ONE THOUSAND GIFTS (Voskamp): Part 6

PART 6: Devotions 51-60

ONE THOUSAND GIFTS:
A Devotional Finding Everyday Graces

Ann Voskamp (Zondervan, 2012)

WEDNESDAY, November 5  Re-Membering Grace

Luke 17:18 MSG

Jesus said, ‘Were not ten healed?  Where are the nine?  Can none be found to come back and give glory to God except this outsider?’  Then he said to him, ‘Get up.  On your way.  Your faith has healed and saved you.’

• This fallen world never stops dis-membering who we are.  We’re all breaking a bit more every day, even in small ways.
• But when we remember how He blesses, loves us, when we recollect His goodness to us, we heal – we re-member.

            Some days, some lives, seem like an ever-flowing parade of despair: illness, job loss, broken relationships.  How in the world can one stop and say thank you in the midst of it?  Yet it is that very act that can begin the act of healing.  ‘Thank you, God, for the medicine that keeps me alive this day for my family.’  ‘Thank you, God, for this opportunity to explore new employment.’  Thank you, God.  Nothing goes to waste.  All the broken pieces will be re-membered into the whole once again.  

            I continue now to weave my thanks into my daily prayers.  I BEGIN with them.  Abundant gifts of pumpkin, ability to bake to share, Jed's journal submitted, Letter from Swansons, Lectionary group, Pink tint to storm clouds, Unknown melon revealed to be a honeydew!.....Thank you, God.  

THURSDAY, November 6  Storm Grace

Hebrews 12:28

Therefore, since we are receiving a kingdom that cannot be shaken, let us be thankful, and so worship God acceptably with reverence and awe. 

• Neglecting to give thanks only deepens the wound of the world.  What of faith in a God who wastes nothing and makes all into grace?
• To thank God in all is to bend the knee in allegiance to God, who alone knows all. 
• That which I refuse to thank Christ for, I refuse to believe Christ can redeem.

        Today I realized that I have listed nearly 300 God-Grace-Gifts so far, and probably not one of them is thanking God for something I perceive as ‘bad’. Do I not believe God is present in these issues, these unrecognizable blessings?  God can work through the garbage and bring good from it.  I need to include thanks for such in my list so God can start the process of transformation. 

        So….Thank you, God, for Mom’s health problems.  They have started our family on a path to reconciliation.  Thank you, God, for my brother's addiction.  It is helping me realize my weight problem carries similar traits.  I can’t ask Mac to be strong and resist when I am not and can not.   Thank you, God, for the trials you set before me.  From garbage to grace…..

FRIDAY, November 7  Breathing Grace

Psalm 30:5  BBE

….in his grace there is life; weeping may be for a night, but joy comes in the morning.

• Fear is banished in this present moment when the presence of I AM fills it. 
• When you are weak, take a deep breath.  Breathe.  Say His name.  Say YES to God. Eucharisteo.
• Black notes make music too. 

    In the dark notes of our days, music can be found.  We simply must open our ears and our hearts to listen.  When fear stops us in our tracks and the world suddenly seems silent, may we listen carefully.  There is music in the black notes.  There is music in our pain, and that melody can carry us over the fear, over the discord, into the joy of gratitude and thank-giving.  Take a deep breath and listen, listen to the melody of the world.  God is singing to us. 

Jed had black notes thrown at him last spring in regard to his PhD.  Disappointment and despair.  But God was composing the music all along – a better dissertation in the long run.  Completed yesterday.  Grace at work.  

SATURDAY, November 8  Amaryllis Grace

Isaiah 14:24  GNT

What I have planned will happen. What I have determined to do will be done.

• The daily practice of the discipline of gratitude is the way to daily practice the delight of God. 
• Plant the truth in me: there are gifts worth counting to one thousand for, gifts that will emerge out of the deathly dark.  Unfurl amaryllis grace today.

“Joy is the gigantic secret of the Christian.”  (GK Chesterman)

            I find it amazing that today is amaryllis grace: grace that comes after the dark of death, beauty from a bulb left dormant for a long time.  Several beloved Baker figures passed away this week.  Funerals are coming up, opportunities to celebrate life in the wake of loss.  Two are for men who died too soon – in their 50’s.  ‘Not fair’ we think.  But buried beneath the tomb-dark comes resurrection.  May we give thanks for that.  This reminds me somewhat of the bulb analogy for life-death-heaven I read previously.  God has the joy of the blossom awaiting us.  It can be in this life on a different level if we practice gratitude.  Look for the flowers blooming today.  

