The Ultimate Gift

"And it was of His own [free] will that He gave us birth [as sons]by

[His] Word of Truth, so that we should be a kind 

of firstfruits of His creatures [a sample 

of what He created to be consecrated to Himself]."

James 1:18 (Amplified Bible)

This is the ultimate gift!  God the Father, the One who sustains us and strengthens and perfects us through trials; the One who gives us the way to bear up under temptation;  the Giver of all good things; by His own free will is the One who gave us birth--the new birth that lasts forever.  Mind you, it was not our free will, but His.  We did nothing to deserve this birth, nothing to merit being called His child.  In fact we did everything to deserve the death of hell, a rebirth into an eternity of separation from the One who created us.  (Isaiah 53:6).  

Just as the firstfruits of our labors are to be consecrated to God, so are we.  What a desire this should create in us to live a life of dedication and consecration to the One who gave us this gift of rebirth as His children!  As the Word of Truth brought us forth to become children of God, so should the Truth of the Word continue in our lives to bring us to a point of total abandon to Him.

Desiring to be a consecrated example of what He created,

Gloria