July 08, 2022
Daily Devotion:
"Sharing is Caring… "
1 Samuel 25:11
New International Version
11 Why should I take my bread and water, and the meat I have slaughtered for my shearers, and give it to men coming from who knows where?”
It's not difficult to see why Abigail said her husband lived up to his name ~ Nabal the fool! Nabal would not be the first to think he shouldn't have to share his hand-earned money or possessions with complete strangers, yet who but a fool would say it out loud! Then again as a matter of moral inquiry, the actual question he poses is not a bad question. Why should we share? Just when you think sharing has been so inculcated through child-rearing and cultural values that it is axiomatic, we see not only Nabal questioning the obvious, but also David's warriors. The soldiers who actually went into battle didn't want to share the plunder with those who stayed behind guarding the supplies! Were they not also fools?
If we are brutally honest, hardly a day goes by that you and I don't find our-selves begrudging the moral obligation to have less so that others can have more. Naturally we have less trouble sharing when we know that those with whom we share will reciprocate. We all bring a potluck dish and share our meal together. The more difficult sharing is when the recipients of our bounty are strangers who have neither means nor opportunity to share back. In that instance, what Nabal's question exposes is a fundamentally false assumption-that the water was his! Did God create the water just for Nabal? Only when we understand that what we have is not really ours can we begin to fully appreciate the virtue of sharing. All that we have is but a trust that God has given us to divide with others as each has need.
The truly painful question is: As I look around at all my possessions on every hand, can I really bring myself to think that they are merely on loan until someone else needs them more?
