Sunday, January 28, 2001
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Sunday, January 28, 2001 |
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God loves those cheerful givers By DR. DAVID L.
CHANCEY
The circus came to town. One of the circus athletes dazzled the crowd by displaying tremendous feats of strength. He would conclude his muscular act by squeezing an orange dry. After completing his demonstration, he would then challenge the audience to produce anyone who could make even one little drip of juice fall from squeezed fruit. Usually, in town after town, the challenger failed. On one occasion, a little man stepped from the audience and accepted the strong man's challenge. The crowd snickered when they saw how small he was. He stepped onto the stage, took the shriveled orange, then slowly but firmly compressed his right hand. Every eye was on him. Electricity filled the air. It seemed like an eternity. Then finally, a drop of orange juice formed and dripped to the floor. As the cheers of the crowd subsided, the circus performer, astonished at the strength of the little man, asked him how he managed to develop such strength. "Nothing to it," he grinned. "I happen to be the treasurer of the local church down the street." The Bible says, "God loves a cheerful giver," but how many of us give the way God's Word teaches us to give? God expects us to give to Him systematically, regularly, proportionately, liberally, with a heart of joy, love and celebration. Yet study after study reveals that American Christians give less than 3 percent of their income to God through their churches. Deep down we realize that God is the giver of all of life's resources, yet we want to keep those resources for ourselves. We have yet to learn how to invest in something bigger than ourselves. I heard about a man who flew to another city to make a speech. Unfortunately, the airlines lost his luggage and he had to scramble to find a suit at the last minute. His taxi driver had a local contact that possibly could help him out of his jam. With time running out, the driver whisked him to the nearest funeral home, where he could borrow a "black suit" from the undertaker. When the speaker put on the suit and tried to stuff his pockets with his wallet, keys, comb, etc., he discovered neither the pants nor the coat had any pockets. Very pointedly, he was reminded that "you really can't take it with you." Since you can't take it with you, then we need to learn how to use it wisely ohn earth. Many people have good intentions when it comes to giving. I saw a cartoon in which the usher stood holding two offering plates full of paper. The usher said to his pastor standing there, "Your stewardship sermons are getting better. Still no money, but a lot more IOUs." Good intentions only go so far. They must be translated into positive action. Practicing God's principles of giving, starting with giving a tithe (10 percent of our income) is the way to a life of spiritual enrichment and blessing. We must learn that life is too short to hoard "our" money. There are too many needs out there. Arnold C. Marts tells of sitting with an 80-year-old friend who had just made a $100,000 donation to his church. The old gentleman was really happy about it. Suddenly he pointed to another elderly gentleman who was walking by. "See that old coot?" he asked. "He has the same amount of money that I have, but I feel sorry for him." When Marts asked why, his friend said, "He has never learned how to buy any happiness with his money. His lifetime game has been to be worth more on Dec. 31 than he was on the previous Jan. 1. So far he has always won." He may have won his game, but he has lost at life, for he has missed out on the blessings of giving cheerfully. He has yet to discover the joy of giving. The Rev. Dr. David L. Chancey is pastor, McDonough Road Baptist Church, Fayetteville.
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