Giving Gladly

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Black Friday brought bright news throughout the land: shoppers bought more than expected, causing statistics to jump 22% from last year. Even better was the 39% increase in food purchases the day before Thanksgiving. Maybe times are a-changin’.

This weekend the girls and I initiated the Christmas season by watching “How the Grinch Stole Christmas.” Jim Carrey’s rubber face and crazy antics made the movie a hit, but little “Cindy Lou Who” did a pretty good job convincing Whoville that Christmas wasn’t just about pretty packages.

Of course local retailers hope it is all about packages. But when family money is tight, purchasing in all categories goes down, particularly extras like gifts. At the end of the season, numbers gurus will let us know whether or not we spent enough to make a positive difference in our country’s all-but-non-existent financial recovery.

During belt-tightening times, charities suffer severely, which includes churches. A recent Sunday morning worship service at my church included a challenging children’s sermon. As the kids came forward, they couldn’t help but notice the pastor was holding a giant container of animal crackers. When they got there, he gave one to each of them, telling them, “Don’t eat it. Go out into the congregation and give it to someone else.”

This assignment met with some reluctant givers, but eventually they all did as instructed, returning to the front afterwards. “Now,” the pastor said. “I’m going to give you each two more animal crackers. This time, give one away and then you can eat the other one.” It was smiles all around as they dashed into the congregation to share what they had.

Then the pastor made his point: “God blesses us for one reason: so we can bless someone else.” It was a powerful sermonette, and not just for the children.

Sometimes we adults struggle to give, not wanting to let go. But if we truly believe God knows our needs and loves us enough to follow through on providing, it should be painless to give away our surplus. And more than that, it should be fun.

When doubts crowd in, Scripture offers reassurance: “One person gives freely, yet gains even more; another withholds unduly, but comes to poverty.” (Proverbs 11:24) God knows it can be hard, but he’s watching for people who aren’t just willing to give but who do it with eagerness and a smile. (2 Corinthians 9:7)

The pastor’s message must have sunk in deeply with our congregation, because at the end of the fiscal year, we had a significant surplus and had the delightful problem of wondering what to do with it all. But we didn’t have to wonder very long. Even the children could have told us: “Give it away!”

And that’s what we did.

“Remember this: Whoever sows sparingly will also reap sparingly, and whoever sows generously will also reap generously. And God is able to bless you abundantly.” (2 Corinthians 9:6,8a)

Home Again

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Mom had broken her hip badly, a break that needed an operation and a long pin to hold her leg together. It wasn’t easy for this 80-something to come back from surgery, but she focused on the day she’d eventually get to leave the hospital and return home. The medical staff and social workers, however, rerouted her to rehab first and said, “Depending on how you do there, then we’ll talk about going home.”

Mom worked hard in “the torture chamber,” as she called it, and finally found herself riding in Mary’s car back to the place she’d missed for so many weeks. As her wheelchair moved along the sidewalk toward her back door, suddenly she buried her face in her hands and burst into tears.

“What’s wrong?” Mary said, alarmed at her distress.

Looking up at her home she sobbed, “I… I just… I just… didn’t think I’d ever get back here!”

I believe that’s exactly the way we’ll feel when we move from earthly life into eternity. Our current sense of longing to escape our troubles and live in the safe surroundings of a loving home will instantly be satisfied with a tsunami of joy like we’ve never known. We’ll immediately feel settled and secure, because we’ll be home.

I don’t think it’ll feel new or like someone else’s house. The presence of Divinity and the release of our 5 senses to see, feel, smell, hear and touch in new ways will find us wrapped in all things familiar, just better. It’ll seem like someone has put our house in order while we’ve been away on a journey, then added the physical, visible presence of Jesus!

In his book “Heaven”, Randy Alcorn writes, “A common misunderstanding about the eternal Heaven is that it will be unfamiliar. But that couldn’t be further from the truth. When we hear that in Heaven we will have new bodies and live on a New Earth, this is how we should understand the word new – a restored and perfected version of our familiar bodies and our familiar Earth and our familiar relationships. Because we once lived on Earth, the New Earth will strike us as very familiar.”

Scripture contains a mysterious verse in reference to this phenomenon: “The spirit will return to God who gave it.” (Ecclesiastes 12:7) If that’s literally true, then of course arriving in heaven truly will be coming home.

Mom used to croon to new babies, “You are precious because you’ve so recently been with God.” I used to call that nonsense, but maybe she did have something there.

In any case, I’ll never forget Mom’s overwhelming joy that day as she re-entered her own home. But when she got to heaven in 2005, I’ll bet there was no comparison.

“We would rather be away from these earthly bodies, for then we will be at home with the Lord.” (2 Corinthians 5:8)

Hello, Goodbye

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Thanksgiving is an easy holiday. The menu is always the same, and it’s difficult to mess up a turkey. Relatives and friends gather for laughter and good conversation like the “other big holiday,” but compared to that one, Thanksgiving is a walk in the park. No gifts to choose, pay for, wrap, send, or write thank you notes for. No boxes of decorations to put up and take down, and no giant tree to decorate. Easy.

Like all special holidays, though, there’s a down side. It’s fun to prepare for guests and welcome them as they arrive, but at the other end of the celebration, we have to say goodbye.

Hello, goodbye, hello, goodbye.

After a loved one dies, that one permanent, painful goodbye taints all the others. As Thanksgiving guests walk out the door and drive away, we wonder if we’ll see them again. Although this seems like a morbid conclusion to a happy day, the reality of a recent death marks us permanently. We wave goodbye with “maybe-the-last” in our minds.

I remember the agonizing process of saying goodbye to Nate. During his cancer, daily losses forced all of us to inwardly say goodbye a tiny bit each day. He did the same.

The last conversation I had with his oncologist (after he’d done all he could) involved admitting death was close. The trauma of knowing a final goodbye was just ahead was upsetting, and I was hanging onto each day like a child hangs onto his mommy each time she leaves him.

On the verge of panic, I asked the doctor, “What if I wake up one morning and find out he died during the night? What would I do!”

The doctor looked me square in the eye and said, “Consider it a gift.”

That answer was alarming. After many days of partnering with Nate as he steadily moved toward our final parting, I knew that if I couldn’t say goodbye, I’d be crushed.

As I watched him decline, gradually I saw how none of that was within my control. Only God knew the day and minute Nate would leave us, and unless I wanted to live in constant fear of missing my goodbye, I had to let God have it.

That’s actually a good thing to do with all our goodbyes. As we stand and wave, none of us knows what will happen next, but we can take comfort in knowing God does. Surrendering our goodbyes to him is simply the release of something we never controlled in the first place.

Although Nate and I did get our goodbye, if we hadn’t, I know God wouldn’t have let it crush me as I’d feared. Trusting him to tend to the details of our goodbyes (and what happens after them) gives us freedom to celebrate not just special gatherings like Thanksgiving but every get-together, all year long.

BTW, there’s one goodbye we’ll never have to experience:

“My Spirit, who is on you, will not depart from you.” (Isaiah59:21b)