God's Gifts
Today is Epiphany and my mother-in-law’s birthday. Actually it is the day we commemorate the Three Kings or indeterminate number of Wise Men, giving gifts to the baby Jesus. You can visualise the scene, the young and not particularly wealthy, new mother, Mary, and these erudite, rich, old men. You can imagine Mary thinking “What the Dickens am I supposed to do with gold, frankincense and myrrh on a trip to Egypt with a tiny baby?” Surely if the men were that wise they would have known, disposable nappies or packets of milk formula would be more useful – but then they were only men!
How many useless presents did you get for Christmas? My husband had two bottles of shower gel – we do not have a shower! According to the newspapers, thousands of unwanted gifts have already been sold on e-bay. What an ungrateful lot we are. Or is it that those of us who give the presents do not really think about the person for whom they are intended and buy what we would like?
God gives us gifts all the time, sometimes things we want but often we do not understand what we have been given or why we should need it. Many gifts we actively dislike as they commit us to courses of action we do not relish, but He has decided what He wants from us, and sooner or later we will succumb to His will. If God wants you to do something He gives you the resources to do it. I can assure you it was never my burning ambition to write weekly notes for an Evangelical church and I can only do it with His help.
On Friday evening we held a six-hour, prayer vigil to ask the Lord how the Church should proceed. We have been concerned over the dwindling church membership and the future of NMEFC. There have been many discussions about what we should do. We would like to see the dry bones rise (Ezekiel 37) and the walls of the church no longer able to contain them. The building itself should be no more than a dry husk – the vibrant, living part of the Church should spill out of the doors and into the world as the members disperse.
The Lord was quite emphatic about His wishes. Person after person got the same message in different forms – they came and went and there was no time for collusion. These were real messages and emphasised what we have been hearing over the last few weeks. The Lord does not want us scheming and making grand plans. Yes, we need to have aims and objectives, small achievable targets but we need to be flexible. We are only required to live according to His word and to be constantly aware of His presence in all things. He will show the way and we must be ready to respond. As has been said before we are human beings not human doings, our love and mindfulness of Him are all that is needed.
