Gifts Of Year 35

The older I get, the less I want or need tangible gifts. This is not to say that I have reached a stage of true contentedness. I still struggle with that. I do think that God continually reminds me of the gift that is life, of the ultimate value of eternal life, and of the wonder of the little gifts God gives along that way. In that vein, here are five great gifts from my 35th year around the sun, gifts I do not deserve, but which meant a lot to me:

My Dad's recovery from major surgery: I don't think anything ever prepares a person for a decline in their parent's health. I knew my dad needed surgery and would need some time afterward to recover. I never imagined how hard it would be for him, or for us, to claw his way back. Life does look different for him, and for all of us now, but we are so thankful to God to still have Dad in it.

Last Patriot Run 10K: The Patriot Run was my first run back after Dad's surgery. Dad got to be there to watch it, and I told him that I ran that last 5K lap for him. Little did I know that this would be the last iteration of this race, my first race when I moved back to Arizona, and a race I had done almost every year since.

The Mesa half-marathon: I wanted to run this race since running my first half-marathon, but kept putting it off because the time did not seem to be right. This year, I bit off the goal, and did it, and it went better than I could have dreamed, so good, it has me dreaming of new things!

Live training for work: I have recorded podcast episodes for work before, but this year, I got to give a live training! Preparation required a lot of work, and I needed a lot of feedback and support along the way. In the end, it went well, for which I give God the thanks and glory. Will I train more? We will see.

Meeting Jess McClain: Pat's Run 2024 was awesome, but technically, I could do that again. Meeting a top US runner, who's also a hometown girl? That might never happen again. Definitely a special memory!

Who knows what the next year will hold, but I want to rejoice and be glad in it, and in the gifts God gives (Psalm 118:24). To Him be the glory, forever and amen!

Maybe I've Been Wrong....

I can be pretty harsh in assessing judgments and motives. If I listen, the Holy Spirit usually leads me to tune in and re-evaluate, but my first instinct is often to think the worst. And so it has been for me with gifts much of my life. I like gifts, don't get me wrong, but I have sometimes seen big gifts as trying to win affection or favor. Maybe I've been wrong. Maybe they're just expressing love in their love language, because gift-giving is a way to show love. What if I took it as that?

I started thinking this way after a big gift from my husband. It was a very, very nice gift, and it still left me feeling unsettled. I could not quite discern why. I know I felt unworthy. I know I didn't like the price tag of the gift (which I saw, because we share a budget). I worried that I would somehow break the gift. But there was somehow more. But then that old stuff came up: judgments of people, past experiences where someone gave big gifts, when I really needed something more intangible: connection, affirmation, time, etc. But then I had to remind myself that my husband is not them. He loves me well and he only buys me big gifts when we can afford them. He buys me nice things because he wants me to have them and believes they will be useful. He gives me big gifts because he loves me. His love in other ways is not lacking, either.

I may also struggle with because big gifts are not my love language. Big gifts were few and far between in my growing up life, and as a saver, it's hard for me to spend a lot of money all at once. And I would rather be served or have little gifts a lot of the time. Service is my own giving love language. But we're all different. What if a person can love well and give gifts? Shouldn't that be okay? Shouldn't I let them? Shouldn't I affirm them and thank them? I'm afraid I've been wrong about a lot of gifts and gift-giving. It's not the gift, but the heart that matters. May God, in His grace, allow me to look for that.

Capacity

I am the weaker vessel. I am less strong than my husband and more needy. I fall apart relatively easily and need lots of support. I continually find that I don't have the bandwidth for all of the activities that other people do, or even for all of the responsibilities on my plate. I get tired easily. I need a lot of sleep, and food, and alone time. Take any of that away and I am a mess. When I get into a mess, it also takes me long time to recover from it. My capacity is just low. My limited capacity has persistently bothered me, and I am still reckoning with it.

I heard a sermon some time ago about spiritual gifts, and about how God gives believers capacity and then fills it. Fills it. Even a small capacity. If I believe that God is perfect, and I do (at least at a head level), that means my small capacity is not a mistake. It means God has given me everything I need, and that I do not need to grasp for more. It means that I can do everything God calls me to do in his strength (and likely that all that capacity expanding stuff is not for me.) After all, 2 Peter 1:3 says: "His divine power has given us everything we need for a godly life through our knowledge of him who called us by his own glory and goodness" (New International Version). 

