This Christmas, we received a very generous and amazing gift.
On the 12th day before Christmas, the doorbell rang and when we got to the door, there was a bag with pears in it on our doorstep. I thought it was odd until I saw the #1 on the bag and thought I wonder if it's 12 days!! And then on day 2, the same thing happened and there was a gift with a #2 on it. Well, we eventually figured out who our surprise gift giver was and they were SO disappointed because they truly wanted to remain anonymous throughout the whole thing.
So I won't share their identity.
But, can I tell you what a blessing these creative gifts were to our family! They were generous and so thoughtful! The family always included enough things for all our kids and the kids just couldn't get over that they were receiving gifts every day! Our kiddos have already have planned out a family to do this for next year and we will continue this new tradition in our family for years to come.
I learned an important lesson about receiving gifts, as well. It's humbling to receive lavish gifts and my immediate thought was, "I have to pay them back and get them an amazing gift and ..." My mind went right to "doing" instead of "accepting". God honestly taught me that it's okay to accept a gift and I thought immediately of the greatest gift given to me- salvation. Jesus. I try so hard to be good enough for that gift, to work hard to be holy and to live a good life but God says, "NO! Stop working. Stop trying to earn my favor. That's not the Gospel. It's a free gift! Receive and let the truths of that gift sink in deep to motivate acts of love and service." I'm a doer and that's hard for me but such a needed reminder this Christmas season. Thankful for these generous gifts and the givers of them and for the GOSPEL that reminded me afresh what a gift Jesus is to me!
