a gift...

Matt gave me a gift today...it wasn't flowers or chocolates or a pair of new Danskos, although all of those would be very nice. He gave me the gift of time...time alone.

While I was putting the finishing touches on our lunch today he walked in and said, Whit I've got something for you to do today. And the somewhat unkind words that followed were, sure right after I work on the YL banquet stuff and do my lesson plans. And then he surprised me and said, I want you to go be by yourself for at least an hour today.

Truth be told, I don't have much time, well sure I do, but I mean I don't choose to spend my time being alone. And truth be told even more I used to be scared to be alone. I am an extrovert you see and being with people gives me fuel, but something inside him sensed what was screaming on the inside of me today...I need get away...to reflect...to pray...to praise...to sit...to breathe...to be alone.

So I headed to a local coffee joint with my reading materials in hand. And I asked Jesus to show up because I desperately needed a word from my Savior. And He did. I turned to Chapter 16 in The Rabbi's Heartbeat by Brennan Manning, the chapter titled "Recovering Passion" and these were the words that jumped off the page.

"The kingdom of heaven is like a treasure hidden in a field which someone has found; he hides it again, and goes off happy, sells everything he owns and buys the field." Matthew 13:44

The treasure is Jesus Christ.

It is one thing to discover the treasure and quite another to claim it as one's own through ruthless determination and tenacious effort. -B. Manning

He goes on to talk about how John the disciple would sit so close to Christ that he would hear his very heartbeat. And that John did not believe that Jesus was the most important thing; he believed that Jesus was the ONLY thing. That...is...passion.

The treasure is Jesus Christ...what a gift.