DAILY READING
REFLECTION
The Blessing of Giving
by Katie Borden
If you have ever sat with someone when you know it’s the last time you’ll ever see them, you know the profound weight that the words spoken in those final conversations carry.
This is the weight with which we might hear Paul’s words in today’s “farewell” text. Paul senses that he won’t see these Ephesian leaders again, and so his final address to them contains both extensive encouragement and emphatic exhortation.
One standout in all of this: “It is more blessed to give than to receive.”
Why would Paul leave his co-laborers with these words?
Well, first of all, it’s true.
But not because we are “better people” chalking up more “holy” points when we give. When we give out of the abundance we have been given (however small that abundance may seem), we are living out the way of Jesus. Paul modeled the shape of his life after Jesus, working for the sake of others and loving them through self-sacrificial action. Our giving is actually a way in which the Holy Spirit shapes us to be more like Jesus.
Also, giving is a participation in the restorative work of Jesus.
Jesus gave completely of himself, all the way to the cross. And then he was raised in glory–and his resurrection was the beginning of new life for all of creation. When we give to others in the self-giving, loving way of Jesus through the life-giving power of the Holy Spirit, we are living in view of the new creation, fully restored and fully alive, even in the midst of a world that still experiences the effects of sin in the here and now.
But hear this: the phrase Paul uses is very different from saying that “it is blessed to give, not receive.” Accepting the gifts that others offer us is not wrong! It’s just that there is no gift greater than that which we have already been given–the life and love found in Jesus. Jesus, and life with him, is our greatest gift, and that gift is a blessing both to ourselves and to the world around us when we live lives of self-sacrificial love that bring life in his name.
Thank God for the perfect gift of Jesus: for us, in us, and–I pray–through us.
PRAYER
God, thank you for the indescribable gift you have given to us in Jesus. Would you multiply that gift through me, for the sake of the world you love? Amen.
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