Are you as generous in March?

Sioux Falls is a generous city. In fact, it got national notoriety a couple years ago for its generosity. During the holiday season, there is a lot of attention on the needs that exist in our community and the opportunities we have to meet those needs. Some of my previous posts detail some of these opportunities that exist in Sioux Falls. But this post concerns whether our generosity extends past the Christmas season. I was on the phone with one of our community partners last week. As we were talking about a recent project that we had been through together, the partner made the comment that they were receiving many different material offers from other partners. As our partner was discussing this infusion of holiday goodwill into their organization, the partner made the comment of 'where is the help in March'? The point of the comment was that while the parnter and organization were grateful for all of the assistance they were receiving between Thanksgiving and Christmas, they wondered aloud what it might look like if that help was distributed a little bit more evenly across all 12 months of the calendar. In March, it's not as popular to be generous. There are no Red Kettles, no Christmas specials, or intentional food drives. In March, most of us are honestly paying off Christmas and not in as generous of a mood. It's simply tougher to strike the generosity chord in March, or May, or July, even though the needs continue.

Followers of Jesus ought to understand all of this and work hard to be generous throughout the year, not just at Christmas time. Churches with strategies that seek to meet needs (and more importantly, address the problems that create the needs) throughout the year prove to be a good witness for Jesus.