Overkill

Scripture is laced with the value of thanksgiving. God Himself is the Great Giver and about 15 years ago, sports fields had John 3:16 held up at NFL playoffs to remind a watching world "God so loved the world that He gave…"

The value of that gift, the Son of His love has never been duplicated in any other setting.

Our response to His love is stated well in Psalm 92:1

It is a good thing to give thanks to the Lord, and to sing praises to Your name, O Most High

I am conscious of the proximity of this post to Thanksgiving, a celebration of thanks to our great God for all His blessings of the past year, and our expressions of gratitude for one another.

This theme continues with Paul's word to the church at Thessalonica, to continue to encourage each other and build each other.

The Aaronic blessing in Numbers 6 takes us to new high places in what it means to truly grace each other with our words.

The Lord bless you and keep you;
the Lord make his face shine upon you and be gracious to you;
the Lord lift up his countenance upon you and give you peace
Numbers 6:24–26

BUT can there be such a thing as overkill ?

I went to the letterbox – what I found was an anonymous card with a token for a therapeutic massage. It couldn't have come at a better time, I was at the time suffering from a bad case of dermatitis and the only thing that seemed to bring any relief was a massage. I had been several times before but going as regularly as I would have liked was proving rather costly.

The joy was overtaken by an itch to know who had gifted me with this. I rehearsed in my mind all those possible names, people I had shared with about my condition. It didn't take long to link someone who had just the kind of giving heart to make the effort and surprise me with such a significant expression of help and support.

I immediately approached him. I could see the look of concern – he had been found out and he couldn't deny it, but in the process I had robbed him of the purity of the gift!

Somewhere in my brain long ago there lodged this need to trace every stream of grace and pour out my appreciation. We OWE proper thanks. Then every time I saw the giver over coming days and weeks to thank again and again, to thank for a thank you. To over-thank.

But what if someone in the spirit of the sermon on the mount wishes to not let the left hand know what the right hand is doing? That day I felt as if I had not only robbed my friend Geoff, I had robbed myself as well. A gift is just that – a gift. A gift does not create a debt. There are no strings attached.

A new song

I will never forget that day. The hurt in the eye of the giver that he had been found out, all to serve my need for a clean balance sheet, and ensure I had thanked everyone who needed to be thanked in my life.

Six years ago (beginning 2014), we had a potential major need arise with health and finance implications. Only a handful of people knew of our circumstances. One afternoon an anonymous envelope turned up in the box, more than $1,000. This time it was just a personal praise-offering to the Lord.

Like the poor and the maimed and the lame and the blind (Luke 14:21), we will not always be in a position to "give back" as we might like to, but that's what makes the gift have more lustre than ever.

Surely, Calvary is the great demonstration of extravagant grace, What else can we do but bask in the lightrays of the magnanimous heart of such a God. We could never give enough, love enough, thank enough in return.

Indeed, to even attempt to begin to try would only deface the purity of the gift!

O the joy of being liberated in grace!