Beyond expectation

There have been millions of words written about happiness. How to get it, and more importantly, how to hold on to it. The world says that happiness is found in acquiring things. The Bible has the opposite view. It says that what we give, not what we get, brings lasting joy to our lives. Hoarding never produces true happiness. True joy comes in seeking the good in others and giving away what God has given us. Find a way to make someone happier today. Jesus said it is more blessed to give than to receive.

I saw this first hand this past weekend. Our church had planned a tsunami relief fundraiser this past Saturday. We had stories about it in our paper and on tv news. We had advertised it on our website and on social networking sites. And off course we lifted it up in our prayers. But none of us, to be honest, knew how it was going to turn out. Our church does fundraisers real well. We are an extremely generous church and our faithful tithers. But we had never taken on an endeavor like this.

The usual way we raise funds is to have a family night. This is where we have Samoan dances and each family donates a certain amount for their dances. This is how we tithe. Some churches put their tithes in an envelope and into the plate, we add a cultural aspect to it and have dances. But there were no dances for this fundraiser. It wasn't a real festive mood. But we had food sales and a car wash. Again, the usual way we do food sales is to sell tickets to ensure that enough people come to buy the food you've prepared. The aim is not to be stuck with a lot of un-bought food or not prepare enough for people to buy. But we had no tickets. We just went on faith alone that God will provide.

And boy did He come through in a big way. The outcome was more than anyone expected. But it began within our church. People volunteered their time for the effort. People donated for this that have never donated for anything else. We had so many car washers and cooks that many people didn't have a job to do. And we had people coming from all over Texas to donate. We had people from Austin, San Antonio, Houston. We had all nationalities, religions, you name it, they were there. And in the end, we raised $10,000 for the tsunami relief fund. Praise God.

And all I could think of was the generosity of these people. I don't know if they were all Christians, but many of them were. They really proved Jesus' command, it is better to give than to receive.