ONE THOUSAND GIFTS (Voskamp) Part 5

PART 5: Devotions 41-50

ONE THOUSAND GIFTS: A Devotional Finding Everyday Graces

Ann Voskamp (Zondervan, 2012)

SUNDAY, October 26  Lovely Grace

Romans 1:19-21 MSG

But the basic reality of God is plain enough. Open your eyes and there it is! By taking a long and thoughtful look at what God has created, people have always been able to see what their eyes as such can’t see: eternal power, for instance, and the mystery of his divine being.

• Augustine asked two questions of the world: ‘If there is no God, why is there so much good?  If there is a God, why is there so much evil?’
• I wonder if I have spent a lifetime murmuring under my breath only the second question.  Is our default to ignore the expected and focus on the unexpected?
• Maybe this is why the world hemorrhages – if we think God doesn’t care, why should we?
• Every breath is a gift and if life is a gift, there is a Giver and if there is a Giver – all’s grace.  When all’s grace – we give, because a gift never stops being a gift to be given….

              Whoa.  I had to stop and read parts of this lengthy devotion over several times.  I had never seen Augustine’s questions before.  All gifts are signs of good, signs of a God who cares very deeply.  If we focus on the evil, we can easily blame God – why don’t you care?   Maybe the question really is of ourselves, why don’t we care?

            All gifts of grace make God’s presence plain and clear: Creation in all its glory makes it clear.  God loves us.  God cares.   Give thanks.  

MONDAY, October 27  Kindling Grace

Psalm 107:6,8  VOICE

In their distress, they called out to the Eternal,
    and He saved them from their misery…..

May they erupt with praise and give thanks to the Eternal
    in honor of His loyal love
And all the wonders He has performed for humankind!

“It is a good thing to be without a trouble; but it is a better thing to have a trouble, and know how to get grace enough to bear it.” (C. Spurgeon) 

“Thanksgiving has attained its rightful place in us, only when it is part of all our days and dominates all our experiences.” (JR Miller)

• What if I gave thanks in the trouble, for the trouble, because the trouble is a gift that causes me to turn to God?
• It’s only when grief and grace kindle us to the very same flame of gratitude to God – it’s only then that our love for God ignites in a pure blaze of glory. AV

Yes! Believe it or not!  A Scribble!  Long overdue!

KINGDOM KINDLING

I awake each morning to a cold fire,

A spirit dulled by the slumber of soul.

How to light my flame? 

How to LIGHT my day?

Gather the manna.

Gather the bread of the Word.

Gather Kindling-Grace.

Slowly, word-by-word, feed the fire.

Manna-sticks of praise –

Moments of God-glory-grace that make

The embers glow and flicker…

Kindling of fears, hurts and pain,

Give thanks for God’s love and presence.

Feed the fire with thanksgiving

And watch the flames ignite.

The Kingdom blaze must be constantly fed

With Kindling-praise.

Feed your fire all day long

And let the glory burn within you.  

TUESDAY, October 28  Endless Grace

Colossians 2:6-7,10  MSG

My counsel for you is simple and straightforward: Just go ahead with what you’ve been given. …School’s out; quit studying the subject and start living it! And let your living spill over into thanksgiving…..You don’t need a telescope, a microscope, or a horoscope to realize the fullness of Christ, and the emptiness of the universe without him. When you come to him, that fullness comes together for you, too. His power extends over everything.

• Stress can be an addiction and worry can be our lunge for control and we forget the answer to THIS moment. AV

“All fear is but the notion that God’s love ends.  Do you think I end, that I will not be enough?  I am infinite, child.”  AV

            I love the Message translation: ‘You don’t need a telescope or a microscope…to realize the breadth of God…’  Indeed we just need to step outside ourselves for a moment and really see the fullness of Creation, of ourselves, of relationships, and the power of GOOD over all.  That power is of God through Christ.  And we have it in us IF we will but accept it and allow that fullness to become part of us.  (Fullness reminds me of my Weight Watchers meeting last night...Shall I fill up on God, not food?  Good slogan!)

            But too often we are plagued by Voskamps quote, ‘All fear is but the notion that God’s love ends…’  Is not fear a lack of trust in the infinite power and love of our Creator?  We fear because we know we don’t have the ability, we are not in control.  Christ can make that Fear into Faith when God is in control.  So easy to write, so hard to practice.  I can start by adding to my grace list, with thanksgiving and praise, acknowledgement of the endless stream of grace poured into my life.  Thank you, God.  

WEDNESDAY, October 29  Losing Grace

James 1:17  MSG

Every desirable and beneficial gift comes out of heaven. The gifts are rivers of light cascading down from the Father of Light. There is nothing deceitful in God, nothing two-faced, nothing fickle.

• The song is always found in the surrender.
• When you wake to losing someone, something, you win love.  When you realize that what you have you will lose, you win real eyes.  You win grateful joy.
• The way to love life is to imagine losing it.  ‘The one who loses his life finds it.’  AV

The scripture made me think of this scribble
with its fountain of God-light. 

            ‘The song is found in the surrender’.  There is something beautifully poetic about that phrasing.  When we lose, we win.  Think about it.  If you lose your vision temporarily (maybe your glasses need an upgrade!), aren’t you so much more grateful for sight when vision is restored?  Are not the colors a little brighter?  Do you not notice the tiny shimmers of God-light that radiate throughout the day?  Loss causes us to stop and realize the value of what we are losing. 

            Today I am going to stop and appreciate those gifts from God that are cascading down like ‘rivers of light’.  Say grateful thanks and surrender myself to drown in the river of God.  In so doing, what gifts of God-grace will I be blessed to see?

