Read the transcript from today's video devotional.
I'm going to ask you a few questions. After I ask you these questions, I’d invite you to pause for a quick minute to think about it. Are you ready?
First: what's your favorite color? I'm sure you got that pretty quickly. We talk about that a lot. A lot of times we get asked that.
Next: what's your favorite restaurant? That's a little bit different. We usually have a favorite color. Favorite restaurant? All of a sudden we have a plethora of restaurants that pop in our head and we think, I don't know if there's a favorite. I have a couple.
Next: what's your favorite book or movie? Again, it could be the same thing. Maybe you have a plethora that pop in your head and it's like, I don’t know how to choose, this certain book or movie from this. Now you’re debating and thinking through all of the different things that just popped in your head.
Now: what's something you ate lately that was really, really good? Now the question taps into our other senses. I'm sorry if you haven't eaten and you're really hungry—I'm now bringing up food twice. Now you're thinking about something that's really, really good, and you can probably almost taste it.
The last question is: what's something that God did for you lately that you're thankful for?
As soon as I ask that question—because I've actually done that a lot and asked that question—it's almost like on the computer where you're waiting for the video to start and there's a circle that just keeps going over and over in a circle, thinking, thinking.
Some of the other questions I asked—a lot of times we have things pop in our head immediately. But when I ask the question, "What's something that God did for you lately that you're thankful for?" sometimes it's a blank slate. There's nothing there. You're actually trying to sort through the desert of this thing that you may be thankful for that God has done.
Why This Matters
Now it's exactly that. That's why I ask these questions, because our Verse of the Day has been so impactful in my life to really change my perception and understanding of seeing God at work in the day-to-day in my life. It comes from James chapter 1, verse 17. "Whatever is good and perfect is a gift coming down to us from God our Father, who created all the lights in the heavens. He never changes or casts a shifting shadow."
Why Lights in the Heavens?
The fun part about our verse today is you kind of wonder: of all the attributes of God, why is it referencing that He is the Creator of the lights in the heavens when it comes to every good gift? There is so much that could be talked about in the attributes of God when it talks about a good gift.
Catch this. This is what's so amazing about this verse. If you look at the different lights in the sky—in the heavens—that we're talking about, that God created as the Father: it doesn't matter what time you're going through. There is always a light in the sky. Always.
The Sun vs. the Stars
Sometimes when we're looking for God to be at work—and that's why when we are asked sometimes, "What's something lately that God has done that you're thankful for?"—what we're actually looking for is this huge sun in the sky. That it's this dominant, supernatural thing that God is doing in our life, and that is what we're trying to search for.
When we don't see this massive sunrise in the sky from God, then we don't think He's at work.
That's the beauty of this verse, because when it says that every single good gift comes from God, what if we change that? What if, instead of looking for the sun in the sky, what if we actually saw sometimes the glimmering of the stars in the sky—that it's these small things in our day that God sent our way? The good things that this verse is saying came from God.
God Is Behind Every Good Thing
The unfortunate thing is a lot of the good things we either think that we produce, or someone else did that for us. But according to this verse, how amazing is it that the God of the universe—the God that's holding it all together, that spoke the stars into existence—actually did those things for you today?
A New Perspective
If you want to change this dynamic, I would love for us all to get to the point—I'm speaking to myself as well—that just like these other questions, as soon as they're asked, you have a plethora of things, or you have this one thing (your favorite color), or you have the plethora of thoughts go through your head to consider.
Imagine if we have all the thoughts of God's goodness to us, and what we're thankful for is as significant as all of the lights and stars and galaxies and everything else in the sky, that we constantly are at a place that when we end our day, we look back on every single day and say, what are the good things that happened in my day?
Sometimes it'll be the faint stars that are in our day—that's maybe more difficult to see—but identify those, and then reflect: This was a gift from God to me.
Celebrating God's Gifts
Then we can start living into this verse and seeing God at work in our day. Then it'll be that when someone asks us that question, we'll say, I don't know which one to choose from right now. There's just so many things that God's doing and at work.
May we take time to celebrate His good gifts to us today.
