FREE GIFT

Free Gift -- that's almost redundant. If it's a gift, it's free, in't it? Maybe. Some gifts do have "strings" attached, you know! Especially on the internet. You get your hopes up high when you see a fantastic offer for something free only to find out you must "participate". In other words you have to sign up for so many subscriptions to this, that or the other in order to claim your gift. Or you have to pay postage that's almost as much as the gift itself is worth if you bought it outright. I don't consider that free!

Don't misunderstand me -- I like free gifts as well as I like the bargains I was blogging about yesterday! Just the other day I received a free Energy Bar in the mail -- ops, wonder where it is. Forgot to eat it. Bet my husband snitched it -- for the last I saw it, it was on his computer desk! I've gotten other candy bars, or samples of cookies, a box of cereal -- just a small individual box, to be sure, but it was enough for my breakfast! Another time I got a thermal coffee mug, even three pounds of gourmet coffee. That, however, had strings attached! That time I was signed up to get a pound of coffee every month -- had to pay for it, of course -- and I don't even drink the stuff because my rapid heartbeat won't tolerate the caffeine! Nor would my husband ever be able to keep up with a pound of coffee each and every month, so I cancelled the order!

I sometimes wonder if birthday gifts and Christmas gifts are really free. If you're like me, you feel you have to reciprocate with an appropriately priced gift in return.

My sister's worse than I am. She used to ask (as only a family member dares), "How much did you pay for it?" And then, "But my present to you didn't cost that much. I'll have to buy something more!" Then we decided to write each other a check for a certain amount. That settled the equality of the gift and also ensured we would get something we really wanted or needed. But wasn't it crazy, we asked, to write each other a check for the same amount? Why not just agree to spend so much of our own money on ourselves and consider it a gift? Hey, that ruined the pleasure of giving and receiving the gifts so we finally decided to completely forget about giving gifts to each other! After all, we both had all we needed or wanted!

Then I think about the one Gift that is greater than any other gift in the world -- and it has absolutely no strings attached. We don't need to quote John 3:16 to know what that wonderful Gift is -- the Gift of Eternal Life through God's only begotten Son!

Romans 6:23 says in part, "The gift of God is eternal life." And II Corinthinians 9:15 says, "Thanks be unto God for his unspeakable gift." That should give us reason to "shout for joy and be glad" as yesterday's blog encouraged!

Probably should have written this blog at Christmas; but as I was looking at some of the Christmas gifts we received this year, this thought came to me and a little Voice whispered, "There's your blog for today."

And as I checked out the word "gift" in my concordance, I heard that Voice again saying, "There's your blog for tomorrow!"

See ya then!

Preacher's Kid