Every Good and Perfect Gift

I can’t seem to move past the concept of giving thanks and the connection to Eucharist (communion).  Here’s the full definition of Eucharist:  a sacrament of thanksgiving, an outward and visible sign of inward and spiritual divine grace, a thing of mysterious and sacred significance.

Of course!  When we experience grace, the undeserved goodness of God’s hand, a gift of pure unconditional love, we’ve been invited into a moment of mystery.  Anything that blesses us, or continues to bring us into complete wholeness (the present-tense of salvation) is a gift:  a thing of mysterious and sacred significance.  That “thing” is holy – no matter how it comes wrapped (whether in a bright cheerful package that makes us smile, or a black box topped with a black bow of grimness).  That moment is God’s divine, personal touch on my very mundane, normal life.  If I recognize it, I have to pause before the sacred, for the Divine has chosen to enter into my world. 

In that recognizable moment, how can I not give thanks (eucharisteo)?  How can I not respond as the one leper who returned to Jesus, and bend low, to loudly, excitedly, and vibrantly, glorify Him and give grateful applause for all he’s done? For when I do, I truly experience Communion with him.

Question:  How has the Divine entered your world over the past week?  Do you see him in the big, obvious blessings – but have not learned to acknowledge him in the small and the insignificant? Every good and perfect gift comes from the Father of Lights.  May I highly recommend keeping a "blessings book?"  The more we see our blessings, the more our hearts fill with cheer...and, as we all know, a cheerful heart is VERY GOOD medicine!

Remember the Lord your God, for it is he who gives you ___________________!
Deuteronomy 8:18a