A gift really isn't a gift if there is no giving

​Is it possible to know you have a gift if you don't pour out that gift? What is a gift, afterall, if there is no giving of it?

Writing is one way I come to know God. Throughout the day, I'll read about God, I'll entertain thoughts God puts in my head, I'll feel things based on the prompts God puts in my heart - but they are all just ideas and information until I write them.

And share them.

Many days that is what you are reading here - my out loud journey to better know God. My attempt to give my gift in attempt to better know the ultimate giver. And in many ways, to thank the giver.

If someone gives us a recipe for a cake they baked and absolutely loved, we'll never fully understand the gift of that information until we bake the cake.

If someone tells us about an awesome trail they ran - it's the most beautiful trail ever, they say - we can never understand the beauty of that information until we've run on that trail.

If someone tells us about a song they heard - it moved them to tears - we can never fully understand those tears until we've listened to the song.

The point is, especially when it comes to a desire to know God, what we've been told is not nearly enough. What we've learned means nothing if the learning doesn't turn to making.

Making the things God has gifted us the chance to make. Doing the things God has gifted us the chance to do. Things he wants us to make because he wants the WORLD to see the gift he has given us. Things he wants us to do because he wants US to see the gift he's given us.

We can never have a meaningful relationship with anything - or anyone - unless we find a way to make that relationship come alive. My relationship with writing comes alive this morning as I make not so random thoughts real. My relationship with God comes alive as I thank him for making my random thoughts not so random.

But we have to make and we have to do to discover the gift. The gift we have inside us, the gift we have in one another, and the gift we have in God.

God doesn't want to be a gift we know, he wants to be a gift we make come alive. And that is impossible without making....

Because a gift really isn't a gift if there is no giving.