Do you ever have a word jump out and seem significant to you?
Does this word ever stay with you and seem important in a lot of different situations?
Does this word begin as significant but then grow even more fundamental over time?
I have had two such words act this way over the course of 2022. I’m sure I have heard or read many other profound things, but these two stand out and I often come back to them.
The second of these words is “receive.”
I don’t recall when it first struck me this past year, but I began to see what a powerful thing it is to receive. If I receive something, as in a gift, there is reason for joy and gratitude but not for self-centeredness. This good thing was received and is not a result of my own genius or careful planning or diligence.
This might not seem important to you, but for someone like me, who is beset by self-centeredness, this notion of receive is big magic indeed.
And then the Scriptures come along and added their voice and authority:
What do you have that you did not receive? If then you received it, why do you boast as if you did not receive it?
The months passed, and I kept coming back to this very helpful word. When tempted to various shapes of self-aggrandizement, I would recall that I cannot boast as if I had not received it. It is a lesson in much needed humility. But then, reading a wonderful little book by Yves Congar, I came upon:
Between us there is only exchange. God alone gives, only God.
This can bear the weight of meditation.
I receive many things from many people – the food I eat, the electricity that keeps me warm, the love of my children. I am receiving all the time. But when you chase all of these things down to their source of sources, you find that it is God alone who gives: what we manage is merely exchange. We have received everything. We can only give what we have already received.
In other words, all is gift.