If God has given me everything I need, that means that God's gift of grace is just right for my capacity. Instead of mourning my lack, I can give thanks for God's sufficiency. As Ephesians 4:7 "But to each one of us grace has been given as Christ apportioned it." In Romans 11:29, the Apostle Paul writes, "God’s gifts and his call are irrevocable." If God has filled my capacity for my calling, my capacity is not going to change. So I had better get to work accepting it, and maybe on cutting out the things that surpass it.

How I see my capacity affects how I use it. If I see myself as lacking, I am either sitting around mourning my lack, or striving for more, working outside my gifting and calling. Neither one brings honor to God. Mourning my lack is like burying my talent. (See the parable in Matthew 25:14-30). It says that God might have made a mistake. And operating outside my calling says the same, or that I think I can somehow outsmart the way God wired me. It is not going to work. I remember reading something Kylie Mitchell wrote about her husband saying, 'You don’t know your capacity until you’re past it.” Recognizing symptoms of being past capacity means I have a lot of bailing out to do. That does not reserve time or space or energy to do what calls me to do.

So what is God calling me to do? To be faithful with my gifts. To be faithful to where God has called me. With my limited capacity, or maybe what I should rephrase as my God-given capacity, that means basically means three things: following God, working, and being faithful to the calling of marriage. Not much, if you ask some. Honestly, too much if you catch me on my bad days. But this capacity of mine, these responsibilities, are what God has given me. May I learn to be content, so that God can truly fill and use me as He (not I!) sees fit.

101 Gifts Of Marriage

The waters of life have been a little bit rough lately. The marriage I see reflected in the waves has not been quite what I would want it to be. As my husband and I discussed our struggles lately, he made the comment that we want our marriage to be good because we want it to be a good reflection of the gospel. That comment really struck me, and after a few days of pondering, I resolved to make a list of 101 good things about marriage. I cultivate a daily practice of gratitude based on the book One Thousand Gifts, so why couldn't I make a list of at least 101 gifts in marriage? The list came easier than I thought. Some of the gifts relate to marriage in general, and some are specific to our individual marriage. Nevertheless, all are gifts, and I want to count them as such:

1. Admonishment
2. Adventure
3. Affection
4. Anniversaries
5. Apologetics
6. Bible reading
7. Birthday celebrations
8. Board game playing
9. Bocce ball
10. Care
11. Celebration
12. Christmas
13. Church
14. Commitment
15. Companionship
16. Community
17. Concern
18. Conflict resolution
19. Cook books
20. Cooking
21. Covenant
22. Creativity
23. Cuddling
24. Daily devotions
25. Dates
26. Discipleship
27. Dreaming
28. Eating out
29. Empathy
30. Encouragement
31. Excitement
32. 5Ks
33. Forever wedding dates
34. Forgiveness
35. Friendship
36. Furniture shopping
37. Goals
38. Gospel witness
39. Gnocchi
40. Grace
41. Help
42. Hiking
43. Home ownership
44. Hospitality
45. Hugs
46. Identity development
47. IKEA trips
48. In-laws
49. Inspiration
50. Kisses
51. Learning
52. Love
53. Matching clothes
54. Memories
55. Mercy
56. Movies
57. Notes
58. Optimism
59. Parks
60. Partnership
61. Pasta
62. Personal growth
63. Perspective
64. Photographs
65. Planning
66. Positivity
67. Problem solving
68. Prayer
69. Prioritization
70. Recipes
71. Rummikub
72. Running
73. Sanctification
74. Scrabble
75. Scripture study
76. Selfies
77. Service
78. Sex
79. Shared meals
80. Shopping
81. Sleeping in
82. Snuggles
83. Sports games
84. Sriracha sauce
85. Taste testing
86. Teamwork
87. Technology
88. Text messages
89. Theological discussions
90. Time
91. Touch
92. Trips
93. Travel
94. TV shows
95. Vacation
96. Valentine's Day
97. Vows
98. Wake-ups
99. Walking
100. Wisdom
101. Working out 

Is this list all-inclusive? No. If I'm honest, I hadn't started counting the gifts of marriage until I numbered these. I had been keeping a tally of all the hard things, but this list helped change my perspective. If I am looking for good gifts, I am sure I will find more.

Birthdays (Why and How to Celebrate)

It's this guy's birthday today. He's not necessary big on celebration, but I am. And since he married me, we're going to celebrate.

Why do I believe celebration is important?

Because life is short. We never know how long God will give us on this earth, so we should celebrate every day. Birthdays are another year of life past and an opening year before us. Why should we not look forward to that?

