Part IX of our series on Visiting and Remembering

I want to close this series on Visiting and Remembering with a few comments specifically related to financial giving.

When we maintain a regular visitation schedule, it changes how we think about financial giving. Once we are in the habit of personally visiting widows, orphans, the sick, and the imprisoned in the name of Jesus, we become a lot less likely to give by making donations online or by dropping money in the offering plate so that the church can hire someone to visit these people. Instead, we become more likely to buy an extra carton of milk when we are at the store, or to try to figure out how to schedule and pay for a clinic appointment for someone in need, or to pick up a study Bible and have it engraved with the initials of a new believer in prison. We gradually stop thinking about these gifts as charitable donations and instead start to think about them simply as family expenses.

In fact, as we visit people in person, we stop giving to fund-raisers and instead become fund-raisers. As John Wesley says:

You might properly say in your own case, “To beg I am ashamed;” but never be ashamed to beg for the poor; yea, in this case, be an importunate beggar; do not easily take a denial. Use all the address, all the understanding, all the influence you have; at the same time trusting in Him that has the hearts of all men in his hands.

What can you do, today, to transition from giving to fund-raisers to becoming a fund-raiser?  If you’re at a loss, perhaps the answer is simply this: visit someone.