Generous

Fr Richard Healey reflects on the profound themes of generosity and abundance through the lens of Jesus’ teachings. Drawing from personal anecdotes and biblical stories, particularly Elijah and the widow of Sidon, RH illustrates the transformative power of giving. Despite life’s challenges and fears of scarcity, we are invited to trust in God’s provision and live generously. By embracing a lifestyle of giving, we not only help others but also enrich our own lives, fostering a deeper sense of community and connection. Join us as we explore how to embody generosity in our daily lives.

00:00:00 Yesterday I went to the birthday party of one of my God daughters. Jillian turned 12. So it was, you know, wonderful to to arrive and be part of all of the the celebrations there. But you know, that experience when you go to a function like that or someone invites you around for this big dinner and that experience of just the the generosity of other people, knowing that there’s going to be more than enough food or enough drink, there’s plenty to go around. You’re not worried. You’re not concerned. That experience of the abundance of the generosity of God, we invited into that experience. You know, Jesus had that sense, that attitude and so much of what he did and said that freedom that he experienced, you know, when he so often he would remind the disciples, consider the lilies of the field. You know, they haven’t worked and toiled, but look how amazing, how beautiful they are. Look up. Look at the birds in the sky. They don’t have places to to call home necessarily, but they are free in their their experience of life.

00:01:15 And so also for us to have that same experience of the freedom. But so often, you know, life has kind of beat us down. Life has kind of pushed us, and we begin to distrust the generosity of others. We imagine that the world is actually just a very scarce place, that there isn’t the abundance of food, there isn’t enough resources to go around. And so we grab hold of whatever we can, and we hold it as tight as we possibly can to prevent anybody else from being able to to steal our stuff, to take away our joy. But in so doing that very act of holding that, very active of trying to grab as much as you possibly can. You know, of having your fist so clenched around your stuff. There isn’t the freedom that we’re invited into this space, this invitation to a place of freedom, a place of generosity. And we know that Jesus didn’t come from a rich background. You know, when we read about the offerings that Mary and Joseph made on his behalf.

00:02:27 It wasn’t the normal offering prescribed by the law. It was a concession that was there for those who were poor. The couldn’t afford, couldn’t afford to offer a fattened lamb that they were able to offer two pigeons instead. And so that sense that Jesus is already coming from a frail and humble background, but then we presume that Joseph has died. At this point, there’s no mention of Joseph After the time when Jesus was 12 and went with the family to the pilgrimage to Jerusalem to make the celebration of the festival there. So at some point after that, Joseph has died. And so Mary is a widow. Mary is there. We don’t know how she makes a living. It was almost impossible in that period for any woman who had been widowed to to do anything that was able to, to provide enough for her family. And so that profound sense of scraping, of begging, of borrowing or just calling upon others in the community to provide for her needs. And so Jesus experienced all of this as he continued to grow.

00:03:41 And perhaps that’s why he stayed home as long as he did, to provide for his mother, to make sure that she had enough so he was able to understand the needs of the poor, the those who were so desperate. It’s why so many of his parables are addressed to those who are on the edge, those who are marginalized. Because that was his own personal experience of growing up and experiencing that deprivation himself. And so when we feel empty, when we feel that we’re afraid of what might happen in the future, there is that sense that we can we can trust in Jesus, that he will understand what that is about. He will be there and join us in solidarity with that experience of of uncertainty and fear and anxiety. And there’s so much of that in our world. And yet he invites us into this space of generous living in the examples that were given today of this widow in the first reading, a widow of Sidon, a widow, not even a Jewish woman. She is a pagan, a foreigner, and she is part of that community that Elijah is trying to to battle against.

00:04:59 The whole experience that he has against King Ahab and his wife Jezebel, who comes from that family, that people who comes as an outsider bringing the worship of the God of the Baals rather than the worship of Israel. And Jezebel had taken the heart of Ahab and led him astray. And so it’s a really weird thing for Elijah to try and find refuge with a woman who comes from that lineage, a woman who’s equally destitute, even more destitute, because all she has is she’s backed down now to just a little bit of oil, a little bit of meal. That’s the whole sum total of her possessions. And so she’s going to make this one final offering, gathering a few sticks together. She doesn’t even have wood enough for a fire. And so she’s trying to get what she can in order to make this final meal so that she and a son are able to at least have something to eat, thinking this is going to be the last of it. There’s no no more resources, nothing more that she can depend on.

00:05:58 And so this is it. She’s offering this to, to offer just that experience of, well, this is all I have, this is what I will have. And then she will die because she will starve to death after that. And then Elijah, in this great kind of act of, of male bravado, kind of says here, can you give me a drink of water? Can you get me a little baked scone? And the woman is like, but I don’t even have enough for myself. But yet he was instructed by the Lord to go to this woman. He was instructed to go and to meet this lady there on the outskirts of Sidon. And so he does, and he invites her, will you make some for me as well? And that’s when she tells the story. And yet something in her recognizes something in him. No, she says that your God, that I will do this for your sake. Not because there’s any belief in Yahweh. There’s no experience of that. And yet she sees something in Elijah, that openness, the calls from her, this experience of generosity.

00:07:02 And so often people who are on the edge, people who are so fragile and don’t have what they are able to, you know, there’s nothing that they can rely on, nothing that they can depend upon. And so all that they have, they’re able to freely offer. And this woman does just that. And thankfully, there is this miracle. Thankfully, there is this transformation and that there is enough to keep her through this period of drought and provide for her and her son during this time. And so that sense, that experience that when we don’t believe that we can trust, when we’re feeling hard pressed, we’re not able to muster any of those experiences of generosity. Even in those moments, especially in those moments, we’re invited into this space of generosity. One of the interesting facts is that it has been demonstrated statistically, the people who are more generous, people who volunteer their time service within community groups are more likely to live longer and are more likely to avoid all kinds of disease and sickness.

00:08:08 So if you are afraid of getting sick, if you are afraid of of losing all of your stuff, one of the five ways to overcome that is by being generous and by serving others, by giving yourself in service to others, the surefire ways. One of the other facts of of the research has indicated that people who take a day off each week, people who keep the Sabbath, people who are able to experience the presence of God in that way, actually live up to ten years longer than people who don’t. That’s an extraordinary reality, isn’t it, that if we begin to do what the Lord is inviting us into, simply surrender? Stop trying to possess and occupy and do all those things 24 hours a day. If we’re able to surrender, to give to others, to be generous, to serve others, that we will live longer, better, and healthier than the alternative. So the Lord is inviting us into this space of generosity, into this place where we stop holding and we start recognizing the needs of those around us.

00:09:17 We start to live out the Golden Rule, the commandment that we heard last week to love the Lord your God and to love your neighbor as yourself. That is, the Lord transforms us and changes our hearts. Let’s indeed invite him to be there for us, to call us into this generosity, to call us and to give us this freedom, to overcome our fears and to allow the God of grace to bring us into a place where we can give generously to those around us.