Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us in Christ with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places. (Ephesians 1:3)
God has given us more good gifts than we could ever number. Family is a good gift. Money is a good gift. Health is a good gift. Food is a good gift. Our work is a good gift. A good night’s sleep is a good gift. The clothes we wear, the car we drive, and the place we live are all good gifts. But if we love the gifts more than the Giver of those gifts, our hearts will never be satisfied and we will never be able to enjoy all those good gifts we have received from God. When we love any created thing more than we love our Creator, we have created a massive problem for ourselves. When even the best of gifts become ultimate gifts, they become bad gifts that remove the Gift Giver from the throne of our lives.
Before sin entered into humanity, Adam and Eve loved God and loved the good gifts of God; they lived in holy harmony with their Creator. There was no disordered love for the good gifts that pulled their hearts away from the Good Gift Giver. There was no sinful self-absorption or self-centeredness, because they were not sinners. But after the Fall, sin entered into the heart of humanity, and we all began to turn our good gifts into God-alternatives. We began to love the gifts more than the Giver of those gifts. We began to believe that our gifts could give us more life than God. The great Reformer Martin Luther once said, “Whatever your heart clings to and relies upon, that is your God.”
The key to avoid falling into this idolatrous trap is to love God through His good gifts. God created us to worship Him by enjoying His good gifts and using all of them for His glory and the expansion of His Kingdom in this world. We must remember that everything we have comes from God; the more we have, the more we are indebted to Him. Satan thought that Job only loved God because of all the good gifts God had given him, but the accuser was wrong. Job still loved God supremely, even after losing everything — his health, his wealth, and all ten of his children.
If this is to be the confession of our lives, no matter what we experience, we must look at life as Job did, and see that God is the ultimate Gift. When we do that, we will see everything He gives as just the sweet icing on the cosmic cake.
This is the Gospel. This is grace for your race. NEVER FORGET THAT . . . AMEN!
Grace for the Race 