Tag Archives: generosity

Lent, generosity and choice

Posted on by

It’s lent and so a time where many people decide to give something up. Favourites seem to be chocolate, biscuits, cake or coffee. Some people do all of them! There are also those who will give up a particular activity, such as Facebook or watching TV. However my favourite lent activity is not giving up, but trying to be more generous. The 40 acts campaign has been run for a few years and has excellent ideas and things to do in order to be generous. A couple of years ago I blogged about their hospitality idea. Today though, I was thinking about generosity in general.

I find that I quite enjoy being generous. Those times when you feel that you can freely give to others, maybe beyond their expectations, do make you feel good. These generous acts don’t all need to be about money, time, skills and effort can make a huge impact as well. I will again recommend 40 acts  to get you thinking about this. Small acts, giving someone a lift, spending time to have a chat, buying someone a drink or having people over for dinner can have a positive effect on us, as well as others. At Chennai Challenge we have been blessed with generosity from many places. Many people have been generous with their money in donating to us, others have used their time and skills to raise money for us, others, the generosity of venues being given for free. That is not even everywhere we have been fortunate, every team member has been generous with their time and skills in coming on the project and in India we have had huge generosity shown to us in terms hospitality. So a big thank you to everyone who has been generous towards us, it is greatly appreciated.

Back to 40 acts. Today’s challenge is all about choice, and letting someone else make a choice about what to do in your leisure time. The idea of choice is really central to what we do at Chennai Challenge. One of the hallmarks of poverty is a lack of choice. We are trying to increase the choice that people have. One big way we try to do this is by supporting education. Both Oasis and the YMCA run education programs, the YMCA with 2 schools and Oasis working in communities. Giving people an education starts to give people choices. The choice or career rather than being forced into one. The choice of how they live their life. I think that that is important.

So once again thank you for your generosity, please continue to be so, and lets help increase the choice that people have.

 

Personal Challenges

Posted on by

Human nature is a funny thing. We always want the latest phone with all the apps, the newest car, the football shirt for this season etc. but are we ever happy with what we get or do we always think we can do better?

Today I visited the Education Show ready to get bags of freebies and the best deals possible. Ambling round the stalls, my colleagues and I were moaning about the lack of freebies and the absence of generosity from the retailers. Even though in my hand I held numerous bags containing; CD roms, pens, pencils and glue sticks (a much-needed teacher resource!) which I managed to obtain without burning too much of a hole in my pocket! As I was nearing the end of the enormous trek around the NEC, I stumbled across an outdoor play retailer. The friendly stall guide began his sales pitch trying to persuade us to buy these amazing products. After the pitch he asked about the facilities already in place. As I began to reel off the items within our brand new school I saw his eyes light up and a smile spread across his face. He was amazed by the facilities our school provides for our children. The discussion quickly changed to how fortunate the children are. At this point I was very quick in explaining how the children don’t see this and they will only learn the true value of our facilities when they leave in Yr6 and no longer have access to them. This was a great reminder to me that we all struggle with being grateful for what we have. When was the last time you thought about how fortunate you are?

For the last two years I have accompanied Chennai Challenge to India and for most team members the hardest issue to deal with personally is this issue of us individually being too materialistic. These trips not only allow us to help the deprived and disadvantaged, they challenge us to think about the way in which we live our lives and our personal attitudes and values. I was particularly challenged through seeing the lack of possessions the children at the Boys Town have. I tell no lie when I say they can fit all their possessions in a small suitcase the size of my hand-luggage case! When I think about this and compare it to the possessions of children within my Yr6 class it disappoints me that they cannot see their fortunes and maybe adopt a more gracious attitude.

The people of Chennai live for what they have rather than what they don’t have. Jealousy and greed are two emotions that can drive us as humans however I believe that we need to adopt an attitude of gratitude, focusing on what is right in our lives and be thankful for those things. This opportunity to visit Chennai not only affects the people who we go and help but it allows us to adapt our personal views and in turn highlight to others how lucky we all are. I can’t wait to return this year to see what a difference we made last year and how we can help now!

