Mary smelt her coffee that was almost finished dripping. She loved that aroma! Filling her cup to the brim Mary manoeuvred her precious preparation off the counter. Unfortunately, it never got too far as Mary tripped up on her own pyjamas. Coffee landed everywhere including atop the gift cards. They were a bonus Robin had received for some work he had done that year. The spill did not bother Mary but the reminder of the money wasted on gift cards did. In any other time of their life it would have been lovely and thoughtful to have received a generous gift in the form of restaurant cards. However, Mary knew they needed far more than restaurant cards and it seemed an impractical gift for two people who needed so many necessities.
Mary had grappled with this gift all week and tried putting it out of her mind. Every time she looked at the cards she cried because she knew they could have used the money to pay off their debt more. It was painful. She realized she was being ungrateful and had tried being thankful to God. The givers of the cards were well intentioned. It seemed to Mary this was all a part of God’s response to a desire of her heart that she had prayed for years: to be content in all things.
As she sopped up the mess off the cards, the counter, and floor Mary cried to herself. It was a place of trust, she knew that. She also knew she was being very selfish and ungrateful each time she looked at the plastic cards. She wanted to be so different at heart. However, she knew she must walk through this despite her response and dislike of herself. “God, it is hard to be content in all things, “Mary whispered to her Creator in the dark.
Tears rolling down her cheeks, Mary took her cup of coffee and went back upstairs to pray. “God, please help me to be satisfied with what is given me and forgive me for trying to tell you what to do”, Mary sobbed out. Putting her coffee down gingerly on her desk she opened her devotional to the days reading.
The scripture passage was from Matthew 6; a reminder of the lily of the field who does not labour or spin. It was like God asking “Why do you worry so?” Oddly, Mary and Robin had been discussing the need for winter attire just that morning. Oh, there were so many things they needed. They had decided not to exchange at Christmas time for the third year in a row. Mary had been alright with it the last couple of years but something inside her this year resisted a little. Robin had wanted to buy gifts but Mary argued that they would just be eating up their line of credit and visa. Mary didn’t want the extra stress of adding more debt to their life.
Mary cried again as she thought of their situation. In her heart she realized the truth of scripture. The Book of James encouraged Mary that
every good and perfect gift came down from the Father of the heavenly lights. The restaurant food vouchers were something good. Perhaps Mary was too worried about something that God didn’t seem at all concerned about: wouldn’t He have sent cash if he wanted them to focus on paying the debt down? By sending this”good gift” it seemed God was suggesting as the scripture passage today that they not worry about what you are to eat, or drink or wear. The next verse really caught Mary’s attention. It said “For the pagans run after these things and your Heavenly Father knows you need them” (Matthew 6:32).
Mary hung her head in shame. She spoke harshly to herself: “Haven’t you learned to trust God all these years in so many ways that were so numerous that you couldn’t even begin to count them, if you tried? Yes,” she whispered to herself.
Then more angrily and louder, no longer whispering she berated herself: “Then why do you act like a pagan? You need to rejoice and be glad at this gift. You need to give thanks that your Father is going to supply all your necessities and just enjoy this good gift He decided to bless you both with.”
Mary knew this meant trusting God and being grateful rather than murmuring. She didn’t want to be ungrateful like the Israelites who received manna in the desert. No, she wanted to dance, praise God and give thanks with full abandon. She wanted to be like the child she once was who lived in the moment and let everyone else worry. She needed to do that now. She made up her mind: she would. This Christmas season she would praise and thank God for whatever He gave her. She might even throw caution to the wind and maybe, just maybe think about exchanging gifts with Robin for Christmas. Oh, it wouldn’t be much, but perhaps even a $20 gift wouldn’t hurt. She would see.
For now, Mary decided to focus more on praising and thanking God-even now in this situation when she didn’t understand how He worked or why He worked that way. If God was more concerned about them being entertained and eating out then Mary knew she should enjoy the restaurant coupons without guilt or worry. Lifting her coffee cup to her lips Mary read the next verse of scripture: “Seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness and all these things would be added unto you”. Mary smiled to herself. Mary and Robin had been trying to help where help was required, give where there was the most financial want and even joined a church leadership class to seek God’s direction for their life.
“Perhaps, just perhaps,” thought Mary to herself, “these cards are some of the things being ‘added unto us’ because we are seeking first God’s kingdom.” Was she right? Was she misled? If you are a fellow Christian you might judge her for being so distrusting of God. If you are a worldly sort you will understand completely what Mary was going through. After all, you have been on your own for your whole life looking out for yourself and your needs. Like Mary perhaps you have trusted only yourself. Yes, perhaps Mary should have known better because she had trusted God in other ways and in other circumstances. This was a new way, however, a new road God had been taking her on and Mary had never been so stretched to trust in God.
