giving

Holy Week – Day 2

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Jesus looked up and saw the rich putting their gifts into the offering box, and he saw a poor widow put in two small copper coins. And he said, “Truly, I tell you, this poor widow has put in more than all of them. Luke 21:1-3 ESV

On this, His final day of public ministry, Jesus takes time to praise the offering of a widow. Among the crowds at the temple that day, she was probably considered the least important by most people. In fact few would have even noticed as she quietly slipped her two coins into the charity box. However everyone noticed the rich men as they carried in their gifts with great fanfare.  At the sound of their silver and gold coins clanking into the offering box people were oohing and aahing about how much they gave. But Jesus wasn’t impressed with money. He didn’t care about a big performance or false religiosity. He just waited quietly to see if anyone had come to give with all their heart.

Then just before Jesus went to prepare for His last meal with His disciples He gave us a simple insight about one widow. She had come with a pure heart and she had given all.

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A Cheerful Heart

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A cheerful heart is good medicine, but a broken spirit saps a person’s strength.   Proverbs 17:22 NLT

I felt frustrated by the small number of people that were coming to our church service at the nursing home. It seemed despite our best efforts; fewer were coming each week and we simply rushed in and did our duty and went home without accomplishing anything.

God’s medicine for my increasingly glum attitude arrived one day at the end of the meeting. “God bless you. How are you today? Thanks for coming.” I said as I shook each person’s hands. About halfway through I came to one lady and she slipped something into my hand. When I turned my hand over and opened up my palm I discovered two shiny quarters there, looking up at me.

“No I can’t take this’” I protested.

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She just smiled and said with a wink, “You keep those; there are lots more where they came from!”

I just shook my head and laughed as the dark clouds lifted from my heart. She taught me that day that real cheerfulness is based on just simply trusting that God is in charge. He is Heaven’s pharmacist and has given to each of us a prescription that must be refilled every day!

The Gift of Joy

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For in a severe test of affliction, their abundance of joy and their extreme poverty have overflowed in a wealth of generosity on their part. 2 Corinthians 8:2 ESV

Our twelve year old grandson is named Christian. Whenever Christian is happy about something he squints his eyes, rubs his hands together and smiles as wide as he can. Christian loves to tell me a joke or to give me some small gift he has made. While he is doing that he will shout out my name and sometimes even jump up and down in excitement. Some say that our grandson has special needs; but I just think that God has given him to our family so that we will know what rejoicing looks like!

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Christian with his little brother

When was the last time you can honestly say that you experienced joy like that? In today’s verse we are introduced to the little church in a town called Philippi who had a giant giving heart. They were very poor believers who had befriended Paul but they discovered first-hand what being more blessed giving than receiving really meant. Perhaps because of their own poverty they understood hunger and when they heard about people who were without food; they eagerly sent as large an offering as they could. Like us in the Western world some of the richer churches groaned when asked to give, and just grudgingly gave what they felt they had to. But the Philippians saw this as a joyful opportunity to give their best and they discovered that in God they were really rich.   They found out just as our grandson has, that giving whatever they had gave them a chance of receiving God’s overflowing joy and that was way more than they could have ever imagined!

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