Sharing Our Abundance

The Christian Community Comes Alive
Seeds of New Growth

Sharing All Things

Luke 3:10-17   The Message

¹⁰ The crowd asked him, “Then what are we supposed to do?”
¹¹ “If you have two coats, give one away,” he said. “Do the same with your food.”
¹² Tax men also came to be baptized and said, “Teacher, what should we do?”
¹³ He told them, “No more extortion—collect only what is required by law.”
¹⁴ Soldiers asked him, “And what should we do?”
He told them, “No shakedowns, no blackmail—and be content with your rations.”
¹⁵ The interest of the people by now was building. They were all beginning to wonder, “Could this John be the Messiah?”

^16-17 But John intervened: “I’m baptizing you here in the river. The main character in this drama, to whom I’m a mere stagehand, will ignite the kingdom life, a fire, the Holy Spirit within you, changing you from the inside out. He’s going to clean house—make a clean sweep of your lives. He’ll place everything true in its proper place before God; everything false he’ll put out with the trash to be burned.”

For Reflection 

"I'm not giving him anything !  He dosen't deserve anything Let him earn his own!"  Yeah, well, none of us deserve God' blessings and grace.  And yet, God provides them freely.

How do we act in a Christian community?  Poverty is the lack of equitable distribution of financial resources to the extent that people suffer.  Injustice is the lack of equitable distribution of fairness that favors some at the expense of others. It seems to me that a loving community would be one where there is an equitable distribution of those monies, goods and services that meet the essential needs of each in the community.  Sure, some will have more than than others, but, none in God's Kingdom will suffer hunger or no sense of place or well being.

They called Jesus crazy.  Why can't we all share in Christ's insanity?

Pray

that the poor, the downtrodden, the trivialized, the disenfranchised, the disadvantaged, the outsiders, the sick, the weary, and the hopeless find hope, a place in a loving community and extravagant hospitality in the arms of the rejected stone, the one who is empowered with insane love the one crazy with compassion, the one above all others, the lamb of God.