Ripples and Gifts

Gifts in waiting, are they part of the ripples? It seems we often save gifts for special occasions. We tuck them away on a shelf somewhere waiting for a special time to use them. One such gift at my house was utilized recently. It may have been on that shelf for over a year. It was a truly useful and wonderful gift in the form of a car wash gizmo that needed no scrubbing or rinsing and dried spot free. It had it's own "magic wand" for the application in the form of a special spray nozzle which held the washing and rinsing solutions. We had been waiting for the right time to use it. In retrospect, anytime a motorcycle or vehicle needed washing would have been the right time.

When I mentioned to the gift giver that we had finally tried the car washing wand, I detected a note of disappointment that it had not been used sooner. He may have even felt that we did not think it was a very important gift because we had not used it yet. We are each given gifts, in the form of talents, by our Creator. Many if us spend our lives waiting for the right time to use our talents. Sometimes the right time has come along but we are too tired, too stressed or too busy to notice or have not the energy to use the gift. Occasionally we even make excuses saying "if this happens" or "if that was a certain way" we would use our gift.

What if our Creator is offended that we put off using our gifts? Is he hurt that we do not use our talents? Or do you suppose God is patient about our gifts, allowing time for their discovery, purpose and utilization? I believe that the hints we receive in our daily lives, in the form of coincidences and highlighted events, are placed in our path to remind us to use our gifts. Author Rushnell calls these God Winks. (When God Winks : How the Power of Coincidence Guides Your Life by Squire Rushnell.)I call them divine coincidences or divine awakenings.. Sometimes the light around us seems a little brighter, a tree or scene seems to have more color. Often something we need to help nudge us along shows up in the form of a gift from a friend or an Angel; they can be one in same.

Instant Messenger has emoticons that shake our computer screens to get our attention or help us feel the experience. God gives us the divine nudge more often than we realize. When we walk on the beach we usually see acres of smooth sand. The waves will come up leaving small tokens of favor in the form of sea shells, pebbles and drift wood. When the tide goes out all of the effort of the waves can be seen in the patterns left in the sand. It may seem like we can leave our talents unused but then what form do they take? Are they like the smooth sand on the beach blown by the wind; unnoticed? If we use our gifts or don't use them the ripples we can create spread in patterns we can not always see, touching the lives of others, as the ocean of life moves on. We are always part of the wave that carries others along their path, the result can be like the many natural jewels we find on the beach or it can be like the wave that crushes our sand castle. You choose.

I saw a planned neighborhood yesterday that was filled with beautiful million dollar homes. Each one was an architects dream. We passed other areas where a single wide trailer sat next to a great red tile roofed estate. The Intercoastal Waterway has many different views. Today I saw a town that had the most unseal combination structures I have ever seen. Two gigantic paper plants formed the north and south perimeters. Great amounts of white steam clouds came from the stacks. The wind blew from the north so heavy that the smokestack looked to be in motion like steam engines moving along the tracks. The plant to the south lay nestled by the water. It looked like an industrial sized roller coaster with all of its motorized conveyor belts glinting in the sun. In front of these plants was a beautiful harbor filled with many moored sailboats lazily at anchor. The sailboats had names like Cosmic Rose. In St. Augustine I saw "There Be Dragons" and "Solitaire". The quaint town of Fernandina, with streets of lined with many colored buildings, was situated in the middle. Her docks filled with all variety of recreational boats. A 65 foot powerboat was docked next to a schooner from the 1800's. The power boats along this waterway have names like Blue Chip and Kisses. The harbor was also filled with many commercial shrimping boats heavy with salt and nets sporting names like Georgia Bulldog and Earl's Girls. As I took a few photos, our American Flag proudly displayed on the stern of our sailboat, I thought only in America. I had just started reading a novel today about life in the year of a sperm whale. It reminded me that maybe I should have been thinking only humans would build a town like this. I also could not help thinking that I am probably not the only one who found it contrastingly beautiful in a sort of Matrix or Mad Max (the movies) sort of way.