Relational Generosity

Introduction

Those interested in building healthy relationships must be willing to show the kind of kindness that goes beyond what is normally expected. This means that being cordial is not being generous with your kindness. Sitting in the same sanctuary is not being generous with your kindness.

Sacrifice

Oprah is a great example of doing just enough to say you did something. Oprah offered initially to stay with Naomi her widowed mother-in-law

Compassion

The thing that separated Oprah from Ruth was her compassion.

Covenant

In order for us to practice the type of generosity that Ruth displayed we must reorient ourselves and rethink our relationships with one another. What does it mean to be a church member?

1 Corinthians 12:12–14 ESV

12 For just as the body is one and has many members, and all the members of the body, though many, are one body, so it is with Christ. 13 For in one Spirit we were all baptized into one body—Jews or Greeks, slaves or free—and all were made to drink of one Spirit. 14 For the body does not consist of one member but of many.

1 Corintians 12:12-14

Conclusion

Ruth’s generosity stemmed from her compassion and desire to relieve the burden of her mother-in-law. Ruth’s generosity was not sustained by natural affection, it was upheld through a covenant relationship. The bounds of Ruth’s generosity were set by the bounds of Ruth’s relationship with Naomi.

But to what point? Where do we draw the line and stop giving?