“Everything that the Father gives to me will come to me, and anyone who comes to me I will never drive away…” (John 6:37)
We say Jesus is God’s gift to us, and He is. Today’s passage, however, doesn’t say that. Instead, today’s words make this astounding claim: We are God’s gift to Jesus.
Maybe the best way to understand our being God’s gift to Jesus is to consider how parents feel that their child is a gift to them. The parents have a baby that takes constant care, self-sacrifice, sleepless nights, and huge resources, and, oddly enough, they think their baby is a tremendous gift that brings more meaning and purpose to their lives.
If the parent’s love for the child were contingent upon what their child does, that child might not be loved. Their love simply comes from the outpouring of their hearts towards the child.
The same with Jesus: If His love was contingent upon what we do, we might not get loved; but His desire to receive us from the Father comes simply from the outpouring of His love.
If we remembered we’re God’s gift to Jesus, I wonder if we would live any differently. With our spouse, kids, or someone we love, we want to give them our best gifts. We want their eyes to light up on Christmas morning. We want them to be gleeful when they open their birthday presents.
Because we are God’s gift to Jesus, I encourage us to offer to Jesus the very best gift of ourselves that we can, which would be us at our most loving, grateful, forgiving, hopeful, and generous.
God gives His perfect Son to us, and God gives imperfect us to Jesus. It hardly seems fair. It may not be fair to Jesus, but it’s more than fair to us. More than fair is called grace. And grace is always amazing and astounding.
Reflection Questions:
- How do you respond to your being God’s gift to Jesus?
- When I remember that I’m God’s gift to Jesus, everything in my life looks different. If you were to more often remember that you are God’s gift to Jesus, does anything in your life look different?
- What would it mean for you to offer the very best gift of yourself to Jesus?