A random musing inspired by this afternoon’s lunch conversation with a good friend…

There was a moment, before we were born, when we were left alone in a candy shop.

Innocently, we looked around and saw plenty of attractive things, and we took some of them.  And then we walked out of the store without paying.  We didn’t know any better.

God let us keep those gifts.  He graciously blessed them and he let us think they were things that we rightly owned.  Then he wiped our memory clean of our childish theft.

The gifts that we have in our life – our wisdom, strength, joy, goodness – our generosity, self-control, our families, and even our very lives – are not our own.  Like a good-natured thief, we took them one day, and now we can’t even remember our own petty theft.

Ironically, we sometimes even brag about them – as if they were our own creation.

Hopefully, at some point in our life, we remember where we received those gifts, and we give proper credit.  At that moment we take an important step towards being deserving of the title ‘child of God’.  For only then have we learned the genuinely attractive virtue of humility.

Peace,
Greg

Note:  Since posting this little story, it was brought to my attention that God gives us our gifts, we do not steal them.  True.  So where did the idea for ‘story’ come from?  Well, when we claim ‘ownership’ of our gifts without giving thanks, we are ‘stealing’ the rightful praise that we owe to the true giver.  But I agree – we don’t steal the gifts in the first place.  You simply can’t steal…gifts.  Sorry for the imperfect analogy.  I hope you liked the story anyway…