February 3, 2018

Check Your Motives

A person may think their own ways are right, but the LORD weighs the heart. – Proverbs 21:2

I was shocked. Surprised. And so very disappointed. How could someone use a ministry to drum up business for their friends? It was just so wrong.

This woman, someone I considered a dear friend, had used information I gave her to benefit others. She took flowers to someone with a sick daughter and then proceeded to hand her a business card and try to convince her to use a specific hospice organization.

I had already told her I wasn’t going to do it. I explained that the choice was for the family to make. I even went further to say that there are many wonderful hospice groups and that the woman needed to make the decision in conjunction with the medical personnel and her family.

So my friend took matters into her own hands.

I’m sure she would call herself justified. She always thinks she’s right about these things. She doesn’t yet know how deeply she has damaged our friendship.

It isn’t the first time I have thought she should spend more time with God and less time volunteering. I criticized myself for the thought. Who am I to judge? Who am I to even think about pointing out the speck in someone else’s eye? And yet our pastor last Sunday admonished us to speak up, to stir things up, not to be a doormat when it comes to challenging things that we know are wrong.

“When giving is from a heart whose real motivation is what we’re hoping to get in return, it’s not really love at all.” – Lisa Terkeurst

I’m sure my friend will tell me she was just doing a good deed. Each Monday she takes the alter flowers and turns them into small bouquets that she takes to the sick, the frail, the shut-ins. It really is a wonderful ministry and people love the thoughtfulness of their church thinking of them.

Any extra flowers she takes to those in hospice. That, too, is a wonderful thing. It means a great deal to those who are suffering to receive that small bit of sunshine.

The line gets crossed when that ministry gets used as an opportunity to promote business. It sours the good deed and turns it into something else entirely. Shame on anyone who thinks that’s okay.