“You Can’t Out Give God” — A True Faith-Building Story

We Christians have our share of clichés. “You can’t out give God” is one of them. But there is a reason why they are clichés — they are true, so we repeat them so often they lose their ‘punch’. Hence, a cliché.

Judy reminded me of what happened on our trip home from Taiwan. Until she connected the dots for me I had failed to see this particular cliché in action. It is a small story, but even small stories can build our faith.

At the station in Kaohsiung, as we were boarding the train to Taichung for the second part of our ministry trip, Pastor Ezra and his wife Angel gave us a small red envelope. A gift they said, from their daughter and her fiance. I opened the envelope on the train. It contained two crisp bills totaling $x in US dollars. This was a significant gift for this young couple to give to Judy and me! And they went to some trouble to get dollars. We were touched.

I showed the gift to Seumean and offered him the money. He declined. “Use it for your hotel bill in Taichung”, he said.

We taught in Taichung for the next 5 days at the City Celebration Church. During that time we got to know and love Pastor Jenny and her staff including Momo, Arthur, Sally, Brush, and Meggie. At the Sunday morning worship service we put the $x in their offering bag.

The three of us flew home the next day. Our flight left Taipei at 10:00 pm and we arrived about 13 hours later in Houston. Judy and I had made a reservation at a hotel near the airport for the night, intending to get up early the next day to catch a flight back to North Carolina.

We picked up our luggage and called the hotel to send the shuttle bus. By the time the shuttle arrived and we got dropped off at the hotel it was close to midnight. We had been awake for about 30 hours.

We walked up to the desk in the lobby and gave the clerk our names. “Oh”, he said “we overbooked and no longer have a room for you.” “What!”, we said, “here is our confirmation number.” “That won’t help”, he said, “we have no rooms left. But we will move you to our sister hotel for the night” “Where is that”, I asked, thinking downtown. “Oh no”, he said, “it is across the street”.

So 10 minutes later we were unpacking in a suite in the hotel across the street. I have stayed in a lot of hotel rooms over the years and this one must have cost at least $2x. But because of the inconvenience, the first hotel paid the cost of the room. It was free for us!

We gave away the money to pay the hotel room in Taiwan and God orchestrated the situation so that our hotel room in Houston, which cost twice as much as the one in Taiwan, was given to us for free.

Ok. Maybe it was a coincidence. But personally, I don’t think so. I believe it is a small example of the cliché that you can’t out give God. Give it (whatever ‘it’ is) away; He sends it back at least doubled.

Even though the example is small, it has real implications for my faith. It means to me that God is present in our daily affairs — Jesus is alive! I felt ‘prompted’ to put the money in the collection bag, even though a voice in my head told me to keep it. After all, it was a gift to us.

God is not only present, but He sees and knows our heart and our actions.

He is powerful. He orchestrated all the pieces of the story — the gift, our giving, the overselling of the rooms, and the room that we were given in the other hotel — to achieve this outcome.

And He wants to bless us in response to our blessing Him, which is what we did when we gave the money to the City Celebration Church. His blessing is often much greater than our giving.

I have two choices when I think about this giving and receiving. I can write it all off as coincidence. Sometimes fate gives and sometimes it takes away. It is all ‘blind’ chance. Or, I can choose to see God at work, blessing us but also telling us “I am with you”. I choose this way — the way of believing.

Of course, this opens the door for a much deeper discussion. “What about the bad things that happen to you?” the world will ask. “Isn’t God the author of them as well?” In my experience, sometimes He is if He has a bigger, better purpose in mind. But mostly He is not. Jesus weeps with us. And just like in my little example, He is with us providing and protecting. You can believe that or not. Your choice. But I can tell you if you choose the way of believing and faith when it is offered to you, you will experience a life of love and intimacy that the world cannot provide and does not understand, as well as a life of signs and wonders that points to and glorifies Him at every turn on the way. He is even present in the trauma and the tragedy providing comfort, strength, hope, and at times, joy.

Blessed,

John