As mentioned earlier, this weekend we celebrated my daughter’s 5th birthday. In God’s good providence he used this time to help me evaluate what I value. There were several items that God brought together to reveal my own heart to me.
I was reading and meditating on the 127th Psalm, which, as many are familiar, tells us that “children are a gift from the LORD” (v.3). Of course, I agreed and was thankful for my children and God’s goodness in giving them. Later that night we read and discussed the Psalm in family devotions. Likewise we were thankful. At the same time I was studying for a message that I was to give on Sunday morning at OBC on Titus 3.1-8. In a glorious passage that highlights the goodness and love of God saving sinners I was growing more impressed with the goodness of God incarnate, Jesus Christ. However, the connection was not yet made. It was not until Alaynah’s birthday, when I was thanking God for her, and just thinking about what a joy she is to all of us that I was blindsided with conviction. My compartmentalized meditation had just bled together and produced an explosion of conviction much like the mixing of nitric acid with ethanol; God had lit me up.
It is good to be thankful for our gifts that God has given, whether these are children, our spouse, our church family, or even things like food and entertainment; these things are good. However, in the midst of this I realized that I had not gotten so exercised by the reality of God’s goodness in giving Jesus to me and bringing me to him! How shortsighted! Yes I am to be thankful for my daughter, but it should pale in comparison to my thankfulness for my Savior!
God is so good to work in such a way and provide great encouragement in Jesus. Birthdays are great checks to our affections to measure our true delight in God and his infinitely beautiful Son, the Lord Jesus.