The spirit of volunteerism just for the sake of volunteering is a spirit of blindness. While some are being praised for volunteering their time and effort, others are being paid for their time and efforts by the same organization.
Non-profit organizations serve as icing on the cake for profitable organizations. It’s their marketing strategy. Publicly they give, privately they take for themselves hundred times of what they’re giving.
The disciples didn’t volunteer their time. They went along with Jesus wondering if it’s really worth it. Eventually they asked Jesus, “What’s in it for me?”. And Jesus did provide a very satisfying answer:
“Peter began to say to him, “See, we have left everything and followed you.” Jesus said, “Truly, I say to you, there is no one who has left house or brothers or sisters or mother or father or children or lands, for my sake and for the gospel, who will not receive a hundredfold now in this time, houses and brothers and sisters and mothers and children and lands, with persecutions, and in the age to come eternal life.”
(Mark 10:28-30)
Even when they were asked, “why not leave?”, they then responded to Jesus, “only you have the word of eternal life.”
Many people today will blow themselves up in the spirit of volunteerism.
Christ didn’t volunteer to come. He was sent. It was an act of obedience on his part.
Wasting your time and effort to help another get compensated while you yourself are neglected, that’s not goodwill. That’s foolishness.
If you want to help another, take a look at your neighbor and see if you can help with what they need. If you bring a middle-man in the process, you will have to pay him because he doesn’t work for free. And so shouldn’t you.
The laborer deserves his wage.
If Christians were to die volunteering their time and effort in order to receive their paycheck in heaven, then they shouldn’t be collecting paychecks on earth.
When Christ helped, he forbade the news to be spread because he wanted the glory to remain with his Father who would glorify him at the right time by the resurrection.
“Bring me your money and time and effort and God will bless you”. Is that right?
“The blessing of the Lord makes rich, and he adds no sorrow with it.”
(Proverbs 10:22)
Help where help is needed if you can and are moved by God to do so, not to gain fame.
“Whoever oppresses the poor to increase his own wealth, or gives to the rich, will only come to poverty.”
(Proverbs 22:16)
“Religion that is pure and undefiled before God, the Father, is this: to visit orphans and widows in their affliction, and to keep oneself unstained from the world.”(James 1:27)
Jesus is the well of the living water, the Holy Spirit. 