Generosity

From the Salvation Army, you're listening to Wonderful Words of Life. Welcome back to Wonderful Words of Life.

I'm Bernie Dake, and I'm with Cheryl Gillum. Cheryl, it's been a pleasure to be with you. We go back so many years. We do.

And it's fun to just be in a comfortable place talking to our friends out there listening. We hope you've been enjoying this series on finance. Today, Mike and I begin to discuss generosity. And to start today, he focuses on being the recipient of someone else's generosity. Cheryl, do you or Tim have stories about people that have been generous to you in your appointments as a Salvation Army officer?

Yeah, absolutely. I mean, there's times when you're in ministry where the funds run dry, and you find yourself in real need. And there's been times where we have had to pray the funds in. And in particular, I remember being in our second appointment, and I was the bookkeeper at that point. And that's back when we had the actual paper.

We didn't have a computer. And so I thought, I mean, we were in such desperate need of funds to keep the lights on. And I remember laying my hands on the actual book to say, Lord, we're in need, and we need a miracle. And we needed a specific amount of money. We needed $35,000 to keep the lights on. And we prayed that morning, both Tim and I did.

And I'm not lying, that afternoon, a check came in for $35,000. Praise the Lord. And that's the God that we serve.

He supplies, and He speaks into other people's hearts. And we were recipients of that generosity that day. Amen.

Wow. I believe a generous heart comes from a thankful heart. Do you agree?

I absolutely. We mentioned this earlier on in the series, but in episode two, we talked about the stress of money, and that thankfulness leads to peace. And peace is the enemy of stress. How does that statement hit you, Cheryl? Yeah, because I think that when you start to count your blessings, right, there is something that wells up within you that you want to give.

You need a release of that in some way in your life. And so I think it's important that we practice that thankfulness because out of that comes our own ability to give generously to other people. And for me as a development director, as a person who got to interact with a lot of donors or volunteers, I saw people that even they didn't want recognition. They just wanted to have a peace in their own heart about being able to help or give back. Have you seen that?

Yeah, absolutely. So many people that we come into contact with don't want their name out there. They don't want the recognition because that's not the heart from which it comes. It comes out of a heart of wanting to give to others because they have been generously blessed themselves. On behalf of the Salvation Army, we are grateful for your partnership with us in ministry.

To the radio station you may be hearing this episode on, thank you. And to all of the very generous donors that come alongside with us, literally shoulder to shoulder in this ministry, thank you. Thank you for your contribution and know that we do it in Jesus' name and to God alone be the glory. For me the thought is infinitely such that it's too hard for me to touch.

You won't let Welcome back everybody. I hope that you are enjoying this series with our friend Mike Harris about financial things and the biblical perspective on various financial things in life. Today we're going to talk about the idea of generosity and Mike and I have been sort of talking in the background about different ideas and I'm going to turn this over to you right away Mike and say, teach us how we might be able to be generous as Christian people with our finances. Generosity is something that comes from within, we have to believe that but what I've got to focus on I think in this is the position that we are in or I'm in as a Salvation Army officer because what we experience as Salvation Army officers is people's generosity manifesting itself in the lives of people. This country has a lot of rich people.

