Giving Interrupts Our Illusions

It’s still the first week of the year, which makes my snarky side want to ask: Have you broken your New Year’s resolutions yet?

For years, my father used this season to set new goals. He never called them resolutions, but that’s what they were. Almost all of them had something to do with money. That wasn’t greed—it was memory. He grew up dirt poor and never wanted to return there.

When it comes to finances, most of us live with a handful of well-maintained illusions. We don’t call them illusions, of course. We call them plans. Or goals. Or resolutions. Or “being a responsible adult.” But beneath the language, a quiet set of assumptions hums along:

• What I have is mine.
• I earned it myself.
• I can secure my own future.
• I know what I need.
• I don’t depend on anyone else.

They’re tidy. Comforting. Mostly invisible.

And then generosity walks in and flips the table.

Sometimes the table flipping is playful and celebratory, like a kid who finally wins Monopoly. Other times it’s confrontational and laced with anger, like Jesus in the temple. Either way, generosity exposes how fragile our assumptions really are.

The moment we release a gift, something cracks open. We remember: I’m not the center of this story. I’m a steward, not an owner. What’s in my hands is temporary, not ultimate.

Giving interrupts the illusion of self-sufficiency. You can’t give generously and still pretend you’re an island. Generosity is an admission: I have received far more than I could ever produce. We live in a web of grace.

Giving interrupts the illusion of scarcity. Scarcity whispers, There won’t be enough. But every sincere act of giving becomes a quiet rebellion against that fear. It says, I trust that enough will come.

Giving interrupts the illusion that compassion is optional. Once you see the face of someone who needed what you had—money, time, attention—you can’t unsee it. The world comes into sharper focus.

Giving interrupts the illusion that my comfort is the point. Let something go and your priorities rearrange themselves. New questions surface: What matters? Who matters? Why was I holding so tightly?

Giving interrupts the illusions we live by so that something truer can take their place. We aren’t defined by what we keep, we’re shaped by what we release.

So this year, embrace generosity. Call it a goal. Call it a resolution. Call it spiritual formation. Call it whatever you want.

Just make it central.