{"id":895,"date":"2016-10-23T09:55:05","date_gmt":"2016-10-23T14:55:05","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.deaconlarry.org\/blog\/?p=895"},"modified":"2016-11-03T09:59:32","modified_gmt":"2016-11-03T14:59:32","slug":"how-should-we-give-to-god","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.deaconlarry.org\/blog\/?p=895","title":{"rendered":"How Should We Give to God?"},"content":{"rendered":"

Thirtieth Sunday in Ordinary Time<\/span><\/h3>\n

Sirach 35: 12-14, 16-18; 2 Tim 4: 6-8, 16-18; Luke 18: 9-14<\/span><\/h3>\n

Dc. Larry Brockman<\/h3>\n

One of the most difficult things for all of us is to discern just how, what, and how much we give to God.<\/span>\u00a0 <\/span>I\u2019m not just talking about money, either.<\/span>\u00a0 <\/span>Rather, I\u2019m talking about time, talent, and treasure.<\/span>\u00a0 <\/span>Today, our scriptures give us three different views on giving to God.<\/span>\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span><\/p>\n

Sirach says to: \u201cGive to the most high as he has given to you- generously, according to your means.\u201d<\/span>\u00a0 <\/span>So, each of us is admonished to give generously of our treasure.<\/span>\u00a0 <\/span>Then he says: \u201cBut offer no bribes.\u201d<\/span>\u00a0 <\/span>Indeed, bargaining with God is not a healthy way to ask God for help.<\/span>\u00a0 <\/span>Then Sirach implies that the cry of the downtrodden will be heard by God.<\/span>\u00a0 <\/span>Clearly, the emphasis in Sirach is on generosity and sincerity of heart.<\/span>\u00a0 <\/span>Give to the Lord generously and your needs, not your wants, will be provided for.<\/span>\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span><\/p>\n

Then, there is the story of Paul.<\/span>\u00a0 <\/span>Paul has given himself generously to the Lord, but rather than treasure, Paul has given his time and talent.<\/span>\u00a0 <\/span>He gave up everything to become an Apostle to the Gentiles.<\/span>\u00a0 <\/span>Before his conversion, Paul was a Pharisee in good standing, and from a wealthy family. <\/span>\u00a0<\/span>After his conversion, Paul was shunned by his fellow Pharisees, and lived from day to day as a tentmaker.<\/span>\u00a0 <\/span>Paul travelled tirelessly throughout the Eastern part of the Roman Empire to bring the Gospel of Jesus Christ to the Gentiles.<\/span>\u00a0 <\/span>He was imprisoned several times, mistreated by some, and living from day to day throughout his ministry.<\/span>\u00a0 <\/span><\/p>\n

Yet Paul is joyful, even offering forgiveness to his persecutors.<\/span>\u00a0 <\/span>Because Paul recognizes that \u201cthe time of my departure is at hand\u201d.<\/span>\u00a0 <\/span>Paul is hopeful that the crown of righteousness awaits him.<\/span>\u00a0 <\/span>Notice, that he does not declare himself as righteous.<\/span>\u00a0 <\/span>Rather, he recognizes that the crown awaits him following his judgment; and Paul is confident that his devotion and dedication to the Lord will be rewarded.<\/span>\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span><\/p>\n

That brings us to the Gospel- one of the most well known passages in the Gospel.<\/span>\u00a0 <\/span>First, we are told that the parable is addressed to those who consider themselves righteous.<\/span>\u00a0 <\/span>Well, you know what, that\u2019s all of us here today, isn\u2019t it?<\/span>\u00a0 <\/span>After all, we are here, whereas an awful lot of folks haven\u2019t bothered to get up and come to worship God. <\/span>\u00a0\u00a0<\/span>And we all contribute something to the collection.<\/span>\u00a0 <\/span>We are doing our part.<\/span>\u00a0 <\/span>Those others have more important things to do- golf or outings or many other things; and they contribute nothing to the church.<\/span>\u00a0 <\/span><\/p>\n

But you see, our salvation is not \u201crelative\u201d.<\/span>\u00a0 <\/span>We cannot judge our righteousness based on the righteousness or lack of it in others.<\/span>\u00a0 <\/span>Our status with God is standalone- it is based on our relationship with God, and our relationship alone.<\/span>\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span><\/p>\n

Jesus wants us to not only give of our time, talent, and treasure; but to do it from our hearts; to do it out of humility and love.<\/span>\u00a0 <\/span>And as this Gospel tells us, the tax collector gave out of humility and love.<\/span>\u00a0 <\/span>It isn\u2019t how much we give, but whether we give out of love, with the right intention.<\/span>\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span><\/p>\n

Recently, my wife had a major operation.<\/span>\u00a0 <\/span>She was in the hospital for almost a week, and so, she had several different nurses caring for her.<\/span>\u00a0 <\/span>I visited her there daily.<\/span>\u00a0 <\/span>It is fair to say that all of these nurses were qualified; and all of them gave her care according to their training.<\/span>\u00a0 <\/span>But, there were significant differences in the quality of care as viewed by their patient.<\/span>\u00a0 <\/span>\u00a0<\/span>Some of them did everything by the book; they were clinically outstanding in their practice.<\/span>\u00a0 <\/span>But they projected neither compassion nor caring as they ministered to their patient.<\/span>\u00a0 <\/span>These acted out of duty.<\/span>\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span><\/p>\n

Others were equally proficient from a clinical perspective.<\/span>\u00a0 <\/span>But they had a way of making their patient feel accepted, valued, and cared for.<\/span>\u00a0 <\/span>These acted out of compassion and love.<\/span>\u00a0 <\/span>I am sure that anyone who has spent multiple days in a hospital can relate to the difference.<\/span>\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span><\/p>\n

Well, so it is with our need to give to the Lord.<\/span>\u00a0 <\/span>We need to give to the Lord, not out of duty; but out of love.<\/span>\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span><\/p>\n

God is the giver of all things.<\/span>\u00a0 <\/span>There is nothing that we possess- no talent, no time, and no treasure- that he has not given to us.<\/span>\u00a0 <\/span>Even those things we think we have acquired by our own skill are given to us by God, because without God, we can do nothing.<\/span>\u00a0 <\/span>Every breath that we take, we owe to God, and that is reason enough to love God back and want to give something back to him.<\/span>\u00a0 <\/span><\/p>\n

As to how much we give to him, the more the better.<\/span>\u00a0 <\/span>For as Sirach says, God will give back to us seven-fold.<\/span>\u00a0 <\/span>And God is rich in Mercy to those who love Him.<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Thirtieth Sunday in Ordinary Time Sirach 35: 12-14, 16-18; 2 Tim 4: 6-8, 16-18; Luke 18: 9-14 Dc. Larry Brockman One of the most difficult things for all of us is to discern just how, what, and how much we give to God.\u00a0 I\u2019m not just talking about money, either.\u00a0 Rather, I\u2019m talking about time, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[4],"tags":[433],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.deaconlarry.org\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/895"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.deaconlarry.org\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.deaconlarry.org\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.deaconlarry.org\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.deaconlarry.org\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=895"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"http:\/\/www.deaconlarry.org\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/895\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":898,"href":"http:\/\/www.deaconlarry.org\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/895\/revisions\/898"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.deaconlarry.org\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=895"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.deaconlarry.org\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=895"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.deaconlarry.org\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=895"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}