SUNDAY, November 9  Happiest Grace

Romans 5:15 GNT

It is true that many people died because of the sin of that one man [Adam]. But God's grace is much greater, and so is his free gift to so many people through the grace of the one man, Jesus Christ.

• You can’t earn God’s love.  You can only turn toward God’s love.
• Holy joy lies in the habit of murmuring thanks to God for the smallest of graces.
• Happiness is not getting something but being given to Someone, Christ.

            Each time we utter our thanks, our acknowledgement of a moment of God grace, we have turned ourselves once more to God, to God’s love.  We have unwrapped another part of the gift of God love’s.  This isn’t a package we open in one moment, one day, but in a lifetime of thanks.  This package may come in the tiniest of boxes or in unwrap-able size.   Surely receiving free gifts always make us happy!  Surely our parents taught us to say thank you!  Over and over again!

MONDAY, November 10  Comforting Grace

Isaiah 49:13 

Shout for joy, you heavens; rejoice, you earth;

            Burst into song, you mountains!

For the Lord comforts his people

and will have compassion on his afflicted ones.

• When God moves us out of our comfort zone – into places that are way bigger than us, places that are difficult, hard, painful, places that even hurt – this is a gift.
• The greatest gift we can ever receive is the gift of losing our earthly security and comfort….so we can unwrap the intimacy of the Savior and his heavenly comfort.
• Those who fully live, who live ecstatic lives of joy, embrace moving out of comfort zones.  Ecstatic joy is found outside of static comfort zones.  Because it’s moving out to where the Spirit moves.  Like the wind, the Spirit always moves.

            It seems impossible to consider death, divorce, poverty, loss as a GIFT from God.  But for those of us in our secure, safe, comfortable western culture, it takes something drastic for us to realize our need to depend on God.  It takes shifting us out of the comfort zone of independence.  Christianity is strongest right now in those countries and cultures where suffering is rampant.  Faith is sometimes all the people have and they are able to make it a joyful experience.

            I love the Spirit analogy.  The Spirit-Wind is always on the move, shifting and changes.  So must we as we allow that Spirit to infiltrate our lives.  Give thanks for the uncomfortable.  There is comfort to be found within it from a compassionate God who seeks what is best for each one of us.  

TUESDAY, November 11  Cycling Grace

Isaiah 6:3

Holy, holy, holy is the Lord Almighty; the whole earth is full of his glory.

• It’s the astonishing truth that while I serve Christ,  it is He who serves me….that I never need serve in my own strength.
• It’s the fundamental, lavish, radical nature of the upside-down economy of God: empty in order to fill.

            We are back to the Multiplying-Backwards-Math of God.  The more we give, the more we get; the more we serve, the more we are served.  It’s how God operates.  The pot must empty before it can be refilled to overflowing.

            The key is the repayment plan.  We don’t necessarily get back what we gave, only more – we receive in return what we NEED in abundance.  Such God currency may take the form of joy, contentment, a deeper relationship or awareness.  God knows best what to give back.  It can be an ever-spinning cycle of grace.  

WEDNESDAY, November 12  Wearing Grace

Zephaniah 3:17 MSG & VOICE

Your God is present among you,
    the champion who will rescue you.
Happy to have you back, he’ll calm you with his love
    and delight you with his songs.

• What if we wanted to BE beautiful more than we wanted to BUY beautiful?
• Happiness and healing is in the opening of a hand…

            What if we WORE grace?  What if we wore the love of God as a garment that defined who we are and what matters to us?  What if we made that conscious choice day in and day out?  Choose love.  Choose to radiate God’s grace.  Indeed, a God who is so present in our lives that we can’t help but bubble over with that love in happiness and joy.  

THURSDAY, November 13  Trumpeting Grace

1 Chronicles 16:10-12 MSG

Thank God! Call out his Name!
    Tell the whole world who he is and what he’s done!
Sing to him! Play songs for him!
    Broadcast all his wonders!
Revel in his holy Name,
    God-seekers, be jubilant!        

• ‘Honk if you’re happy’ is really, ‘To be happy, honk’.
• ‘Give thanks if you are joy-filled’ is really ‘To be joy-filled, give thanks’.
• If a joy-filled heart is good medicine, then giving thanks is my daily prescription.

