Copyright © 2006 by The Voice of Prophecy

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JESUS' TOP TEN WORDS OF ADVICE #3

RECEIVING MORE BY OPENING YOUR HAND

A natural gas explosion near Mrs. Lily Ramsey's house woke her up in the middle of the night. This elderly woman wondered what was happening. The eerie green glow in the sky convinced her that aliens had landed--and would soon be knocking on her door. You know what the first thing was that went through her mind? How do I look? I better put on something presentable.

Isn’t it funny, the things we worry about in moments of crisis? It’s like Mom telling you to always wear clean underwear in case you’re in a car accident. But you know, sometimes our “trivial” concerns expose deeper ones. Near the heart of all human endeavor is a desire to be presentable, to be accepted, to be affirmed in your own home.

We want to feel secure. And it’s easy to subconsciously depend on accessories for that security. It's the old story of relying on the size of our house or the brand of our outfit to feel good about ourselves. The pursuit of material things is a poor substitute for filling the holes in our lives. But don't we half believe a new set of dishware will cure our irritability? Don't we sort of hope the new big screen TV will bring us closer as a family.

Nice things sometimes help. But trying to build security by accumulating possessions---it's like getting ready for the End Times by putting on more makeup.

Greed is a dead end. That’s why Jesus warned us so strongly about the love of money. Financial security is an oxymoron. We can never get enough to feel secure.

So how do we gain lasting security? Jesus gives us the secret in one of His Top Ten words of advice. He shows the absolute best way to feel secure. This promise is dynamite: “Give, and it will be given to you; good measure, pressed down, shaken together, running over, they will pour into your lap. For by your standard of measure it will be measured to you in return.” (Luke 6:38, 39, NIV)

Generosity changes the world. That’s why it’s one of the qualities most emphasized in the New Testament. It changes the world in extraordinary ways. What was once a barren landscape can summersault into a place of abundance. Giving is the best way to get enough.

There’s a very important reason why this is true. Giving enlarges our capacity to receive. It affects the state of our hearts. Jesus urged his followers to lay up treasures in heaven. Why? "Where your treasure is there will your heart be also.” When we lift up our resources to heaven, our hearts are lifted up to heaven. When we enlarge our giving, our hearts are enlarged.

It’s human nature to cling tightly to “visible means of support.” It’s human nature to grab more in order to feel safer. But the New Testament encourages the opposite impulse. When we open our hand, when we express generosity in some way, something happens to our grasp. We are able to take in “good measure, pressed down, shaken together.”

Giving enlarges our capacity to receive. This same principle applies when it comes to our time. In our middle-age years, many of us get pretty stingy with this commodity. It doesn’t stretch ahead indefinitely. We resent people who take up our time without good reason. Don’t call. Don’t write. Don’t knock on my door. I’ll contact you.

Well that happened to a friend of mine. Shawn found himself suddenly single in midlife. And he'd gotten to the point where he was trying to remove all the hassles from his life. He wanted a vehicle that never needed repairs. He wanted a yard that mowed itself. Above all he didn’t want any people around who gave him chores.

Finally, Shawn managed to whittle his day-to-day down to the essentials. Finally he managed to hoard some real quality time for himself. And what did he do with it? He ended up playing solitaire every night while watching old movies on TV.

But then my friend got to know a woman at church who was struggling to raise three little boys by herself. Shawn's kids were in college. He'd been there, done that. Still, this woman was such an intriguing person that Shawn began taking her and the boys out to lunch sometimes after services. And one night he found himself playing hide-and-seek with them in the dark. A couple of hours flew by. He'd missed another Humphrey Bogart adventure. But the laughter of those children filled him up in a way nothing had for a long, long time.

Shawn didn’t really find “quality time” until he gave a little of it away.

Yes, giving enlarges our capacity to receive. That principle applies when it comes to our homes too. You know, if we’ve finally managed to mortgage our way into a dream house, we get pretty particular about who we let inside, right? We don’t want to wear out the carpet. We don’t want the bratty neighborhood kids bumping over the lamps.

And of course it’s natural for our circle of friends to get a little smaller---just people who go with our nice furniture, thank you. Jesus had another suggestion: “When you give a banquet, invite the poor, the crippled, the lame, the blind, and you will be blessed.”

After Timothy's kids left for college, he presided over an orderly, nicely decorated house. Only a few selected buddies ever visited. They cleaned up after themselves.

But then one day, people outside his circle tramped into his sanctuary. It happened only because Timothy was shooting a few scenes for a television series at his house. They changed their clothes in the bedrooms; they practiced lines in the hallways; they rearranged the living room; they ate lunch all over the place and left a big mess behind.

But afterward, in the stillness of that evening, guess what Timothy remembered? He remembered how the voices had warmed him up. And later he said this, "I didn’t really find my home until I opened it up to strangers and they filled it up with their very different stories from very different backgrounds. My house had become terribly vacant without hospitality."

It’s natural, of course, to try to build security by filling our homes with wonderful things. But the more we concentrate on these accessories, the emptier our lives become. Our security seeps out the back door. And we keep buying new stuff to replace it.

The only way to shut the back door is to open the front door. When we open it a little wider, we’ll find we can receive full measure, pressed down and running over.

Giving enlarges our capacity to receive. And the New Testament points out exactly what kind of giving does that. Listen to Paul: “God loves a cheerful giver.” (2 Corinthians 9:7, NIV) Some give grimly, to fulfill an obligation. Some give little, because their heart isn’t in it. It's only cheerful giving that does the trick, giving because God has been generous to you. God loves a cheerful giver. And a cheerful giver is conscious of God’s love. You trust that you’ll be okay if you give; you’ll be provided for.

This is an ever-expanding circle. Being conscious of God’s love makes you more generous. And being generous makes you more conscious of God’s love.

By the way, people who picture giving as a means to become wealthy miss the point. As Jesus reminded us, life doesn’t consist in the abundance of our possessions. We aren’t enriched simply by having a lot of things. That generally dulls us. We are enriched by becoming more sensitive to beauty, more appreciative of blessings, more open to friendships, more responsive to insights.

Cheerful giving opens us up. That's a wonderful New Testament word of advice. What makes the difference between happiness and misery in life? Much of the answer depends on whether our hearts are shrinking or stretching.

Instead of shrinking nervously around your rigid “financial plan for the future,” you give God a little room to work.

Instead of shrinking angrily around your “unmet needs,” you give a friend a little support.

Instead of shrinking tightly around a little recognition that comes your way, you give someone else a little credit.

Instead of shrinking around “godliness as a means to financial gain,” you trust in the God who “richly provides us with everything for our enjoyment.”

Think about Jesus' Sermon on the Mount, and His call to radical giving. Why go a second mile with the one who demands you walk one? Because it enlarges your capacity to receive.

Why give your cloak to the one who takes your tunic? Because it enlarges your capacity to receive.

Cheerful giving, not conspicuous consumption--that's what creates the good life. Always remember, the Christ who promises us life in all its abundance is the Christ who calls us to radical generosity.