1 minute, 28 seconds
Do you remember the television game show Let’s Make a Deal? Selected members of the studio audience, called “traders,” made deals with the host, Monty Hall. Each trader was offered a prize and then given the choice of keeping it or exchanging it for a different item, hidden from view until they made their final decision.
The trader didn’t know until the deal was made whether they were getting something of much greater value or a “zonk”—often a comical item of little or no value. Like Monty Hall’s traders, we usually don’t know what we’re receiving until we open the present.
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My daughter is one of the few people I know who doesn’t like gifts. A minimalist and non-collector of stuff, she prefers cash or an Amazon gift card to anything wrapped. A self-proclaimed “poor gift giver”, my girl came up with a brilliant remedy years ago: she began re-gifting.
When she receives a gift, she cheerfully “Oohs” and “Ahhs” appropriately, then later shelves it in her closet. When she needs to give a gift, she visits her re-gifting pile, selects an already-given gift, and rewraps it. Voila!
This worked well until one birthday when my girl received a box of tea from a friend. A dutiful thank-you note writer, she thanked friend #1 for the tea without opening the box, thinking she had the perfect re-gift! She rewrapped the “box of tea” for friend #2.
My girl received a beautiful thank-you note exclaiming how elegant the hand-knit scarf was! Her friend said she didn’t know my daughter knew how to knit!
In our family, my daughter’s gifts are like a box of chocolates…you never know what you’re going to get. SHE might not even know!
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Unlike Monty Hall, there are no catches in God’s benevolence and never a zonk.
Unlike my beloved girl, the Giver of our days knows precisely what He’s measuring out for us, and He is never caught off guard or surprised.
As we wake and step into the unknown every morning, we don’t know what we’re going to get dealt, but God does. He’s not only the Dealer—the Giver of this gift called life is also the omniscient Author who sees the beginning to the end, the only One who knows each of our stories completely and intimately. For those who call upon Jesus as Lord and Savior, He’s written our names into the book of life.
Be assured that every gift He gives is for our good, and for His glory.