            Which comes first, the chicken or the egg?  Which comes first, happiness or thanksgiving?  Voskamp tells the story of a man who reluctantly followed his grand-daughter’s request to honk when daily viewing a tattered sign by the road, ‘Honk if you’re happy’.  He gradually discovered the action made him look forward to a new day of honking, a moment turned to minutes and then happiness seeped into all his life.  By honking?  No, by praising and thanking. 

            This ends Voskamp’s book.  But it will not end my effort to record the God-gifts that I encounter each day.  And I will try to keep going once I reach One Thousand.  For now, can I get to 500 by year’s end!  Yes!  How can I BE a blessing 500 times over as well?  Now THAT is a holy challenge!!  

            How jubilant is my thanks?  Do I secrete my God-Grace-Gifts away in the book and never share them?  Do I trumpet my praise?  Do I begin my prayers with thanksgiving?  How often do I verbalize a ‘Thank you God’ when in the presence of others?  Hallelujah! 

FRIDAY, November 14  Becoming Grace

Genesis 12:2

I will bless you….and you will be a blessing.

• This work – the thousand endless jobs of daily life – they each give the opportunity for one to become the gift.
• The way through the pain is to reach out to others in theirs.
• God can enter into me, even me, and use these hands, these feet, to be His love, a love that goes on and on forever, endless cycle of grace.

            We are blessed to become the blessing.  Our every action can become an act of thanks when performed in such an attitude of gratitude. 

            I wondered in reading this final devotion if I do enough acknowledging of my thanks to those OTHER than God?  When I write down the name of someone who has been a blessing to me, do I share with the person?  How often do I publicly affirm other people in my life?  Verbally?  A note or card?  To become grace, to become a blessing, I must remember to bless in an active way. 

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.  

ONE THOUSAND GIFTS (Voskamp): Part 4

PART 4: Devotions 30-40

ONE THOUSAND GIFTS: A Devotional Finding Everyday Graces

Ann Voskamp (Zondervan, 2012)

WEDNESDAY, October 15  Seed Grace

Genesis 1:29 VOICE

Look! I have given you every seed-bearing plant that grows on the earth and every fruit-bearing tree. They will be your food and nourishment.

• The seeds, they fall into my hand small, jewels.  I am holding seeds, first gift He ever bestowed upon His people. … But to look at seeds and believe He will feed us?
• To hand someone seeds for his swelling, panging starvation, and ask him to believe in a feast – is this what everyday faith is?
• He gives, He gifts.  He gifts with seeds as small as moments, grace upon grace, and the unlikely here and now, it shall sustain you, feed you.  Do not disdain the small.  The promise of feast is within the moments.  Our enough is always in the now, because He never leaves us. (AV)

            Seeds are small, often rather bland in appearance, sometimes downright miniscule.  The flowers, the fruit, the abundance that results can only be considered a miracle.  Tiny God-gifts are the same.  What perhaps appears insignificant or ordinary is transformed by God into abundant blessing. 

            I start a new Habitat build today.  Are the nails my seeds?  Are these small bits of metal the building blocks for grace?  The seeds that will become the feast of a home for someone?  May I continue to keep my eyes wide open to the miracle of the moment, the feast in the seeds of God.  

THURSDAY, October 16 Transplanting Grace

Revelation 21:5 GNT

Then the one who sits on the throne said, “And now I make all things new!”

• A plant isn’t a flower but a weed only by function of its place.
• Transplant the weed to the heart and it blooms a flower, and I might function in this place.  Love is ridiculous and reconfigures everything.

                        Sometimes the most unpleasant of plants can be beautiful: A purple thistle, a field of dandelions, even the intricate design of a goat’s head.  Sometimes the most unpleasant of events can produce unexpected joy.  Sometimes the most unpleasant of people can be transplanted by the love of God as shared by those around them.

            Am I looking for the rose or the thorn?  Am I looking for  weed or flower?  Am I seeking the fortune or the flaw?  I will find what I seek and my focus will remain as such.  May I seek the new in Christ, the fresh, the transplanted beauty in all as God works grace in all.  

FRIDAY, October 17  Lowest Grace

John 3:30  MSG

This is the assigned moment for him to move into the center, while I slip off to the sidelines.

