Living Generously

Generosity is not just a nice idea, it is a practice of Jesus and a way of living which can completely transform us. How can we live generously in regards to our time, talent, and treasure?

Oct 18, 2024

Hey friends!

A few weeks ago I was lucky enough to spend five days with my parents, my brother, and my husband in Sicily. It was a dream. We stayed in a house built into the cliff side overlooking both Mount Etna and the sea. Every morning I looked out the window and found myself outside of time, sitting in the clouds alongside the Creator, basking in the glory of his creation, and suspended in the beauty before me. The picture above was the view I got to see each evening from our porch as the sun began to set over Mount Etna. It was truly astounding.

Nature is actually a perfect example of God’s generosity. Take a stroll through the woods in the early afternoon as the sunlight breaks through the trees, hike up a mountain to a vista at sunrise, twirl through a garden of wildflowers in the peak of summer, or float in just about any body of water when the air is warm and the sun is hot, and you will find the Creator weaving his generous love into the fabric of creation. All of this he created for us to enjoy and care for. We serve a generous God.

Generosity is not just a characteristic of God, but it is also a practice of Jesus, which means as Christians, we are called to live generously. What does generosity look like in the lives of ordinary people? How can we cultivate a generous heart in the midst of a culture which prioritizes materialism and wealth? Today we are going to explore generosity through the lens of Jesus. Along the way, I hope you find your own footing as you explore what generosity looks like in your own life.

So, let’s dig in together…

First, a personal story on generosity because who doesn’t love a good story.

In 2020, Dan and I were living in Los Angeles. He was a little over year into his job as a flight instructor and I was teaching as an adjunct professor across several college campuses. We were living paycheck-to-paycheck as most people do in LA and neither of our incomes were secure as things often fluctuated for us both.

In the spring, I was ready to apply for a full-time position at one of the colleges I was working at and Dan finally had enough hours to apply to the airlines. We were super excited at the prospect of moving up in our careers, getting some pay increases, and having much awaited steady income.

Then, March 2020 stormed in and everything shifted in a matter of days. Within a few weeks, the college retracted the full-time position due to the uncertainty ahead. The airline industry took the worst dive in its history, laying off pilots left and right, so Dan’s hopes for an airline position dissipated before our very eyes. And the worst of it, the flight school Dan was working at suddenly shut down leaving him out of work again.

Everything seemed to fall apart.

As April 1st came quickly, we scraped together just enough money to pay our rent, but it completely tapped us out for the month. We had nothing left over to pay for groceries or our bills and I had no idea how we would manage paying our rent in May. It all seemed pretty hopeless. I had been following Jesus for several years at this point and the only thing I could think to do was pray.

God, thank you that you are a provider. Jesus says that whatever we ask for in his name, you will provide. I don’t know what to do right now. I don’t know what is happening in the world or how long things will be shut down. I don’t know what job Dan or I will get or not get, but I do know that you love us. And, right now, we need help. And I know you are a provider and all that, but we need real money to pay our rent and bills. Please, will you show up for us? Please Lord, help us.

As I prayed that desperate prayer, I felt the peace of God wash over me. I really wanted to trust God to provide, but we needed actual money, not a cure for an ailment or peace from worrying. How could God help us in this situation?

I imagined the college calling me and offering me another class, or another job popping up quickly for Dan, or a bonus check from work that I didn’t expect — I imagined all the tangible and practical ways that God could answer my prayer and I held onto hope. I eventually fell asleep in peace that night, not completely worry-free of course, but I decided that I was going to trust God. It was really my only option.

Over the next few days, I continued to feel peace that God would move on our behalf. I prayed the same prayer each night and morning. God, I trust you that you will provide for us. Thank you that you will provide for us.

A week into the month of April, Dan went into the kitchen to make us both some coffee. While the coffee was brewing he walked toward the lounge and noticed something taped to our front door. As he walked outside and pulled the envelope off the door, cash spilled out into his hands.

Inside was simple card which read:

Jamie,
I’ve been praying for you and felt like God wanted you to have this. He will always provide for you.
—In Christ
P.S. Not sure if the number means anything, but it is $2,330.

