The Gift of gifts

(photo by mtsofan)

This puritan prayer spoke volumes to me when I read it.  It is so perfect, it is my hearts cry to know and remember that in Him I have so much even heaven has nothing better to offer. 

O Source of All Good,

What shal I render to thee for the Gift of gifts,

thine own dear Son, begotten, not created,

my redeemer, proxy, surety, substitute,

his self-emptying incomprehensible, 

his infinity of love beyond the hearts grasp.

Herein is wonder of wonders: 

he came below to raise me above,

was born like me that I might become like him.

Herein is love:

when I cannot rise to him he draws near to me on wings of grace,

to raise me to himself.

Herein is power:

when Deity and humanity were infinietly apart

he untied them in dissoluble unity, the uncreate and the created.

Herein is wisdom:

when I was undone, with no will to return to him,

and no intellect to devise recover,

he came, God-incarnet, to same me to the uttermost,

as man to die my death,

to shed satisfying blood on my behalf,

to work out a perfect righteousness for me.

O God, take me in spirit to the watchful shephers, and

enlarge my mind;

let me hear good tidings of great joy,

and hearing, believe, rejoice, praise, adore,

my conscience bathed in an ocean of repose,

my eyes uplifted to a reconciled Father;

place me with ox, ass, camel, goat,

to look with them upon my redeemer's face,

and in him account myself delivered from sin;

let me with Simeon clasp the new-born child to my heart,

embrace him with undying faith,

exulting that he is mine and I am his.

In him thou hast given me so much that heaven can give no more.

Merry CHRISTmas!