A Gift

Have you ever heard the saying, ‘God does not give dying grace on an undying day’? Yesterday gave me a small glimpse of that principle in action.

No, nobody died or anything but the day did contain an amazing amount of stressors: fights, kid falling out of a shopping cart, hungry whining kids in the checkout line, several cooking projects while watching another kid in addition to mine, pee on the floor, carrying two children (one asleep) in a store, bead up a nose (twice!) prepping for dinner guests, Christmas tree pulled over, major fit from a kid, another kid throwing up all over their bed, no ‘down time’ for mom – all along with laundry, dishes, meal prep and the usual ‘mom’ stuff.

Yet, when all was said and done and I was finally settling into bed, I observed to Brian that, despite the events of the day, I had felt strangely calm and cheerful the whole time. I don’t even think I lost my temper (by no merit of my own). What made this day so different than other less crazy days where I’ve lost it?

Pondering this morning I decided it was this: unmerited grace.

I was not striving to ‘be in the Lord’, I wasn’t ‘continuing in prayer’, I wasn’t meditating on scripture to get me through the day, I was just living. There was nothing I had done, or was doing to pull down extra grace for the day but God had deemed it necessary for me and reached down in love, providing what I hadn’t even asked for.

You never know when you’re going to need this kind of grace and don’t always know you’re experiencing it until you look back. I wonder if dying grace is that way, not just for big time Christians as they die a martyr’s death, but unexpected and there when you need  it.

God knows just when to touch my life and He does it because He loves me, not because I’ve had my quiet time that morning.

A gift. Grace.

An early gift for you as a thanks for reading.

Merry Christmas!