I immediately broke down in tears. I couldn’t believe it. I hadn’t really shared with anyone what was going on with Dan and I financially yet. I felt quite embarrassed by our money troubles and it was something I kept to myself. All I did was pray, asking God to show up for us, and here I was sitting in the most incredible answer to prayer.

A week later, there was a knock on our door. It was around 8pm, so we had settled in to watch a show on TV and it seemed like an odd time for a visitor.

I walked to the door and opened it to find no one outside. I looked around down the driveway and out onto the street and all I could hear was a car driving off in the distance. As I went to go back inside, I looked down only to see an envelope at my feet. As I picked it up, the letter crease opened to display a wad of cash, again. A folded piece of paper rested against the back of the envelope.

Hi Jamie,
God will always provide for you.
— In Christ

Another anonymous note. Another wad of cash, this time over $1,600. I couldn’t believe what was happening. The note was in completely different handwriting as well. These were different people. I sat there in utter disbelief.

The total amount of money may seem random, and I think I thought it was at first, but it ended up being pretty much to the dollar what we needed to carry us through the month and pay the following month’s rent and bills. Our bills were paid fully, our rent was paid on time, and we somehow managed to survive what could have set us back into more debt and more despair at the start of an already difficult season.

One person prayed, asking God for help in their time of need.

Two people prayed and obeyed God’s invitation to be anonymously generous.

And it changed my entire life. I’ve never quite gotten over the blessing of this. It lives deep within my heart and bubbles up in faith in ways I can’t even articulate.

Money is such a touchy subject to talk about, and let’s be real, it’s one of the only things left in the world that we all remain quite private on.

Why do we struggle to talk about our finances? I can tell you just about everything concerning my closest friends, but I couldn’t tell you anything about how much they earn or how much they give. It is this secretive aspect of life that we all feel quite protective over.

Even writing this, I had to fight a little imposter syndrome because at 37 years old I am still trying to figure out how to be a good steward of what I’ve been given. I’ve not always been great at balancing the books. But, everything I write about here is something I, too, am working through so we are on this journey together.

There is this famous line in scripture that always stirs something deep within me: "Where your treasure is, there will your heart be also".1 You can tell a lot about a person by what they spend their money on. So, if you are curious what is most important to you, look at your bank account or your budget. Aside from life’s necessities (food, water, and shelter), where does the majority of your money go? How much do you give away?

I’ve had a few wake up calls over the years concerning the topic of money and it’s been really important and hard to look closely at my finances and ask God to give me wisdom to help me build healthy patterns of generosity and spending. I’m still on that journey, but it has been one of the most important aspects of growth for me. And, the more I partner with God in this space, the more I realize just how much he cares about freeing us from greed and materialism. And the more I live generously like Jesus, the more joy I seem to access because there is something deeply satisfying about living generously. As scripture says, “‘It is more blessed to give than to receive.’”2

In the Christian view of stewardship, God owns everything, and he has entrusted us with resources and provision to do good in the world — to care for ourselves, our family, and others, to care for the world, and to steward our resources well.

Healthy teaching on tithing and giving has this idea at the center — everything we have is from God and we are called to live generously because of this. When we tithe, we are investing in God’s kingdom, so in theory we are simply giving back to God what is already his.

This is not to say that as humans we have always gotten this right. There is plenty of toxic theology around giving, particularly in the realm of the prosperity gospel (how much you give determines how much God blesses you). This distorted view of tithing and giving has corrupted many people so it’s worth mentioning. That being said, I don’t plan to talk much about tithing at all in this post. Not because I’m against it because I’m not. I do tithe in my own generosity practice. But, because Jesus doesn’t really talk much about tithing at all.

This is not to say Jesus doesn’t talk about money. In fact, Jesus consistently talks about money throughout scripture. Tyler Staton says, “In the four gospels, Jesus talks about money more than any topic except for the kingdom of God. He talked about money three times more than love and seven times more than prayer. He talked about money more than heaven or hell or eternity. Seventeen of Jesus’ estimated forty or so parables are directly about money.”3 Jesus talks about money. He gives us advice on living generously. He talks about giving to the poor a lot. He warns us about greed and materialism. Why?

Perhaps he knew just how enticing money can be. Perhaps he knew the very human side of us that is blindly lured into greed and wealth while simultaneously feeling like there is never enough. Perhaps he knew the benefits and joys of a giving heart to our health and well being.

