The Purpose for Giving (Part 2)

As you may have suspected, I am one of those people who has been giving faithfully and wondering where the blessing is. I've been hearing one testimony after another how God is blessing his people. Through it all, I've had one question. "WHERE'S MINE?!"

I'm a believer, I attend a spirit-filled church, I'm involved in the music ministry at that church that I know God has called me into. I have a wonderful, loving wife and a perfect daughter who's beautiful inside and out. Some would think that I've got it all together.

And they would be wrong. Oh, I'm blessed...I am definitely blessed. But only through the grace and love of Jesus Christ. I am far from perfect, with a whole lot still to learn.

The truth is, God has been taking me to the woodshed when it comes to the reason why I give -- why I do anything for that matter. The questions that has permeated my soul lately is, "What is the purpose for my giving?"

I found myself answering that question with things like, "to do the right thing" or "to help feed the hungry" or "to help those in need." But the question kept coming up. When I finally searched deeper, I realized that I was giving what I thought were the right answers, not the honest answer.

The honest answer: I was looking at my situation and giving to get out of it. When you strip everything away and get down to where the rubber meets the road, I wasn't really giving to help others. I was giving for the purpose of receiving. I was giving for myself.

You can plant a seed in fertile ground, but if the seed itself is bad it will never reap a harvest. In other words, when you give to a worthwhile cause but with selfish intention, you'll never see a complete turnaround in your life that your looking for. And any blessing you do get will be temporal.

Feeding the hungry is a worthwhile thing to do, but food is a temporal blessing, not lasting.When it comes to the purpose for giving, the only WAY to a complete and lasting turnaround in your life is to give for the purpose of spreading the Gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ. In that there is real, lasting power.

That is why, with this post, I am rededicating Recipes for Hope to spreading the Gospel and sharing the love of Jesus Christ. Afterall, Jesus is THE true recipe for hope.

The Purpose for Giving (Part 1)

It's easy to get caught up in our problems. Some folks are ridden with debt that they can't pay. Some have marital problems, health problems. Perhaps you've lost your job. Whatever the problem is, the longer it persists it can begin to consume your thoughts.

So often we're taught that in order to receive we must give. We must sow a seed to reap a harvest. Why do we give? Do we give because of a need we have? Do we give with the hope of receiving a financial blessing? Do we give simply because the Bible says we should? There are a lot of reasons people will be motivated to give.

Why then, even though I'm sowing seed, am I not reaping? The key is in the reason you sow a seed and the ground into which you sow.

The Story Behind the Book

Our family attends World Harvest Church (WHC) is Columbus, OH. Currently we are in our 40 day fast for the season of Lent, leading up to Easter. This is also the time when many of us are preparing a special sacrificial offering, or Resurrection Seed, in honor of the sacrifice Jesus made for us, and in celebration of his resurrection. This year my wife and I have decided to step out on faith and let God move by committing one week's income. The reason this is such a big step of faith is because I am currently unemployed. As a result, giving up one week's income would make an already difficult situation even more difficult.

Muddling along on unemployment compensation, looking for work, and trying to build a home based business, we had no idea where the money for this seed would come from.
We realize some would say committing to an amount we really couldn't afford is stupidity; and if we were the ones in control we would agree. But we are not in control. God is. And with God in control, there is no wrong direction.

Anyway, I needed a plan to raise the money for the seed. So I asked God to give me something…someway of coming up with this seed. A few days later I found myself lying in bed, wide awake, at 6 AM with this idea for a cookbook running through my head. I thought to myself, “Why in the world am I awake at 6 in the morning? And why am I thinking about a cookbook?” I rolled over to go back to sleep, but I could not stop thinking about it. Then, with a little prompting from the Holy Spirit (yes, for the doubters, God still does speak to his people), I realized this was the idea I’d asked for. “Why a cookbook?“ I asked. “I've got several sitting on a shelf that rarely get opened.” And I heard these words in my spirit, “Just trust me.” So that’s what we’re doing, trusting Him.

Now we realize that some folks are turned off by this sort of talk. That's fine.
Some will be touch by what we're doing, some will not. Some will feel led to contribute, other will not. We have no control over any of that. We will not hide our faith in God and what he's able to do just to avoid offending a few people.

If you do contribute, you will not just be helping us with our Resurrection Seed, you will be helping to:

• feed millions of starving children and families
• put clothes on their backs
• put a roof over their heads
• provide education to children who otherwise would not have access to it
• restore lives devastated by natural disasters
• etc.

Please consider helping us help them by purchasing our collection of recipes or donating.


Thank you and God bless!