Pay it forward

Have you ever heard of the saying “it’s better to give than to receive”? It’s one of the many sayings we get from Jesus: “In everything I did, I showed you that by this kind of hard work we must help the weak, remembering the words the Lord Jesus himself said: “it is more blessed to give than to receive”” (Acts 20:35, NIV)

I think the first step in understanding this saying is having gratitude. We live in a society where we have a lot of things at our fingertips, but that can sometimes make us forget to enjoy the simple things.

So how do we focus on being thankful? One of the best ways to do this is to make it a daily habit to thank God for something, or things, and we start to realise just how much we have to be thankful for.

The next step is turning that into charity. I like the ‘pay it forward’ analogy. I couldn’t even begin to count the number of things I have in my life to be grateful for that are a direct result of someone else’s actions, let alone indirectly too. If I make it my mission to pay forward the same amount of good deeds I have received in my life, let’s just say I will be a very busy person!

“A generous person will prosper; whoever refreshes others will be refreshed” (Proverbs 11:25, NIV)