Gifts in January

I begin hearing and seeing the book One Thousand Gifts – A Dare to LIVE FULLY Right Where You Are by Ann Voskamp pop up on some of the Christian bloggers I read; but most of them were very vague in giving a full review. One blogger even said “I started it ages ago but put it down because I found it difficult to read in terms of simple reading comprehension.” This came from a blogger who I respect much of and has read Pilgrim’s Progress several times, which for me was a difficult read, so much that I did the same thing with Pilgrim’s Progress that she did with One Thousand Gifts, I put it down. Only to pick it up and try again, put it down, pick it up, put it down and given up.  Another blogger said, “Her words are strung together with the strength of a spider web and as delicately as the veins in a butterfly wing.” So I became intrigued by the vague and mixed reviews of One Thousand Gifts, especially since it spend 22 weeks on the New York Times Best-seller’s list, that the words had been translated into six languages, that a reader in Iraq would read it and give their life to Jesus.

I am not here to give a full review of this book, because I am just wading into the pages. That is a creative way to say I am a sloooow reader. Ask my husband, he will tell you. I don’t like to think about it as being a sloooow reader, but a reader who savors…taste…enjoys the words. Doesn’t that sound better than you are a sloooow reader? It certainly does to me and that is why I am a sloooow reader. I enjoy reading and meditating on the things written on paper, pondering in my mind the meanings of the words and the applications to my life. Sure, I am jealous of those of you who can do this at lightning fast speed, but I can’t. Let’s just say if I ate the way I read, I would probably be skinny.

The book title in itself intrigued me…One Thousand Gifts! Who wouldn’t want 1,000 gifts?

The book begins with the author’s entrance into the world and her memory of her little sister being ran over by a truck with phrases and words like “vernix-creased” and “grave’s precipice “. I must admit it took me longer than normal to get in to this book, probably because I had to keep looking up words. So far, it is a very real raw look at her life and journey from being “snapped shut to grace” to living fully in His grace through eucharisteo. Eucharisteo. It means thanksgiving. At its root it means grace and its derivative is joy. The author peels back through layers of scriptures (Luke 22:19; 1 Corin. 11:23-24, 26; John 11:41; Matt 11:20-21, 23 and Luke 17:15-19) to find several meanings and purposes to thanksgiving. Go read and see.
My favorite is the story of the 10 lepers. You know it. Only one came back to give Jesus thanks for healing them of leprosy. Ann questions, if Jesus had already healed them, then what did Jesus mean when he told the one that came back “Your faith has made you well?” She digs deeper to discover the Young’s Literal Translation that “your faith has saved you”. It is sozo in Greek. In our words, it is salvation. There is so much there I had to stop and savor that! As my previous Sunday School teacher would say, “chew on that cud”.

May I share one more nugget with you that I loved? “Thanksgiving is the evidence of our acceptance of whatever He gives. Thanksgiving is the manifestation of our Yes! To His grace.”

You see 1,000 gifts, we see as what we will receive, but in truth we have already received, we just need to open our eyes, be aware, and watchful to behold the gifts we have…not the gifts we want. Isn’t it human nature to think that gifts are things we are going to get instead of thinking of gifts as what we already have? I've already been challenged just through the first three chapters to live full of eucharisteo.