Good and Perfect Gifts

Have you ever struggled to get your heart to agree with what your mind knows is true?

I took a writing trip recently, but the first day, just couldn’t get my heart in it. I sat there in a comfortable chair with a cozy blanket, toes warmed by a well-placed radiator, basking in the brilliance of bright sunlight and puffy clouds, watching waves roll in, indescribably blue with perfect white caps of foam.

This is a gift. I thought, willing my heart to agree. But my heart didn’t want to agree. It felt more like pouting than praising God.

Sometimes, dear Reader, we fixate on things God has not chosen to give, or things He has given that we don’t want, and refuse to see the good and perfect gifts that are right there in front of us. I’ve been relearning in recent days the truth that sometimes, gratitude is a simple matter of the will, regardless of my emotions.

I sat by that window and prayed, and tried hard not to pout, and asked God to help my heart find joy in His good gifts. By the time I went to sleep that night, my heart had begun to get in line with my head, and I went to sleep with a far more willing prayer of thanks.

The next day, God underscored the lesson I was learning in the most gracious way, by pouring out unmistakable, just-for-me gifts the whole day long! It was such a precious day, full of reminders of His love and goodness (and mercy) that I could hardly believe how much I had struggled the day before.

But I don’t think my heart would have received those gifts, or taken them as tokens of God’s love, if I hadn’t chosen to fight my ungratefulness the day before.

It made me wonder, how many of God’s good and perfect gifts do I miss, or fail to realize the blessing of, simply because I am caught up in my own expectations and emotions, instead of choosing to yield myself to God’s perspective?

Dear Reader, sometimes, life hurts. Sometimes it doesn’t feel like there are any of God’s good and perfect gifts to be found. But just as God doesn’t change, His gifts never truly disappear from our lives. He is always there with tokens of His love, if only we will choose to acknowledge them for what they are.

“Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above, and cometh down from the Father of lights, with Whom is no variableness, neither shadow of turning.” 

James 1:17