Looking back over my 30 years as a Christian, giving has always been an area of growth for me. I feel the pull of possessions and money. But that means it’s something I’ve had to prayerfully wrestle through with God’s help. Here are two ideas that God has graciously used to transform my heart over the years.
Principle 01
Receive With Thanksgiving
I have so much to be grateful for. Before we ever get the chance to give, we start by receiving. God gives us life, family, education, wealth and most of all his beloved Son. Our lives are lived in a shower of God’s kindness! When I find myself discontented it’s often because I have lost sight of how greatly I am loved by my Heavenly Father. I remind myself of God’s blessings and my discontentment transforms into gratitude. I’m not badly done by, I’m a child of the most generous Father of all!
Gratitude also changes how I see ‘my’ possessions and ‘my’ money because, without God, I’d never have them. God gave them to me, or better said, God’s loaned them to me. Everything I have is still ultimately his, and so something to be grateful for and use for his glory.
Gratitude also helps me trust God. God has already freely given me so much, it inspires me to trust him as I give to others. God has looked after me and I can trust him with my money and my future. As we’ve approached this building plan, I have been asking God to make Emma and I acutely aware of how blessed we already are.
Principle 02
Generosity Flows From Gratitude
Gratitude leads me to be generous. As a Christian, it’s not duty that drives me to be generous. Christians give because we’re inspired by God’s generosity to us. The cross is the story of reckless, passionate, devoted generosity! God loves being generous — it’s who he is. And reflecting on his generosity makes me want to be generous too. God may value prudence, but he loves generosity. I’d love to be a kind of “reverse entrepreneur”. An entrepreneur is always creating ways to make more money, but God’s generosity makes me want to creatively find ways to give more money away!
As God’s transformed my heart, I’ve found myself praying, “God, how can I give more? Can I sell something to free up more money? Can I extend or renegotiate my mortgage? What can I say ‘no’ to in order to be generous? How can I prioritise spending to devote more to giving?”
During the preparation for this building project, I’ve been praying every morning for God to give me a certain amount of money to give away. Over the months that amount has increased as God has opened my heart. Would you pause, right now as you’re reading this, and pray this with me?
Generous heavenly Father, thank you for everything. Thank you for your Son’s death, thank you for my salvation, my church, my possessions, my money. Please make me more generous than I already am. Generous like you.
Generosity is going to look very different to each of us at HBC. Someone with much might give thousands but not be generous. Someone with little might give hundreds and be more generous than everyone combined. So while I’ve been praying that God would bless our church with a home, my deeper hope is that God would transform us into a people who are more grateful and more generous children of God.