“The way is narrow, it says somewhere in scripture, that leads to life, and boy, this is a narrow road,” Mary thought to herself. “Oddly enough on this particular section of the road I should be happy, unconcerned, and carefree like the bird in the air that never sews seed or gathers food in barns but yet has plenty. “So why not,” she thought,” yes, why not be happy?”
What a challenge! What a fight! For it would be one, for sure, to trust in God, give thanks and let Him do what He was doing and not worry. Yes, it was a battle. Mary realized the first weapon of her warfare at this time of learning to trust and be content no matter what God gave or didn’t give was praise and thanksgiving. Mary decided to be determined to do both. Getting up from her chair Mary hummed a happy tune of praise and went on her way with the day.
As Mary got dressed she found herself thinking: “I will let go and surrender to you, God each time I find myself focusing on our money problem.” Then she realized something in mid thought: it wasn’t their problem it was God’s! She never saw it this way before and today was the first time this thought possessed her. Yes, Mary cried out, it’s your problem, God and not mine. You are my Father and own the cattle on a thousand hills. This is your problem, not mine.
Tears flowed down from Mary’s face as she contemplated this idea of God as her Father. It was time to put into practice all that scripture said about being a child of God. Mary knew the problem she faced and had always faced: her earthly father had never been there for Mary. She had grown up in a home where he was absent. Mary’s mother had worked hard and had her four children out working to help make ends meet. Martha had worked at Christie’s Bakery nights while going to school during the day. Her brother Joe, Mary knew, had worked in an amusement park when he was 8 years old. Mary herself had spent the 14th summer of her life babysitting 5 children (one of whom was mentally challenged) who lived next door. She got $15 a week from that job. She paid her mom $10 for room and board. The rest she saved in the bank. By the time Mary was 16 she had saved enough money from this and other babysitting jobs to buy her first coat.
It was a long, below the knee, full length black fur coat with thicker fur cuffs on the arms and bottom rim of the coat. It was cinched with a black shiny belt at the waist. Mary had been so proud of her first purchase. It represented many hours of holding and feeding crying babies.
As Mary reflected on this difficult time Mary knew that her mother had done right in leaving her father who was an abusive alcoholic. If her mother didn’t hide some of his pay he would spend it all on booze and then come home and beat their mother. No wonder this was a tough area to trust God, Mary thought to herself. From as early on as she could remember Mary had to fend for herself within the family just to survive.
Mary had learned what she thought were a few valuable lessons from it so when it came time to trust God it was hard to relearn all she had been taught. Her own father was never there: would God be there? Her own father had abandoned her: wouldn’t God too? Her own father never gave her anything: would God?
Mary had seen God act mightily in her own life but she still struggled with the old voices of fear and doubt that raised their ugly heads when troubles came. Not only that but Mary had to deal with her mother’s dead voice that still echoed in her memory like alarm bells going off every time a bill came in or reprimanded Mary each time Mary felt she spent frivolously. Mary would never forget the time her mother gave Teresa, her sister $40 for her birthday. Teresa had gone out and bought this beautiful Blue Mountain statue of a dog. It was a lovely green shade. Mary never could figure out why they called it “Blue” Mountain when the colour was obviously anything but blue. At any rate, Teresa was so happy and proud of her gift but when her mother saw it boy was she mad!
“How could you spend this money on such a useless thing?” Mary recalled her mother say and on and on the harping went. Teresa, according to her mother, should have bought clothes or underwear or something more practical. How could she!
Then it hit Mary like a lead pipe: this problem with the gift cards from the restaurant was her mother’s voice deep within resounding loud and clear and condemning Mary. “How could she ever have a nice time out when so much money was owed elsewhere? They should be paying off debt and not going out to dinner.” Mary sat stupefied.
Mary’s reflection included a look back at her mother’s home when she died. There were no trinkets or pretty things in her mother’s house that her mother had bought. Everything had been given to her mother as gifts. She would never waste her money on such things. Despite her attitude her mother loved each and everything her children had given to her. It dawned on Mary that in her own fears she was becoming like her mother.
How sad, she thought to herself, her mother had been so deprived she had gone to the opposite extreme of what was necessary. Mary supposed most depression era people had learned to control their spending. Then to top it all off her mother had raised four children alone. Mary could see why her mother had become so practical. It was a bittersweet memory because Mary realized how much her own mother went without to look after them.
Her mother rarely went out to dine, rarely shopped at the store for dresses and depended on bags of clothes given to them from the church or school where she taught. She had given up so much for them. Looking back Mary realized that these tough survival lessons she learned from her mother were a hindrance when it came to trusting God. This was a new season though. God would look after her, after all He promised to supply all of her needs in a way worthy of his magnificent riches. She must trust, that was all there was to it. She would not discard what her mother taught her though for she knew she could not throw the baby out with the bath water.
