Kissed By an Elephant

The Giving Project

OK, so I haven't updated my blog in over a month. I blame... something or someone else but give me time to think about it. I also failed to go to my one-month follow-up eye appointment after my Lasik but I'll take full responsibility for that one. So, let's get caught up to speed, shall we?

After the Incident of the Prophetic Turkey, I learned that my church was offering "The Twelve Outreaches of Christmas." Twelve different outreach opportunities to try - something for everyone as it were. Like getting up early? Try the "Black Friday" outreach. Head over to the retailers where people are standing in line waiting to get in, and pass out hot chocolate. Like babysitting? Try the outreach providing free child care to families with disabled children so Mom and Dad can get out and do some Christmas shopping together. Like random acts of kindness? Try putting together a Christmas basket and delivering it to some random person in your neighborhood while caroling. As for me? I was gung-ho about the "Christmas Tree Giveaway."

The gist of the Christmas Tree Giveaway was that the church would be setting up several small tree lots around town. When people showed up and picked out the tree, they discovered the tree was free (hence the label "giveaway"). How cool is that? I loved this idea. I couldn't wait to show up. I couldn't wait to show people God's love in a practical way. You can't earn God's love, it's just yours for the taking. We don't deserve it, we just receive it. You don't pay for it, you just get it for free. Here, take this tree and remember that He is willing to give you eternal salvation if you'll just agree to take it.

Procrastination is not my friend. By the time I got around to visiting the website to sign up for the Christmas tree outreach, all of the volunteer opportunities were filled. Well, except for the "Meet at the church and help us load the Christmas trees onto the trucks" slots but there are a host of reasons why that was not something I was interested in. Including sweating, wearing work gloves, and getting pricked in the fact with pine needles. So again, like the time we showed up too late for the prophetic turkey thing, I was deflated and felt that I was not able to serve in the way I wanted to serve.

Something funny happened (again) during church that week. I realized "I don't need the church to organize an outreach for me! I can do my OWN outreach! There is no reason why I couldn't, say, go to a tree lot and buy someone's tree for them!" And the more I thought about it, the more an idea formed in my head.

At this point, if you are my church pastor, you may ask yourself why I wasn't listening to the uber-powerful message being given that morning. But I can assure you, I was. The outreach idea only formed during the pauses. Busy morning for my brain.

Here is the idea that came to me: I decided to allocate $100/month, above and beyond our current tithe and charitable giving, to a "Giving Project." The plan is that each month during 2010, I would give away $100 in whatever way and to whatever person/organization/cause that I felt God was leading me to. After the Incident of the Prophetic Turkey, I realize that I may really not be terribly clear on this and I may never feel that sense of fulfilling God's purpose or calling, but I'm willing to give it a shot. The hardest part is really that whole "listening to God" thing, but that's actually the point of the exercise.

I have two goals for this project: 1) learn how to go where God leads me (which means learning how to really HEAR Him), and 2) develop a more generous spirit. Both of these present significant obstacles as by nature I often lean towards glorifying myself rather than glorifying God. For this reason, I suspect God may very well hide from me the outcome of my generosity lest I become prideful and boastful. But I'm up for the challenge. Today is January 31st and I did find a way to give this past month. However, seeing as how I had to take all this time just outlining the project - more evidence that procrastination is not my friend - I'll have to tell you about the January giving another time.

Let this serve as a lesson to me to update my blog more regularly.

Labels: charity, church, generosity, giving

posted by Kermit the Vixen @ 11:19 AM 0 comments