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God’s Way of Giving

                 Especially at this time of the year, most people are aware of the fact that God loved us so much that he sent his Son (See John 3:16-17).  It is important to know that God is a giver and that he took the first step to bring us back home.  What most people do not realize, though, is how God gives. 
1 John 3:1 says, “See what great love the Father has lavished on us, that we should be called children of God! And that is what we are!”  How does God give?  He gives lavishly.  His giving is over the top and more than we could possibly imagine. 
                Luke 6:38 restates that idea when it says, “Give, and it will be given to you. A good measure, pressed down, shaken together and running over, will be poured into your lap. For with the measure you use, it will be measured to you.”  God goes not give a little bit.  He does not begrudgingly do the minimum.  Instead, God gives us his blessings in heaping measures which are so full that they spill over to those around us.  We are then encouraged make the same sort of offering to others with the full knowledge that we will never out give God’s provision.
                There are also other words that speak about the abundance of God.  Scripture tells us that we are to be “overflowing” with things like grace (Romans 5:15), hope (Romans 15:13), thanksgiving (2 Cor 4:15/9:12 and Colossians 2:7), joy (2 Corinthians 8:2) and love (1 Thessalonians 3:12).  Again, God has provided such an abundance of these gifts that we cannot keep them to ourselves. 
                  We do not need to convince God to love us.  We cannot earn his kindness.  We do not have to try to wrestle good things away from him as if he is vengeful and miserly toward us.  Rather, God gives lavishly, overflowingly, freely, graciously, joyfully and abundantly.   When I understand that, it changes the way I view God and how I see my own giving to others.  If I know that God is so generous to me, how can I be anything but generous to others?
                “God is able to bless you abundantly, so that in all things at all times, having all that you need, you will abound in every good work” (2 Corinthians 9:8).

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