Christmas is a time of year that revolves around gifts and giving. This isn’t a bash on Christmas, because it’s original intent was about a giving a gift. However, like many originally good things, it has been blown off course and been distorted.

Christmas is generally come at in one of two ways:

The first way: Christmas is a time of giving and receiving gifts as well as time off of school and work to be with family. There is an enormous emphasis on getting the right gift and getting the best gift, and much of it becomes about the person giving rather than the person receiving. People are generous, but only to the point where it will benefit them in someway; whether that be reciprocated generosity, or mad props from the person receiving.

The second way: Christmas is a time of giving gifts and being generous to those they care about. They want to get good gifts because they love the person they are giving to and they want them to understand how much they care. They give because they want to bless others at a time of year that is about receiving the greatest gift of all–our Savior.

Now I realize there are more than just these two ways, but thats why it is called a generalization. That isn’t the issue or the argument. The real issue is something God taught me at church.This past Sunday God pointed something out to me during the sermon:

“The One who gave the most will receive the least.”

This is, of course, speaking about God. The whole reason we have Christmas is because He gave us Jesus. John 3:16: “God so loved the world that He gave…”  We spend this holiday giving to everyone around us, Salvation Army, charities, and whatever else; but how much do we give to God?

We may be generous with our time and finances to others around Christmas, but how generous are we with ourselves to God? This year I want to make sure God gets all of me and that He gets more of me than anyone or anything else. He will use me to be generous to others, but first I have to generously give all that I am to Him so that He can use me. God gave more generously than we could ever repay, but I’m not going to let that stop me from trying. Are you?

Generosity: Gen-er-os-i-ty, noun;

The quality of being kind and ready to give more than expected.

Synonyms include: Lavishness, bounteousness, unselfishness, etc, etc.

While brainstorming about this blog, my friend Austin Young was quoting the movie Elf, “The best way to spread Christmas cheer is singing loud for all to hear.” Ideally, I picked up on the idea of pimping his blog because the stuff he writes on his blog is pretty legit. I could seriously have ended the blog right here, seeing as I’m being generous and shouting out to Austin’s blog. However, it doesn’t exactly tell much about generosity.

With Christmas around the corner, it’s interesting to see how my perspective of requesting so many things is slowly (but surely!) turning into the perspective of wanting to give! Perhaps it’s giving away the real reason to celebrate the season, that is the birth of Christ. Lavishness shocks the world more than receiving, seeing as people are generally about themselves. It may seem harsh, but it’s true!

For example, I’d still love to get a few Barnes & Nobles gift cards or even something from Starbucks, but my goal this Christmas is to give, give and give! Whether that be spending time with my family at work, devoting time with my spiritual family, buying the drink of the person behind me in line, I want to be bounteousness this Christmas. Why? Because God gives. When I give with the right heart, I’m reflecting who He is.  Or simply put, “Through generosity, we develop character not selfishness. We become more like Christ!

Counting down the days till HIS birthday,

Benjamin

I am determined to get creative with the ways that I give this Christmas. I don’t plan on spending money that I don’t have on a gift that would be much more appreciated if it were something that I had to make. Or even a visit to the living room to sit by the fire with some coffee, just to chat. My time is what I am giving this Christmas to those who don’t see me that often. (I’m talking about my Illinois peeps.)

I know that this Christmas will be different. My mission is to bring truth to my family who doesn’t know it and to have purposeful conversations with those who already know the truth. I am open to whatever God wants to do through me and in me.

Oh, and I can’t forget- a lot of gift making!

This holiday season we usually try to make a big list, and want to receive more than we actually give.  But is that the right Spirit?  This holiday season is all about Jesus’ birth, but in all honesty who really thinks about that this day in age?  Instead we usually think about Christmas, and all the gifts we get, give, or how much money we spend on someone we care about, or just want to out give a certain person.

