Who Am I?

Four Hundred Texts on Theology (Third Century) 3

Posted: September 14th, 2010 | Author: | Filed under: St. Maximos the Confessor | Tags: , , , , | 1 Comment »

7.  Scripture exhorts us to offer gifts to God so that we may become conscious of His infinite goodness. For God receives our offerings as if they were entirely our own gifts and He had not already given us anything. In this way God’s untold goodness towards us is fully evident, for when we offer Him things which in reality are His own He accepts them as if they were ours, and He makes Himself our debtor as though they were not already His.

I don’t believe we usually grasp this reality. I know I struggle with it. It feels as though when I give, I am giving that which is mine. But I think back to when my children were small and they would offer me gifts. I always received them with joy and treated them as though my children had offered my something from their own resources. In truth, at such young ages, they really had nothing much apart from the resources we provided.

The same is true with God, even when we don’t acknowledge it. But he is our loving Father, and that matters not at all to him. It is our love we reveal (or sadly our lack of love) in our gifts. And that is what truly matters. It is communion God seeks with us and that can only be found through love.


One Comment on “Four Hundred Texts on Theology (Third Century) 3”

  1. 1 Elizabeth Esther said at 6:15 pm on September 14th, 2010:

    Pithy and profound, Scott. Thanks for sharing.