In everything I did, I showed you that by this kind of hard work we must help the weak, remembering the words the Lord Jesus himself said: “It is more blessed to give than to receive.”
Acts 20:35
In the words of God’s beloved disciple, Maria Magdelana, “A givers hands are never empty.” I do not believe that it is coincidence that when we give of ourselves to something bigger than us, we inherently feel as if we got more than we gave. It isn’t coincidence, it is in our design. The feeling of fulfillment when we give; The freedom that comes with the release of worldy stuff; it is a natural consequence of becoming more like Christ. When Jesus simplified His expectations for us by giving us the greatest of the commandments: “Love God and Love others”, I believe He was giving us the blueprint to our architecture.
I was so struck after my first trip to Nicaragua. Eternally altered, though initially I couldn’t exactly figure out how or even why. It wasn’t as if I had never served before or been around those less fortunate. Then, on the ride home from the airport, while talking through my experience with my sister, she said something to me that has haunted me ever since. I so desperately wanted to understand how the people there could be so different and she conjectured that maybe it wasn’t just how different they were there, but also how different I was there. While we were in Nicaragua, that’s all there was. Loving God. And Loving others. There was no stuff. There was no work. There were no bills. No billboards trying to sell us something. There was just us missionaries, God, and a people who needed both. I was eternally altered because I had gotten a glimpse of how He created it to be.
A life of loving and serving without reservation is what He is beckoning us to. It is more blessed to give than to receive, because the reward that awaits he who gives his life away is beyond anything that this earth can provide or even comprehend. It isn't tangible or even visible here because it's deeper than that. It's inherent.