Jesus teaches us about money because it is powerful and deceptive, but it can also be used for good in incredible ways. One of the most famous parables concerning money in the gospels is in Luke chapter 12.

The Parable of the Rich Fool
¹³Someone in the crowd said to him, “Teacher, tell my brother to divide the inheritance with me.”
¹⁴Jesus replied, “Man, who appointed me a judge or an arbiter between you?” ¹⁵Then he said to them, “Watch out! Be on your guard against all kinds of greed; life does not consist in an abundance of possessions.”
¹⁶And he told them this parable: “The ground of a certain rich man yielded an abundant harvest. ¹⁷He thought to himself, ‘What shall I do? I have no place to store my crops.’
¹⁸“Then he said, ‘This is what I’ll do. I will tear down my barns and build bigger ones, and there I will store my surplus grain. ¹⁹And I’ll say to myself, “You have plenty of grain laid up for many years. Take life easy; eat, drink and be merry.”’
²⁰“But God said to him, ‘You fool! This very night your life will be demanded from you. Then who will get what you have prepared for yourself?’
²¹“This is how it will be with whoever stores up things for themselves but is not rich toward God.”4

Before Jesus begins the parable, he warns his disciples, “Watch out! Be on your guard against all kinds of greed”. Greed is being described here as a sickness of money and materialism. Jesus is saying ‘watch out’ because he is giving a warning here and the implication is that we can be easily fooled by greed. We can easily be blind to our own greed, often not seeing it play out in our lives. This sly characteristic of greed is something Jesus is warning his disciples about. He’s saying, if you are going to follow me, you must be aware of the sly and deceptive nature of all kinds of greed. As Tim Keller says, “Coming into relationship with Jesus changes your relationship to money and possessions.”5

In the parable, the rich man is storing up all of his grains. In an agrarian society like this, grain surplus and land equated wealth. Basically the rich man has so much excess stored up for himself that he can just sit back and enjoy life. This is actually quite similar to the ideal retirement plan. You earn enough to live comfortably and sit back, stop working, and enjoy life. There’s not anything necessarily bad about longing for a life like this. It’s certainly most people’s goal and is part of the reason we all try to start saving for retirement at a young age. And yet, Jesus is saying, if your goal is to accumulate more to store up for yourself, you are doing it all wrong. None of it can go with you and the greed will consume you quietly and subtly. Jesus is also not saying that greed is a sickness which only affects the wealthy.

Tim Keller has an incredible sermon surrounding this parable, which I encourage you to listen to. Keller explains that through this parable, Jesus highlights six signs that you have the money sickness of greed and I paraphrase Keller’s explanation below:

Two situational signs:

Gloating over money. Verse 19 says, “I’ll say to myself, ‘You have plenty of grain laid up for many years. Take life easy; eat, drink and be merry.’’ The wealthy man gloats over his possessions and wealth.
Worrying about money. The man in the parable is worrying about having enough and storing the surplus. Keller says, “Jesus is saying it’s possible to have money and not have the sickness but it is also possible to have the sickness and not have money… to worry is to set your heart. You are just as materialistic.”6

Two psychological signs:

You look to money for security and safety. When we see money as our place for safety and security instead of God, when we set our heart on it to feel safe, we are experiencing the deception of greed because money can never give us the security and safety that we long for, only God can.
You look to money to feel beautiful, attractive, worthy or important. We see money as a way to achieve status or worthiness, but this is a lie woven into greed, only God makes us worthy.

Two practical signs:

You run after money. You are constantly chasing more in some way to accumulate more wealth. You are always looking for a way to earn more and accumulate more. Money becomes your main goal and focus.
You obsessively store it up. In the time of Jesus in an agrarian culture, your wealth was your possessions — your fields, your home, etc. There were no banks or savings accounts. But, if there were, Keller says, “Jesus is calling them to be willing to dip into savings and investments to give radically…to lower your net worth to give away to other people — ministry, other people, etc. If you can’t, you have money sickness.”7

I don’t know about you, but I feel quite convicted with all this. I’ve never had a lot of money of my own throughout my adult life, but I think I’ve been quite blinded by the way greed has filtered into my own experience. It has only been through honest self-reflection that I’ve begun to see how money has owned me. So, how am I working toward freedom?

