Thanks-giving

 

 

“Thanks-Giving”

24-Nov-74

 

Written when I was in seminary at Drew:

Introductory remarks:

 

I want to thank you for the opportunity to share some thoughts on Thanksgiving.  As much as it is a trial for me to be up here speaking this morning, I'm sure it's a bit of a trial for you to sit and listen to a young seminarian stumble through and learn the art of preaching.  I appreciate your patience and understanding.  Perhaps together we can catch a glimpse of the great mystery which is the Gospel of God.

 

 

LET US PRAY:

 

*****

 

Father, bless these words where you would have them heard,

and bless those whom you would have hear. In Jesus name, Amen.

 

*****

[Open Barrett [1] first]

 

We read in Paul's second letter to the Corinthians, the ninth chapter, beginning with the first verse and ending with the fifteenth: [Reading]

 

I

 

Have you ever read the small print on church offering envelopes? “Freely ye have received, freely give." or: "God loves a cheerful giver."  Today these words seem like some pious sayings that make us feel good to mutter, but never quite fit reality.  Someone told me recently that sugar may soon be over $3.00 for a five-pound bag --maybe even as high as a dollar a pound!  We have to increase our budgets almost weekly, or we cut corners, or a little of both.  When we sit down to write our monthly checks to pay the bills, we find that what we owe is rapidly eating up our paychecks and going beyond what we have. Last week I deposited two pay checks.  And that same day I wrote a dozen checks against the entire balance.  In the land of plenty, things are getting plenty rough.

 

Last week we came forward with our offerings and pledge cards.  Most of us were smiling on the outside.  I wonder how many of us were cringing on the inside?  Why were we giving? Feelings of obligation? Guilt? Going along with everyone else?  Doing the "Christian" thing --the right thing?  Why do we  give to the Church?

 

This Thursday is Thanksgiving.  Thanks-giving; the giving of thanks for the gifts we’ve received.  "Freely ye received, freely give.”   Turkeys, stuffing, cider, cranberry sauce, potatoes, pumpkin pie --We give a lot of time and preparation to Thanks­giving dinner.  Electric bills, water bills, rent, mortgage, doctor bills, food budgets, church pledges --We give a lot of money for living.  Too often it seems like we are on the giving end, rather than the receiving end.  And it hurts to give!  Thanks-giving? the cheerful giver?  How can we give cheerfully and thankfully?

 

II

 

St. Paul wrote three or so letters to the church he founded at Corinth.  Writing letters was a common thing for Paul.  Most of our New Testament is a collection of letters he wrote to churches.  The Christians at Corinth must have been a special challenge to Paul.  It seems they always had a question or problem for him.  At the time he wrote his second letter to the Corinthians, Paul was at another Church in Macedonia.  He was collecting the offering which he had engineered for the needy Christians in Jerusalem.  The Corinthians had pledged a generous gift. Paul must have been pleased.  After all, He was telling the Macedonians about the promised contribution from Corinth to encourage their giving to the collection.  And then Paul hears that the Christians at Corinth were not following through with their pledge.  You can almost sense the combined feelings of embarrassment and anger, and yet hope, in Paul.  The Corinthians were about to let him down again.  But Paul had tact.  He exercised some skillful diplomacy. Perhaps Paul could be called the Henry Kissinger of the early church.

 

He starts off, in chapter nine, by saying that he knows that they are ready.  Any further pep-talk was not really needed!  The Corinthians, who were probably expecting some stinging remarks from Paul (who could be very testy at times), must have been stunned by Paul's optimism.  It must have been like a son, who having forgotten to mow the lawn and expecting his father to ground him, hearing his father reply: "Well, I know you’re going to do it!"

 

In spite of his optimism, Paul was realistic.  He knew that there was a difference between being ready to do something, starting it, and finishing it.  If the Corinthians were not fulfilling their pledge, others might quit too.  So Paul sent some assistants to check up on them and make sure they were doing their best.  Wanting to avoid further embarrassment, Paul needed, to be certain that the Corinthians were prepared their contribution.

 

Considering the things Paul went on to say in his letter, it appears that he had been accused of using the collection project as a means of extracting money from the congregations.  Paul replies with his view of genuine giving. He sails into some pretty deep water and it’s easy to lose sight of his intentions.  He uses the popular analogy of planting seeds --an analogy which Jesus often used.  Paul says that you receive according to what you give.  If you plant a big garden, you get a lot of plants.  But giving was to be an expression of what you felt inside.  Paul says that we shouldn’t give because we want to be praised or because we fear getting put down, nor should we give grudgingly.  Giving should be cheerful.  So Paul says: "God loves a cheerful giver."

 

Of course, Paul never meant that God only loves the cheerful giver.  Paul argued long and hard that God loves the sinner, even "the man who will not give at all, cheerfully or otherwise" (Barrett).  So Paul could not and would not insist that giving was based on building up good points with God.  Rather, God rewarded the cheerful giver.  But the cheerful giver needs to remember that it is a gift from God to be able to give at all.  Not that Christians are somehow automatically guaranteed some kind of minimum wage so that they can keep up their pledges, No!  But since God is the giver, there will always be some kind of good work we can do.  Again, not that good works put us right with God --Paul vigorously opposed this.  Nevertheless, in obedience to God, Christians are required to do works that are good in God's sight.  Paul means that we shouldn't do good works to get us on good terms with God; we should do good works because we have already been put on good terms with God through Jesus Christ.  And here's the problem: if giving doesn't get us anywhere with God, why give?

