Dumpster Gifts

The gift came wrapped in maggot infested newspaper. The stench was unbearable causing gag reflexes to spring to life. You immediately place a hand to cover your nose and mouth as massive revulsion takes over the senses. Yet, amazingly the draw of the gift is unrelenting, even in the midst of the reality of the circumstances. Forced onward like an enemy combatant, you begin to peel back the wet layers of newspaper shaking the fetal flies from their gooey beds. Your eyes water as you swallow hard struggling to keep your lunch inside your body. Layer after layer slowly peels back from this hidden treasure. “I hope this is worth it,” you mutter under your breath. You have been digging for days, sitting in a dumpster mining for gifts that elude you. Trying just to understand this drive to open this unknown question. “I need to know, I need to understand, I need to get through this madness!” has been your driving force. Which on a minute by minute basis alternates with thoughts like: “I hate this crap!” “Why, God?” “Why can’t I have any peace?” “I can’t understand what is happening to me?”
All these questions have haunted you ever since it all began..... pain can make you crazy.

“there was given me a thorn in my flesh, a messenger of Satan, to torment me. 8 Three times I pleaded with the Lord to take it away from me. 9 But he said to me, “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.” Therefore I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ’s power may rest on me. 10 That is why, for Christ’s sake, I delight in weaknesses, in insults, in hardships, in persecutions, in difficulties. For when I am weak, then I am strong.” 2 Corinthians 12:7-10