3rd Person Reciprocity: A Christian Obligation

Matthew 18:32-33 Then his lord, after that he had called him, said unto him, O thou wicked servant, I forgave thee all that debt, because thou desiredst me:

33 Shouldest not thou also have had compassion on thy fellowservant, even as I had pity on thee?

Third person reciprocity became better known through the movie Pay It Forward which was based on a book of the same name. The movie poster has this sentence, “When someone does you a big favor, don’t pay it back… pay it forward.” This is third person reciprocity put in more simple terms.

Reciprocity in general is an ancient economic system. Simply put it means if someone does something for you then you are obligated to do something equally valuable for them. If a wheat farmer needs fruit he will give a fruit farmer wheat after harvest expecting the fruit farmer to reciprocate with an equal value of fruit after the fruit is harvested.

In the case of third person reciprocity the wheat farmer would freely give his wheat to the fruit farmer as a gift to help the fruit farmer. The fruit farmer would then give fruit to someone else who needed help. There is an understood obligation to help others when someone has helped us. 

This is the teaching in the passage above. Read the story surrounding these verses and remember that this is Jesus' illustration of the Christian practice of third person reciprocity. We are obligated to give what Jesus has so freely given to us to others who are in need as we once were.

In a broader sense third person reciprocity is required of all people by God, because He has showered us all with His gifts of grace. This teaching is not just in the New Testament, it is all through the Bible. Deuteronomy 24:17-22 and Exodus 22:21-27 detail this requirement in the Mosaic Covenant. We who have received benefit from God in the past, even in our ancestors, must return the same to people in our present who are in need of it.  

Teaching Children To Give By Betsy Barnes

Giving. It's a trait we all hope our children develop. But, like most things, we have to teach this trait to them. Many families participate in the Angel Trees at Christmastime or backpack drives at the start of the school year. These are tangible, simple ways for our children to learn the joy of giving to others. Participating in these programs with our children on a regular basis helps them see, understand and learn to give to others.

Well, I have another program that you and your kids can participate in. Our church (Santa Fe Baptist Church) has a children's home in Mexico City. Most of the kids in the home come directly off the streets or are pulled out of abusive homes. The kids enter the home with nothing. Most of the little girls have never owned a baby doll and most of the little boys have never owned a toy car. The home provides warm beds, delicious meals, education and love. But they struggle to meet the day to day necessities, so frivolous things like stuffed animals and baby dolls usually cannot be bought. We, however, try to remedy that.

Each year we take a trip to the home and have a week of fun with the kids. We take them to a safari park, playground park and have a huge fiesta for them. At the fiesta they get a bag of gifts that are bought just for them. It's a fun week for everyone. But we need help getting gifts for each child (currently, there are 48 kids in the home).

If this sounds like something you'd like to do, email me (lebarnes84@gmail.com) and I can send you a list of toys that we need. My little girl loves to pick things out for the little girls in the children's home. She actually talks about the kids all the time (she even has pictures of them in her room). This has been the best way for us to teach her how important and rewarding giving can be.

You can also sponsor a child for the entire week (all the entrance fees and gifts cost $83 per child). If this is something you're interested in doing, you can visit the home's website at: www.agchmx.org. Click on "Give a Smile" to read about the kids and the week that we spend with them. There's also a gallery with photos of each child who hasn't been sponsored with a paypal donate button.

As always, we understand that not everyone can afford to give. But everyone can afford to pray! Please pray that the home will have sufficient funds to provide daily needs and pray that we can find enough donors to make sure every child gets a great Fiesta Week! Since each child has a picture on the website gallery you can go online and pray for each child by name. Many are emotionally and physically hurt. They need your prayers. - Betsy

The Problem Of God 10 - 1 > 10

God is an unpredictable problem to many in our world. He just can't consciously exist in their world, or He must at least be kept consciously out of the concrete operational side of human existence. To give Him a place in the conscious side of life creates a nonsensical equation... an irreconcilable problem.

This is a problem well known to the agnostic thinker. Here it is: if God is allowed to enter conscious human existence then an immeasurable factor has invaded a world of physical laws. There is no way around it. It is well known that if there is a Creator He must be all-powerful, at least within that creation, and transcend what He has created. Any involvement then in His creation after physical laws have been put into place is without a measurable cause and is unpredictable, so nothing in the creation can be considered to be permanent, stable, or absolute.

The moment a believer says God did this or that the believer has declared that there is a factor in their world, and the world of everyone else, that is without a measurable cause and is unpredictable. God is an independent all powerful intelligence who can do whatever He wants. But math and science are all about measurement, verification, and prediction. So for many, these days, God is not welcome in the realm of the measurable.

Let me illustrate the problem with a verse which the prophet Malachi says came directly from the Creator:

Malachi 3:10 Bring ye all the tithes into the storehouse, that there may be meat in mine house, and prove me now herewith, saith the LORD of hosts, if I will not open you the windows of heaven, and pour you out a blessing, that there shall not be room enough to receive it.

The word tithe means a tenth. Under the law given by God to Israel there was a requirement that every citizen give a tenth of their income to God's “storehouse”. This post is not a discussion about tithing, it is about the implications of the equation of tithing. The Creator has stated in this verse that if one tenth of all income is given "into the storehouse" He will return more than that tenth back to the giver in the form of "a blessing”. Here's the equation:

10 – 1 > 10 (ten minus one is greater than 10)

That equation doesn't fit physical law. This is not an investment that bears measurable interest or brings dividends. The 1 is fully separated from the 10. It is given away. From the viewpoint of physical law it is an impossible equation. It is based solely on a statement from the Creator that He will act on behalf of the giver from outside the laws of economics. His action will be physically unpredictable and the cause will be immeasurable. This is what happens if God is in this world... and He is in this world. This is what faith is all about:

Hebrews 11:1 Now faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen.

For this equation to be true the Creator must have access to and, therefore, control the economies of this world. He can change the math into an unpredictable equation. The implications of just this one verse-and there are many more-are earth-shaking, especially considering the current world economic turmoil. God is not the problem... we are the problem, He is the solution. And... He can do more than you think He can. Open your mind to God.