 

Paul addresses this matter in the last few verses of chapter nine.  He reminds the Corinthians that both they and those in Jerusalem will benefit from the gift.  The Corinthians receive God's reward for giving.  The Jerusalem Church receives the badly needed contribution of money.  But it also means more than this.  The Corinthian’s gift leads to thanksgivings to God and the increase of his glory.  Because of the gift, the saints at Jerusalem will thank God, not only for the money, but also for the Corinthians obedience to God and their integrity in fellowship with other Christians.  In short, the Corinthian's gift is a confession of faith in the Gospel.  It is a confession, not only of words, but of genuine obedience to God in service.  God is glorified by the believer’s obedience.  The quality of Christian life is clearly shown.

 

Even beyond all this, and more significantly, the Corinthian's gift is also a sign of God’s grace.  The gift of the Corinthian’s contribution to the Jerusalem Church points to God’s gift of Jesus Christ which has made the Christian community and all giving possible.  So, when Paul, at the end of chapter nine, thanks God for his unspeakable gift, he refers to the grace of God revealed in the Corinthian’s giving, and the grace of God revealed in his gift of Jesus Christ.  Because God gave himself for us, we can give ourselves back to God and to our neighbor.  \Vith that, Paul draws his thoughts to conclusion.

 

 

III

 

How can we sum up this involved argument? What is the basis for giving?  How can we give cheerfully and thankfully? Paul suggests number of things.  Perhaps I can get a hold on what he is saying by saying that there is joy in giving and giving in joy.

 

Recall some moments of joy:  The smile and surprise of a child opening a Christmas present.  A young couple sharing the warmth of a new love.  The deep things said in a starving child's face as he receives the first good meal in too long a time.  The poor woman secretly giving the church a few dimes --all she had to spare that week.  The startled wonder of a handful of disciples three days after their master gave his life.  There is joy in giving.  And there is giving in joy.  When we are filled with joy, we give ourselves to others.  Joy cries out to be shared.  God loves a cheerful giver, yes!  and the cheerful giver loves the world.

 

But if we don't have this joy, are we to crawl up within ourselves and wait for love to grasp us so that we can give cheerfully?  No!  There is also joy in giving.  Although Paul reminds us that inward joy and love are the primary motivations for giving, there are others.

 

I remember a stewardship campaign my home church ran a year or so ago.  They had quite a brochure encouraging our giving, complete with a do-it-yourself computation table to make it easy to find out what you were expected to give according to your income!  I remember the cover.  It had a picture of Jesus on the cross from a scene in "The Greatest Story Ever Told.”  Underneath the picture it said: "How much do you love him?"  I wrote a long letter to the stewardship committee.  Every member of the committee received a copy.  My question for them was: can we ever pay back God for what he did for us in Christ?  I didn't, and still don't, think that's possible.  I argued that giving must be motivated by the love we have as we respond to and accept the Gospel message.  Stewardship campaigns needed to be renamed evangelistic outreaches.  I also remember a reply I received from the church treasurer.  He said that he didn't know much about theology.  He regretted that giving was rarely motivated by spontaneous love.  But he did know that he had to pay a stack of bills for the church each month.  This is where he felt pledging was necessary. I learned a lot since that event.  The church has real needs.  There are needs that can't wait for the giving that comes from joy.               But it need not be a cold “business-only" thing.  We need to expect the joy that comes from giving.

 

There is joy in giving and giving in joy.  If we are not giving from joy, there are other reasons.  For one thing, people have needs.  There are the sick, the lonely, the poor, the starving, destitute people who are crying for help.  They need our gifts.  Are we to wait for joy to strike us before helping them?

 

Then there is the demand of the Gospel.  Faith means obeying God in service, loving our neighbor, the person in need.  Our obedience is a confession of our faith, It is the living of the Christian life outwardly and not merely inwardly.  Are we going to ignore this side of the Gospel?

 

And then there is the thanksgiving offered to God.  Those who receive our gift thank God, not only for the assistance, but for our obedience to God, and our fulfillment of fellowship.  Both we and our neighbor-in-need thank God for his gift of Jesus Christ which has made our giving possible.  Our gifts, like the gift of Jesus Christ, are signs of God’s grace.  Shall we forget this?

 

There are many reasons for us to give.  And in all of them there is cause for much rejoicing.  We should give expecting and hoping for joy, even in the midst of suffering.  Our giving and all that it means is a pregnant gift which gives birth to joy.  There is joy in giving and giving in joy.

 

IV

 

We need to get more specific now.  How can we give?  I would like to suggest that we can give ourselves.  I think that the chair last week and the giving of food this morning shows this.  Yes, we need to pledge, but not to avoid giving ourselves.  We need to pledge our money and ourselves.

 

Pledging can sometimes be a way of running away from the Gospel.  Put a dollar in one end of the great machine of mission, and service to our neighbor and to God comes out the other end.  We don't even get our hands dirty!  Sometimes I think it is easier to send dollars across the world rather than down the block.  When we give to those who live next door, we have to get involved.  We give ourselves.  Genuine giving is not merely from wallet to wallet, but from heart to heart, and hand to hand.

 

Can we give ourselves as Jesus gave himself?  Perhaps we'll just mail our monthly or weekly check to appease our consciences, and to keep the machine we call church running smoothly.  Giving from joy and expecting joy? Can we really do it?  I don't know.  It’s a decision that confronts us every day --from the lips of people crying in need, and from a lonely tree --empty now, but once holding a man dying a painful and slow death --a tree which crosses the sky with hope and love.

 

 

For a closing prayer, I would like to read hymn no. 513.  Will you turn with me to no. 513 and prayerfully follow the words as I lift them up to God?

 

[“We plough [plow] the fields and scatter.” Hymn #513, from the 1966 Methodist Hymnal, https://hymnary.org/hymn/MHOH1966/d513 ]

[1] Scripture Reading:

From C.K. Barrett, The Second Epistle to the Corinthians, chapter 9, verses one to fifteen.