The Art of Receiving

The virtue of giving is a well-worn one.  It is for that reason, I believe, that the enemy of man has imbued the act of giving with pride.  Whether we admit it or not, we see the giver as superior to the "object" of the gift.  Giving is "God-like" and it is natural for the giver to feel a kinship with deity.

Conversely, the same enemy has imbued the receiver, not with a sense of humility (another virtue), but it's dark caricature, humiliation.  In so doing he has twisted everything into a disruption of the flow of God's Love Economy.  We take pride in giving, thus turning a foundational virtue of relationship into a sin.  We are humiliated in our need to receive, and thus turn away the gift with our own pride, ala, "We don't take charity."

John Steinbeck summed it up,

"Perhaps the most overrated virtue in our list of shoddy virtues is that of giving. Giving builds up the ego of the giver, makes him superior and higher and larger than the receiver...It is so easy to give, so exquisitely rewarding. Receiving, on the other hand, if it is well-done, requires a fine balance of self-knowledge and kindness. It requires humility and tact and great understanding of relationships. In receiving, you cannot appear, even to yourself, better or stronger or wiser than the giver, although you must be wiser to do it well."

We cannot carry out God's command to "bear one another's burdens" if we cannot learn to receive with grace.  When we deny the gift we insult God Himself, and we sabotage God's purpose and the power of healing in our relationships.