GETTING TO GIVE

In one of his sermons the late Harry Emerson Fosdick made the following observation: "The Sea of Galilee and the Dead Sea are made of the same water. It flows down, clean and cool, from the heights of Hermon and the roots of the cedars of Lebanon. The Sea of Galilee makes beauty of it for the Sea of Galilee has an outlet. It gets to give. It gathers in its riches that it may pour them out again to fertilize the Jordan Plain. But the Dead Sea with the same water makes horror, for the Dead Sea has no outlet. It gets to keep."

Both giving and keeping are in our hands. We get to give and we get to keep. No one can make us do either. The choice is always ours. And it is always a free-will choice: to freely give and to freely keep. There is nothing and no one that can force us to do either. We in the preaching profession love to quote Scripture where it says that we should give, that we should tithe, even, because it is better to give than to receive.

That is all true. But no one has to listen to Scripture or even believe what is there to know the truth about something. I have always believed that if I have to quote a Scripture passage to prove my point, my point isn't worth trying to prove. It has to stand on its own, make sense on its own, convince on its own.

And so it is with giving. Giving to others of what we have must make sense all on its own. We must be convinced not only that it is better to give than to receive, but it is even better still to give than to keep.

They only way that we can come to that conclusion is by experiencing it for ourselves. Fosdick's analogy is wonderful and makes wonderful sense. But the analogy must become real in our own lives. In fact, it has become real, too. Think about it. We all know the joy there is in giving. It always feels good all over to give of ourselves, to give something of ourselves, to give of our possessions. Giving always gives us pleasure.

And it feels even better to give when we do not want nor expect something to be given to us in return. It's the grandparent in us. Grandmas and Grandpas love to give to the grandkids. It is pure and total joy. They expect nothing in return. What they receive in return is the love of the grandchild which is beyond even joy. I certainly know this from experience. The joy cannot be described. It can only be enjoyed.

On the other hand, we all know the sadness there is in keeping. When we hoard our possessions, when we pile one thing upon another, we never find happiness and joy. Momentary joy and happiness perhaps. But it is only momentary. Why? Because when joy only comes from the piling up of possessions, we have to acquire another something to add to the pile. And it is never enough. The joy comes when we can take from that pile and give it away. Even greater joy comes when we take the money we would spend on ourselves and use it to give joy to someone else even if that someone else is anonymous.

We all have with us the potential to be like the Sea of Galilee or the Dead Sea. When we get to give, we live. When we keep, we’re, well dead.