Thank you, Jim, Dr. Schaffer, Chairman Weeks, Chairman Knuepfer, members of the County Board, ladies and gentlemen. It is a great honor for me to be asked to speak to the sixth prayer breakfast in DuPage County, not only to see so many of you this early in the morning, but also to be part of such wonderful fellowship, and hear such incredible music, from the ladies playing the organ and a piano, and from Myrna White.

You might think by listening to me, that I just got off the boat from England. Unfortunately, the introduction gave it away that I didn’t. I’ve been over here 30 years.

I told Jack Knuepfer that I sometimes pretend that I come from Georgia and since very few people know what Georgians sound like, I usually get by.

I also was raised in the Church of England denomination, not because I chose to be, but because I didn’t know there was another one. I went into the Army and they told me I was C of E, which either stands for Church of England or Christmas and Easter. When I came to Canada I became an Anglican, which is really the same thing with a Canadian accent. When I came down here I became an Episcopalian. Anglicans tend to be singularly unexpressive of their faith — and I can say that because I have been one.

When we moved to Hinsdale in 1966, my wife, being a Baptist, and I agreed that we ought to try something a little different. So we searched and in the Fall of ’66 we went to Christ Church in Oak Brook, which is a nondenominational church. It seemed to be just what we were looking for and we thoroughly enjoyed our first few years there until Reverend DeKruyter, the minister, said “Ed, I’d like you to give a lay perspective at the Sunday evening service. – Well, I thought, this is absolutely the worst possible thing that could have happened to me; Anglicans do not give lay perspectives. They just would rather die than say anything about their beliefs.

That I would have to stand up and say something that I really believed caused me to have some very serious moments of retrospection and reflection to think what I could say about my personal beliefs. The thing that I recognized was that there had been many turning points in my life. One of my turning points was the impact of prayer on my life. It’s much too obvious a topic for a prayer breakfast to talk about prayer, but goodness knows, it’s a marvelous subject.

There are other things that you think about when you recall turning points in your life; some of them are somewhat humorous. For example, as a man, when somebody first calls you “Sir,” you realize you have “arrived.” You realize middle-age has arrived when somebody tells you to pull your stomach in and it’s already pulled in. I tell my wife she needs glasses when she starts to read the hymn verse from the pew in front.

But perhaps one of the most significant turning points in life is when you find out who Santa Claus is.

When I was a small boy we didn’t know who Santa Claus was because we called him Father Christmas. In England, that’s the name for Santa Claus. And for many, many years we kept up the mystery of Father Christmas miraculously arriving, filling stockings (he doesn’t come down chimneys in England; he seems to come in through the front door which is certainly less complicated). However, one of the things, as a small boy, that I used to notice was the size of the gifts. Kids are that way; they judge a gift by its size. They judge a gift perhaps more by its size and its weight than they do by the wrapping. Children don’t save the wrapper off a gift.

Another turning point again comes not just when you find out who Santa Claus is, but when you find out that it is more fun to watch others open a gift than it is to open your own. The heart and spirit of the gift is more important than the size. The giving of a gift is more important than receiving one.

Let me side-track a moment on one other thing in my personal life which I want to share with you. I spent four years in the British Army in the artillery and, before I went in, I went over to say goodbye to an old uncle who lived in North London. He had spent four years in the first World War in the Royal Horse Artillery, and he said to me like uncles do, “Edward, do you want some advice before you go in the arm?-

And when you hear an uncle say that, you say, “Yes, Uncle George, I’d like to know what you’ve got to say.”

And he said, “Well, I’m going to give you some advice, but you’re not going to like it, because it’s not popular advice. But, my advice to you is, volunteer for everything.-

“Well,” I said, “that is incredible advice. That’s not what others have told me, and you certainly can get yourself into a packet of trouble in the army volunteering for everything.”

He said, “I know that, but eventually the sergeant will spot that you’re going to and will side-track your volunteering into things more productive

And that was true. I had an incredible time, and I am still having an incredible time, volunteering for anything and everything.

The important thing is to give of yourself without question, and this is where it relates to giving. Giving is really part of what it means to be a Christian. Jesus said, “It is more blessed to give than to receive; give and it shall be given unto you.” And Jesus was a lifetime documentation of giving, leading to giving of His own Life for all of us.

I want to share one other thing with you about giving. Anybody who has driven along 31st Street knows that at Christ Church we have done quite a little bit of building. And we have had to raise building funds to cover our mortgage obligations. I was privileged to be part of one of our three year building drives. The man whom I shared that responsibility with was a man by the name of Frank Swan. Frank Swan was and is the President of Nationwide Beef down on Fulton Street, so he’s an old meat man like me. Frank Swan and I worked on this building fund drive. We divided the church canvassing into north of Ogden Avenue and south of Ogden Avenue. We had meetings on two successive Sundays for the canvasser groups. and Frank Swan spoke at each one of them. He concluded his speech at each one with the phrase, “Remember, you cannot outgive God. – Now he was not talking just dollars, so I thought to myself, when I speak at this breakfast, what a wonderful thing to use that as a Scripture source, but it isn’t in the Scripture. The phrase, “you cannot outgive God,” isn’t in the Bible in those words. So I went back to Frank and I said, “Where did you pick that up?” He said, “You won’t believe it but I picked it up from another meat man.” Now this man is a man of incredible personal integrity; his is a story which I also want to share with you.

