It is often difficult to be generous. It is hard to give freely of our time, our resources, our hearts.
It is often difficult to trust. It is hard to open ourselves to others, leaving ourselves vulnerable to betrayal.
It is often difficult to see the abundance that is in God, and perhaps this is why it is so difficult to give it all away.
The widow whom Jesus noticed giving up her last coins in the temple could see this abundance. She saw how beautiful and full living in God’s life could be. She saw what we must open our own eyes to see: that we can only be generous and trust God with our lives when we see that our life in God, this kingdom of God here on earth, is abounding in life and love and joy.
Yes, we live in a broken, fallen world, but we don’t have to wait for the end of all things for God’s rule on earth to begin. Something occurred in creation when Jesus was raised from the dead. Something began at the resurrection that begins to bring God’s new life to this earth here and now. Paul speaks of us, among other things, as a new creation in Christ. I am not a theologian, so I do not pretend to understand how this happens or even exactly what is occurring.
Yet perhaps part of what this means is that we are called to bear witness to the perfect life in God, the perfect life of Genesis 1 & 2 and Revelation 21 & 22. We are called to live life in a way that bears witness to the perfection that we as well as all of creation will become, and perhaps simply living a witness kind of life is the way in which we are right now bringing God’s kingdom to fruition in our world.
When we act, as followers of Jesus Christ in the world, as if the limitations of this world set the boundaries for how we can act, then we are…failing in our witness to the cosmic redemption that has been accomplished in Jesus Christ ~ Jonathan Wilson, author of God’s Good World: Reclaiming the Doctrine of Creation
So let us live lives full of generosity and trust, opening our eyes to the abundance of life around us. The very same abundance that is ours in a witness life in Christ.
Art Credit: The Widow’s Mite by James Tissot