After a few holidays away from home, you learn some things about yourself. I discovered that I could do without the tree, without the presents and even (gulp) without my family — but one year, I realized that I was longing for some tangible connection with my closest friends. I wanted to buy real cards, add notes with a real pen, and drop them in the mail — so they could hold them in their hands on the other end.
I didn’t have a lot of money, but I knew Who to talk to. And (delightful proof that He doesn’t always say “Wait”), by that evening, I held a card in my hands. Inside was this:
One hundred Norwegian kronors.
Here’s the sweet and humbling part: It came from a friend who can’t be any richer than I was. She’s soft-spoken and snowy-haired, hands crippled up with some affliction. She’s a life-long single who recently survived a bout with cancer. And for all that, she’s got a spirit as youthful and refreshing as a girl’s.
She sent me her widow’s mite, which proved to be worth…just the amount of shekels that went into mailing my cards. She sent me more, though: a clear reminder that my Heavenly Father sees and hears my needs, a sense of joy and satisfaction in connecting with friends at home…and who knows? Perhaps some encouragement for them as well.
God’s way of giving is so utterly incongruous:
In a severe test of affliction, their abundance of joy and their extreme poverty have overflowed in a wealth of generosity
How is this possible?
He who supplies seed to the sower and bread for food will supply and multiply your seed for sowing…You will be enriched in every way to be generous in every way.
The result?
This…is not only supplying the needs of the saints but is also overflowing in many thanksgivings to God.
Let’s think a moment about His inexpressible gift to us! For the raising of our Messiah, we are debtors to a peasant man and his teenaged wife. For news of our Messiah, we have shepherds, fishermen, and tentmakers to thank. As word passed from mouth to mouth, and people paid the price to believe, we owe something to slaves who spilled their blood in Rome, and generation after generation since, of ordinary people who lived the good news, died the good news, and carried the good news to us.
What better reminder than Christmas that in God’s economy, all are equipped to give — and often the poorest of us, the richest of gifts.
PS In honor of my generous friend — and of Jesus’ birthday! — I’d love to send five of you a postcard, from my side of the ocean to yours. Leave me a comment with a question (or two or three) you’d like me to answer on your card, and I’ll contact you for your name and mailing address.
Elisabeth Adams 