More gifts!

So many gifts, so many reasons for joyous gratitude in my mundane, totally ordinary, but yet God-ordered good, good days. Where do I begin? Maybe with the science fair the other night, perhaps? After all the toil, sweat, and tears of the infamous science experiment, we finally went in on tuesday night to enjoy the fruit of all the children's labors. After all my fretting and fussing, after all our failing and faltering..

It was wonderful! Seriously.

Though a pretty crummy photographer, I couldn't help but capture every child's science project on film. How I wish I could figure out how to put pictures on this blog! But just imagine it: there is each child, standing proudly in front of their masterpiece, smiling broadly in front of moldy orange slices or embalmed hot dogs (thank goodness we weren't having hot dogs for dinner later) or basketball graphs or popcorn in various stages of preparation, or, in the case of my son, toilet paper floating in glass jars, or grass growing in plastic pots or fishing poles and on and on.

There is just nothing like seeing joy on display. Joy in the finishing of some hard task. Joy in sharing with others. Joy in being a 4th grader surrounded by parents and siblings and friends and dear teachers who love you beyond all reason. Joy in the gift of living and breathing and being fully present in that moment.

Somehow, it felt like one of those holy moments that break into our everyday, regular routine. Holiness at the science fair, how about that?! You know, I think God gives those holy moments to us all the time, continuously in fact, but we just don't have eyes to see. We are too busy, too preoccupied, too self-absorbed, too focused on the peripheral or the urgent to see His gifts. But in that moment, God broke through my hard shell, and I couldn't help but be overwhelmed with the joy of it all. To be there, to be able to ooh and aah and encourage each child and witness all those spreading grins. To realize in that moment, God had lavished upon each of so many gifts. Gifts of our children, our lives, our senses, our teachers, our friends, our laughter, our gratitude.

And to think I had fretted and fussed about all this science experiment stuff! Shame on me! And so I'm reminded of another gift--grace. His grace, so utterly undeserved, just so amazing. As I walked around the room that evening, gazing at all those science projects, I wanted to shout: "Gift! And another gift! And another gift! And another gift!" Gift upon gift upon gift, one right after the other, one child, one smile at a time. God's unique, priceless children fully on display for the world to see how extravagantly good, how perfectly loving, how astoundingly creative is our Great and Glorious God.

All those gifts in one evening--and that doesn't even include the pale pink tulip tree bursting with blooms that greeted us outside the hall as we went into the school that night! Gift. Or the taste of sweet strawberries and crunchy toast and gooey chocolate cake for hungry mouths later that night. To be hungry and to be fed and to savor--gifts... especially the chocolate, of course!

Or talking on the phone with my daughter in another town--hearing the sound of her voice and cherishing her love and laughter and life. Gift! Or watching basketball games with my family and cheering--or despairing--and discussing this or that. Gift. Walking with my husband and our boys and watching them play golf on a windy, sun-drenched March day. Gift. Listening to music, singing along or just feeling the peace or the passion or the joy behind the notes and words that speak in ways that go far deeper than language. Gift. Or seeing extraordinary answers to prayer for our women's Bible study, and simply sitting back amazed and awed, and utterly humbled, at what our Almighty Sovereign Savior loves to do for His children--His often doubting, faithless, faltering children. We just count it all grace and say "Thank You, Lord for Your gifts upon gifts."

"Rejoice in the Lord always; again I will say, Rejoice!" (Phil.4:4) How can we not rejoice--in who He is and what He has done and in His ordinary--yet extraordinary--gifts upon gifts upon gifts? Elisha prayed for his servant when the hills were surrounded by God's glorious flaming armies, "O Lord, please open his eyes that he may see." (2 Kings 6:17) We, too, pray, "Lord, open our eyes that we might see all Your manifold gifts, showered upon us daily. Give us eyes to see and then to rejoice in You and in Your gifts." Rejoice not in possessions, but in people. Not in our stuff but in our Savior. Not in success but in sanctification. O Lord, open our eyes that we might see and rejoice in You and Your gifts and Your glory and grace!

"To our God and Father be glory forever and ever. Amen." (Phil. 4:20)