THURSDAY, October 30  Joyous Grace

James 1:2 VOICE

Don’t run from tests and hardships, brothers and sisters. As difficult as they are, you will ultimately find joy in them.

“No man can live without joy.” – Thomas Aquinas

• While I may not always feel joy, God asks me to give thanks in all things because He knows that the FEELING of joy begins in the ACTION of thanksgiving.
• Only self can kill joy.

            We control our own happiness.  It’s a matter of attitude.  We control how we respond to people and situations.  They can bring us down or bring us up.  That attitude begins with gratitude.  Give thanks for the situation and what it brings to you.  Give thanks for the people involved.  Give thanks that God is at work in your life, whether you can perceive it or not.  And suddenly, in the midst of all that thanksgiving, we can find joy.  Sometimes we might have to dig fairly deep in the well of the thanks, but the joy is there, ready to bubble forth.  

FRIDAY, October 31  Pit Grace

Psalm 103:2-4  MSG

 O my soul, bless God.
    From head to toe, I’ll bless his holy name!
O my soul, bless God,
    don’t forget a single blessing!

 He forgives your sins—every one.
    He heals your diseases—every one.
    He redeems you from hell—saves your life!

• Do I really smother my own joy because I believe anger achieves more than love?
• How did Jesus do it again?  He turned his eyes.  ‘And looking up to heaven, he gave thanks….’
• Contemplative simplicity isn’t a matter of circumstances, it’s a matter of focus.

            How do we react when angry?  Usually we lash out, use words we instantly regret, and desire to get back in some way at the one who angered us, be it kids or co-workers or spouse.  How that anger might be diffused if we followed the approach of Jesus.  First give thanks.  Take a moment to focus on God and say thank you for this person, for this situation, for what we might gain from it, IF we keep our sight on God and not on the situation.  Blessings trump all.  

SATURDAY, November 1  Shielding Grace

Luke 9:23 GNT

 And he said to them all, “If you want to come with me, you must forget yourself, take up your cross every day, and follow me.”

• Your word is our sword against the pain of this world.
• Christian hands never clasp and He doesn’t give gifts for gain because a gift can never stop being a gift – it is always meant to be given.
• How will this planet change if God’s people do not become its change??

            When I went online to read this passage in multiple translations, I suddenly was struck with the word daily, every day.  Not just after church on Sunday, not just when the fancy strikes.  We are called to act upon our faith EVERY SINGLE DAY. 

            Voskamp’s last quote reminds me of Ghandi’s:  “Be the change you want to see in the world.”  We cannot harden ourselves to the suffering just because it is not within our little ‘realm’.  We must respond.  It is our call.  Our response may take a variety of forms: personal, financial, prayerful, but we must return the blessing, we must continue to give the gifts away.

SUNDAY, November 2  Full-Bodied Grace

John 13:12, 14 GNT

 “Do you understand what I have just done to you?” he asked. ^….. I, your Lord and Teacher, have just washed your feet. You, then, should wash one another's feet.

• Every one of us longs to live a life of gratitude for the blessings that expresses itself by becoming the blessing.
• Eucharisteo is giving grace away.  The communion service is only complete in service.
• God calls me … to give thanks away.  That thanks-giving might literally become thanks-living.  That our lives become the very blessings we have received. (AV)

            This reminds me of an anthem our choir sang, “Make me a blessing to someone today.” If we are truly thankful for our blessings, that joyful spirit overflows and we become the blessing.  I really like the phrase to make our thanks-giving our  thanks-living.  When we spend our day constantly focused outward in a search for God-graces, we can’t help but transfer  that attitude into a way of life.  Who needs a foot washing today?  How can I bless another? 

MONDAY, November 3  Dark Grace

Ephesians 1:11 MSG

It’s in Christ that we find out who we are and what we are living for. Long before we first heard of Christ and got our hopes up, he had his eye on us…

• Fullest life itself dawns from nothing but Calvary darkness and tomb-cave black into the radiance of Easter morning.
• Darkness transfigures into light, bad transfigures into good, grief into grace, empty into full.  God wastes nothing – makes everything work out according to His plan. 

            “Out of darkness, into light” was the theme from some Christmas years and years ago.  But the phrase has stuck with me.  Today’s message reminds us that we have to experience the dark to appreciate the light.  I loved the last quote – ‘God wastes nothing’ – nothing happens to us that God cannot transfigure.  We must have the patience to work with and in God to recognize the transforming light.  God doesn’t WILL bad to happen, but with an ever watchful eye, our Lord can change it, can change US, to bring the dark into the light of day, the light of grace. 

TUESDAY, November 4  Strained Grace

Psalm 7:17 MSG

I’m thanking God, who makes things right.
I’m singing the fame of heaven-high God.

• Music is made in stress.  A string pulled tight, it has to be plucked, it has to be stressed.
• Stressed and empty and stretched right out, this is the space of song….The resonance is in the surrender. 

            Rick worked this past weekend on the siding of the church, blessed to be in a group that was serenaded constantly by a member who always was humming a tune, singing songs that filled his heart. 

            Singing and praise can fill a hurting heart, hearts wounded and relationships in peril.  But it takes the reaching out, the stress and the tension first, to allow the music space to happen.  There is a broken relationship in my life, one that has wounded us as a family.  I want to take that tension, surrender to my responsibility in the pain, and allow the music of reconciliation to happen.  So I will thank God, with the confidence that in His name and power, things will be made right.  I’m going to sing today and allow my heart to heal.