Freely you received, so freely give!

Luke 14:12-14

Jesus also said to the man who had invited Him, The next time you put on a dinner, don’t just invite your friends and family and rich neighbors, the kind of people who will return the favor. Invite some people who never get invited out, the misfits from the wrong side of the tracks. You’ll be—and experience—a blessing. They won’t be able to return the favor, but the favor will be returned—oh, how it will be returned!—at the resurrection of God’s people.

Food for thought!

Here is a searching passage, because it teaches us the secrets of giving and getting. Jesus is saying, give without expecting to get and then you will indeed get. But if you give expecting to get, you will indeed miss the reward. This story below may help to illustrate the point. 

After serving for more than eighteen years in the U. S. Army, Sam was dishonorably discharged for drinking and fighting. Depressed and unable even to imagine himself holding a steady job, he soon exhausted the little money he had managed to save during his Army career and became a “street person.”

Early one afternoon, while waiting for lunch to be served at a church-run center, Sam answered a call for volunteers to help move some furniture and roll up a rug that needed replacing. It was the first time he had done anything for anyone but himself in quite some time. It really felt good. 

As he was leaving the building after lunch, Sam noticed a heavy growth of moss on the roof that threatened to damage the shingles. He volunteered to remove it. “You’re welcome to help, but you know we can’t pay you,” the supervisor said. Sam went ahead with the work anyway, again experiencing an unexpected good feeling. Sam developed the habit of offering his services FREE whenever he heard of a job he thought he could do. 

It wasn’t long before the center needed a volunteer typist. Since Sam had learned to type in the Army, he again offered his services for FREE, and became an enthusiastic office volunteer. Soon after he began working in the office, Sam moved from the streets to a spare bedroom in the home of one of his co-workers. 

Then, without his asking for it, the manager of the center offered Sam a small salary and increased his responsibilities in the office. Another co-worker offered Sam a good used automobile for a reasonable price, with payments he could easily afford. Today, Sam manages a community food closet operated by the same organization to which he first volunteered his services. He rents his own apartment and is planning to marry.

Sam got what he wanted by learning to offer his services for free. One of the keys to prosperity is realizing that true prosperity doesn’t come by getting more—it comes by giving more! We can prosper by emphasizing what we are giving rather than by concentrating on what we are getting. 

Think of some ways you can use, for FREE, your mind, your energy, and your time, your money, your life. Is there something constructive that you could do that would add to the good of other people? Find some way in which you may give, for FREE, and then do it without expecting to get in return. "Freely you received, so freely give." (Matthew 10:8).

"You cannot be lonely if you help the lonely." (John M. Templeton)