Have you ever watched a kid try to keep a balloon in the air? Not a helium balloon. I mean the regular balloon — the one filled with your breath. At first, it feels magical. You blow it up, tie it off, toss it into the air, and for about two seconds it looks like it might work. It floats. And then gravity remembers. So you smack it. Now you’re committed. You smack it again. And again. And suddenly you’re no longer enjoying a balloon — you’re in a full-contact sporting event. You’re diving across the living room. You’re lunging over furniture. You’re yelling, “Don’t let it touch the ground” like this balloon somehow holds the fate of civilization. Eventually someone spikes it too hard and it hits the ceiling fan. Chaos ensues. The balloon shoots off at 40 miles per hour like a rubber torpedo, lands behind the couch, and everyone pretends the game was fun. But here’s the reality: a breath-filled balloon never stays up on its own. It requires constant intervention. Constant smacking. Constant effort.

Now compare that to a helium balloon. You don’t have to smack it. You don’t have to remind it what it’s supposed to do. You simply fill it with the right thing — and it rises. It floats quietly in the corner of the room doing its job without exhaustion or a pulled hamstring.

There are two ways to keep a balloon afloat. If a balloon is filled with your breath, you have to keep smacking it to keep it off the ground. That’s how many people are with their generosity. They need someone, once or twice a year, to “smack” them into giving. All of a sudden, they give out their money left and right, but it only lasts for a short time — that is, until they’re “smacked” again.

There’s another way, of course, to keep a balloon in the air. It’s to fill it with helium, and it soars on its own, no smacking required. Paul says in 2 Corinthians 8 that what he wants for believers is generosity that works like that — generosity that rises naturally. He doesn’t want reluctant giving. He doesn’t want pressured giving. He doesn’t want generosity that only appears when someone makes an announcement, shares a need, or creates urgency. He wants love that is genuine, because genuine love produces natural generosity.

In 2 Corinthians 8, Paul points to the Macedonian believers — people who were not wealthy, not comfortable, and not giving from surplus — yet their generosity overflowed. Why? Because their hearts were full first. Their giving was not driven by a moment. It was driven by a reality: they had experienced the grace of God. That’s the helium.

When generosity is powered by guilt, it needs constant reminders. When generosity is powered by pressure, it fades quickly. When generosity is powered by emotion, it spikes and drops. But when generosity is powered by grace, it floats. Grace changes giving from something you do occasionally into something that naturally rises from who you are.

So the question is simple: are you trying to keep generosity in the air by smacking it or by filling your heart with the right thing? Because when the grace of Jesus fills your heart — the One who became poor so you could become rich — generosity stops being forced. It starts to float.