The Unspeakable Gift 

Thanks be to God for his unspeakable gift (2 Corinthians 9:15)   

First Corinthians 9 speaks more than any other chapter in Scripture to the truth of Christian giving.  It is a case study.  Poor saints were in Jerusalem.  A collection had been arranged for them already a year ago (cf. I Corinthians 8).  The Corinthians are praised for their zeal for this cause.  Paul had even boast of them.  Now he exhorts the Corinthians to be ready to give lest when his coworkers come they find Paul’s boasting in vain.  The Corinthians were an example for all of us.  The exhortations and encouragements to Christian giving are for us too.

Not without this one word: thanks be to God for his unspeakable gift.

God will have the first and last word on giving.  It will be about his giving.  It is about Christmas.

The gift of all gifts is Christ.

God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten Son (John 3:16)  If only the Samaritan woman would know the gift of God, even the Messiah Jesus who was talking to her, she would have eternal life.  If only we would know this gift of God, and receive it and him every day, we would be happy and full of life and joy and him forever.

The gift is Christ for us, come to earth to save us; to make atonement for us on the cross; to merit for us all the blessings of salvation: forgiveness, reconciliation, santificaiton, glorification.

The gift is Christ in us, so that there is a Christ-likeness in and seen in our lives, in the Church, as even at Corinth.  This is the idea of I Corinthians 9:14: the exceeding grace of God in Corinthian and Comstock Parkian saints is Christ in us bearing fruit by his Spirit.

Christ the gift of God himself for us, in us, to us, with us.  God gift.  God our Savior given.  Wrapped in swaddling clothes.  Clothed in shame and ignominy.  Veiled the incarnate deity.

So Christ is the focus.  Not angels.  Nor shepherds.  Not their songs, nor their gifts.  Nor Corinthian giving, nor ours.

Christ is the supreme gift, once, now, and always.

This gift, unspeakable.  Not that we should never and can never talk of it.  It is just beyond what we can describe.  King of the universe in that babe.  Wisdom of God on the cross.  Who can know it?  How high, how low, how deep, how broad.  How grace, how love are manifested in that giving and in that gift from heaven to men…

So speak the unspeakable, the unthinkable—with wonder, with joy, with boldness…

First say nothing.   Silent reverence is the fitting first response in all to whom the gift is given.

Then surely speak.

Go tell it on the mountain.

Over the hills.

And everywhere.

This speaking the unspeakable is but the beginning of all giving and giving and living to the glory of God.

The given-unto people of God do give now in Christ’s name. 

They give it on the mountains, over the hills, and everywhere.

And mountains and marriages, hills and hells, everywhere and everyone will never be the same.

-Pastor Dick