From the heart...

“Tell the Israelites to bring me an offering. You are to receive the offering for me from everyone whose heart prompts them to give.”Exodus 25:2

Follow your heart when it speaks to you about doing something for God—-what a wonderful reminder! If we give as our hearts prompt, we will probably give far more than we would if we gave it too much thought. In some matters it’s wise to sit down and consider and calculate, in others, as with giving to God, it’s best to be unfettered and generous to the point that it “pinches” our lifestyle a bit. When we debate or hesitate or give too much thought about doing a good thing, rarely does the good thing get done.

A person in love is often extravagant and even reckless in the manner in which he/she showers gifts and attention on the one loved. When you’re in love you’re not constantly checking your bank account or portfolio, you’re in love and you show it by your abandonment of how frugally you might have lived before you fell in love. That’s how its supposed to be! And that’s how we’re supposed to respond to an opportunity to give back to the Lord when He move our hearts. Obviously He is not in need of our offerings, but we are in great need of being to express our love and lavish those gifts upon Him. We’re far better because of it.

In this case Moses was not addressing a tithe, which all believers are supposed to give, but “over-the-top” giving that is given not because we’re required to give it, or because we want to get something special back from God. It’s something we choose to do because of our “heart condition”—i.e. we love Him.

Our hearts will prompt us to give to Him, but are we listening to our hearts and are we willing to obey our hearts? There could come a time when our choice of being “hard of hearing” becomes true deafness to His voice. Be careful. Our hearts become hard not because of old age or a lack of strength, but because we choose to neglect our first and most important love.