Last Christmas our son wanted to teach his daughter about the joy of giving and not just receiving, so as a gift for me, he had her paint (with his help) some old recycled watering cans we had been using as plant pots. They now bring spots of bright cheery colour to our front porch.
After all, "It is more blessed to give than receive"
Yes that's a bible verse (Acts 20:35)…..but like all Scripture it cannot be taken out of context and in isolation.
Giving in and of itself is not necessarily 'good' or 'right', even though it might sound better than 'getting'. We are thankful that our little grand-daughter is being taught to give and in a good and right way, but as she gets older she will need to learn further lessons about giving.
One of those lessons is that there is such a thing as selfish giving. For our giving to 'count' in God's eyes it shouldn't be selfish. Selfishness is shameful in the eyes of God. But how can giving ever be selfish?
1st it can be attached to an expectation/secret-demand for reciprocity. In other words it requires pay-back of equal levels to what was given. It is 'giving' that creates a debt that someone else owes us and we feel dis-inclined to give more until the person has at least 'paid back' what was so far given.2nd we give to get. This is similar to the above. In other words we tell ourselves we are giving when we buy something we want from a charity shop, or 'give' a kid some money in return for him mowing the lawn or give only because we get more back on our tax refund. This may be using wise ways to spend our money, and it might be showing concern to train the younger generation in a good attitude to work, or it might be, by default, assisting the work of a charity where we choose to buy what we want, but is it really giving in the biblical sense of the term?3rd we can give because it makes us feel 'good' and 'righteous', but has little or no regard for the true needs of the receiver. Or we only give to those things, even if legitimate, that make us feel good.
4th we can give according to what is 'easy' for us and is of little sacrifice or consequence for us, instead of benefit for the receiver.
5th like point 4, we give what we don't need anymore, our left-overs and our damaged and obselte items and treat recipients as an alternative to the garbage tip and make them feel bad if they won't eagerly and gladly accept it. You may have heard stories of missionaries receiving used teabags, used tea towels and shirts with all the buttons taken off - these are not fairy stories, personally I can say they are true.
Giving by definition is also for the benefit of the receiver - but it is not a benefit if:
- it incurs a debt for the receiver
- the giving is irrelevent or becomes burdensome to the recipient
- the gift doesn't meet the required need.
Think Before You Give
Recently the Aussie news brought attention to the fact that the Red Cross want Aussies to stop giving 'stuff' to disaster affected places. The idea of collecting up old clothes, tools, household goods, canned food, toys etc to send to those whose houses have just been lost to flood or earthquake sounds all very good but it might be creating a bigger problem than its solving. They cited a situation where 70 container loads of items were shipped to Vanuatu and a year later 18 of those container still haven't even been opened. The containers cost a small fortune to clear through customs, to store, to move, to unload and sort through and then distribute. Many of the items are totally unsuitable (like heavy blankets for tropical islands) or food is out of date by the time it can be used.
This is an example of 'selfish giving' as well as unwise giving. It's giving that sounds wonderful and cost the sender a lot of money to buy and ship the container. But it was giving that was without due research and consideration for what would be best for the recipient. Instead of being helpful, the items have never reached the recipient and a huge amount of money they could have been used to really help people has to be spent clearing useless containers of 'stuff'. Givers need to realise that this kind of giving has no honor attached to it…..instead it is shame on the West. We need to think before we give.
Have you ever had a child choose a birthday gift, card and wrapping paper for a sibling according to what they would like rather than what their sibling would like? It's so easy to still do this as adults but in a more 'grown up' kind of way. We have a natural sinful 'bent' toward being selfish, self-centred, and self-focused that we have to recognise the subtlety of.
The phrase 'do to others what you want them to do to you' doesn't mean if you want a pink teddy bear that you should buy everyone a pink teddy bear. It means that just like you want others to think about what you want and need when they give, then you should think about what they want and need when you give.
A couple of books have been written on this problem of international aid. 'Dead Aid' by Zambian economist Dr Dambisa Moyo, and 'When Helping Hurts' by Steve Corbett and Brian Fikkert published by Moody Press are two we would recommend.
When we unselfishly give as God wants us to give:
- we should give with careful thought-out purpose and not impulsively according to our feelings of the moment. Every thought of our mind (including the idea to give) should be brought captive under Christ.
- we should give with more careful consideration for what is good and appropriate for the receiver whether it 'feels' good for us or not.
- we don't give our left-overs but should be willing to sacrifice what we would like to have for ourselves but know God wants us to give it for others.
- not in amount but in heart - like with the widow's 'mite', it's not the quantity of what we give but the heart motive and attitude.
Unfortunately we see a lot of 'giving' coming into Africa that is either useless, irrelevent, unhelpful, burdensome or plain destructive in the long term (read the above books for more info on that). Dembisa in her book Dead Aid notes that over US$1 trillion of aid funding has been poured into Africa, and asks where do we see proportional results?
It looks good on a Facebook page or a newsletter to be able to post photos of great amounts of 'stuff' sent to the 'poor' people overseas, and it sounds good to say a huge amount of money was raised for a particular project and then show a photo of a building or tractor or a pile of clothes for orphans. But it is only 'good' if it is good for the recipients in a long term sustainable and beneficial way.
It is very easy for us to live by impulse, by careless and selfish ideas (even if they seem sincere), by what we can 'see' or benefit personally as a result of our giving, and by 'feeling good' about it.
God-honouring Giving
But we need to evaluate even our giving, and see if it is truly both wise and self-less and God-honouring.
We need to learn more about giving in such a way that firstly means God smiles because He is pleased, then the recipient will still be smiling because of thankfulness of the gift years down the track. Then and only then do we consider if we smile about it - being happy about our good deed should be last on the priority list. When we do it in that order we will be able to smile, we will have joy - not because of our own goodness in it all, but because of how God has guided and blessed for the good of others. The temptation is to get it all backwards and give when we feel good, but then down the track the recipient has no smile, and in it all God has no smile and at the end of it, we don't have a smile either.
Instead of the shame of selfish giving, engage in honourable giving that brings a smile to God's face!
No comments:
Post a Comment