You Google the ten richest people in the world, I think seven of them live here in the States including the top two or three, I mean it's a remarkable amount of wealth and you ponder very often, you know, what is the reason that people get rich? Well I think when done right, wealthy people should naturally be generous people because they're in a position to make a difference and I think true generosity comes from the notion or the idea of giving something, believing it will make a difference and so what happens for us in the Salvation Army is we see generous people giving us their resources typically in the form of money. Believing something good will happen with that and I try to think of a good illustration and the nice thing is there are so many illustrations I could use to show how someone's donation someone's generosity has manifested itself in a life changed and I think if I might I'd like to share this story because in our second appointment we were in Hickory, North Carolina it was a most wonderful place, the most wonderful community that supports a big Salvation Army. Most people would never have heard of Hickory, some have considered it to be the best kept secret in the South as far as the Salvation Army is concerned and so amongst the programs we have there, we have a homeless shelter, an emergency shelter, there's a Salvation Army Boys and Girls Club, it's where the Salvation Army and the Boys and Girls Clubs of America have kind of got together, created one of the best partnerships you find in the non-profit world and created these Salvation Army Boys and Girls Clubs. So there's a lady who lived in Hickory whose husband was horribly abusive, I mean horribly abusive, they had three children and every Friday night, it wasn't just Fridays but certainly every Friday, dad would get paid, he'd come home drunk and as soon as he came in the house the oldest of the three children would pull the other two into a closet, pull coats over their heads so that when mom got beat by dad they couldn't hear her screams and when the noise had finished the oldest brother would come out just to make sure mom wasn't dead this time. That's the life they lived for years, he was the kind of man that checked the mileage on the car to make sure the wife didn't go anywhere, put his hand on the hood, this woman was imprisoned by her husband for years and that's the life these kids grew up with until one day she got the courage, she got the courage to load her children into a car and had nowhere to go except the Salvation Army, she knew there was a shelter, shelter run and operated by the generosity of people because people had sent money our way believing we'd do something. So this woman gets into the shelter and someone smarter than me and it's before I'd arrived in Hickory that this occurred, saw potential in her and offered her work. In the meantime the three children had all been affected in some way by what had happened in their lives but they were brought into the Boys and Girls Club, again something funded by the generosity of people and once we'd arrived what we saw there was a woman that was working her way back up in life, got a bit of confidence again, an oldest son with a severe form of Asperger's syndrome, been told by doctors he would always be living at home, could never be self-sufficient, a middle child who could have panic attacks at any particular moment and the youngest child with the level of ADD I've never seen in my life and I've seen a lot of kids in the army burning and in our five years there we watched as this Boys and Girls Club and people around and it includes the congregation very much come alongside this family to the point that when we left mum was the executive director of the Boys and Girls Club, the oldest son was going to college and he got a full scholarship as a wrestler, he's the kid who said you'll always be at home, you'll never be able to participate in team events or sports, you'll never succeed in school, off to college he goes with this thing.

The middle child was excelling in sports and tuba burning, he played tuba and the daughter there was really really coming into herself. Now I tell you that story, none of that could have happened, none of it if people had not been generous and believed something great would happen and when you put God into the mix, and in the Salvation Army he's front and centre, should always be, when you put God into the mix miracles happen. So generosity surely is something that is inspired by the heart, this need to give to something bigger than me or different to me or something that can make a difference and so therefore there's a trust element that goes with that but on the back end of it and sitting there as a Salvation Army officer and as I said Bernie I could have told many many stories that was simply one that I could think of that I wanted to share immediately, that's what happens. So please know that generosity is something God inspired and that God will always always use.

Amen. I think it's important for our listeners to know this is not a sales pitch, we're not raising money for the Salvation Army through this episode but it's a great example of how the sum of many donations can equal something greater than you could ever imagine. There are other ministries out there, of course the Salvation Army would love to use your money and I would say if you are considering giving to any organisation, particularly a non-profit organisation, there are other companies out there that act as watchdog organisations like the Chronicle of Philanthropy. You can look up the stewardship aspects of an organisation like the Salvation Army, for instance if you give us a dollar today you need to know that there are administrative costs associated with that dollar and at one point we were reported to spend 87 cents of every dollar given to us would go right back to meeting human need in Jesus name which means the other 13 cents is going to administrative costs. All organisations have that kind of thing.

It's the cost of doing business. It is the cost of doing business and you'll want to know, particularly with us as of course as Salvation Army people, we're a little biased. I love when other people talk about the Salvation Army, for example we've been called Christianity with its sleeves rolled up. Now we don't believe in faith by works but certainly faith without works is dead and we want to encourage you as listeners, if you have an opportunity to be generous or you're considering being generous, reach out to those people that you see doing good things in your community. If it's the Salvation Army, to God be the glory but if there are other Christians in your community support them as well as much as you can.

We hope that you're enjoying this series with our friend Mike Harris and pray that you'll come back and hear more next week on Wonderful Words of Life. The Salvation Army's mission, Doing the Most Good, means helping people with material and spiritual needs. You become a part of this mission every time you give to the Salvation Army. Visit salvationarmyusa.org to offer your support and we would love to hear from you. Email us at radio at uss.salvationarmy.org. Call 1-800-229-9965 or write us at P.O.

Box 29972 Atlanta, Georgia 30359. When you contact us, we'll send you our gift for this series. It's totally free for listeners like you, one per household while supplies last. You can also subscribe to our show on iTunes or your favorite podcast store and be sure to give us a rating. Just search for Wonderful Words of Life. Follow us on social media for the latest episodes, extended interviews and more. And if you don't have a church home, we invite you to visit your local Salvation Army worship center. They'll be glad to see you. This is Bernie Dake inviting you to join us next time for The Salvation Army's Wonderful Words of Life.