Setting Money Aside for Generosity Changes How We See Needs Around Us 

By Ryan Klund 

When my wife and I first moved to the Milwaukee area, we spent a lot of time driving down Miller Park Way. 

If you're from Milwaukee, you know the road. It's a busy stretch through West Milwaukee with just about everything you might need. Grocery stores, restaurants, gas stations and plenty of traffic lights. 

And at many of those lights, we would encounter people asking for money. 

I don't know exactly where I picked this up, but growing up I had learned how to handle those situations. 

Don't make eye contact. 

Look straight ahead. 

Don't engage. 

And definitely don't give them money. 

So that's largely what I did. 

But one day, my wife and I were driving together and started talking about it. We both hated the way it felt. 

Here was another human being standing just a few feet from our car, visibly asking for help, and our instinct was to pretend we didn't see them. 

We talked about the kind of people we wanted to be. More specifically, we thought about the kind of people we wanted our future children and grandchildren to see us become. 

We didn't want them to see people who instinctively looked away and said no. 

We wanted them to see people who looked for opportunities to say yes. 

So we came up with an idea. 

We went to the bank and withdrew $100 in five-dollar bills. We put the money in the glove box and made a simple decision. 

When we encountered someone asking for help, we would give them five dollars. 

This isn't an article about whether giving cash to someone on a street corner is the best way to help someone experiencing poverty. There are fair arguments and important considerations around that question. 

For us, something else happened. 

It completely changed the way we drove down Miller Park Way. 

Instead of avoiding eye contact, we started looking. 

Instead of hoping the light would turn green before someone reached our car, we wanted enough time to roll down the window. 

I can remember making U-turns because we'd passed someone and realized we had missed the opportunity to give them one of those five-dollar bills. 

It was fun. 

And looking back, I think part of what made it so much fun was incredibly simple: 

The money was already gone. 

At least in our minds, it was. 

We weren't sitting at each intersection deciding whether we could afford to give five dollars. We weren't mentally subtracting it from our grocery budget. We weren't having the internal debate about whether this particular situation justified the expense. 

We had already decided the $100 was for giving. 

All that was left was to look for an opportunity to give it away. 

Decide to Give Before You Know Where It's Going 

I've thought about that little experiment a lot over the years, particularly through my work with generous families. 

There is something powerful about separating the decision to give from the decision of where to give. 

Scripture tells us, “Each one must give as he has decided in his heart, not reluctantly or under compulsion, for God loves a cheerful giver” (2 Corinthians 9:7). 

I've always appreciated that phrase: as he has decided in his heart. 

There is an intentionality to it. 

What if some of our generosity began with a decision made in advance? 

This belongs to God. I'm going to give it away. 

Then, instead of repeatedly asking ourselves whether we can afford to be generous, we get to ask a different question: 

Where is God inviting me to use it? 

That's a very different way to live. 

Money Set Aside for Generosity Changes What You See 

I see a version of this regularly in my work at National Christian Foundation. 

Families place money into Giving Funds, also commonly called donor-advised funds. Once those resources have been given charitably, the question changes. The money is already designated for charitable purposes. Now the family gets to prayerfully consider where to recommend grants. 

In some ways, it reminds me of those five-dollar bills sitting in our glove box. 

The money has already been given away. Now you're looking for where it should go. 

And I think that can do something to us. 

When a friend tells you about a ministry making an impact, your first thought doesn't have to be, Can I afford to do something? 

When your church presents an unexpected need, you're already prepared to consider it. 

When God puts something in front of you that stirs your heart, there is money waiting to be deployed. 

You begin looking for opportunities instead of protecting yourself from them. 

That's what surprised me about our little glove-box experiment all those years ago. 

The amount wasn't significant. It was five dollars at a time. 

But the change in us was. 

We went from trying not to notice people to actively looking for them. 

And perhaps there is a lesson about generosity in that. 

Sometimes the biggest obstacle to generosity isn't that we don't want to give. It's that every opportunity requires us to make the decision all over again. 

About the Author 

Ryan Klund serves as a Relationship Manager with National Christian Foundation Wisconsin, where he walks alongside generous Christian individuals and families as they seek to steward what God has entrusted to them with wisdom and faith. Through conversations about generosity, charitable planning and giving strategies, Ryan helps families think not only about how they give, but how generosity can help shape their hearts and draw them closer to God.