Giving Good Gifts

James 1:17 Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of lights.

During the Christmas season, we often focus on the giving and the getting of gifts. This is a great impulse that shows how the Christian holiday still impacts the larger culture. Christmas, after all, is a celebration of the greatest gift ever given, namely God giving Himself to the world in the form of the baby Jesus. The world may have perverted the idea of gift giving into merely a giving and receiving of material gifts, but we can and should continue to give in the way God gives. Here are a few Biblical principles of giving that can help us give like Jesus.

First, our giving should be done willingly and gladly. Paul tells the Corinthians in 2 Cor. 9:7 that each person should give what they want from their heart, and that God loves a cheerful giver. He reminds them how much God gives them, and that they will receive a reward from the Lord for their giving. The reward for giving to the Lord would not necessarily be material, but rather comes in the form of deepened relationship with God and others. Furthermore, while they were giving to God, the actual money was going to poor Christians in Israel who needed material help, so by giving to God, they ended up help fellow believers too.

When we give out of love to other people, we are ultimately giving back to God. This understanding of giving will lessen the transactional nature of giving that our modern society has. Many people give big gifts because they want to see the reactions of those receiving the gifts and to hear the praise about how great the gift was. Sometimes this comes out of an emotional need to be needed, rather than loving desire to see the best for the other person. If when we give, we are simply giving it all to God then we trust Him and have joy in Him regardless of the reaction of the individual getting the gift.

This will also help us learn the second lesson of giving, namely that we need to learn to give sacrificially just as Jesus did for us. Many of us in America are very wealthy compared to the rest of the world and people throughout history. We can give a lot and not really feel the loss in any real way. Thus we need to learn how to give up something of value to us for the sake of giving to others. In Mark 12:41-44, we see Jesus pointing out that a poor widow who only gave a few cents to the temple actually gave more to the Lord than did the rich people because she gave all that she had to the Lord. 

I have often experienced that people who have the least are often those who are most generous. In my first ministry, the poorest family in the church always had and open door and was always willing to have you join them for a meal, while the wealthiest family never had me in their house in the three years even though I was on their doorstep several times.

To learn how to give sacrificially, we need to examine the areas of our lives, both time and money, to which we hold on the tightest. We then need to give those areas over to the Lord and ask Him how we might give these very things away to show His love to others. Perhaps you can find a needy family have your whole family give them Christmas presents. Operation Christmas Child, Angel Tree, and many local ministries focus on the needs of people who might otherwise not get gifts. You could also spend time helping at a mission or find some other way to serve your community. In these ways, we can both learn to give up our time and money and also help people who have real needs.

Finally then, if our giving is really to be a reflection of the love of God, then we need to give wisely. God desires to give good gifts to His children (Matthew 7:11), but He does not always give us what we want. Rather when we ask, he gives us what we need.

So when we give we need to make sure that we do not give gifts that may end up being harmful. For instance, giving a pocket knife to three year old would not be wise, but giving a cellphone or gaming console to a preteen may be just as harmful if they do not have the discipline necessary to set limits on their time or the content they watch. We could also end up hurting our family or ourselves if we go into debt to give gifts. We are not loving others well if in buying the present we give away the future. 

By learning these biblical principles of giving we become more like the ultimate giver of good gifts and become part of giving His love to the world.