Day 218

1 Chronicles 22:2-23:32, 1 Corinthians 2:6-16, Psalm 91:9-16

There have been a number of times in my life when I have received gifts that I could never have imagined. Sometimes these have been material gifts (a camera, a mug with Samuel’s footprints on and so on …) but then there are times when they have been the non-material. Times when I have received love from unexpected places or when I have realised how people feel about me (in a positive way!)

Now imagine that it is pre-Easter (the very first one!) and that you are searching for the Messiah. Your relationship with God is in a bit of a pickle, in fact it could not be much worse. The whole “you and God thing” really looks pretty grim. You start imagining what could possibly put this right and other than some pretty massive sacrifice (because that is what you do to please God) you actually can’t think of anything.

Lots of people have been thinking about it and they have all come to the same conclusion. No one can imagine what they could do and certainly no one can conceive what will happen next. God sends his son, not just to try and have a chat, but he sends his son knowing that one day he will be mocked, whipped, beaten, nailed to a cross and then die. You remember thinking about a pretty big sacrifice, well this is it – the Son of God.

“No eye has seen,
   no ear has heard,
and no human mind has conceived
   what God has prepared for those who love him”

Like those gifts I talked about at the start, the ones I didn’t expect - the gift of Christ, the gift of life, is something that we can’t imagine, yet it is a gift that God made.

That is love. Claim that gift as your own today.