Living well and following Jesus into... Giving

Last week at small group we were looking at 'living well' and what we could find in the bible about it. We looked at John chapter 10, because that's where we find the verse that's familiar to lots of us, when Jesus says "I've come that they might have life in all its fullness". We talked about how full life, life lived fully and well following God, was a spacious and freeing experience, where we found space to grow into being 'our own kind of beautiful / strong / creative etc.' - in other words a place where we could become who we are meant to be.

This week at our gathering we're going to explore giving. I wanted to explore some of the bible themes around this because the bible has quite a lot to say about it, and so it might have something to do with this living life fully and well.

So here are some things the bible says about giving, focussing specifically on money (although there's lots we could also say about giving of time and of ourselves, but that's for another day.)

Stuff - is it really ours?

“The earth is the Lord’s, and all it contains, the world, and all those that dwell in it.”  Psalm 24:1

A really common prayer that's used in churches when they receive the money that people have given is "all good things come from you, O God, and of your own do we give you". I think there's a really strong principle here: Everything we possess now or ever will belongs to God, because God is the ground of our being and the source of all life. The stuff we have is entrusted to us for us to look after and use - this is called 'stewardship', being given responsibility to look after, direct and manage resources. We see it in the story of the garden of Eden: God asks humans to look after the world (Genesis 2:15)

Money - it can be a trap

"Whoever loves money
    will never have enough money;
Whoever loves wealth
    will not be satisfied with it." Ecclesiases 5:10

Money isn't bad and it's necessary for our lives, for our nourishment and our health. Its important for having fun and expressing ourselves and giving ourselves space in our complex times. But it can also be a trap for our souls - possessing it can be addictive, and because it gives us power in our world that feeds the darker parts of ourselves.

Jesus said: “Don’t store treasures for yourselves here on earth where moths and rust will destroy them and thieves can break in and steal them. But store your treasures in heaven where they cannot be destroyed by moths or rust and where thieves cannot break in and steal them. Your heart will be where your treasure is... No one can serve two masters. The person will hate one master and love the other, or will follow one master and refuse to follow the other. You cannot serve both God and worldly riches." Matthew 6:19-21, 24

If we invest our hopes and our identity and our self-assurance in what we own, in what we have saved for a rainy day, in the things people can see when they come into our homes or click on our holiday photos on facebook, then we're looking inwards to what 'I' can provide, what 'I' can prevent, what 'I' can protect, how clever or hard-working or just damn special I think 'I' am.

When the bible talks about sin, this is basically what it boils down to: a preoccupation with self and a desire to be self-dependent.  And accumulating money can lead us into this trap - defiant independence that I don't need anyone else; that I'm better at saving than those others who, for example, ended up on the dole when they lost their job without being able to sort themselves out; that I'm in charge of my life and everyone else is in charge of theirs so I don't need to worry about them. It leads us out of compassion and caring and leads us into putting barriers up between ourselves and others.

Eugene Cho, a church leader from Seattle who practices what he preaches when it comes to being radically generous with his money, wrote that "“Generosity is what keeps the things I own from owning me. In other words, the point of my generosity isn’t just to bless others; it’s also to liberate me.”

Balancing what we want and what we need

Our world is very good at selling us stuff. We have been raised since we were children as consumers: shopping is a leisure activity, brands tell us who we are and we are at the mercy of expert, extensively researched advertising campaigns. We're really susceptible to being told that we 'need' stuff.

In Matthew 6, Jesus goes on to say “So I tell you, don’t worry about the food or drink you need to live, or about the clothes you need for your body. Life is more than food, and the body is more than clothes. Look at the birds in the air. They don’t plant or harvest or store food in barns, but your heavenly Father feeds them. And you know that you are worth much more than the birds. You cannot add any time to your life by worrying about it.

“And why do you worry about clothes? Look at how the lilies in the field grow. They don’t work or make clothes for themselves. But I tell you that even Solomon with his riches was not dressed as beautifully as one of these flowers. God clothes the grass in the field, which is alive today but tomorrow is thrown into the fire. So you can be even more sure that God will clothe you. Don’t have so little faith! Don’t worry and say, ‘What will we eat?’ or ‘What will we drink?’ or ‘What will we wear?’ The people who don’t know God keep trying to get these things, and your Father in heaven knows you need them. Seek first God’s kingdom and what God wants. Then all your other needs will be met as well."

