"G:enerosity: Taking Care of Others"

So, 

Are you blessed?

It’s a simple question: Are you blessed?

Do you perceive all that God has done for you? When you got up this morning was their heat in your house? We’re you in a house? Did the tap allow you to get a glass of water. Did you have a toothbrush, toothpaste, teeth?

When you realize that in spite of all the progress we have made, there are still people without the basics of a toothbrush, you have to see that perhaps you really are blessed.

And to those whom are given much, much is expected.

So are you blessed?

As Christ followers we are to count our blessings. Do you know why?

Because gratitude is foundational to faith! And gratitude comes from seeing the blessings.

Seeing all that God has done for you fundamentally changes your relationship with God and with others. It changes the way we see the world. It opens up to us the gift of joy.

On the other hand, if you don’t see your blessings, you are in danger of seeing yourself as deprived, as living with less, and worse close to the beginning of thinking it’s someone else’s fault.

Usually we start with people, then systems, and then with scapegoats, like women, people of color, and heretics.

We are not blessed because of them. It is a form of spiritual blindness.

Because understanding yourself to be blessed opens you up to a world of incredible possibilities. It opens the lines of communication with God.

As a man with an amazing wife, an amazing family, an amazing calling, I never, ever have had a reason to think I am not blessed.

Think about it. I hit Boo-Boo - Yogi’s sidekick with my wife’s car, and the bear got away it appears safely, and a DEC officer was behind me and a Forrest Ranger behind him.

The air bags never went off. Neither of us were hurt. The car goes into the Collision shop tomorrow, but I have car insurance and will pay only $200 because it is considered a comprehensive case.

Blessed!

Emma turns one year old November 5! Noah takes a bus everyday to all day Preschool in the Cobleskill-Richmond School District’s Ryder Elementary School, and loves it.

Blessed!

Are you blessed?
We live blessed, don’t we.

But sometimes there are people in this world, systems in this world, that really want to steal our joy. They want to convince that we are not blessed. 

That instead we have been and are being shorted. That the glass is worse than half full, it’s near empty even while we live in the richest country in the world, even while we live lives of amazing peace, even while we will have full tables on Thanksgiving.

And of the things that is especially wrong about the idea that we are under oppression and are losing, and that what we rightly deserve is being stolen, is that in the deal what we are losing is our blessing!

Not that God’s blessing is not still with us, we just no longer see it!

And not seeing the blessing is what kills our gratitude and joy!

Because when we are blessed and we know it, we are able to be generous. Our overflowing hearts bring praise to God and help to others.

We see others and want to care for them. We hear stories of need and know that God has provided and will continue to provide, so we can do something: fill some bags with food for someone else’s Thanksgiving, fill a Christmas box with toys, get a bag of candy for the Trunk or Treat.

We are able to think as the Samaritan did, as one who has been blessed by God, and is now blessed to be able to do God’s work for another who is hurting and broken.

We are to love God and love our neighbors.
And who is that neighbor? 

Jesus’ answer is the one God has set before you to care for!

The ones God has privileged you to use the resources God has placed in your hands to care for.

Of course, as Jesus makes clear, generosity is not just about using your resources. It’s also about having your heart in the right place.

Jesus knew that there were people in his audience who were going to lose their minds at his answer. It’s not the typical religious, holy men who are the heroes of the story, but a heretic.

Because it’s what you do - not what you say that reveals your heart. 

And if you are blessed and know it, what you do will show it.

In the way you treat people. 

In the way you respect differences. 

In the way you use the time and energy you have to care for others.

Are you blessed? Show it! 

Amen.