Generosity and Cakes

Posted on by

Today I made £575 for Chennai. Now, I’m not saying this to make myself sound good (Although my cake baking skills are pretty epic) I’m saying this to illustrate what can be achieved through a little resolve, and the humbling generosity of others. (With a little help from God, of course)

My church mission committee elected to give me a cheque of £400. This is a staggering amount, but I found myself, while extremely grateful, completely taking this in my stride. It was no less than I expected -

You see, earlier I had had people paying me for cupcakes in notes. I’m not pretentious enough to assume my humble cakes were good enough to warrant such expenditure – no, I knew they were giving me the money because they believed in me and Chennai Challenge, or what I had said at any rate -

You see, earlier I had had the privilege of talking to my church about Chennai Challenge – what it is, what we are about – what we hope to achieve with the help of our God. I could see that what I was saying was going down well. It all fitted in.

You see, earlier our vicar had done a great talk on stewardship – particularly the start of Philippians 2, where Paul talks about showing others the ultimate comfort that is the love of God – and he touched upon the fact that our very abilities to love and to give are gifts from God. He used cakes as a yummy visual metaphor to show the giving of ourselves. It was perfect, it made what I said all the more relevant, and my cakes all the more enticing. Which was a huge relief to me.

You see, earlier I was sitting on my bed, feeling weary, worrying about what on earth I was going to say.

It’s funny when everything fits together like that. It’s almost as if someone is up, looking down, working it all out.

Birthday on the first day of Lent….

Posted on by

Ok, so I know it’s only 24 hours since my last post, but this is too good a blog opportunity.  That’s right. It’s my birthday today.  But it is also the first day of lent.  Does one sense a difficult problem? Can I eat any chocolate today? Can I have a drink? I ate pancakes last night (and although we were extravagant, we didn’t finish off the luxury items in the cupboards!) so have I committed to giving up life’s indulgences even if it’s my birthday? I hope not because I think I’m going out tonight!

So, what exactly is lent?  Well, the source of all knowledge on the internet, Wikipedia has this to say:

Lent in the Christian tradition, is the period of the liturgical year leading up to Easter. Lent is a time of sacrifice for Jesus. The traditional purpose of Lent is the preparation of the believer — through prayer, repentance, almsgiving and self-denial — for the annual commemoration during Holy Week of the Death and Resurrection of Jesus, which recalls the events linked to the Passion of Christ and culminates in Easter, the celebration of the Resurrection of Jesus Christ.

All seems a little ‘high church’ to me.  I was not brought up in a household that put a huge emphasis on the traditions of lent.  I mean, we had pancakes on Shrove Tuesday, and I was aware of it I suppose, but we didn’t observe it with fasting.  In fact I don’t really remember giving anything up at all.  In modern culture (let alone Christian culture) it seems to have become a time to give things up or deprive yourself of chocolate/coffee/biscuits/anything nice, regardless of what you believe about JC.

I’m not so sure about that.  Obviously it is a time to remember the 40 days that Jesus spent in the desert immediately following his baptism.  His baptism at which he heard the voice of the Father say ‘This is my son, in him I am well pleased’, and the Spirit of God came to him.  What were these 40 days about?  Well I think they must have been preparation, like Mr Wikipedia says.  God knew the battle ahead.  He knew the devestation that he would have to face as Christ.  And he knew the incredible strength of Spirit that was required in Jesus to carry out his 3 years of ministry in the way he did.  In the way that (regardless of what you believe about who he was) meant it got remembered for over 2000 years.  But I don’t think the 40 days in the desert were really about deprivation.  I think they were about preparation.

So no, I am not going to give up chocolate.  Or coffee.  Or anything for that matter.  And with that the dilemma of my birthday being the first day of lent is dissolved.  In fact I recently discovered Stewardship’s latest campaign – 40acts.  The premise is that instead of giving something up, we should spend the time giving something out.  I’m not sure it’s what I think Lent is about, but I do think there can’t be much bad about developing a ‘habit of generous living’ as they say.

For a start I have decided not to ask for gifts (although most of my family seem to insist on giving me ‘something to unwrap’!) but instead ask for musical suggestions.  What’s your favourite album? List it on the comments below, or better yet donate the cost of the album to Chennai Challenge here, naming your choice in your comment.

So, whether you make use of Lent by preparing for something (maybe this is August Chennai Challenge team!) or by giving out and developing a habit of generous living, I don’t think we should focus on giving things up or depriving ourselves. I believe in a God that loves us, a God that wants us to be happy but prepared.  I think I’ll spend Lent coming to God every day and asking for him to prepare me.  For Chennai Challenge and this year’s project, and for the future and everything lying on the road ahead.