"The need to give"
Hymns
160 Rejoice, Ye Pure in Heart
120 Your Love, O God
Written as a marriage hymn, with calls for love and an end to the
"walls of fear that divide us."
159 Lift High the Cross
Written dating back to 1887 missionary days.
John 20: 19-31 (Doubting Thomas)
I contend that we all have the need to give to others. I have the need to give to others.
You have the need to give to others. It is built into all of us by God. Some scientific investigators have conducted research, the results of which seem to indicate that the need to give to others is built right into our DNA. I find this easy to believe.
I contend that God built the need to give to others right into our DNA.
The need to give to others is important to the world and it is crucial to our own spiritual journey. The need to give to others motivates the best activities of men and
women in this world. The need to give to others motivated previous generations to give us much of what is admirable in this world. The need to give to others
motivates people today to act in unselfish ways for the benefit of people today, as well as the people of tomorrow. In the process, those who recognize their need to give to others find themselves growing spiritually - further along on their own spiritual journey.
I contend that you have the need to give to others. I know that I have the need to give to others. We all have the need to give to others.
Research into the language of the Bible shows that the word "believe" is mentioned 273 times. The word "love" is mentioned 714 times. But the
word, "give" is mentioned a whopping 2172 times. The good book is about belief and it's about how to love. But there's a lot there about the importance of giving.
The first apostles had the need to give to others, although on the first few days after Jesus's death they didn't know it yet. Our Bible reading this morning about Jesus's appearances to His disciples makes it clear that this small group of men and women were ruled by fear. We can't be completely sure what went on in their minds because the Biblical accounts don't tell us. But this time of year I think about that fearful
time. This pitiful, small group of men and women knew that they were all that was left of Jesus's ministry. For all they knew, Pilate would send
his soldiers to find them and finish the job.
The apostles were ruled by fear. But you can't feel that need to give if you are ruled by fear. And then Jesus came. What did
He say to them?
"Peace be with you."
Why those words? Why those particular words? The disciples were not at peace.. They were hurt, confused, reeling from Judas's betrayal, abandoned by the crowd, and terrified.
Like the apostles, you can't feel the need to give to others if you are full of these feelings. And yet, even today, this morning, many of us have come to church hurt, confused, reeling from feelings of betrayal and abandonment, and fearful.
To us, â€" just as He did to the apostles â€" Jesus comes this morning and says, "Peace be with you."
He wants us to be at peace. He wants to help heal our wounded hearts. He wants to be a living part of our lives. And He wants to send us into
the world, giving to others in His name.
That day, just a few days after His death, He calmed the men and women in that small room. He came back and made Thomas count the wounds still visible in his resurrected body. Then He sent them out into the world to give the good news, give care and comfort to the poor, and to give their lives to the Kingdom of God.
I've known many people who dealt with their fears, and then were able to find _expression for their need to give to others. One was a man I came to know when I worked for the National March of Dimes. He lived in Sun City, California, a famous retirement community south of Los Angeles. He suffered from a very rare genetic disease. It was a disease that skipped generations and then almost always found its way to one person. He was that person for his generation of relatives. He was quite successful in business, despite his disorder, and had accumulated a great deal of wealth. He had no children and his siblings were as successful as he so he approached the end of his life wondering what to do with all his money.
The man refused to allow himself to be ruled by fear of his impending death. He was quite at peace, really. He gave his assets to support scientific research into the causes and prevention of his genetic disease. I advised him that it might be next year or 50 years before the March of Dimes licked the disease. But he told me that he knew that he could go to his grave in peace knowing that some day his descendants would not have to suffer like he did.
This was not a gift given in fear. It was not a gift given with the selfish desire for a plaque on a wall that would impress people. It was a gift from the heart, to his family and to all mankind.
He had the need to give to others. He found a way to express that need. He lived his last days a more complete human being, a better man for having found that inner voice, a voice that I contend was built into our DNA by God.
Our denomination provides many opportunities to give.
Listen to this example from the United Methodist web site from parishoners in the South Louisiana Conference who had returned from a mission trip:
"I feel more needed and wanted here than I have in a long, long time," said Pam Waguespack, on her first mission trip. Waguespack is a postal worker and member of St. Charles United Methodist Church in Destrehan, La.