He does a small meat business off a single truck, buying down in Chicago. His name is Russell Youngstrom. Russell Youngstrom for forty years has been superintendent of the Chicago Gospel Mission.

Living in Wheaton, he goes down to that Mission every night but one, seven days a week. It started at 1125 West Madison, and 1125 West Adams is where he has established a youth mission. That man, without pay, and with his own personal input and that of his little board, has ministered to the needs of the people. They put out a pamphlet and in that pamphlet to support his philosophy that you cannot out-give God, it says that this mission is faithful in giving.:

– the Gospel to the needy

– an encouraging hand to needy youth

– a helping hand to the needy.

His efforts have expanded and grown; he’s reached more people, he’s brought people to the ministry. he’s reached kids who would normally be down on the poorer part of the street, brought them to know the Lord, and he’s given it all: not only dollars, but his time, his talents, and his efforts. His is a wonderful testimony to the fact that you really cannot out-give God.

No one in this room is really needy. We may not be rich in the bank, but we’re rich in disposable income compared to so many people in the world. We’re rich in disposable time, which is just as valuable. We are rich in disposable talents. We live, though, in an age of selfishness. The theme “We will overcome,” we don’t really believe. What we really mean is, without anybody else listening, I will overcome if I get a chance. It’s not we, it’s I. We take care of ourselves; we tend to distrust others. We honestly live in a selfish age, and when you are selfish you are self-conscious. How does a selfconscious person with many talents get started on giving?

Here are four ideas. My first idea for you is; don’t wait for the band to play. If you’re going to give something, you don’t need an audience, you certainly don’t need musical accompaniment, and you shouldn’t expect to get it in the newspaper. Do it secretly. The Lord loves a secret and cheerful giver.

The next thing is, do it anonymously. Try giving something anonymously. It may be a funny kind of thing to do; to drop a poinsettia on somebody’s door at Christmastime without a note saying who it is from; you’d be surprised how rewarding it is.

Next time you pray, deliberately don’t pray for yourself first. Pray for someone else first. It is remarkably satisfying and it will change your whole attitude from inward to outward.

Then as a practical matter, I’m going to try this idea on you because it is an opportunity to practice something of giving of yourself, without an implied Christian principle, and the idea focuses on manners.

It amazes me when I go downtown on the Burlington every day how many people walk through a swing-door and let it swing right back in the next fellow’s face.

Nobody every looks behind them, they never see who’s coming, they don’t hold doors open for people, they don’t say thank you to people. I was in New York the other day and was staggered to find them getting on the elevator before I could get off it: surely, that is the epitome of bad manners. Here is an opportunity for all of us, even if it is only under the guise of the Christmas spirit, to try to improve our outreach to people with good manners. Just hold the door open for someone, don’t try and be first, try thoughtfulness.

Over in England there’s a school and it has a motto. Most English schools have a motto which is written in Latin and the actual meaning of it is today somewhat obscure. But this Winchester College, maybe some of you have visited Winchester, has a motto written in English, and I have the motto in our kitchen for the benefit of our boys. The motto is very simple, “Manners Maketh Man.” There’s a lot of merit to that little motto, and if you want to give of yourself, manners is a good place to start.

Now you don’t have to make a list of how and what to give. Whatever your mite might be, you have something to give. I was trying to think very quickly of what you could give personally within your family. They say that teaching Christian principles and the Golden Rule to your children is one of the great things you can give them, the teaching of right and wrong. The best education you can afford is the greatest gift you can give your children. You can love them for all they’re worth, no matter what they do, and perhaps that’s the greatest gift.

In a Dear Abby column, a writer suggested something else that you could give: “I have learned that the greatest gift a man can give his children is himself and his time.”

And, in this time of broken homes, it was Charlie S hedd, the Christian writer, who wrote, “The greatest thing a father can give his children is his love of their mother.” Perhaps that’s worth some reflection.

There are many things you can give. You must decide. Your gift may not be the largest, the best wrapped, so f want to ask you one question: If God owns fifty-one percent of the stock (and He owns more than that) and therefore has a majority vote in your family, in your business, and in your life, how will you declare a dividend to the Lord in the form of a gift of your money, your talent, your time, and all your disposable assets?

I thought I’d close with a prayer. I wonder if you could do something which perhaps you don’t do every time you have a breakfast. It would be nice if you all held hands around the table and closed your eyes, and then I’ll read this prayer summarizing a lot of thoughts which are good for you to think about on the subject of giving.

“Teach us, Good Lord, to serve You as You deserve; to give and not to count the cost; to fight aml not to heed the wounds; to toil and not to seek for rest; to labor and not to ask for any reward save that of knowing that we do Your will. In Christ’s name we pray. Amen.”