The Offering Song

If we really want to learn about how to give, we need only look to God. He sent His only Son to us to teach us how to love completely and unselfishly. And teach us He did. He taught us about loving the unlovable; the people in our society who are outcasts or misfits. And He didn’t just talk about it, he did it by giving of his time and eating with those that the community considered unworthy. He did it by taking water offered from a woman of another race, whose past was most certainly tainted.

He also did it by showing us how to provide for our needs and the needs of others without undue worry as to how, because He who created all things will provide. He showed us in that moment when he accepted the offering of 2 loaves of bread and 5 fish and blessed it. Instead of hoarding it for Himself and His disciples He shared it and multiplied it to feed five thousand hungry people. He revealed to us that our gifts too, would be multiplied in the sharing.

And most of all, in giving up His Life, he showed us love through forgiveness and self-sacrifice. He could have lived out His earthly life in seclusion into a ripe old age, writing thoughts about how to forgive others as God has forgiven us. But instead He allowed His Life to be ended at such a young age and with so much suffering, so that we would know the complete and true meaning of being forgiven and forgiving others. It’s not easy to comprehend, and it’s even more difficult to do. But Jesus did it from the very, very, very, very, very, very, very bottom of His heart.

For us.