Teaching children the generosity of God by Margi McAllister, children’s author

LIMITS? WHAT LIMITS?

God is no good at limits. Giving is what he does.

A while ago I was commissioned by Lion Publishing to produce a book about Women of the Bible. I started with Mrs Noah (yes, I know what you’re thinking, but there must have been a Mrs Noah) and worked my way up to Lydia. I really took to Lydia.

She’s in Acts 16, a woman who listens to Paul, is baptized, and offers hospitality to him and his friends, but more than that, she’s a business woman. She trades in purple cloth, and that stuff doesn’t come cheap. Purple dye came from squished sea snails, and you need twelve thousand of them to make a metre or so of purple cloth. That’s a shame if you’re poor, because you can’t afford it (and it’s pretty bad news if you’re a sea snail.) Lydia notices colour, she knows all about it, and that’s why she loves God’s generosity with it. He pours out purple, liberally, joyfully, into lavenders, crocuses, geraniums, figs, berries, violets. He flings the finest gold into sunrise and sunset. Lydia knows that colour is precious, but God throws it around where rich and poor can see it. That’s how Lydia experiences God’s generosity.

NOW WASH YOUR HANDS

The marriage feast at Cana, don’t you love this story? At first Jesus says that the shortage of alcohol is none of his business, but, you know, it’s his mum. Notice that he doesn’t ask how much wine, they need, he just tells the servants to fill up the water jars. Six of them, about twenty or thirty gallons each, yes, that should do it. And it’s crazy, extravagant, ridiculous generosity that makes me laugh, though I do wonder what the guests washed their hands in. Cava de Cana, presumably.

PASS IT ON

In case we still didn’t get it, God gives us ridiculous generosity ever summer and autumn and pushes us into sharing. In my back garden is a much loved fruit tree, and yet again I will be up a tree, harvesting my body weight in cooking apples. We can fill the freezer and still have enough to stock a supermarket. They are shared around neighbours, family, the Community Grocery. Apple trees are common here, so boxes of them marked ‘help yourself’ appear on garden walls. Some people leave beans and tomatoes. God nudges us into sharing his generosity.

Pass it on. We can pass on the generosity of God to the children among us, looking with them at the wild abundance of colour in the sky, apples on the tree, sand and shells on the beach. Do we model this in our relationships? Do they learn that there is no rationing of hugs, of laughter, of forgiveness? TV time and snacks may be limited, but not love.

Having said that, God in his wisdom knows our need for faith and patience. At a time when I feared the future, a wise nun told me, ‘God gives us the graces we need when we need them, not before’. The Israelites in the desert could only have enough manna for one day, and those Old Testament widows always had enough flour and oil for a day, but no more. He will give us enough love, enough patience, enough humour for the next day. Or the next hour. Or the next bout of tears/fighting/refusal/winding up a sibling that we have to cope with.

Then there are the treats. It seems to me that some experiences are held back for ‘special’. We can see sparrows everyday, but to see a kingfisher is a treat that we remember for its rarity. We can see a sunset whenever the sky is clear enough, but the sight of the Aurora Borealis this summer had us all running outside and dancing.

WHATEVER YOU WANT?

This brings us to another aspect of God’s generosity, or rather, what it isn’t. Whatever you ask for in my name, says Jesus, you will have it (paraphrase of John 16.23). Thank you, Lord, I’d like three holidays a year and a well-behaved spaniel. Working with children, you do have to make the point that this doesn’t mean you can ask God for a new pony and a bike and you’ll get it, because that’s not the way God works. God is not Santa Claus or a slot machine. In my experience children are quick to get this. (NOTE - I confess that a couple of years ago I had three days exploring Northumberland woodlands with a goddaughter who was desperate to see a red squirrel. By the end of the third day, I was begging God for a sighting.)

Once children understand that God is a loving father, not an indulgent uncle who keeps them quiet with goodies, they can start to get their heads and hearts around that word, ‘abundant’. Show them the abundant generosity of God. Model abundant love, abundant patience, abundant laughter. The abundant, ridiculous generosity of God.

About that squirrel. At the end of the third day, in the car park ready to go home, I was still praying and scanning the trees. Then there it was! Abushy-tailed red squirrel running up a tree, staying around long enough for us all to see it, bouncing through the branches and raiding a bird feeder.

Sometimes it’s bread and oil. Sometimes it’s a sky. Just occasionally, it’s a squirrel that tells you of the generosity of God.