Giving Niceness 3

For he loveth our nation, and he hath built us a synagogue. (Luke 7:5)

I want us to look at another aspect of giving that God approves.

And it is the giving that does not attract anything to ourselves since we stand to gain nothing from it. It is a giving that could open us to insults from the ones we gave to or towards.

This centurion is famous in the scriptures for one major reason; he understood authority. To the point that Jesus said He had not seen such faith in Israel.

But behind that was a faith-guided lifestyle.

How does someone build a synagogue he is prohibited from entering? How does someone build something he would defile by entering; a building he would be stoned had he attempted to enter?

Yet he built it anyway.

How does someone seek the healing services from someone he is disqualified from hosting for someone who treats him as an infidel?

Isn’t it interesting that his servant was a Jew that he ‘knew’ qualified for that healing? I am sure he could not have ‘risked’ looking for healing for his person or family if we are to go according to his reasoning.

For me, that is exceptional giving.

The other person who gave in such a way was the Samaritan we call good.

He invested his time, care and resources for a person who would have easily spat on his face. A person who may have wished that he had died rather than having his life saved by a Samaritan.

It is possible he ordered the innkeeper not to reveal his identity because what he was pursuing was healing for a person he had found in need.

Yet they gave. And God commended them for so doing.

Do we ever give in such a way? Will we give like that?

Simply because that attracts God’s approval and of course blessing.

But it is more exciting giving for the cameras and rewards and ‘revenge’.

But those have their rewards here and nothing from God who knows the heart from where all giving originates.

Though the rewards for worldly and selfish led giving are many times immediate, the substance of the rewards for God led giving are eternal because they start at the heart.

That is what I want us to pursue.