The hour drive it takes to get to the lake on a Sunday afternoon, I think of the Sunday morning sermon.

The preacher was preaching pure gospel, how to be born again.

Twenty-five years he’s been preaching it in our little country chapel, to the hog farmers, the corn-croppers, the mothers with babies in arms.

How you can’t work for it, angle for it, or jockey for it —

You can’t earn God’s love. You can only turn towards God love.

When we all unpile, the little girls run and cousins squeal and holler happy at the water’s edge.

My mama and I stand there, toes in sand and the wind blowing back hair —

Our faces turned straight into the sun.

 

It’s the gift, that’s what the preacher said.

Salvation is the gift, the one wrapped in God taking on skin, laying His bare love out for the world, arms spreading to the very ends of the limbs of the tree of life.

There is their giddy laughter.

There is their young, wild running.

There is my mama smiling.

There is that singular sea gull writing across the sky. These are gifts. They beg praise to Him.

Holy joy lies in the habit of murmuring thanks to God for the smallest of graces.

Sure, I mess it up and gripe a thousand times, but just like you keep doing the laundry, you just keep beginning fresh again — The habit of thanksgiving is the one habit to wear for a lifetime.

And the thing is, really —

There is only one gift — the one ocean of Christ that falls as rain over us in a thousand ways.

Christ is the offering and salvation is the gift and repentance is what makes us recipients of grace.

Christ is the gift. Christ is the bridge Home. Christ is our joy. How can I forget this, ever stop giving thanks for Him alone?

Happiness is not getting something — but being given to Someone.

Communion with God is possible anywhere.

Yeah, it’s wild, but you’d better believe it, because that’s what believing is: Communion with God is possible anywhere.

A million little things will happen this week — and there are always really only Two Choices:  You get to decide whether you want to Complain.  Or whether you want Communion.

Life’s complicated. That’s clarity:  Complain . . . or Communion.

Some pundit sipping carbonated knowledge said it somewhere: Reality – Expectations = Happiness

The equation supposedly goes like this:  if your reality is greater than your expectations, then you’re happy.

[Reality (25) – Expectations (6) = Happiness (19)]

But if your expectations turn out to be greater than your reality, then you’re unhappy.

[Reality (25) – Expectations (35) = {Un}Happiness (-10) ]

There’s the beach, us at the edge, and there’s the figuring, figuring life out:

Your Reality in Christ is that you’re 100% saved, redeemed, accepted, carried, cared for, watched over, provided for, comforted, loved. Christ isn’t just sort of for you, Christ is 100% for you — your Reality is 100% safe in Him.

As for expectations — your expectations have a direct correlation on your irritations. The higher your expectations, the greater your irritations.

Mama’s watching the girls run down the shore and she’s about told it to me as many times as the waves keep lapping the shore: Expectations kill relationships.

Your Expectations in Christ are that you don’t deserve anything, can’t earn anything, don’t merit anything — your expectations are 0% in and of the flesh. It’s all grace.

The formula for life turns out to be blessedly simple:

Reality in Christ (100%) – Expectations (0%) = A Happiness — that has nothing to do with what Happens

The waves just keep coming and they can.

I turn to my Mama, the water washing up over our toes.

The whole sea’s rushing up to meet the feet turned and surrendered . . .

And there’s the Father always there, catching . . .

all this happiness —

just in Him —

right into last light.

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You can’t earn God’s love. You can only turn towards God love. {Tweet this!}

Q4U: Is life feeling a bit messy for you right now? Are you finding it hard to give thanks? Find happiness? Receive Grace? Give Grace? So what do you think — how can you dare to be grateful, right where you are? Christ is 100% for you!

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