Do you have enough? Do you have extra? Are you willing to share from your extra? Would you like others to share with you from their extra? Have you thought that by helping one another each of us has what we need?
It is countercultural for us to think about sharing with one another when we live in a culture that continues to tell us to acquire more and more. Our mind is set on getting the next new shiny object. We do not even think about those that have next to nothing.
Homelessness and poverty continue to increase in our communities and across our country. The recent pandemic has made it worse. People lost their jobs. Corporations downsized. Businesses learned how to reduce overhead by allowing people to work from home. Some who worked from home were not nearly as productive and were released from their jobs.
True, we see a lot of help wanted signs in business windows. But when you go from a $60 an hour job to a $15 an hour job, you no longer have the means to make your house payment. Think about it. You now make twenty-five percent of what you made before. Something has to give. When house payments are not made, banks foreclose, people are put out on the streets.
Paul tells the church in Corinth to share. He states a truth we do not want to hear. There will be times when we have plenty or extra. Those are times we can share with others. There will be times when we do not have enough. Those are times others can share with us.
I pray we all open our eyes and see what is going on around us. I pray we see the homelessness and poverty in our communities. I pray each one of us will have a heart for sharing from our blessings. Look around your community. See the poor. See the homeless. Be willing to share.
2 Corinthians 8:13-15 Our desire is not that others might be relieved while you are hard pressed, but that there might be equality. At the present time your plenty will supply what they need, so that in turn their plenty will supply what you need. The goal is equality, as it is written: “The one who gathered much did not have too much, and the one who gathered little did not have too little.”
Marty Pressey 