How do we GIVE?

How do we GIVE? Many times we encounter poor beggars asking money or food from us. How do we respond to them? Have we not experienced times when we only gave a 5-peso coin to a street child, or gave a 50-peso bill hesitantly, or did not give at all because at the back of our minds we say, “Why give?! This man still has the strength to look for decent work; and here he is, making things easy for himself by begging! Perhaps he will just use the money for bad purposes!” But, why don’t we also step back and recall those countless times we have received large sums of money from generous people? Isn’t it that we too do not deserve to receive the money? The fact is that it was just given to us out of their generosity! We too have not labored hard to earn the money. Many times, we are tempted to take advantage of our status as priests and seminarians, and so we sometimes forget how it is to give. We fall into the human tendency like Peter who said, “And what will I, Peter, as first among the 12 get as a reward?” In our first reading, the Lord warns those false shepherds who have been feeding themselves and taking advantage of the vulnerable sheep, but do not even feed the sheep.
Again, I will repeat the question: How do we GIVE? First of all, by humbly acknowledging that we are sinners in the eyes of God. Even though we are priests and seminarians, we are still part of His flock. And because of this, when one of us gets lost, he will leave the 99 to look for that 1. Simply savor what the famous psalm is telling us today: “The Lord is my Shepherd…even though I walk through the darkest valley…his rod and staff they comfort me.” Like those laborers who probably felt hopeless that they could not work and earn money on that day because still no one hired them and it was getting late in the afternoon – we, too, many times feel hopeless and empty because of our failures. But in the eyes of God, the Landowner, calling us at 5 o’ clock in the afternoon is never too late. God, the Landowner, just saw the need for more workers on His wide vineyard, so He calls us to cooperate with Him no matter who we are, no matter what we have done. And see what the Landowner gave us at the end of the day? Unexpectedly, we were all treated equal. In normal economic practices, we know it’s not just and equitable since we have not worked correspondingly for the money we have received. But here, we are treated more than what we expected. “Who am I? I was last but he made me first!” That is how we sinners are loved so much by God; and we see that great manifestation of his generosity in the cross. It was more than the violent “makibaka” type of Messiah that the Jews expected; it was a kenosis -- a self-emptying; more than just giving food to the sheep but giving his very own body and blood for us. So how can we not be consoled by that, especially in times when we get impatient with ourselves because our sins come back again and again and again. God consoles us through a song, “Hindi ka kailangang magbago, kahit ito’y mas ibig ko. At hindi ka kailangang magsikap nang husto upang ika’y ibigin ko. Iniibig kita…ako’y kapiling mo, kahit ikaw pa ma’y mapalayo.”
So my dear brothers, we are challenged today to be generous; just GIVE: whether it is in our human and spiritual formation, in the streets, in our apostolates, or in our studies. And every time we do that, let us always step back and think of the Lord who has given more than we expected, so that when it will be our time to give, we will be able to give much more than what the Church and the society expect from us.
May we always be generous shepherds because “the Lord is our Shepherd; there is nothing we shall want.”