Gift giving is NOT my love language, but one of my friends sure has it. When she gives me a present, her eyes sparkle. I know she received enjoyment in every step of the picking out/wrapping/presenting process, and it culminates when I open it and recognize that it was specifically planned for me.

God is like my friend. He LOVES to give us gifts. He intricately designed our bodies—that was a gift. So was the beautiful world we inhabit. These “common” graces we enjoy every day (not so common, really) are ongoing presents.

Then there is the carefully planned, sacrificial gift of His Son! That’s a gift that boggles our puny minds. That was a gift given through tears, God holding out to us His very soul, though His heart throbbed with pain.

He gave THAT gift so He could continually give. Jesus told His disciples when He left Earth that He was leaving them a present. The Comforter (boy, do we need a Comforter!) would provide the constant, never-failing Presence of God in our very hearts!

WOW! Cool gift! But somehow I forget about this Comforter, this Holy Spirit that stirs inside me.

So God gives me “little” gifts each and every day to remind me that I have HIM.

This day will be crazy busy. I knew that from the moment I woke up. But it has already been chock-full of gifts. I got to wake two of my children up, kissing soft lips still full with sleep. On the drive to school a hawk swooped above the car, close enough we saw individual feathers on its taut wings. We drove our favorite route, and the cattails shone against the grey sky and the beech leaves fluttered silver in the soft breeze.

These were not accidental gifts. God holds time and space. He’s better than the director of The Truman Show who could say, “Okay, Truman is about to cross the street. Cue ray of sunshine, bird song, and brightly colored leaves falling to earth right..NOW.”

God literally plans these kinds of gifts for me every day. That hawk was a present, timed perfectly so that I saw it. He LOVES to give me these gifts. He is like my gift-giving friend, taking joy when I take joy in what He gives.

And each “small” gift is a reminder that He has much, much bigger ones available for me. He’s knocking on the door of my heart. “Let me come in and BE with you.” He doesn’t duck out when I encounter something hard or frustrating. He doesn’t say, “You’ve blown it, so no more gift of My Presence.”

His gifts to us are all pictures of the greatest gift of Himself: the same yesterday, today, and forever, YET new and fresh in beauty and depth.

God, the Gift Giver!