Hoarding Hearts

hoardingLuke 6:37-38 “Do not judge, and you will not be judged. Do not condemn, and you will not be condemned. Forgive, and you will be forgiven. Give, and it will be given to you. A good measure, pressed down, shaken together and running over, will be poured into your lap.”

Money, resources, time. Generosity comes in different shapes and sizes. Scripture provides clear examples of generous givers from the widow’s mite (Mark 12:4) to the churches in Macedonia whose “extreme poverty welled up in rich generosity” (2 Corinthians 8:2).  It connotes largesse, bigness, liberality, giving without expectation of return.

But Jesus takes it further….

In Luke 6, he admonishes us to give generously in the way we view other people. When we see others in their weaknesses, he calls us not to hoard judgments against them. Not to stockpile reasons to condemn. When someone hurts us we are not to fondle our grievances like a miser pouring over his gold. A judgmental heart is a stingy heart. It refuses to release love. It penny-pinches kindness.

You’ve probably heard of people afflicted with hoarding. They can’t let go of anything. The thought of discarding  newspapers, old clothing, food, even plastic bags and cardboard boxes throws them into an anxiety attack. A common reason hoarders keep accumulating lies in their perception of the future. They’re afraid if they let something go—even something insignificant— they may end up needing it in the future. Eventually their environment becomes so cluttered with piles upon piles of stuff, that they barely have room to move. Their world shrinks.

I think that’s what happens to us spiritually when we hoard the love God has lavished on us…love he intended for us to give to others. The “good measure, pressed down, shaken together and running over” that returns to those who give can’t be poured into our lap. There’s no room! And when we hold on to judgments because we think if we let go of them we will somehow be diminished in the future, our world actually does shrivel up. Hoarding hearts eventually suffocate and wither.

So how’s your heart? Are you holding on to things you should be discarding? Things constricting your growth? Now’s a good time to just let go. Don’t put up with a hoarding heart.

Go for an extravagant one….

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