November 21: "Thanksgiving 102: Why Thanksgiving and Generosity Go Together" - 2 Corinthians 9:10-15

Barry Giddens

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Thanksgiving Sermons – Message #5: Why Thanksgiving and Generosity Go Together

Main Idea

God doesn’t just want to bless us so we can meet our own needs, but he does it so we can meet the needs of others. As we give generously in Jesus’ name, the recipients thank God, not us.

Perhaps you’ve heard me say that “Love isn’t love until you give it away.” Another popular slogan is that we are blessed when we are a blessing. The idea of both is that when we move beyond ourselves into giving the love of Christ away, we are blessed infinitely more than we ever give. That’s why I believe so strongly that growing churches are ones that choose to be involved in their communities, and why I look forward to the Christmas lights beginning December 6 and the discussion of a possible Preschool in the very near future. That’s why Acts 20:35 says, “It is always more blessed to give than to receive.”

Scripture

Keeping this context in mind, I invite us to stand and to stand and hear the word of God today from 2 Corinthians 9:10-15 (NIV)

“He who supplies seed to the sower and bread for food will supply and multiply your seed for sowing and increase the harvest of your righteousness. You will be enriched in every way to be generous in every way, which through us will produce thanksgiving to God. For the ministry of this service is not only supplying the needs of the saints but is also overflowing in many thanksgivings to God. By their approval of this service, they will glorify God because of your submission that comes from your confession of the gospel of Christ, and the generosity of your contribution for them and for all others, while they long for you and pray for you, because of the surpassing grace of God upon you. Thanks be to God for his inexpressible gift!”

And may glory be to God for the reading and hearing of his word this morning. Thanks be to God. You may be seated.

As we have learned together in our previous messages, gratitude is a deep seated feeling of fulfillment that penetrates down to our very soul.

It invites us to show our thanksgiving because we are grateful for the good things in our lives. A key point today is that gratitude doesn’t just come because we receive something. It can be the result of being generous above and beyond what is required. Generosity is the quality or fact of plentiful or large and it inspires gratitude in the one who gives. That gratitude gets translated into more generosity. It’s cyclical and addictive.

If we look at what we have as something we’ve earned, we are tempted to hold on to it tightly. If we recognize God gave us the ability to make money, it’s natural to see ourselves as stewards of what he has entrusted us. One of the keys to gratitude and generosity is seeing that everything belongs to God from the beginning and it’s still his even after we are entrusted with it.

There’s a story of a woman who had finished her shopping and returned to her car to find four men inside it.

She dropped her shopping bags, drew a handgun from her purse, and with a forceful voice said, ‘I have a gun, and I know how to use it! Get out of the car!’ Those men did not wait for a second invitation. They got out and ran like crazy! The woman, understandably shaken, quickly loaded her shopping bags and got into the car. She just wanted to get out of there as fast as she could. But no matter how hard she tried, she could not get her key into the ignition. Then it hit her: Her car was parked four or five spaces away. She got out, looked around to see if the men were near, loaded the bags into her own car, and drove to the police station to turn herself in.The desk sergeant, after hearing her story, nearly fell out of his chair laughing. He pointed to the other end of the counter, where four men were reporting a carjacking by a woman with glasses and curly white hair, less than five feet tall, and carrying a large handgun. No charges were filed.

Sometimes we hold so tightly to our “stuff” and keeping it that we can’t obey what God is telling us to do. We don’t recognize that as we give to others, God blesses us with gratitude and thanksgiving.

We’re told by our consumer culture that we’ll be happier the more stuff we have, especially as Black Friday is this week. Being a disciple of Jesus is actually counter cultural as He calls us to generously give what we have. What we don’t see is that when we trust him in this, he blesses us. We’re not called to suffer through giving to others; it’s just that we won’t see the blessing in it until we learn to be obedient.

Probably the most generous and thankful people you know aren’t the wealthiest. It is entirely possible to give generously with limited means.

When it comes to generosity, Paul has a particular lexicon.

The words he associates with giving generously are words like:

Abound

Increase

Enlarge

Overflowing

Surpassing grace

When we abound in our generosity, inward gratitude and outward thankfulness are the natural response. We can’t internalize this truth though until we regularly practice generosity, both in our offerings to God and in our everyday lives.

As Thanksgiving is this week, what is one thing you can do to be generous to someone else?

Andrew Carnegie, one of the richest individuals to ever live in the US, died at the age of 83 in 1919.

When he was young, he picked cotton for $1.20 per week. As an adult, he invested in railroads and then started in steel. Some famous places like Carnegie Hall and Carnegie Mellon University bear his namesake. His philosophy was that man does not live by bread alone. At the time of his death, his philantropic endeavors created 3000 libraries around the world and he had given away $4.3 billion. Imagine what that figure would be today if it were adjusted for inflation?!

Generosity is about the blessings from God overflowing from us into the hearts and lives of others.

In 1981, Albert Lexie started working at the Children’s Hospital of Pittsburg, cleaning and polishing for $5 a pair. Albert retired after 32 years on the job. There was a retirement party were Albert was told how much he would be missed. His influence at that hospital continued. Albert had donated 30% of his earnings to the hospital’s Free Care Fund which help cash-strapped parents pay for their children’s medical care. And those tips? He gave every single one to the hospital, more than $200,000 in all.

God is increasingly generous to us.

You can see this in creation and in how he blesses people who follow him and those who don’t. God doesn’t bless us because we deserve what he gives. God gives us abundantly because it’s his nature to be generous. Anytime we realize how good God has been to us, it becomes obvious that we should act generously with others because we’re thankful for what God did with us.

God gave us Jesus out of the overflow of His wealth. He didn’t have to. In fact, he shouldn’t have. We don’t deserve Jesus. But He gives us Jesus freely because we need a Savior. And now God, Yahweh, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, wants us to give Jesus away to others as well. This is the ultimate act of generosity and brings the greatest feeling of gratitude for which we can return thanks to God in all the world. Will you receive God’s generosity today and will you share the generous gift of Jesus with someone else this Thanksgiving week?

Luke 6:38 Give, and it will be given to you. Good measure, pressed down, shaken together, running over, will be put into your lap. For with the measure you use it will be measured back to you.”

Proverbs 11:24 One person gives freely, yet gains even more; another withholds unduly, but comes to poverty.

Proverbs 11:25 A generous person will prosper; whoever refreshes others will be refreshed.