Existing generously

"The earth is the Lord's, and everything in it."

Psalm 24:1 & 1 Corinthians 10:26

To you all, God’s beloved of 1^st Presbyterian of Phoenix, called to be God’s holy People.  Grace and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.                                         (Romans 1: 7 adpt.)

In seasons past, you have found a copy of a budget accompanying the yearly ‘Stewardship Letter.’  Using this document, you’ve been asked to consider the financial needs of 1^st Presbyterian Church of Phoenix as you made your financial plans and commitments for the coming year, and you’ve been encouraged to give generously.  This year, anticipating 2012, you are invited to consider something quite different: your own particular needs.

This invitation is not intended to be an exercise to assess how much you’ll be able to give the church, whether the particular financial situation you face at home can be flexed to free up some additional financial contributions, or whether the increased expenses and decreased income translates to less contribution in the offering plate for 2012.  It is intended to be a reflection, a meditation, a prayerful consideration of your needs: your need to be generous.

There are many reasons why we long to be generous; there are just as many (if not more) ways that exemplify generosity.  We can generously share our time; we generously use the talents, gifts, skills, and abilities with which we have been blessed, and all for the greater glory of God. We can (and do) generously support medical research, charity organizations, philanthropic causes, the person standing on the street corner. We can (and do) give to those organizations and causes that impact our lives, help make us better, seek to make the world a better place to live.  We are generous so that people whose lives have been uprooted by tragedy need not be swallowed up by despair; we are generous so others will know they are not alone. We are a generous people, and the truth is, generosity feels good.

Why does generosity feel so good?  Because that’s the way we’re internally hard-wired.  In creating humanity in God’s own image, God imbued humanity with the best of the Divine’s traits: the capacity to Love, a willingness to be in relation with others, and desire to do all things with a generous spirit.

Another way of speaking about our purpose is to imagine a cup.  The intent of cup is not simply to be full, where it may sit on a table or on a shelf with contents near to spilling over the rim, but to be filled, and then drained, to be filled, and once more drained with trusting anticipation of being filled yet again. That is the intent and purpose of a cup.

Similarly, God blesses generously; God fills to overflowing, not that we should ever be satisfied or content with just being full, but that we should be fulfilled in living into our purpose of allowing God’s abundance to joyfully flow through our God-created lives.  It is a joy rendering to God from the abundance that God has given us.

In this season of giving thanks for the promise of Life that God shares, prayerfully consider the joy with which you will share God’s blessings in the coming year and into the years to come.

"May the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace as you trust in him, so that you may overflow with hope by the power of the Holy Spirit."

Romans 15:13