Giver Blessing 6: Right to Redeem
Beloved, I call your spirit to attention, and I invite the Giver portion to come explore God’s gifts to you.
Of all the gifts God gives, the gift of rights is one of the most valuable, and to the noble Giver tribe, God has given the incredibly valuable right to redeem.
Consider the enormity of Cain’s role in human history. Adam and Eve had been given the finest treasure imaginable. The authority vested in them was staggering. The extent of their calling was incomparable. The available resources for carrying out their calling were beyond extravagant.
The loss they experienced was the single greatest loss mankind has ever suffered. The cascading negative consequence of their choices outweighs all the other catastrophes in human history.
Furthermore, at their judgment, God made it clear that they were blocked on all fronts from repairing this mess. The curses would rest on them individually, and their access to the Tree of Life which could undo the death sentence was effectively blocked by a formidable angel.
Ah, but redemption is always in the heart of God, so in the very act of pronouncing judgment, He also indicated that redemption would come through their seed. So Cain, their firstborn, was embraced by the family as the presumptive redeemer of the human family. Knowing that, God very intentionally selected the gift of Giving for this firstborn son who would receive the legal right of carrying redemption forward.
While Cain was the first Giver with the right of redemption, he was certainly not the last.
Abraham became the father of the nation that would live out the miracle of redemption in a thousand chapters of their history. With seven gifts to choose from, God unhesitatingly selected Giver as the appropriate gift for Abraham since it carries with it the right of redemption.
While the birthing of THE Redeemer would come centuries later, Abraham walked out his right to redeem his nephew. Lot was helpless to redeem himself after the enemy armies captured his home city. Abraham had a band of 300 men who hardly resembled an army and certainly had no militaristic heritage or equipment.
Yet, because God had given him the right to redeem, he immediately and effectively launched an operation to rescue the entire P.O.W. group.
Later when God Himself was on the verge of destroying Sodom, Abraham exercised his right of redemption again to save Lot’s life.
Notice also the roles assumed by Abraham and Isaac at the quasi-sacrifice of Isaac. Isaac was the one who was supposed to die. It was Abraham who symbolically redeemed him by offering the ram instead.
Or consider Job.
At the beginning of the story, he was a natural redeemer – the patriarch of the clan, vigorously stepping up again and again to redeem his children of even the most fleeting, inner sin.
By the end of the story, he was the most unlikely redeemer. He had been stripped of all resources in the natural. His community had turned against him beginning in his own home and extending to princes from far away. His spiritual, emotional and physical health had been battered to a pulp.
Yet, when the three pompous, pious pontificators needed to be redeemed, God looked beyond all of what wasn’t there and focused on what was there. He had given Job the right to redeem.
So Job spoke redemption and heaven calmly nodded agreement. It was so.
Corporately the Baptists are best known for their passion for evangelism. They are simply expressing outwardly the gift for redemption that they, as a Giver tribe, have received inwardly.
Nationally South Korea, Nigeria and Kenya are known for their passion for evangelism and prayer – with much of the prayer being about evangelism. These Giver nations express their right of redemption on a grand scale.
Brazil and South Africa, two mighty Giver nations, have become aggressive at sending their best young men and women to the far reaches of the world because their passion for redemption is so strong it overflows their borders.
So we welcome you in our midst, Giver. You who have received the right of redemption are most welcome to live that out in our midst. We welcome and bless you in the name of our King and Redeemer, Jesus Christ.
Sherman Library
Corona del Mar, CA
December 16, 2008
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