A Generous Spirit

“For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life.”  John 3:16
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Allow me to interrupt this missive to give a huge “Hurray!” to our very own PCA swim coach Kelly Crowley who is competing for the USA Paralympic Cycling Team in London. She captured a bronze medal in the Women’s Individual C 5 Cycling time trial yesterday. She will be competing in the Road Race later this week. Kelly was a gold medalist in swimming in the 2004 Athens Paralympic Games. You can read about her and see a video in this San Jose Mercury News link.
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Can we talk frankly for a couple of weeks? About what you ask? 

• It is the second greatest theme in the Bible next to salvation. 
• It is spoken about in more than 2300 times in God’s word. (That is twice as many verses in the Bible than the topic of faith and prayer…combined.)
• One out of six verses in the NT deal with this subject. 
• Jesus spoke more about this topic than He did about heaven and hell…combined. 16 of His 38 parables were regarding this topic and 15% of Jesus’ recorded words deal with it.

We are going to speak frankly about money and giving.  The essence of Christianity is generosity.  In what is arguably the Bible’s most popular verse, John 3:16, God’s love is declared and then evidenced by His generous giving. For God so loved the world that He gave… The core of God’s nature is to be generous.  It stands to reason therefore that as we grow in conformity to God’s character, we will grow in generosity also.

As we step into this mini-series for the next two weeks called, “Blessed,” I want you to know my heart--I want nothing from you--really!  I want something for you--I want you to experience the freedom that comes through a generous spirit.  We’ll talk more this weekend, but would you sit and ask yourself this question: Do you consider yourself a generous person?  What difference does following Jesus make in your life in this regard? Looking forward to being together this weekend!

I love being your pastor!