Blessed to Be a Blessing

Have you ever had a project grow right in front of your eyes? It happens to me all the time. Take, for example, my kitchen. The cabinets need to be wiped down. But, if I wipe down the cabinets, I should go ahead and get out the paint and touch them up. And I really need to paint the walls. But the staircase walls need to be sanded first, and the windows and doors need to be replaced before I paint the trim. So, I just don’t wipe down the cabinets because I’m not ready to do all of that.

That kind of logic may be what has taken hold of the church at Corinth. Paul told them about the collection for Christians in need in Jerusalem a year before and they had started collecting. They were excited about it – so excited that he had gone on to Macedonia and bragged on them! They were saving every week for the offering. But then something happened, and they stopped.

It may have been that during their dispute with Paul they had stopped and then they just had gotten out of the habit and not started back, but I think we have a clue that perhaps it was more a sense of being overwhelmed that stopped them. Paul says, “It is appropriate for you who began last year not only to do something but even to desire to do something – now finish doing it, so that your eagerness may be matched by completing it according to your means.”

They heard about the need, they wanted to do something so they started collecting, but they stopped. And Paul says, now finish collecting so that you complete your offering, according to your ability to, in a way that matches your eagerness. He also reminds them with a nudge that they are a wealthy port city church, and many smaller more rural, poorer churches have given sacrificially, while they have stopped altogether. He doesn’t want them to send so much to Jerusalem that they were left in need, but he also doesn’t want them to sit back and say, “We aren’t going to be able to solve the problem, so we aren’t going to contribute to its solution.”

It happens over and over again to me, and I imagine it happens to you sometimes. I see a need, I start to meet the immediate need, but then once my attention is focused on the immediate need, I see the greater need, and I realize I can’t do it all, so I never address the immediate need, and I could have taken care of that need. I could have wiped the jelly off of the front of the cabinet, but I didn’t because the whole room needs to be painted.

I do the same thing with gifts. I think about sending a card to someone who is going through a rough time. Then I think I really should send flowers. But flowers are so impersonal. I really should put together a basket of goodies with some activities for their kids to keep them busy and some thoughtful, personalized something for the recipient, like a book that I know will speak to their particular situation and their favorite cookies or snack and a little emergency kit with toiletries if they are having to stay at the hospital. Then, I realize I don’t have time to run all over town and bake stuff and put together a basket. And too often, I don’t even send a card.

Paul tells the Corinthians, “Do what you can do that matches your eagerness.” Write the card.

Our team just returned from the 3rd year of mission in Xpujil, Mexico. Talk about a place where the need can grow right in front of your eyes! Education is not required, bottled water is the only water that doesn’t have to be boiled, typical evening dinner is a hot chocolate drink made of corn flour, milk and cacao with saltines for dipping, or a bowlful of animal crackers, animals are thin, clothes are worn, jobs are labor-based, crops struggle. “Why?” seems like a good question to ask. But the answer is too complicated. The people are indigenous, many speak only Chol and do not speak Spanish, they were moved here by the government, government programs abound, but the programs rarely meet a need by the time they filter through corrupt contractors.

So, much like wiping the cabinets, or writing a card, securing water is a necessary immediate action, even though there is a bigger picture of need. Some of the houses where we worked already had a cistern. But it was from a government program that built the cisterns without the necessary rebar to make them last without cracking, and they were small, so they couldn’t hold enough water, even when they were holding water, to last the dry six months of the year. Some of the houses had spigots coming up that had a handle to turn to turn on water. But none of them brought water…because in some cases the pipe had not been connected to a water source or the water source had never worked or worked rarely for a time but broke and was never repaired. Even in the big city, county seat, of Xpujil, where there was municipal water and houses had running water, it only ran two or maybe three days in the week and was not drinkable.

I turn on the water at my house, and do you know what happens? Water comes out. Predictable, dependable, drinkable water. We are blessed in this country. We are blessed with an infrastructure that works almost all the time. I found myself in Mexico wondering how to work to improve their government programs, how to teach the value of education and better farming techniques and all that I would put on them of my values amounted to changing their culture – and I don’t know where to start. It would be easy to be overwhelmed and walk away saying “The problem is too big for me.”

Paul says do what you can that matches your eagerness. Water. We poured foundations for three cisterns, built the walls for two of those cisterns, and put roofs on two other cisterns. The families who were getting the cisterns worked with us as a community on each other’s cistern along with elders from the church. Each person worked hard and eagerly did what they were able as we shoved wet sand and gravel into 5 gallon buckets and dumped them into the cement mixer, as we wheelbarrowed the cement to the cistern and shoveled it into buckets to pour it into the mold. We became one work team, united in purpose, getting to know and caring about one another despite the language barriers. The families offered us hospitality that was truly sacrificial. It was incredible. As we were generous with one another, God’s grace was evident.

As we said our goodbyes, as we looked into one another’s eyes we exchanged our thanks, our gratifude.

The concepts of generosity, grace, and gratitude, it seems to me, are intricately interconnected; and I think the Greeks thought so too.

In Greek the words for grace and generosity are different forms of the same word. And the word for gratitude is built onto the word for grace and generosity. The word for grace is charis and means more literally experiencing God’s blessing or kindness. The word for generosity is charin and means more literally expressing God’s blessing or kindness. We receive grace and we show generosity. God’s blessing and kindness coming in, and going out. Then the word for gratitude is eucharistos. The prefix “eu” means pleasing or happy. The suffix “tos” indicates “one who is.” So, eucharistos means “one who is pleased by or happy because of grace or generosity,” “one who is pleased by or happy because of God’s blessing or kindness.” We are grateful for this exchange – God’s blessing in, God’s blessing out.

Where we are generous, where we express God’s blessing, we receive grace, experiencing God’s blessing. And our response, “Thanks be to God” – gratitude.

We were grateful for the exchange. Like breathing, we exhale God’s blessing only to then inhale God’s blessing. Generosity/Grace/Generosity/Grace We are grateful for it, eucharistos, like we are grateful for the air we breathe. The source of the term Eucharist, the Greek word for the Lord’s Supper. Here, we are grateful for charin, generosity, expressing God’s blessing. Here, we are grateful for charis, grace, experiencing God’s blessing.