Grace and Money

I walked home today in this horrible weather after class. I checked weather.com and saw that it was around 106 degrees here in LA, and 111 degrees in Cerritos area. But I'm not gonna blog about how hot today was. While I was walking home, I listened to one of Tim Keller's sermons on my iPod. Yes, it was on grace and money.

There were a lot of good points he made in this sermon. In particular, he asked these two question that made me smirk and nod at the same time (don't you love this moments?). First one was about how you can tell someone's a Christian. His answer was that it was the way Christians viewed their economic status and how they viewed their money. How basically our money is not our own and it is God's. How it is only by His grace that we have money. Second one was about how you can tell the difference between a Christian and a nonChristian. He said that Christians have knowledge and experience of His grace. That ultimately makes us actively generous.

I remember listening to one of Pastor Harold's sermons about "generosity" and a Bible Study on "college students and generosity." It motivated me to be all generous and everything. But now that I look back, I was always passively generous. Even as I tithed, I would always think "God will bless me now." At times, I would buy a friend a meal only if he/she was broke or only if he/she asked me. Even when I willingly want to spot someone a meal, it's only because I feel like I should since I'm an upperclassmen now. There are also times when people want to carpool and they want me to drive. On the outside, I'd be all willing and down, but in the inside, I'd just be thinking about gas. Basically, I was always passively generous, or generous when I have to be generous.

Quote by Richard: "I heard from somewhere that we should be generous towards other people to the point where it makes us feel uncomfortable and anxious." Sorry Richard, I kind of butchered that. But seriously, we shouldn't be generous only when we have a surplus. Christ gave us everything, not a surplus. Because He gave up everything, we have everything. Therefore, let us be actively generous. Let's plan on spotting someone a meal today. Let's volunteer to drive so that others don't have to spend money on gas. And let's tithed on Sundays knowing that we're just giving God back what's already His.

-Simon