"These people are just so warm and open and honest and genuine," she said. "And I wish everybody could meet them and know what that's like."
Scott Temple, a paramedic for the Bossier City Fire Department, says, "You just feel fantastic. You feel like you have a heart as big as the Empire State Building."
Laurie Dungan, also from the South Louisiana Conference, has been making mission trips twice a year for the last four years. The experience has changed her life. Now she is taking night
classes to become a nurse practitioner so she can provide care to Mexico's poor.
"I was immediately taken to the mission … and knew that this is what God had called me to do," she said. "I get recharged when I come down here."
Our own church provides us with the means to express our need to give to others. You are already participating. Your weekly gifts support mission projects on the other side of the globe as well as in our own town. We promote the Gospel and feed the hungry. Your support helps our youth of this church, right here in Red Bank, participate in mission projects each summer. Their participation helps them discover a great deal about themselves and God.
(The children of the church school thank you for the crayons, incidentally.)
But rather than giving our selves a self-congratulatory pat on the back, let us focus on how all this giving blesses both the receiver and the one doing the giving.
Each one of us here today is on a spiritual journey. Perhaps we should consider listening to our inner voice that tells us that we have a need to give to others. We will end up knowing more about ourselves, God, and the best direction for our spiritual journey to take. We will better be able to answer these questions:
Who am I? Who is God? Where is the church helping me go? And where does God want me to be on this journey?
(repeat)
There's a true story about the need to give to others told by an elderly woman from one of our churches. She and her sisters were born on a farm in the late 1920's. They were too young to know what life was like before the farm economy crashed. For them, the Depression was something that was always around them - something that caused adults to talk
about 'how many poor people there are nowadays.'
Yet, she and her sisters didn't think of themselves as poor. They didn't think that they knew any poor people. But their minister mentioned from
the pulpit one Sunday that their little church was taking up a collection for the poor people in the church. So there had to be some
poor people out there somewhere.
These girls were only little kids -- in elementary school. But they got organized. They ran errands and did chores for the neighbors. They talked their mother into baking pies, which the girls sold from door to door, the youngest riding in the back of their little wagon. They worked all summer and proudly brought their earnings to church on the appointed
day. A special collection was taken and each of the girls, each with a heart as happy and as big as the sky itself, put a twenty dollar bill in the collection
plate.
Sixty dollars!
They proudly walked home with their mother. Later that day the minister arrived. He had a big smile on his face and an envelope in his hand. The
girls assumed that he must have seen them put the money in the plate and that the envelope contained a nice thank you letter.
After the minister left, the girls sat with their mother as she opened the envelope. And what do you think happened? Money fell out. There were eight one dollar bills and three twenties - the same three twenties that THEY had put in the collection plate.
"It was only then that I knew that we were poor," one of the sisters recalled years later. "How were we to know? We had food to eat, clothes to wear, and shelter over our heads. But when
we saw the money fall out of the envelope, everything changed. It was humiliating. All the joy of giving was taken from us that moment."
The girls and their mother had a full week to decide what to do. They were't sure they could face the other parishoners. They almost stayed home. It was hard, but they held their heads up and went - even though they knew that they were "poor" and that everyone around them thought of them as poor.
That Sunday they sat there and listened to the minister (It was clear that he hadn't seen the girls put the twenty dollar bills in the collection plate the week before.) The minister congratulated the congregation on the extraordinary amount of money that they had contributed to the poor of the church. He said there was a poor family in the next county and challenged the congregation to help them. A month later, the girls' mother put an unmarked envelope with sixty eight dollars in the plate. Plus, there were three ten dollar bills that the girls had earned selling more pies and running more errands.
The now elderly woman recalled, "We decided that we weren't poor. We decided that we were people who knew how to take care of the poor. We were care givers."
Expressing your need to give to others is a way to help you find some answers to life's most difficult questions.
Who am I? I am someone who has a need to give to others.
Who is God? I can't know all of God. But I know a few things and one of them is that God has
built into me the need to give to others.
Where is the church? The church is doing many things, and one of them is helping me find opportunities to fulfill my need to give to others.
Where does God want me to be on this journey?
That, of course, is between you and God.