"Its is more blessed than to receive" Jesus said and working in churches and nonprofits allows you to see our culture chasing after the blessing that comes from giving during the Holiday season!
I understand that there are some opportunities that open up from offering hand outs to the poor, relationships can begin, positive learning conversations can start. But there are also some complications that begin from the message that hand outs can send to the receiver. The following quote is from a book that a group of colleagues and I just finished going through. Let me know what you think about it.
Compassion, Justice and the Christian Life: Rethinking Ministry to the Poor by Robert Lupton
"Anyone who has been given the unfortunate task of dispensing free (or nearly free) commodities will soon have familiar war stories to tell. Something seems to go wrong when one with valued resources attempts to distribute them to others in need. The transactions, no matter how compassionate, seem to go sour in the gut of both giver and recipient. A subtle, unintentional message slips through: "You have nothing of worth which I desire in return." The giver remains protected by his one-up status while the recipient is exposed and vulnerable. Little wonder that negative attitudes surface. It becomes hard to be a cheerful giver. And even harder to be a cheerful recipient.
Ancient Hebrew wisdom describes four levels of charity. The highest level is to provide a job for one in need without his knowledge that you provided it. The next lower level is to provide work that the needy one knows you provided. The third level is to give an anonymous gift to meet an immediate need. The lowest level of charity, to be avoided if at all possible, is to give a poor person a gift with his full knowledge that you are the donor.
Perhaps the deepest poverty of all is to have nothing of value to offer in exchange. Charity that fosters such poverty must be challenged. We know from 40 years of failed social policy that welfare depletes self-esteem while honorable work produces dignity. We know that reciprocity builds mutual respect while one-way giving brews contempt. Yet we continue to run clothes closets and free food pantries and give-away benevolence accounts and wonder why the joy is missing.
Perhaps it is our time and place in history to re-implement the wisdom of the ages and fashion contemporary models of thoughtful compassion. Our donated clothes could create thrift stores and job training. Our benevolence dollars could develop mini-economies within the economy — daycare, janitorial, fix-the-widow's-roof services that would employ the jobless in esteem-building work. "Your work is your calling" declared the reformer Luther. Does not the role of the church in our day include the enabling of the poor to find their calling?"
Tim Coburn
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