Christmas season and New Year are ripe for wonder and pondering. Beneath all the commerce and marketing overlays lie unfathomable questions. We celebrate newness and unimaginable gift. But what do we do with these treasures – if we recognize them at all?
Every day, every moment is new, never before experienced. And we are new also. What has been is not all we are. We have fresh possibilities to explore, if we are awake and aware. Do we have our eyes open to see them?
Grace infuses time and place. God has entered and permeated all creation. The slow, persistent, nearly invisible work of transformation moves on – despite us if necessary. But we can do our part to advance God’s Kingdom through our choices and actions for the good of all.
Grace is pure and simple gift, given, waiting for our response. We might refuse, ignore, ridicule, reluctantly accept, try to exchange for something we imagine to be better, or we might wholeheartedly welcome gift, using it joyfully and well. We are continually offered gifts of all types, shapes, sizes.
If we live one day or one hundred and two years that lifespan is given for us to learn, to grow, to make life better. But we are free to waste the gift of our life, or worse, to pledge allegiance to respectable evil. In some small way, the choice is ours.
Nothing is owed to us. Not today. Nor tomorrow. We need to make good use of whatever opportunities we are given. And if we make plans, we would do well to not hang on to them too tightly.
Bob Johnson says:
I feel grace to be the loving accepatance flowing into our hearts… always.
We (our personalities) can tune in or drop out. Our souls are always on
the right station. I thank you for giving words for thought. For being a
brother. For being out on the edge.