When I was in the seventh grade, I had a classmate named Walter. One day I came to school and saw Walter rubbing something in his hand with sandpaper. I asked what he had, and he showed me a little boat he was carving. It was a round-bottomed dory. I asked, “How did you learn to make such a nice boat?”
Walter answered, “My father showed me.” The next day when he came to school he held the boat out to me and said, “Do you like it?”
The boat was all smooth and finished, and I said, “I love it!”
Then Walter handed me the boat and said, “It is yours.”
I looked at it with admiration and approval. Then I said something I have regretted ever since: “Let me pay for it.”
Walter snatched it out of my hand and put it into his shirt pocket and said, “It is not for sale,” and walked away.
I can remember that day at school clearly. I learned that you can never pay for a gift, because then it isn’t really a gift. As I went home that afternoon, I felt sad with regret.
The next day I went to Walter and said, “Can you tell me how to make a boat like that?”
He said, “Yes,” and told me how to use a gouge and a chisel and sandpaper.
I have been making little boats ever since. I like to show others how to carve little boats and remind them to accept God’s gift. The Bible says, “The wages of sin is death.” That is what we deserve. But the rest of the verse says, “But the gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord” (Romans 6:2323For the wages of sin is death; but the gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord. (Romans 6:23)). “By grace are ye saved through faith; and that not of yourselves: it is the gift of God: not of works, lest any man should boast” (Ephesians 2:89). You cannot pay for a gift, and you cannot work for it either; you just accept it, and then say “thank you.” “Thanks be unto God for His unspeakable gift” (2 Corinthians 9:15).
Have you accepted God’s gift for you?
ML-08/15/1999