It All Began with Giving

We must adopt an ethic of giving constantly, not only when we want God to do something on our behalf. Rather, we should give because that has become our very nature.

May God make me a cheerful giver, not a person who gives only when there is a need, or when it is convenient, or when he wants to get something out of God. Giving and sharing should be something that flows naturally from us.

Over the years, the passage from Ecclesiastes 11:1 and 2 has come to define much of my ministry practice: “Cast your bread upon the waters, for after many days you will find it. Give portions to seven, and even to eight, for you do not know what disaster may come upon the earth.” The Bible counsels us to be diligent and always to invest with vision, looking toward the future rather than thinking only about the immediate.

There is always a call in the Bible not to be stingy and to “give portions to seven and to eight.” I believe that the minister, the church, must always be sowing into people and must always be sowing into projects and initiatives of every kind. It must always put itself in uncomfortable situations, give, and sow grace in the community, without worrying, because when it least expects it, many of those seeds will return in the form of blessing and benefit, in the most wonderful and blessed ways.

That must also be our personal conduct. Jesus exemplifies that principle to the utmost degree. The writer of Philippians, Chapter 2, says, “Let this same mind be in you which was also in Christ Jesus.” God calls us to adopt the same attitude and conduct that were in Christ Jesus, “who, being equal with God, did not regard equality with God as something to cling to, but emptied Himself, stripped Himself, and took the form of a man and went to His death—and not just any death, but death on a cross.

The Lord was generous. He gave Himself for us. He became a man, and not merely a man, but a poor man; and not merely a poor man, but a persecuted man; and not merely persecuted, but a murdered man; and not merely murdered, but tortured. All for us, to give us life, to obey the Father’s call to become the mediator and reconciler between God and mankind.

And how wonderful that the account does not end there! Rather, it says, “...therefore God raised Him up, exalted Him to the highest place, and gave Him a name that is above every name, so that at the name of Jesus every knee in heaven, on earth, and under the earth should bow.”

It all began with giving. It says, “Therefore God”... Because He gave Himself, because He gave generously, because He made Himself uncomfortable, because He emptied Himself, because He did something crazy that no one can rationally understand—for that reason, God raised Him to the highest place. His exaltation was even greater than His abasement. His enrichment was far greater than His self-induced impoverishment. Humbling Himself in obedience to the Father and out of love for others placed Him in a position to be exalted to the highest place.

That same dynamic is fulfilled in every human being who adopts the attitude and conduct of Jesus in his life. If you live as a person who gives himself and is always giving, you too will experience in your life that blessing of God, which will gradually lift you up. It will lift up your children and your finances; it will lift up your mind and your emotions; it will lift up your marriage and your church. It will lift up your city.

That is incredible; it is a mystery. Ultimately, it is the mystery of the cross. On the cross—the ugliest, most terrible, cruelest instrument ever invented by man to torture a human being, the grimmest thing there is—life sprang forth from that sinister symbol. When the Lord mounted the cross and emptied Himself and felt sin—He who had never felt it in His being—when He was bled dry and rendered unable to move, from that position of total powerlessness, the Bible says that He disarmed principalities and powers. The power of God was manifested as never before in the powerlessness of that sacrifice. And that is what happens when we rob ourselves, when we crucify the selfishness that comes naturally to the flesh.

Self-preservation is the most powerful instinct in the individual. When one violates the most powerful biological instinct of all—the instinct to preserve oneself and maintain one’s comfort, permanence, survival, and prerogatives—when one rises up against that carnal, earthly, diabolical principle of selfishness, one then enters the realm of the divine, where God can perform miracles in our lives.

When we mount the cross through an act of personal self-emptying and putting others first, at that moment we enter into the same dynamic practiced by Christ Jesus, and a similar benefit will then be fulfilled in our lives. For just as He was also raised up because He emptied Himself, so too will we be raised up by emptying ourselves for the benefit of others. If we lose our life in imitation of Jesus Christ, we will gain it as He gained His.