Last term we reflected a lot on the Kingdom of God, and how it turns things upside down. Giving away money disrupts what we've come to believe about our world, challenges our priorities and shakes up our understanding of ourselves and who we are. It seems to me that its a pretty good practice that, if we engage with it, God can use to change us and help us grow.

Time for Reflection

How do you feel about the idea that everything is God's and we're just stewards?

Do you relate to Eugene Cho's words that stuff can 'own' us? When we think about 'stuff' more broadly than things
, what would being owned by 'financial security' or 'planning for the future' feel like?

How does the idea of giving money away feel? Where do you think you would want to give the money? What do you think God would want you to be generous to?

"Living Well"

Since before I came to live and work in Cringleford, I have been really struck by the question which seemed to leap into my head when I thought about working here: "what does it mean to live well in Cringleford?"

It seemed to me that most of us who live here are fairly content with our lives, and so how does faith in God fit with that? People have been known to ask "isn't faith just a crutch for people who don't have much in their lives, or feel bad about themselves?"

My own experience of faith has been so enriching and transforming of my life, I can categorically answer "No way!" But I do wonder if a lot of people don't consider faith as having anything to "add" to their lives.

But as we see every New Year, the resolutions people make show that they want to change things in their lives, even if thats just having a tidier study (or is that just me?!). We have an instinct for self-improvement and growth, which is ably exploited by gym-membership deals and the diet industry (but that's another post for another day!) Despite this emphasis on weight and fitness, deeper down it seems to me that people relate to the desire to be better partners, better parents, better friends or better sons/daughters. I think most of us can see ways we would like to be more healthy, more whole-hearted and more present to those around us.

And that for me is the heart of the question "what does it mean to live well in Cringleford?" What would it look like if we went deeper into life instead of skating across the surface? What would people see if we were living well emotionally, physically, psychologically, and spiritually?

There are a few bible passages that seem relevant to this idea of living well generally and perhaps the most famous one that fits with this theme is from John 10:10 where Jesus says: "I came to give life—life in all its fullness."

It's really helpful to read a snippet from the bible in its context: we all know how easy it is to make it sound like a politician has been insensitive or irrational when you take a sound bite from an interview and make that the headline! So it's important we don't get too casual about little quotes.

This verse is in the section of John's gospel where Jesus is talking about who he is and what he has come to do. You can read it in John 10:1-18.

Just before this section there's a discussion going on about seeing and not seeing - a man has been healed of his blindness and the Pharisees are questioning who Jesus and how he could have performed the miracle. The healed man is clear - if this man healed me he's from God, but the Pharisees cannot believe it (cannot or will not, I wonder?)

Jesus points out that we can be blind in other ways than physically - we can be blind to our weaknesses and the ways we mess up, and so continue to wound ourselves and the world around us. We need to be set free so we can be open and be changed.

Jesus compare himself to the Shepherd of sheep, who the sheep know and trust to lead them. All the sheep are known by name and the Shepherd creates safe space for them to be, within a community. And of course, he talks about the love he has for his flock being so strong that he will give his life for them.

Reflection

If this is a picture of "life in all its fullness", then what does it mean for us as we think about living well in Cringleford?

What are some words that come to mind when you think about the life of the sheep that Jesus describes? What might those words bring to mind for you in your life?

In what ways are we sometimes blind to our weaknesses? What does being open and honest, with ourselves and with God, look like in our lives already?

What do we learn from Jesus about love? And what does this say to us about they ways we love ourselves, God and those around us?

Jesus talks about the flock and many people being included - what does that speak to you about church and community? 

Who are we?

When a new thing is just beginning, it's really helpful to think about who or what we are, what we want to be, what values we want to hold. So as Hub Church began, Heather created this set of statements:

We're reviewing these each time we get together so that we can be really rooted in them. I wonder what you think - which is the hardest/ most challenging? which is the most important to you? Which surprises you?