First, I am repenting for the ways I’ve let money control my life, for all the ways I’ve set my heart on money instead of God. Practically, I am praying continually for God’s wisdom and discernment when it comes to money, good stewardship, spending, and giving. And, I intentionally practice generosity. For me, this looks like tithing to my church monthly out of my income, giving financially when I can to charities I care about, and donating my time and talent to organizations that are doing good things in the world. It also looks like being generous with my time — paying attention to people when I talk to them, going out of my way to make time for others who need a friend, and being conscious of materialism in my life. I am continually growing in this area and learning new patterns of behavior to address and new practices to build.

If you’re anything like me and this section of writing stung a bit, perhaps God is inviting you to look closely at your finances and explore how you practice generosity. Perhaps he’s highlighted to you ways money has gripped you. Or, maybe he’s nudging you with ways you can give more than you currently are and explore opportunities to be generous to the people around you. Don’t ignore God’s invitation to go deeper here. Step into the practice of generosity with an open heart to receive what God may want to do in and through your life. I promise, the more you step into generosity, the more joy you will experience because you will find that truly it is better to give than receive.

A quick note on living a generous life.

Although I focused mostly on finances in this post, living generously is not just about money, it’s also about giving your time and talent generously to others. There have been seasons of my life where I have not been able to give as much as I’d like to financially, but I have volunteered my time and shared my talents and skills to help others. Sometimes this looks like cooking a meal for someone, or running an educational workshop, or mentoring others, or even simply volunteering your time to help an organization that is doing good work in the world.

Each of us are born with incredible gifts and over the course of our lives we’ve developed skills and talents. Maybe an invitation to live more generously for you is to look for organizations that are doing good work and volunteer your time or talents with them. Whatever the journey looks like for you, I hope you respond to the invitation to live more generously. I promise, God will do incredible things with whatever you are willing to give.

The Poetry Nook

Messenger by Mary Oliver8

Text within this block will maintain its original spacing when published

My work is loving the world.
Here the sunflowers, there the hummingbird - 
equal seekers of sweetness.
Here the quickening yeast; there the blue plums.
Here the clam deep in the speckled sand.

Are my boots old? Is my coat torn?
Am I no longer young and still not half-perfect? Let me
keep my mind on what matters,
which is my work,

which is mostly standing still and learning to be astonished.
The phoebe, the delphinium.
The sheep in the pasture, and the pasture.
Which is mostly rejoicing, since all ingredients are here,

Which is gratitude, to be given a mind and a heart
and these body-clothes,
a mouth with which to give shouts of joy
to the moth and the wren, to the sleepy dug-up clam,
telling them all, over and over, how it is
that we live forever.

There’s a Book on That

Randy Alcorn writes an amazing book on generosity that is really helpful in navigating what Jesus models for us. Giving is the Good Life weaves biblical principles of generosity and giving into real life stories and the result is a beautiful examination of what the good life truly is.

As always, here is a taster:

“Here’s the truth that can set us free: ‘living large’ actually makes us smaller. Living ‘the good life’ (as our culture defines it) results in missing the best life. Deep down, we all know it’s true: you can spend every last cent you own on yourself — and, through credit, far more — and still end up miserable. In fact, if you want to be miserable, greed and stinginess are the perfect recipe. Those who hoard their money, like those who spend it all on themselves, are the unhappiest people on the planet. Jesus calls us to do something radical: love others by giving away our money and time. That sounds like loss, not gain. Yet in God’s economy, that’s exactly how we expand and enhance our lives.”9

Just in case you missed these recent posts:

Recovering the Ancient Practice of Sabbath in a Busy World: What is Sabbath and why does it matter? I've had my own battle with this spiritual discipline but the more I study Sabbath, the more I'm convinced it is crucial for a joyful life.
Building a Rhythm of Prayer: Prayer is the most natural thing we can do as human beings because it is in our very design to communicate with the one who created us. Can a rhythm of prayer lead to transformation?
Navigating Political Conversations with Grace: There isn't anything quite more divisive these days than politics. So, what does it look like to engage in political conversations with grace?

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A Pocket-Sized Desert with Jamie Phear

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