Psalm 37:25-26 “… l have never seen the righteous forsaken or their children begging bread. They are always generous and lend freely: their children will be a blessing.”
God floats the idea that the generous and their children are blessed, or that the blessed families are generous families. I suppose both are true.
Principle: God blesses America for its generosity and He offers family harmony and prosperity to generous individuals.
One of the reasons for God’s blessing of America is in the record of charitable contributions. Americans gave nearly $450 billion to charitable causes in 2019, which set a new record. Close to 70% of the donations came from individuals as opposed to foundations, corporations or bequests.
Americans in the U.S. compared to all other people in the world – from wealthy to developing nations — are extremely generous. I believe that God is pleased. Some of the blessing and protection from Him is because of that outflow of generosity.
The largest recipient of that $450 billion was religious organizations. They received 28%. of the total. However, the giving record of Christians to their churches is only at about 2% of their gross income. The church has far to go in order to match the ideal minimum of a tithe.
Someone has estimated that if Christians gave a tithe of their income to their churches the whole world could be reached for Christ in one generation, while at the same time being able to minister to the poor of America in a significant way.
Discussion:
1. How have you seen/experienced the Lord’s blessings when you have chosen generosity?
2. What do you think of the phrase “you can’t out-give God”? Have you ever put that to the test?
3. What business decision could you put in place to show God’s generosity to the world?