Because people matter. We live in a fast paced society where we often neglect to tell the people we love that they matter to us. Birthdays are unique to that person and grant opportunity to reflect on what a special someone means.

Because life is a gift. Sometimes we give gifts on birthdays, sometimes we don't. But a birthday is a gift from God, first in the form of a new life, and then in the form of years of living after that. Birthdays are a time we can give thanks to God.

How can we celebrate birthdays?

Birthdays often get overrated and overdone. I don't think that has to be the case. Celebrate big if you want, but also celebrate small. Just emphasize the importance of the day. Here are some suggestions of ways to do that:

Write on their Faceboook wall or send them a message. Facebook tells us when friend's birthdays are, for crying out loud. So this takes little work, but can mean a lot.

Send an e-mail or a text. Yes, this takes a little more work, but can still bless the person's day.

Better yet, call the birthday girl or boy! What a concept! We can actually talk on our texting devices. Yes, people aren't always able to answer the phone, but even a voicemail greeting could bless a person.

Drop a note or card in the mail. Yes, the postal service still works. I personally like sending cards because of how tangible they are. (And it gives me reason to make cards, which I like to do.)

Tell the birthday person what they mean to you. Maybe in person, or maybe via one of the ways above. Just let them know they matter.

Have a special meal. Growing up, my mom let us pick a birthday dinner. It did not have to be extravagant, but we got to pick one of our favorite meals from the normal lineup. That made the day feel special. Going out to dinner or a meal is another option, but not always necessary.

Eat cake (or not). Consider a special treat. Maybe cake's not their thing, but maybe they'd like an extra good cup of coffee. Or a special steak seasoning. Food is a way to celebrate and we can find something that works for every person, dietary restrictions included.

Consider giving a gift. I put this last because it's optional, and honestly, gifts don't mean a lot to some people. But if you have funds and want to give, go for it.

Birthdays matter. Life matters. People matter. So let's celebrate!

(And happy birthday to my beloved. I look forward to celebrating you this day and every day for the gift of God you are to me.)

Presence is My Gift to Jesus This Year

As I read my Savor devotional about the most important gifts the other morning, I thought about Christmas and what Jesus would want from me this year. The word that immediately came to mind was Presence. I want to be present this year. Present with Jesus. Present with my family and friends and loved ones. Present in the moment. 

I've been trying to cultivate little moments of presence and preparation for Christmas throughout the week, but it's hard. Life is busy. Work is busy. It seems like there are always a thousand things to do, but life is about choices and priorities. We can always make choices to prioritize what's important.

Jesus coming as a baby in a manger was about relationship. It was about God condescending to man to bring the light of a perfect baby into a dark, dark world. It was about Mary receiving what God had for her. It was about Mary's betrothed Joseph supporting her in what seemed like an impossible mission to raise the Son of God.

So in celebration of Christmas, I started trying to do one thing a day to cultivate celebration. (I've posted about that on Instagram.) Some things were little, like using a Christmas hot pad. 

Some were bigger, like an art project I did with a group at work and didn't necessarily want to finish, but did.

But what I tried, by God's grace, to prioritize were relationships and serving those around me: I got to make dinner for my family Saturday night. 

We slowed down to go for a walk to look at lights.

I've been trying to hold my schedule a little more loosely so that I have time to spend with people I love. 

As I consider Jesus coming into the world as the Light of lights, I realize that relationships are what really matter. May I be present in them for this season, and beyond, for the way I live my life daily is a year-long celebration of what Christ did for me by coming to earth at Christmas and then dying on the cross at Calvary.

God Gives Good Gifts.

More verses for reflective prayer--It is good to reflect on God's attributes in seasons of upheaval and change. God is faithful and reliable, and he gives good gifts.

Ecclesiastes 3:13

That each of them may eat and drink, and find satisfaction in all their toil—this is the gift of God.

Ecclesiastes 5:19

Moreover, when God gives someone wealth and possessions, and the ability to enjoy them, to accept their lot and be happy in their toil—this is a gift of God.

Romans 5:17

For if, by the trespass of the one man, death reigned through that one man, how much more will those who receive God’s abundant provision of grace and of the gift of righteousness reign in life through the one man, Jesus Christ!

Romans 6:23

For the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.

Ephesians 2:8

For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith—and this is not from yourselves, it is the gift of God.

Ephesians 3:7

I became a servant of this gospel by the gift of God’s grace given me through the working of his power.