When is a gift not a gift?

You can say to yourself, "Yes, I see how such a thing may be." But when you look inward and confront the raw force of your own life unshielded, you see your peril. You see that this could overwhelm you. The greatest peril to the Giver is the force that takes. The greatest peril to the Taker is the force that gives. It's as easy to be overwhelmed by giving as by taking.

When I was growing up, I always knew that if I ever got anything, I was going to give back as much as I can. I learned that all you have to be willing to do is give your time.

The spirit of Christmas is the spirit of love and of generosity and of goodness. It illuminates the picture window of the soul, and we look out upon the world's busy life and become more interested in people than in things.

My work in Africa was paid for mostly by American Christians, and I am so thankful for their giving hearts.

The greatest gift is a portion of thyself.

How different our standard is from Christ's. We ask how much a man gives. Christ asks how much he keeps.

ALMSDEED  (ALMSDEED)   n.s.[from alms and deed.]An act of charity; a charitable gift. This woman was full of good works, and almsdeeds which she did.BibleActs,ix. 36. Hard favour'd Richard, where art thou?Thou art not here: murder is thy almsdeed;Petitioner for blood thou ne'er put'st back.Shakespeare'sHenry VI.

For if one Father is common to us all, and every good thing that can fall to our lot comes from Him, there ought not to be anything separate among us that we are not prepared gladly and wholeheartedly to share with one another, as far as occasion requires.

The proper use, then, of all the good gifts we have received is the free and generous sharing of those gifts with others.

There cannot be a surer rule, nor a stronger exhortation to the observance of it, than when we are taught that all the endowments which we possess are divine deposits entrusted to us for the very purpose of being distributed for the good of our neighbor.

You cannot imagine a more certain rule or a more powerful suggestion than this, that all the blessings we enjoy are divine deposits which we have received on this condition that we distribute them to others.