Secret Friend

A few months ago, my church ran an activity called 'Secret Friend.' You may have heard of it. It involves a group of people putting their names into a hat, drawing one out each and then buying a gift for that person. But the giving is done in secret. You have no idea who your secret friend is.

I, along with two other ladies, helped organise it just for the women since blokes don't really get into gift-giving as much. They had done it for the last few years at least but this was my first time since coming to Dally. Each Sunday for four weeks, we bought a cheap gift for our secret friend, wrapped and labelled it and put it in a box. On the last week, we sat around trying to guess who our secret friend was thanks to various cryptic clues they'd given us. Whether we guessed correctly or not, our secret friend had to confess. It was a lot of fun!

The reason I'm blogging about this is that I've been thinking a lot about giving and our motivations for doing so, especially in regards to yesterday's Bible verse. Secret giving is not something we're generally accustomed to; we're used to being known as the giver and being thanked for our gift. As much as I love giving gifts to show my affection, I realise my motives are often mixed. While I hope my gift is a blessing and is useful to the receiver, I often struggle with selfishness. Will they like my gift? Will they hate me if they don't like it? Do I look like a cheapskate? I hope my gift shows what a witty, creative person I am. I hope my gift is their favourite.

Often we give to make ourselves look good, there's no doubt about it. But how do we deal with mixed motives? One solution is to stop giving but that is inconsistent with what the Bible teaches us about generosity and cheerful giving. Since reading those verses in Matthew, I've found myself becoming more and more excited about anonymous giving.

With Secret Friend, we all eventually found out who our secret friend was. But what if we never found out? What if we saw from afar our gifts being received with joy and couldn't confess that we were the ones who had made the receiver so happy? Our humaness screams at us to take the glory but what if we let the one who truly deserves it, take the glory.....God.

It's a shame that a lot of organisations (even Christian ones) don't often allow you to be an anonymous giver. You have to sign up and commit to a regular amount, they have all of your personal details. I know they need to think about budgets and all that but I found myself wishing there were more instances where I could give secretly. Then I realised that there are an ABUNDANCE of instances for anonymous giving. So many people are in need, not just financially but of encouragement. What great opportunities there are!

So leave money or gifts on someone's doorstep, write an anonymous note of encouragement. By no means am I saying those that leave their name are downright wrong but with secret giving, the person cannot thank you or praise you, they can only praise their Lord and Saviour or it can show them His love if they do not yet know Him. Don't seek your reward in this lifetime. Leave that to God.

I know that when I've been down or facing hard times, I have been so blessed by those who have given in various ways. Whether I knew who you were or whether you were my secret friend....thank you. Your kindness caused me to praise my God.