Bits for Sunday, November 1

Earlier this week, I posted about my encounter with the workbook question. You were kind and left me some sweet comments, which led me to think further about the situation.

The verses Angela focused on were from Psalm 139:

For you created my inmost being; you knit me together in my mother’s womb. I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made; your works are wonderful, I know that full well. My frame was not hidden from you when I was made in the secret place. When I was woven together in the depths of the earth, your eyes saw my unformed body. All the days ordained for me were written in your book before one of them came to be (vv. 13-16).

As you may remember, Angela challenged, “List three things you are thankful God knit together in you.” And I have to tell you – it stumped me. I thought of one thing right away and wrote it down. I thought of a second thing that didn’t really need to be put into words, so I determined to just scribble down “you know what this means.” And from there, I remained stumped.

Stumped and a little embarrassed. God had worked so hard to knit me, and it wasn’t that I thought I was a bad person or lacking in some way, but there’s something very panic-inducing about being forced to think of your own good qualities.

It reminded me of a retreat I spoke at a few years ago. The whole retreat was themed around 1 Timothy 1:6 – “For this reason I remind you to fan into flame the gift of God, which is in you through the laying on of my hands.”

During the early moments of our time together, I handed every woman a small gift bag and a stack of blank paper. They were to write on the slips of paper the good things they recognized as gifts in the others there that day. I sat back and watched as they looked around the room, thinking of the perfect things to write about the others before they started scribbling.

Once they were done writing, we passed around the gift bags, and everyone deposited their thoughts into the others’ bags. Then I watched as they dove into their “gifts.” Some cried, some looked amazed, and all of them seemed very thankful to be reminded of what was good within them.

Why is it always easier to see the gifts and the goodness in others than it is to see it in ourselves? And yet what a gift it is to be encouraged about the person you have become.

So this week you get an assignment. (Working in a school has finally gotten the best of me.) I challenge you to find at least one person in your life and randomly surprise him or her with a note, an email, a phone call – something – that offers affirmation about God’s knitting work. Be a blessing – and I’m pretty sure you’ll get one right back!