Better to give than receive

Do you share the dilemma we have about what to get and give to the kids and grandkids at Christmas? It doesn’t seem to get any easier as we notch another year on the calendar either. So what to do about it?

My wife heard an interesting idea for this dilemma that we’re going to try this year and I thought it was good enough to share with you.

But before I do, I want to share one of my most memorable Christmas mornings as a kid. I think I was about seven. On Christmas morning we had a tradition that we went downstairs from our bedrooms by age. My father, as the oldest, went first and I, as the youngest, went last. That means I was the last to see what was under the tree. But when I did, WOW… it was a brand new bicycle for me (I knew it couldn’t have been for my brother because he was four years older and already too big for the 24-inch blue bicycle that I had spotted)!

I share that little tidbit of a Christmas morning story to say that I realize the importance of receiving gifts as a kid; I’m sure a psychologist could give us the scientific reasons besides the excitement, but I think there’s an element of love and acceptance that a kid feels when receiving a gift. I get that.

On the other hand, in our culture full of an overwhelming propensity of stuff (mostly made in China), the art of Christmas giving AND receiving can easily get lost.

So here’s the idea, which my wife heard on the AFR program, Faith & Finance a week or two ago. This year we plan to give all our kids and grandkids some money to Give and Receive along with a card explaining what we’re doing and why.

The “Why” is that we want to help cultivate in our grandkids the actual fact, in a practical hands-on kind of way, that it really is better to give than to receive.

So here’s the idea and how we’re planning to do it. We’re going to give each of the kids and grandkids a $50 bill to keep and five $10 bills to give away. We’ll probably put the money in a personalized card or letter but we haven’t gotten that far yet. When, how and to whom to give away the $10 bills will be entirely up to them. We’ll try to encourage them to pray about it and use their imaginations, but it will be their decision. What we’re hoping, of course, is that they get a taste of the very real fact that it is truly better to give than to receive.

If this goes as well as I hope it will, perhaps after the holidays I’ll share with you how it went; even better, if some of you want to try it as well I’d love to get some feedback from you too. Just email me at the address at the bottom of this column.

Now, when you do this, you’ll also be teaching your grandkids a biblical principle. In fact,  this may ring a “Christmas Bell” with you. In Acts 20:35, Dr. Luke reminds us of this where he writes “remember the words of the Lord Jesus, how he himself said, ‘It is more blessed to give than to receive.”

Thanks for reading All About Seniors… see you next week!

Bill Milby is a Director of Visiting Angels® of Central Georgia, a non-medical, living assistance service for seniors. If you have questions or comments about this column you can reach him at william.mercylink@gmail.com or search for us at  https://www.facebook.com/VisitingAngelsofCentralGA