Cycles of God

Luke 6:37-38 (NIV) 

“Do not judge, and you will not be judged.  Do not condemn, and you will not be condemned. Forgive, and you will be forgiven. Give, and it will be given to you. A good measure, pressed down, shaken together and running over, will be poured into your lap. For with the measure you use, it will be measured to you." 

Have you ever heard or thought about the cycles of God?  God’s creation is full of cycles.  There is the cycle of the seasons, the cycle of day and night, and the cycle of birth-life-death-resurrection.  There’s also the cycle of sowing and reaping, the cycle of sin (sin—sorrow/repentance—forgiveness/restoration—sin again), the cycle of confession (private sin-private confession, personal sin—personal confession, public sin—public confession) and life’s general cycles like the law of averages. There’s a scientific discipline called chronobiology that studies life’s bodily rhythms that include circadian (24 hour cycles of body temperature, blood pressure, sleeping and waking), ultradian (daily changes in heartbeat, energy levels and attention spans), circatrigintan (monthly menstrual cycle), and cirannual (seasonal depression, sexual drive, susceptibility to certain diseases at different times of the year).  Most, perhaps all of life is cyclic in nature.  

This passage from Luke contains a few cycles of practical and successful Christian living.  There are certain things that you should not do like judging and condemning others.  If you do, then God’s natural cycle of life will cause you to be judged and condemned.  There are certain things that you are to do.  You are to forgive and to give.  If you do, God’s spiritual cycle of life will enable you to be forgiven and you will end up receiving far more than you have given.  This is what Jesus meant by His words, “good measure, pressed down, shaken together and running over”.  Your giving results in God returning to you so many blessings that you cannot comprehend them all just like pouring excessive grain into a container.  No matter the size of container (good measure), no matter how much you smash the grain and shake the container, it will not all fit in that container and will overflow.  God allows an abundance of harvest to result by your generosity of forgiveness and giving. 

“For the measure you use, it will be measured to you” is called God’s “Law of Reciprocity”.  For every action there is an equal and opposite reaction.  If you are friendly to others, they will be friendly to you.  If you are a complainer to others, they will complain back.  If you give generously, you will receive generously.  If you have ever given generously, did you not experience blessings beyond belief?  Were not an abundance of blessings “poured into your lap”?         

Have you ever tried giving something like half of your paycheck away to help others with them not knowing it came from you?  Do you have sufficient faith in God’s promises to try this sometime?   Perhaps the key to happiness and contentment in life is to be a generous giver.  The abundance of your life may be largely based on what you give away.

“We make a living by what we get, but we make a life by what we give.”--Winston Churchill

“No one has ever become poor by giving.”—Anne Frank