The Truth About Wrapping Paper, Pretty Bows, and Heros

God fills so that we overflow—and I find it again here in Colossians 2:10.

And our own completeness is found in him. We are completely filled with God as Christ’s fullness overflows within us.
TPT

I copy the words in my journal because I’m quick to forget that what God gives me isn’t meant for just me.

I pray to know His heart.

Trust His timing.

Remember His words.

Adopt His nature.

Extend His grace.

Praise His name.

Get out of the way.

And God just smiles—because He knows even when I’m unaware that these are all gifts meant to be shared.

Wrapping Paper and Pretty Bows

When I think gift, I picture the back room at the gift shop where I worked as a teen. Giant rolls of wrapping paper were secured to the wall. All colors of ribbon hung too, ready to be wrapped criss-cross and secured on the bottom of packages.

I remember the thunk of the machine we’d use to turn ribbon into bows, the delighted smiles of customers tickled they didn’t have to wrap their just-purchased gifts, and the one-inch rules. One-inch overlap on the paper. Three one-inch pieces of tape per package. I learned to wrap neat and fast, as expectation and practice will teach.

In my mind, a gift is incomplete without pretty paper, sharply folded edges, and a thoughtfully placed bow. Only then is it ready to exchange hands.

If I’m honest, I like neat and tidy. I appreciate rules. I’d prefer to gift what God’s growing in me only after I can package it pretty and tie a bow on top.

But God pokes gently at my definition, reminds me that the gifts He wants to give through me as not the well-articulated after-thoughts of lessons far behind me. They’re squeezed from the moments I feel most inept as a parent. Sown in the real-life clashes of personality and stubbornness. Uncovered in the midst of failure and forgiveness, honest questions and imperfect surrender.

Sharing what God gives in the middle of right-now is often messy. It requires vulnerability to admit our own anger flared or we misunderstood or regret we didn’t speak up. It costs us our pride to share our God’s-still-at-work-here stories.

But you know what else it does? It makes God the hero.

Who Is The Hero?

Every story has a hero. The one who gets the thanks, or at least should. Yet sometimes our stories about what God’s done in our life name the wrong hero.

God met us, held us, grew us through long years of waiting, but when we tell the story, we’re the hero with endless patience or self-control or grit. Answered prayers hinge on our merit, the way we tell it, not on the lavish and undeserved love of Father God.

We chisel out the parts of the story that make us look bad, and in doing so, inadvertently make ourselves out to be the hero.

I’ve gotten it backward, and maybe you have too.

Truth is “we are all a part of a story that began long ago,” as Casey Hilty reminds us Her Children Arise (pg. 101). That story already has a hero. Our job is to point the glory where it’s due.

We’re urged in Isaiah 12:5 to “sing praises to the Lord, for he has done marvelous wonders, and let his fame be known throughout the earth!” (TPT). Promised that we’ll be “filled completely with the fruits of righteousness that are found in Jesus, the Anointed One—bringing great praise and glory to God” (Phil. 1:11 TPT).

Sharing the gifts God gives us while we’re walking through the mess is a bold proclamation that He’s God and we’re not. That He’s good, and He’s patiently teaching us to look, act, think, and sound more like Him. That He’s worthy, though we neither earn or deserve the love He lavishly gives.

Unwrapped Gifts

Missional neighboring is telling the middle parts of our stories while they’re still unfolding and we’re still growing. Holding the grace, hope, strength, wisdom God gives in open hands so it can spill over. Naming God as hero in our stories.

These sorts of unwrapped gifts dislodge the things in our hearts making it hard to hear God’s voice. Break down walls of self-reliance, control, fear, pride. Give others space and permission to be real with themselves, God, us.

Imagine what would happen in our homes, neighborhoods, communities if others overheard us praising God even when nothing is going our way. Before the resolution, restoration, miracle. Before we’ve come through to the other side. Before we can wrap it pretty and tie a bow on top.

Maybe we’d come before God honest. Come together without comparison and pretense. Maybe it would start a ripple effect.

I’ll leave you with this prayer of blessing:

May we choose open hands, say thanks out loud, tell our God’s-still-at-work-here stories.

May we freely share what God’s graciously given us.

And may we always name God as the hero.

Just a friend over here in your corner,

Missional Neighboring 101

This small book will help you make a big impact in your neighborhood as you learn to let missional living flow from the inside out. Download your FREE sneak peek today! Also, get the 30-day missional living challenge free when you purchase Cultivating a Missional Life: A 30-Day Devotional to Gently Help You Open Your Heart, Home, and Life to Your Neighbors.