• If I focus on humility, I look inward to assess if I’m sufficiently humble, and in the very act, humility darts and I’m proud, self-focused. AV
• Receiving God’s gifts is a gentle, simple movement of stooping lower. AV

“I used to think that God’s gifts were on shelves one above the other,  and that the taller we grew in Christian character, the easier we should reach them. I find now that God’s gifts are on shelves one below the other, and it is not a question of growing taller but of stooping lower, and that we have to go down, always down, to get his best gifts.” (GBF Hallock)

            John had it right.  To know Christ, we must allow him center stage.  We must humbly remain off stage.  There, in the shadows of grace, we can receive the abundant blessings God is constantly putting before us.  Yet, humility is unassumed.  It must come naturally.  If forced, pride overwhelms.  So easy to say, hard to balance.

            Without forethought, to lower oneself, to step back and gratefully appreciate all that is before us – then we shall behold the grace of God.  

SATURDAY, October 18   Manna Grace

Deuteronomy 8:3  GNT

He made you go hungry, and then he gave you manna to eat, food that you and your ancestors had never eaten before. He did this to teach you that you must not depend on bread alone to sustain you, but on everything that the Lord says.

• When God gives manna moments, may we give thanks for the mystery.  When the manna makes no sense, God makes it our sustenance.  In our ‘what is it?’ moments, turn us to give thanks. (AV)

            Manna moments.  Those times when we are troubled, grieving, confused or doubting; when we agonize and cry out, ‘Why God? Why?’  The times when it will take all the faith we have to say thank you for that which we don’t understand.  To feed on the manna in gratitude in spite of our pain.

            Ebola strikes.  Isis kills.  Friends battle each other in Palestine or the Ukraine.  Planes crash. Babies die. Cancer strokes.  Where is God in the pain of these moments?  Feeding us manna and saying ‘Trust me! Thank me!’

            Manna moments of grace.  Thank you, God.

SUNDAY, October 19  Bread Grace

2 Corinthians 1:20 MSG

Whatever God has promised us gets stamped with the YES of Jesus.

• Opening the hand to receive the moments. Trusting what is received to be grace.  Taking it as bread.
• We take the moments as bread and give thanks and the thanks itself becomes bread. The thanks itself nourishes.  Thanks feeds our trust.

            This is my body.  The bread.  Christ.  Nourishment and sustenance.  The kind that never fails to fill our hungry souls.  When we look upon our gratitude journal, our recording of God-gifts of grace, we are feeding our soul with the bread of God.  We are fortifying ourselves with the Bread-YES of Christ.  With thanksgiving we offer each morsel of grace moments back to God and in the thanks we are sustained.  Bread Grace.  What a great breakfast.  

MONDAY, October 20  Wedded Grace

Ephesians 5:31-32 GNT

“For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and unite with his wife, and the two will become one.”  There is a deep secret truth revealed in this scripture, which I understand as applying to Christ and the church.

• “In Christ, you have immediate access to God and all of this is yours – joy, acceptance, completeness, rest, righteousness, access to the throne of God.  You are sealed and He has pledged Himself to His people and you are His.”
• The vows of the Christ, they are covenant, and He lasts when we lose everything else and all the gifts are in Christ alone. (AV) 

            The sweetness of honey lasts forever.  It may crystallized or change form, but the taste lingers for centuries.  Sometimes honey is given away at weddings to be a reminder of the sweetness of the moment that will last for eternity.  Each God-gift we discover is like a tiny taste of honey, a reminder of the wedding pledge God has made to us and we to God.  We have taken vows in this relationship as well and pledged ourselves to God. 

TUESDAY, October 21  Love-Song Grace

Jeremiah 31:3 VOICE

    “I have loved you with an everlasting love—
        out of faithfulness I have drawn you close.

• It’s a new voice, this endless stream of grace, one I never get over.  This love song He is singing, it is the antithesist of life’s theme song, that refrain of rejection I know so well.  (AV)
• The most fundamental thing is not how we think of God, but how God thinks of us. (CS Lewis)

          To give thanks daily, hourly, minute-by-minute, is to constantly unwrap the God-gifts of grace.  To open a new present that is bursting with love, flowing forth with the music of life.  This weekend I unwrapped a hug from a son, the warmth of family memories, the aroma of freshly brewed coffee.  I unwrapped the joy of seeing the Baker City 100 miles sign outside Caldwell and the excitement of Pleasant Hill and a ‘first view’ of the Elkhorns as you crest the summit.  God-gifts, waiting to be unwrapped, waiting for the thank you note to be sent, the praise uttered. 

