Generous …

Tipping. I recall being cajoled by a friend in Texas for not tipping at Sonic. We grew up watching Dad tip the waitstaff when we would go out for meals. However, I don’t ever recall tipping at Sonic. Yet, Mark made such sport of us for not tipping the waitstaff at Sonic. “They don’t make minimum wage and so depend on tips to help them make what little they do running trays to cars and picking up thheir leftover trash”, he would say. We relented simply not knowing it was something we should do and now we tip, and have for more than 10 years, when we eat out at Sonic.

Tipping expresses generosity.

I recently finished a new book with the word “generous” in the title. The word was connnected to the word “orthodoxy.” Growing up in a given tribe (denomination) in a given context (the south, Bible Belt) I never heard the two words used in the same sentence much less “orthodoxy” modified by “generous.”

Just because I never heard, and maybe you have never heard, of “generous” used with “orthodoxy” (right doctrine) does not mean we should not use the two together. Generous describes an attitude toward others who may disagree with you or offer a different way of doing/being/believing than with which we may be accustomed.

How far could we go in understanding each other and working together if we dispensed with reductionistic labels and found our way to “generostiy.” By the way this does not mean assent to a position you cannot hold. It does mean than our inability to hold another’s position does not give us the place of condescending and stooping to name calling to dehumanize those with whom we disagree.

Let’s try some generosity where we have not been generous before.

About the Author
Husband to Patty. Daddy to Kimberly and Tommie. Grandpa Doc to Cohen, Max, Fox, and Marlee. Pastor to Snow Hill Baptist Church. Graduate of Oklahoma Baptist University and Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary. Reading. Photography. Golf. Colorado. Jeeping. Friend. The views and opinions expressed here are my own and should not be construed as representing the corporate views of the church I pastor.

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