The economical saving qualities of her mother had been handed down to Mary. These were good things, Mary believed. During these present difficult years Mary had been able to stretch her food budget dollar, spread her money on cost-effective meals that could be frozen for another day, as well as resort to using the basics in cleaning supplies to save money on what could be an otherwise expensive duty. All in all, as Mary reflected on her upbringing and her present need to conserve she realized she had not only used all her mother’s teachings for her current situation but gained some insights of her own along the way.
She was proud of herself. Good things had come out of deprivation. Now the lesson she needed to learn was who God was in all this. She certainly found the inner strength and wisdom to deal with many of the problems she faced herself. Now the great challenge would be to trust God’s provision. Further, Mary would have to confront and battle the fearful voice of her deceased mother that was still speaking to her after all these years! Yet now that she recognized where her fears originated it was a much easier battle. Why, the more she thought of it the more she felt at ease and peaceful about the gift cards. She was suddenly more grateful then she thought possible. They could use these cards in good health and not feel guilty that she hadn’t gotten money instead.
Mary realized with an even greater insight that that was the problem all along: she had felt guilty. Yes, oddly enough she was feeling culpable about not receiving cash to pay off her debt. Wow! That was such a big eye opener. Yes, as she thought about it she recognized she couldn’t be responsible because she hadn’t purchased these – they were a gift, after all.
“How weird that was”, thought Mary to herself, “I was wanting cash somehow to relieve my guilty conscience.” Mary realized she incurred this guilt when her mother rebuked her sister over her transgression of purchasing the dog statue. Somehow though her sister got into trouble Mary still held on to the guilt and shame of the moment as if it was hers! She decided to let go of it now. It was not too late. “I am going to let go of it, Lord, I give you over that guilt and shame from the memory with Teresa and mom. It’s not mine to hold on to. It never was.”
With the relinquishing of that pain and grief Mary felt a sudden flow of relief and tears fell down her cheek as God began to heal her of that wounded spirit. “Forgive me, Father, she cried, for my sin”. Even as Mary spoke these words she realized she wasn’t sure what she was guilty of that needed forgiving. As a child coming from a legalist home Mary felt guilty about everything even when she wasn’t the responsible party. Her husband often commented on this. Despite this Mary still felt compelled to look at her guilt in every situation even if she wasn’t to blame. Now she recognized that even in this situation with her sister she had taken on herself that guilt that was not hers.
What was worst, as in the situation with the gift cards, sometimes Mary had tried to transfer that guilt on to others. In this case it was a burden of guilt she had tried to put on the giver! Out of Mary’s legalistic mind and her great compilation of ‘should haves, could haves and would haves” came a judgemental rebuke: they should have given money rather than the gift cards.
This insight made Mary shake her head in discouragement. How many times in the past had she tried to blame others for a burden that wasn’t theirs to carry or hers to begin with! This was the sin. She had tried to carry the sin and guilt of others and when not possible had tried to point the finger elsewhere. This realization did not make Mary feel very good about herself. God, in Christ Jesus had taken all man’s burden of guilt and sin to the cross. Yet here was Mary all these years carrying this heavy yoke of slavery around her neck. What was worse was that when she couldn’t possibly find herself guilty she looked elsewhere. Ugh! Mary felt a sick feeling in her stomach. She recognized at that point she did have need of forgiveness for trying to carry this burden around.
“Please forgive me, Lord, for my sins. I am not God to carry this guilt around. Jesus, thank you for taking my sin and guilt on the cross, in my place. Forgive me for trying to be my own saviour and for being judge and jury of others. I let it all go and ask for your help in the future.
As she sat back in her chair reflecting she wondered just how far this ugly little thing extended to in her life. One question above all others came to the surface: Was she feeling so guilty right now about their debt that this remorse was at the root of her disinterest in exchanging gifts? If she was in control and trusting herself to resolve her financial issues than the likely answer was “Yes”. However, if Mary was to start trusting God, as Father, than she needed to let go of control and its repercussions in her life. She had to let go of the burden of guilt and she must let go of control. It was a heavy task at hand. She was only at the beginning stages of this discovery so she should not be too hard on herself. She would be grateful, that is how she would start. That’s all she knew right now. “Just to think, Mary said to herself, it all started with these gift cards! Mm”, she mused to herself, “so they were “good and perfect gifts” in more than one way, for the feelings they had agitated within me had turned out to reveal the root of this evil as well.”
“How awesome is that” she said to her spirit in quiet amazement. Yes, it was awesome indeed. As God often did he used one situation to deal with many. His work wasn’t over but He who begins a good work in all of us would complete it someday in Mary! And that is another good gift, is it not?
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