(2 Corinthians 8: 7-15)
As I’ve mentioned previously, I’m currently reading a biography on Franklin D. Roosevelt entitled: A Christian and a Democrat, which is described as a religious biography of our 32nd President of the United States. Chapter Five, Charity-the Cooperative Commonwealth, addresses how Roosevelt’s religious upbringing influenced his views on governing whether it was as the governor of New York State or as President of the United States during the 1930s and 40s. According to the author, Roosevelt’s three core Christian principles were faith, hope, and charity. Roosevelt, born in 1882, received a privileged upbringing growing up in the Episcopal Church and was greatly influenced by the emerging theological trend towards social justice and the duty of the haves to help the have-nots. FDR knew his Greek and his Bible, and traditionally charity, Charis in Greek, stood for grace or the loving kindness of God towards humanity. According to Wikipedia, in the Greek and Hebrew biblical term Charis refers to good will, loving-kindness, favour, in particular to God’s merciful grace, and it is used over 140 times in the New Testament and is a central concept in the theology developed by St. Augustine of Hippo. Combined with Charis is Agape which is a love that is self-giving, by seeking not its own welfare but that of others, enemies as well as friends. For Roosevelt, charis and agape were to be discerned on three fronts: in God’s love toward humanity; in human love toward God; and in self-giving love toward others. In a more communal and less private faith, this is the kind of love that sends us out after our fellow human beings in concern for their welfare. According to the author, Roosevelt believed that every citizen had a right to an “opportunity to make a living, a living decent according to the standard of the time, a living which gave man not only enough to live by, but something to live for.” President Roosevelt said: “We are poor indeed if this Nation cannot afford to lift from every recess of American life the dread fear of the unemployed that they are not needed in the world. We cannot afford to accumulate a deficit in the books of human fortitude.” He believed that the spirit of charity required face-to-face knowledge; people needed to know their neighbors to recognize them as neighbors. Much like how we are getting to know our neighbors at Peter’s Place.
And I believe that it’s this Christian charis that Paul is talking about in our scripture reading for this morning. In Chapter 8 of Paul’s letter to the church in Corinth he writes to encourage them in their generosity. He starts out this section of his letter telling them about the grace that God had given the Macedonian churches which were, by all accounts, poor churches that had been undergoing their own severe trials. Paul tells them that in spite of their extreme poverty there was an overflowing joy that welled up in rich generosity moving them to give as much as they were able and even beyond their ability pleading for the privilege to do more. Paul said: And they did not do as we expected, but they gave themselves first to the Lord and then to us in keeping with God’s will. I take this to mean that Paul and his followers didn’t expect to receive much from the Macedonian churches as they were hurting just as much as the church in Jerusalem for which Paul was trying to raise money. Paul was amazed at how this little congregation reached deep within itself and rose to the occasion. I know how Paul felt.
The Corinthian church was different, it had money and apparently, they had planned to collect money for the Jerusalem churches a year ago and Paul was following up on the effort to make sure it didn’t fall through the cracks. Paul challenged them to act on their promise saying: Now as you excel in everything, in faith, in speech, in knowledge, in utmost eagerness, and in our love for you, so we want you to excel in this generous undertaking. He tells them not to take what he is saying as a command, but to consider it as a test of genuineness of their love against the earnestness of others. He wanted them to excel in the grace of giving. He says: For you know the generous act of our Lord Jesus Christ, that though he was rich, yet for your sakes he became poor, so that by his poverty you might become rich. He tells them that in this matter he is giving them his advice that it would be appropriate for them to finish what they began last year, not just for the sake of doing something, but for the desire to do something, and to now finish it so that their eagerness may be matched in accordance with their means, in accordance with what they had. When he said doing it for the desire to do something our acronym SODS immediately popped into my mind. You know, SODS: Somebody Oughta Do Something, be that somebody. He tells them that if the eagerness is there, the gift is acceptable according to what one has, not according to what one does not have. He says: I do not mean that there should be relief for others and pressure on you, but it is a question of a fair balance between your present abundance and their need, so that their abundance may be for your need, in order that there may be a fair balance. As it is written, he said: The one who had much did not have too much, and the one who had little did not have too little. (Exodus 16: 18)
Four principles of giving emerge here. First, your willingness to give cheerfully is more important than the amount you give. Second, you should strive to fulfill your financial commitments. Third, if you give to others in need, they will in turn, help you when you are in need. And fourth, you should give as a response to Christ, and not for anything you can get out of it. That point was driven home recently when two people our church have helped returned to give back so we can help others. One person gave the spare change he had and the other gave us six QFC gift cards to hand back out to others in need. The point being, how you give or how we give as a church reflects our devotion to Christ. They knew we would help others in Christ’s name.
So that begs the question as to how do you decide how much to give? Paul says that we should give of what we have, not what we don’t have and that our sacrificial giving must be responsible. And John Wesley, the founder of our Methodist denomination, said in relationship to giving: Earn all you can, save all you can, give all you can. Wesley, like Paul, wanted believers to give generously, but not to the extent that those who depend on the giver, people like our families, must go without having their basic needs met. Wesley believed that we should work hard and save as much as we can by not spending it foolishly on things we really don’t need and then, out of our abundance, to give all we can. In this it is important to realize that our generosity does not depend on the size of our bank accounts. It depends on our readiness to open our hearts for the needs of others and to share what we have with them.
For President Roosevelt and us, as fellow Christians, foremost is the idea that poverty is preventable, that poverty is destructive, wasteful, demoralizing, and that poverty in the midst of potential plenty is morally unacceptable in a Christian and democratic society. As a part of Roosevelt’s Christian beliefs, he felt that it was important to see the poor as people, with hopes, fears, virtues, and vices, and to see them as fellow citizens who were part of the fabric of American life, instead of as a depressed class who would always be with us. Charity, charis, when properly understood, involves fellow-feeling and the simple rules of human conduct: justice for the poor, sufficiency for all. And considering how generously Jesus shared his life with ours may help us to live such gracious generosity whether we are rich or poor, in charity for all.
Let us pray.
O Lord my God, when I in awesome wonder consider all the worlds thy hands have made, I see the stars, I hear the rolling thunder, thy power throughout the universe displayed, I scarce can take it all in. Gracious Father, we praise you for your unconditional love for us, your children who struggle to do your will in such an unwilling world. Lead us through your Holy Spirit to truly do unto others as we would have other do unto us. Move us to extend the love of your Son Jesus Christ through unselfish acts of charity wherever and whenever we can for whomever we can. Fill us with your Spirit so that when our souls sing to thee, and we are moved to loving action others who do not yet know you will sing how great thou art. In Jesus’ name, we pray, Amen.