A Giving Resolution

It is hours from the breach of the new year. As the clock winds down to 2008 and I sit stumbling through the words for my next piece here at the kitchen table, God's blessings in my life fill the house with laughter and noise. Even with all the chairs left empty at the table of my life - God has richly blessed me. But like the man sings, 'the winter makes us talk a little slower, maybe laugh a little lower', maybe reflect a little harder on the things we should have done, wish we did, on the losses and gains of our little flames - are they really blotting out the darkness?
I am getting my mind around the story that God has set before me this passing year and how He has stretched and pulled and beaten and loved on my soul - and I am left fixated on giving.
Giving is the essence of our faith and yet I often find I am more focused on the strategies of attainment, the allure of consumerism, and all the things that will complete my life if they work out for me... The theme of the Christian story has always been the gift - from the widow giving her last penny, to the father of a nation offering up his only son - the act of giving seems to be the ultimate measure of God's eternal reality in the world. I am left after all these months of wrestling, writing, living, teaching, parenting and loving with a vivid picture of where God wants me to go. My resolution is to truly learn to give - give my time, relationships, finances, and possessions to bring a little more ammunition to the steady advance of light that launched into the darkness 2008 years ago. Yes, that is my hope for the New Year, that God will not only show me how to give, but will teach me the discipline of giving...
Happy New Year everyone... Matt Litton