Greg Laurie Daily Devotion - May 19, 2008

Monday, May 19, 2008

Remember the Giver

^“For unto us a Child is born, unto us a Son is given. . . ” (Isaiah 9:6)

When people give Christmas gifts to each other, they usually put a lot of thought into the gift beforehand. A gift tells us quite a bit about the giver, doesn’t it? You can estimate, more or less, what people think of you by the gifts they give you. On the other hand, we can all probably remember Christmases from our childhood when we sometimes failed to fully appreciate what we had been given.

It seems to me that presenting gifts to one another is a very right and very good thing for us to do. I believe that in doing so, humanity is subconsciously helping to underscore the greatest and most important thing for us to realize.

We must never forget that God the Father is the giver. Of course, it is natural and right that we should think about the child in Bethlehem, our blessed Lord, lying as a helpless baby in a manger. But let’s never forget this: God is the giver.

It was the Father who sent His Son into the world. It was the Father’s purpose. It is God who “so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son . . .” (John 3:16). It is God who “sent forth His son, born of a woman, born under the law, to redeem those who were under the law . . .” (Galatians 4:4).

There is no greater insult to a giver than when someone is more interested in the gift than the giver. Let’s never forget, therefore, that the Son of God was sent by the Father and that He was sent to bring us to the Father, the great and eternal Giver.

For more relevant and biblical teaching from Pastor Greg Laurie, go to www.harvest.org.