Your Money and Your Life #10: Give More of Your Wealth, Be Generous

As the last post makes clear, God gives us a way to break our addiction to wealth and “stuff.” The tithe. But are there any good Pharisees reading along? I’m one. Give me a rule to follow and when I’m old I shall not depart from it. Given our relative prosperity, it may take more than a tithe to break us of our addiction to, and trust in, stuff. Really.

You see, there’s a very God-like quality called generosity that He wants to cultivate in each of us. How do we do this? Give more of your wealth.

The tithe may be easy for some of us because we’re quite wealthy and it’s a drop in the bucket of the bottom line – or at least we still have a pretty big bucket after giving 10%. The tithe is easy for me because I’ve built the habit – even if it isn’t a huge amount. Some may think a tithe is generous, but it isn’t. How do I know? I tithe, and I know I’m not that generous. I know generous people and I stand in stark contrast to them much of the time.

God doesn’t call us just to tithing, but to generosity.

Proverbs 11:24 One gives freely, yet grows all the richer; another withholds what he should give, and only suffers want.

If I’m not generous, I need more training to be a person who reflects God’s generosity.

If you’re generous, what are the joys of generosity? If you struggle with generosity, why?