Does God Re-Gift?

The Blessing of Pain’s Work, Part II

Gift giving season is upon us. This is my FAVORITE time of year! My children are under the same roof, lots of fun food, movies, laughter, presents and TIME. Just to have time as a family is sacred and precious to me.

Then there are Christmas parties with fun, food, laughter, and the inevitable elephant gift game. I’m always looking through my house for an old, unopened gift that was passed on to me at another party. I was pondering such things when the Lord clearly said, “I re-gift”.

He had my attention. “You? Re-gift? What could you possibly re-gift, Lord, “ I asked.

“Your past,” He answered.

I don’t know about anyone else, but my past has some painful stuff in it and I would NOT want to open it again. Instead of visions of sugar plums dancing in my head, I had visions of me sitting at His Christmas tree with great anticipation as He hands me a beautiful silver-papered box with white tulle. I rip it open and look into His eyes with excitement as I tear open the box…only to see molestation. Shocked and confused, I grab another beautifully wrapped gift; this one has red shiny paper and a big white bow - betrayal.

This isn’t how I envision God’s gifts to me.

So I asked, “What do you mean by that Lord?”

He responded, “I give my children the gift of their past through My eyes and My perspective…if they are willing to accept it.” Ah, there it is…the caveat that we hear from our Lord so often - if they are willing to accept it. I reflected on what the Lord has brought me through. The last four years have been filled with naval staring, crying, reflection, therapy, more naval staring, and one thing I definitely have now is a new perspective.

I couldn’t tell anyone why the Lord allowed me to walk my walk, but one thing I can tell is the more I give Him burdens, hurts, pain, heartache, betrayal and my past mistakes, the more He teaches me about myself and about Him. I see parts of myself I never saw before. Gifts, hopes, dreams and wisdom gained and learned from my past - they are all there wrapped in beautiful, Holy paper - if I want to unwrap it.

So now when I unwrap my past I see it through His eyes and His perspective. In my beautifully wrapped past I see re-gifted molestation that looks a lot like a deep compassion and understanding about how one wounded person can wound another. In the re-gifted betrayal, I see redemption and deep understanding of forgiveness.  I now understand how to love a betrayer through my Savior’s heart. I see beautiful things rising out of the ashes that could not have grown without my past to fertilize and nurture it. I have compassion, understanding, and wisdom that I never had without my history reflected in His perspective.

So yes, God re-gifts. Are you willing to open it?

Starving Writer's Imagination Seeks Audience of One

Is your imagination starved? I know mine is. Does your imagination look towards the heavens or at an idol? By idol, I mean work, leisure time, your spouse, yourself.

I’ve come to the harsh reality that my imagination is starving to death. Oh it is active enough! The writer’s imagination is never silent or stoic. It skips rapidly from one creative rock to another along the stream of life.

That isn’t my problem. My starvation comes from what the said stream retains.

The children of Israel starved their imagination by looking upon the face of idols. Isaiah, in his wisdom, reminded them to look to the heavens. Nature is God’s creative autograph of His Glory and Power.

"Lift up your eyes and look to the heavens:
    Who created all these?
He who brings out the starry host one by one
    and calls forth each of them by name.
Because of his great power and mighty strength,
    not one of them is missing." Isaiah 40:26 NIV

Our ability to imagine is limitless. Why then - and I speak to myself – do we limit God?

Oswald Chambers wrote, “Imagination is the power God gives a saint to position himself out of himself into relationships he never was in.” 1

With recent fussing and fidgeting before God, it came to me with surprising clarity how small I have made my Lord. I minimize my creator in so many ways. Doubting His love, doubting His presence, worrying about that medical bill and how it will get paid, choosing to act without clear direction because I think He’s late, or… helping my sacrifice off the alter because I don’t see it’s replacement in a thicket.

Since childhood my imagination has been my friend, confidant, therapist, and cheap entertainment. Upon a moment’s notice from boredom, stress, or trauma, my imagination has been at the ready and available. It is infinitely easier to slay imaginary dragons, take down enemies, and fall in love in my imagination.

But it has also been my undoing. A two-edged sword.

Like the Israelites, I have let my perception of God and His attentiveness in my life be dictated by what I imagine Him to be – not experiencing who He is.

As I shed what this world has taught me about myself, I long to see my creator and myself not through the eyes of my imagination, but through the eyes of Truth and clarity.

^“And we all, who with unveiled faces contemplate^[a] the Lord’s glory, are being transformed into his image with ever-increasing glory, which comes from the Lord, who is the Spirit.” 2 Corinthians 3:18 NIV

¹ My Utmost for His Highest