Having the “out giving and doing” mindset reminds me of a the TV show Home Improvement. Why?  Because every single Christmas season Tim Taylor tries to out do his neighbor down the street in Christmas decorations.  He gets so carried away in decorations, ” More Power,” and loses track of what the Christmas season is all about.  Yes, I know he has a manger on top of his roof every year, but instead of having the three wise men; He has the three stooges, or an army guy carrying a harpoon gun, or even bozo the clown.  He even looses sight in the “manger scene.”

So if that is not the ” True ” Christmas Spirit- what is?  Well if we look back on what I said in the first paragraph. You can start it with the Birth of Jesus.  But if you fast forward Jesus’ life to the Cross- what was the ultimate price he paid?  He gave his life for all our sins.  So this holiday season I believe we should give our all back to Christ.  I’m not talking about in literal death, but to give what ever we can to Christ.

Proverbs 28:27, ” Whoever gives to the poor will lack nothing, but those who close their eyes to poverty will be cursed.”   Wow, that is a powerful statement.  Now I bet the first thing that came to mind when you read the phrase ” give to the poor”, and thought it was about money.  Well let me give you reassurance.  You don’t have to give money unless you are led by the Lord.  Their is other ways to give than money alone.

And the first example that came to mind about “ways to give than money alone” is found in Acts 3:4-6, “ Peter and John looked at him intently, and Peter said, “Look at us!”  The lame man looked at them eagerly, expecting some money.  But Peter said, “I don’t have any silver or gold for you. But I’ll give you what I have. In the name of Jesus Christ the Nazarene, get up and walk!” ”

So what are some ways to give this Christmas season?  You can share the Good News with others. How?  Do it in your church, your work place, when you are shopping, and in everything you do in your day to day tell others about Jesus Christ.  For we want to be disciples for Jesus, and that means we have to imitate Christ, or in simply terms reflect Jesus in every way.  Don’t pick and chose what you want to do.  For then, you still have control of your life.  But give you whole heart to Jesus Christ, as he gave up his life for us.

1 John 3:16, “ We know what real love is because Jesus gave up his life for us. So we also ought to give up our lives for our brothers and sisters.”  So be in real love, agape love, this Christmas season.  For that is the ultimate gift Jesus gave it, “hope, faith, and love,” so we should not go into hiding with it, but share it with the world.  It is the gift that keeps on giving.

~Kelton Sparky

This Christmas season I have been praying a lot about how I can give  more than any other year. I really want to be a blessing this year and work on receiving less so I can give more. As I was thinking about this, I reflected on who has been the biggest representation of generosity in my life and God pointed out the two people that have been closest to me- my parents.

My Mom and Dad are really awesome. They will give, give, give, and give- and they don’t talk about it- they don’t stress about how they are going to make up for it, they just do it. Ever since I was a kid my Mom would take in Anthony and my friends who didn’t always have the best home situation. She would make them their favorite meals, do their laundry, remember their birthdays and welcome them into our home anytime. My mom’s generosity definitely comes out of compassion, she hates seeing people overwhelmed with their house so she would offer her time and clean their whole house for day.

My Dad is the same way, He is always willing to serve and give. This summer He had 5 of my friends bikes in the garage because they needed to be fixed and he took a few of them back to their houses. He does the same thing with their cars and my car, always checking them for us and helping them pick a trustworthy and reasonable mechanic. My family has only gone on maybe one (barely) two “real vacations” because each time He saves up for one, He ends up blessing someone else with it.

I am not saying this is the only way to be generous, but I look up to my parents so much in this way because they both have taken what their good at ,and what they have been blessed with, and figured out a way to give it. The part that affects me the most is how they never look for recognition, my Dad especially He hates being noticed for it. I’ll probably get in trouble for writing this blog…

I want my life to be like there’s, where I count everything that I have as nothing, and as nothing that is too important to give.

My good friend, Dictionary.com, says the word generous has these meanings:

I love getting christmas presents.

Man, I’m glad I got that out… I admit it, and I’m pretty sure we all like getting new stuff, but why do we get stuff if it’s Jesus’ birthday? Because we were thankful on thanksgiving and we deserve them because of that?

