Thinking about gifts I want to give this year, I told my wife
I wanted to bake something. She looked at me skeptically. I am not a baker or
any kind of a cook. She said she’d help. Within a few hours we had 6 little
cakes that will be ready to go. She “helped.” Ha, ha. She did everything. All I
did was peel the apples. Her help was a tremendous gift to me.
A friend is
undergoing tremendous challenges. I thought he was mostly alone in the world. I
have known him for years and I come alongside him in his difficulties, but
there’s limits to how much I can do. Recently, I received a text from someone
three states away. He also knows my friend and will help in very big ways. I
didn’t know he existed and now he will do much to make things better for my
friend. This has been an unplanned, unexpected gift.
Two of my
three children now drive. Teaching them to drive and helping them get their
licenses seemed to be a matter of course. It’s just something you do when your
kids turn 16. I didn’t anticipate that they would both be thoroughly competent
drivers whom I could not only trust, but appeal to. Hey son, I am busy. Can
you go to store and pick up what we need? Having them as drivers has been a
real gift that at key times has made life easier.
I could go
on with examples of unexpected gifts. I count these as blessings from God. When
Jesus was born, Israel wasn’t thinking, okay, in the time of King Herod,
under Governor Pilate, God will send a Savior. No one was watching for
Jesus, at least not the way he came, born among barnyard animals, born into
poverty. Some hoped for a dynamic military leader, another David who would
strike the heart of Goliath (Rome). No one anticipated a peasant savior whose
defining act would be to die on a cross.
God is a giver of unexpected gifts. If you know Jesus, you know that. You know that the one we celebrate changed your life, gave your purpose and hope, calls you into his church, and into his kingdom. If you know Jesus, you know all of this. But maybe you’ve forgotten. Turn back to Him. This Christmas, turn back to the giver of good things, the Savior.
If you don’t know Jesus, you can! Read the Gospel of Matthew and the Gospel of Luke, and the book of Romans. You have plenty of time between now and Christmas Day. Give yourself the gift of walking in this story. Confess your sins and open your heart to God and he will come in. He will give the gift of salvation and new life. You’ll never be the same.
