Published 10/15/19
By Greg Johnson
What If...
Collecting sports cards is your favorite hobby. You love getting them, opening up the packages and seeing what treasures await within. Mostly you collect baseball and basketball cards, but lately you have been buying football and hockey cards, too. Your collection is incredible. You have boxes of cards you never look at anymore because they are full of “commons,” plus you have notebooks full of “star” cards. Whenever a card show comes to town—and you have money to spend—you are there, buying and trading.
After school one day you stop by the local supermarket with a buddy before heading home. You have a couple of dollars in your pocket so you buy a few packs of Topps baseball cards. Your friend doesn’t have any money. He also collects cards, though not nearly as many as you.
You open the packages and look through them carefully. No sense bending a corner in case you hit pay dirt.
In the first package you get a last year’s MVP. In the second one you get the AL Rookie of the Year and a throwback Ken Griffey, Jr.! Though you already have the AL Rookie of the Year, the Griffey is a big find. The third pack is the best. You get the same MVP and Griffey, plus a Mike Trout and Bryce Harper! Unbelievable! Your friend is excited for you, but then he asks a question you didn’t expect.
“Since you got an extra Griffey and MVP, do you think you could give them to me, or maybe I could trade you for them?”
Giving up a Griffey is like giving him a dollar bill. Everything with either of their names on it is worth at least a buck.
Give them to him or trade... hmmmmmm.
Questions to Think On
• What would you do?
• Why is it so hard to give up something of worth?
• What do you think God thinks when we are generous to others?
• Are there people you can be generous with right now who would be happy if you gave them something of value?
What Does God Have to Say?
A generous man will himself be blessed, for he shares his food with the poor.
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.”
(c)