Nope

Ha

If I had to guess why we get presents on christmas I’d say it’s because God loved us so he gave us the perfect gift of Jesus and because we love others we give them gifts and were generous because God was.

It’s good to be thankful and we should be generous to those that we love and that we’re thankful for. I’m not saying that we have to go buy everyone a bunch of gifts, but what are you going to be generous with this Christmas?

I’ve been finding new ways to show love to others this season that don’t involve any spending at all. As your with your family or others this Christmas give things that are important like: Jesus, prayer, encouragement, a helping hand with the dishes, a smile… and see what happens.

Generosity isn’t just buying things and giving.

I am a pretty spoiled individual when it comes to the number of godly influences I have had in my life over the years. Whether it was my parents, my sisters, my Sunday school teacher, or my neighbor, I was daily given the opportunity to witness a life for Christ lived out right in front of me. I learned many lessons from these influential people, but perhaps one of the greatest lessons I learned was how to give.

From a young age I was shown that giving is less about the worth or price of what we give and more about the value God implements in our gifts.

Growing up, we were not the richest family on the block, but we still gave what we could. I say we, even though as a little girl, I obviously had little to do with it, but I witnessed it. I saw how God used the small things we had like hand me downs or a plate of cookies or even something as simple as opening our home up for teens and kids who didn’t have the best home life. everything we gave was pretty ordinary in our hands, but the more we give our ordinary gifts to God for His use, the more extraordinary they become.

As I get older, it is now my turn to get creative with giving not just of my possessions and money, but of myself.  Being the broke student that I am, money isn’t always there to give, but my time and love should always be available for God to give away. I want to be God’s gift to people. I want to love and care for them the way that He would–the way my parents always modeled for me. I want to give until there’s nothing left in me to give.

When Christmas comes around, so many things begin to go through our minds.  We begin to think and wonder, do you think they will like it? how does this look? I hope I got exactly what they wanted. what do you want for Christmas? does everything look perfect?

With all these things going on in our heads, we hardly have time to thing of anything else or to really enjoy the holiday and what it’s really about.  Did you ever really stop and think about what this season is really about?  When I start thinking about Christmas’ real meaning is, I see that it is really about generosity.  I know that’s an obvious one but when I look around it seems like people miss how obvious it is.

Wikipedia defines generosity as “the habit of giving freely without expecting anything in return.  It can involve offering time, assets or talents to aid someone in need.”

You may think, “Hey I give freely.  I always drop a few coins in those little red buckets outside Walmart.”  That’s all fine and good but I have been starting to learn that generosity is more than just dropping a few coins in a bucket.  I think we all have been missing the whole point of Christmas.  I know we don’t normally see this verse as one we would read at Christmas but it is the greatest example of generosity.

“For God loved the world so much that he gave his one and only Son, so that everyone who believes in him will not perish but have eternal life.” – John 3:16 (NLT).

God has been in the habit of giving so freely to us, who are in desperate need, and he know that we can’t even really repay him.  He has willingly given us more than we even deserve and has held nothing back, including his Son.

I don’t know about you but that is the way I want to be when it comes to generosity.  I want people to know that I am willing to give freely and holding nothing back to those in desperate need.  That is the best gift anyone could give or receive anytime of the year.

Generosity is the habit of giving freely without expecting anything in return.

Choosing to be generous, for the most part, defies the way that society thinks we should earn recognition. Instead if doing something “good” to appease those around you, your generosity is found in the time and effort that you put into making someone else’s day better. Generosity means excluding myself from the whole equation, then the heart and motive is not on my own benefit.

Another synonym for generosity is “all heart”. There isn’t any room for the smallest taint or splotch – my approach has to reflect my intentions. So, in this case, it is bringing what my heart is saying and turning it into action. This way, I not only have good intentions, but I am doing something about them – I am loving someone and showing them that they are worth more.

And back to it being a habit, I want this to be my always-focus, not my sometimes-remember. Being generous and not thinking about my own welfare so I can advance another person’s will come naturally if I consistently put them first and leave that last delicious, little, yet chocolatey cookie to someone else.