The Christmas season is upon us.
Lately, I have found myself jaded when I come across Angel Tree donation videos online, where people film themselves purchasing gifts for children in need. What is meant to bring light to families struggling financially during the holiday season is now often used to gain approval in the public square. There is, of course, nothing wrong with drawing attention to real need; awareness is valuable. But awareness is not the issue. The trouble arises when generosity becomes something to showcase. What often begins as genuine compassion risks becoming meaningless at best (dangerous at worst), and the heart of giving becomes misrepresented, quietly displaced by the desire to be seen.
As Christians, our mandate as believers is rather simple: to give often, give generously, and, perhaps most importantly, to give anonymously. This does not mean I must anonymously give the [redacted to maintain surprise] I bought my father for Christmas. Rather, it demands that, with utmost urgency, we are to diligently guard the spirit of giving; we must not allow ourselves to drift from quiet obedience to a performative self-righteousness intended for the gaze of others.
Preserving the integrity of giving is important, for at the center of salvation stands a God who loves us and “gave freely His only begotten Son” not to condemn the world but to save it. As Christians, that is the standard we are called to uphold—the very heart-posture for which we must one day give an account—and it is from this standard that our own acts of giving must be delineated. And while God judges the heart, and indeed sees our pure intentions, the recipient of our charity does not have that divine vantage point. Public giving, even when well-meant, can leave the recipient feeling exposed or indebted, as though they stand beneath our gaze rather than beside us as fellow image-bearers. In a subtle way, it can communicate a form of condemnation or superiority that we may not (or may) have intended to convey.
Now, that is not to say giving in public is always wrong, nor that it is always ineffective; it can be both good and fruitful. Take, for example, your restaurant server is visibly having a rough night. He forgets your drinks, brings the wrong entree, and has a clear weariness in his eyes. By worldly logic, he deserves nothing: a bare minimum tip, if that. But when the check comes, discreetly tip above and beyond. If he is a believer, such an act may remind him there is a God who sees him and meets him where he is. If he is not, let him encounter a kindness he does not deserve, love given in the way Jesus loves us. The world says he has earned no such grace. But we are divinely called to be in the world, not of it; we are to refuse governance by such logic.
One mindset says, “Look at what I have done.” The other proclaims, “Look at what Christ has done for me, and through me.”
And so, as we enter this season, we risk losing the very heart of giving by making it visible for the wrong reasons. Prioritizing public spectacles, praise, or our own feelings threatens the quiet purity of Christian charity—the kind modeled by a Savior who came into the world, relatively unnoticed given the magnitude of the event, wrapped not in spectacle but in the humility of His own birth. It would almost be funny—our ignorant evil—if not for the disrespect, the distortion we have assigned to the virtue of giving as it is perceived in this world, especially at Christmas. How perverse we are!
Ultimately, when we give, we must give without our right hand knowing what our left is doing, lest we grant the devil even the smallest foothold in our hearts.
Ithaca is a rather cold place this time of year; I hope wherever you call home is somewhere warmer.
Merry Christmas.
