Giving and Living
Giving necessarily involves some sacrifice or it is not really giving in a biblical sense. David refused to offer to God that that cost him nothing. In David’s case, he would merely have been transferring and not giving. Giving means willingly taking something that rightly belongs to us and giving it to another. It comes at some cost to the giver. It was out of “deep poverty” that the Macedonian churches gave to support Paul in the mission work the Lord called him to (2 Co 8:2).
Ironically, this type of giving tends to strengthen rather than weaken the giver. It may seem to us that the opposite would be true, but Solomon avows, “There is that scattereth, and yet increaseth” (Pr 11:24). This is Scripture truth and practical reality. The greedy hand tries to cling tighter and tighter to what he has and cannot seem to find any room for giving to someone else, but in the end he has less.
The only real living is giving and that by sacrifice. But, let us apply the biblical test to the sacrifice. If the sacrifice harms us, we may be trying to play the martyr rather than giving in line with the life of Christ. Christ sacrificed and gave more than all, but rather than weakening Him, He was strengthened, “being by the right hand of God exalted, and having received of the Father” (Ac 2:33).
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