          Listen to God’s Love-Song!  Sing along with the music! 

WEDNESDAY, October 22  

One-Hundred-Times-a-Day Grace

2 Corinthians 4:15 MSG

Every detail works to your advantage and to God’s glory: more and more grace, more and more people, more and more praise!

• Blessings keep our awareness of life’s holy potential ever present.
• It is GK Chesterman who encapsulated the truth of my numbering life: ‘The greatest of poems is an inventory.’  (AV)

            I returned to the lectionary bible study last night at church.  We always start off with ‘Where did you see God this week?’ and ‘Where do you need God?’  It seemed like the first question can be answered by the list of graces filling the back pages of my annual journal.  I am up to #209, having started Voskamp’s book 35+ days ago.  What I have found in this exercise is that a concentration on the blessing removes the distraction or disappointment of the thorns of the day.  I wrote in my blog the other day about the noise from a campfire group at the RV Park – loud piercing laughter noise that went on and on until around 2:30am.  I was getting upset and angry about it when I remembered the devotion for that day:  This noise is my manna.  Thank God for it.  So I said thank you for people who have a sense of humor, who have something to laugh about and someone to laugh with.  I went to sleep shortly after that!  Counting blessings can produce good sleep!

          One other thought - the 100 times a day concept reminds me of Celtic Spirituality - the focus that ALL of life, from washing the dishes to bathing the baby to baking the bread, is wrapped in the holiness of God.  All of our moments are moments for prayer and thanksgiving.  What a wonderful thought! 

THURSDAY, October 23  Numbered Grace

Psalm 90:12 VOICE

Teach us to number our days
    so that we may truly live and achieve wisdom.

• Number the beats, record the blessings, enumerate the gifts, see ONE at the center of it all and know there is much and it is fleeting.
• The way to learn to number our days is to count the moments of His grace. AV

            ‘Our days are numbered’ or so the saying goes.  We know our time on this world is limited, but those days can be so much, much more when we number them with blessings, with moments of gratitude and grace. 

            It seems like it was easier to recognize the God-gifts while I was immersed in the glory of national parks, drives through incredible mountain scenery.  Now I am back in the ordinary, familiar environment of home.  May I continue to ‘number’ my days with a recognition of the grace surrounding me here in this place:  the tiny tomatoes still clinging to the vine, even in October!, the bold blooms of geraniums on the front porch, the warm hugs of return from friends, the color contrast of silver maple leaves, golden flecks drifting slowly down the Powder River, yes….the list of familiar gifts can be numbered.  May I unwrap each with care.  

FRIDAY, October 24  Affectionate Grace

Hosea 2:19-20 GNT

Israel, I will make you my wife;
    I will be true and faithful;
    I will show you constant love and mercy
    and make you mine forever.
 I will keep my promise and make you mine,
    and you will acknowledge me as Lord.

No one is capable of gratitude as one who has emerged from the Kingdom of Night. (Elie Wiese)

• What is greater proof to the world of the power of the gospel of Christ than the world witnessing the power of profuse love FOR Christ? AV

          I take so much for granted.  I have lived a blessed life – a loving childhood, good health, solid community, family, husband and kids.  I have not lived in the Kingdom of Night.  I don’t want to go there just to be thankful, but I do think we who are blessed have to look harder to recognize God-gifts.  We are used to putting a different wrapping paper on grace – perhaps one of ‘coincidence’ or ‘luck’, perhaps ‘good fortune’ or ‘clean living’.  But are not all really the grace of God? 

                                                

SATURDAY, October 25 Standing Grace

Isaiah 60:18

No longer will violence be heard in your land,

   Nor ruin or destruction within your borders;

But you will call your walls Salvation and your gates Praise.     

• God doesn’t need us to praise Him, but He needs us to praise.
• Unless we are intentional about giving God glory throughout the day, our days unintentionally can give way to grumbling.
• Do doxology, not destruction.  AV

          We talked a lot at Presbytery about peace, justice, inclusiveness – all positive concepts designed to build up rather than destroy.  They are a means of praise, thanks that keep us focused on God-gifts.  They build bridges of community and communication.  Am I building walls of praise on a daily basis?  Am I singing doxology?