The Charity Checkbox

There's a question that has been on my mind over the last few days and that question is "What is it that we want to be known for?" I'm not talking about a name, although that is important. I'm also not talking about what we will be remembered for after we are all gone, though that does play into my question a bit. What I'm talking about is reputation. What exactly is it that we want our reputation to be?

I understand that a reputation can either be true or false however in this particular post, I'm not talking about a false reputation. As it's been rightly explained to me, the only thing you can do with a false reputation is live it down. What I'm talking about a true reputation, the kind of reputation that is derived from character. Character is based on the choices and the actions that we make and that gives us control over what form our true reputation will take. So the essence of what I'm asking is based on our choices and action, what kind of reputation do we desire?

Do we want to be know as scholars, firmly rooted in all doctrinal truths? What about for how often the Holy Ghost blesses the churches within our group? How about as a church that prophesies or maybe one that does great humanitarian works? While any of these things would be good things to be known for, Paul said that without charity, they don't have any value (I Cor 13:1-3).

Just a quick sidebar here. Some of my faithful readers might notice that I like to go to the book of I Corinthians, especially the thirteenth chapter, and use the words that Paul wrote there to guide the words that I write here. If you think that lean on this chapter an awful lot, you're right. The thing is, just about every time I re-read this chapter I can find that there is yet another aspect of my own life where I need to apply these scriptures better. Well, let's go ahead and get back to my topic.

How many churches do you know in your area that have just given up caring? I'm sure that you know of at least one that makes you wonder why they bother to keep their doors open on Sunday. There are some churches out there just going through the motions for no other reason than it is the routine that people have gotten used to. A church like this is one that exemplifies the situation that Paul is describing in these first three verses.

Now certainly not all churches fit into this extreme, but I'd hazard to guess that finding a church sitting at the opposite extreme is a much more difficult task than finding a church that knows no charity. Yes, most churches sit on a sliding scale and fit somewhere in between, but I'd also guess that most churches on that scale are sliding in the wrong direction.

1 Cor 13:4-8 may be the most beautiful and awesome description of what it means to have charity working in your life that I've ever heard. One thought that occurs to me in this passage is that charity isn't an easy thing. Right there in verse four Paul says that charity suffers long. Many more modern translations replace "suffers long" with "is patient" and while that might be a more accurate translation, I think that the words "suffers long" convey a truth about charity that being patient just doesn't.

When I think about charity I tend to look at it from both sides. On one side of charity there is someone who pays a price to give charity to someone else and on the other side there is someone who receives that charity that didn't pay any price. When we are charitable, the cost to us becomes the blessing that others enjoy. We have a wonderful example of this exact thing that I'm talking about shown by the price that Jesus paid for our salvation. Because of this act of ultimate charity, He has been a name above every name and right there in that statement is the nugget of truth that I want to convey when I ask the question about what we are known for (Phil 2:9).

Works have been defended recently, and rightly so, so I will not go into a defense of good works. What I will say about works is that our works should be in response to our salvation, not to try to earn it, and the word that best describes this, at least to me, is fruits. Gal 5:22 lays out the fruits of the Spirit, or in my estimation the form that our works should take. Our works should represent these fruits and not only that, they should be a result of those fruits working in us as well.

What I mean by that last bit is that even though like Luke tells us in his second book it's better to give than receive, a truth remains that we must first receive before we can give (Acts 20:35). How can we produce the fruits of joy or peace as an example if we haven't experienced them ourselves? This is how we can perpetuate charity. When we show charity to others, they gain the capacity to show charity from us. Of course not everyone will do this, but what I'm talking about is the same fundamental principle resident in the statement "we love Him because He first loved us". If for no other reason, this should be our motivation, that because He loved us, not only do we love Him, but we pass that love on to others.

To explore how we can do this on a personal level, consider the idea of having a check list that lists the fruits of the spirit so that when we go about doing whatever it is that we are going to do, we consider these fruits while we are doing them. One thing I notice right away is that in Gal 5:22, the very first fruit is love. I Cor. 13:13 seems to agree with the assessment that love should be first on our list. Shouldn't everything we do be influence and led by these fruits, particularly love?

So I ask you, have you checked off your charity checkbox today?