Galatians 1:15 - Ten thousand gifts

"But when [God] was well-pleased - the [One] having set apart me out of my mother’s womb and having called me through His grace...’

-God has a plan (cf Jeremiah 29.11, Acts 2.23), one really big glorious eternal plan (Ephesians 3.11), and contained within are innumerable intricate subplots, all being woven together into a massive marvelous tapestry (Isaiah 14.24, 45.7; Ephesians 1.11).  He formed a plan for me in fact, one which He has been implementing from the day I emerged from my mother’s womb (Proverbs 16.9), and even before that when He formed me in the womb (Psalms 139.13-16), and even before that (2Kings 19.25, Psalms 33.11, Isaiah 25.1).  And now, most of us, we see but dimly, our minds not fully illuminated to the intricacies of God’s unfolding plan.  On this side of eternity, in our natural fallen state, we perceive (or presume?) that our choices are ours to make, our lives ours to live as we please in a relatively autonomous independent orbit, again most of us mistakenly assuming the arc of our lives to have little or no wider consequence save on the lives of my immediate family and those closest to me (unless by chance or by virtue of self-effort I appear to have grabbed a broader scope of influence).

-Paul had been given enough insight to know what most of us will not until we are on the other side of eternity, after we pass through to the other side of life, the truth that who and what I am and whatever I have, is a gift.  A free gift, straight from the heart and hand of almighty God.  My life, and the days measured out for me are precisely that, a gift of ten thousand gifts, the ability to enjoy them and all the manifold glories therein, also a gift.  The very ability to come home in our hearts to Him Who formed us, likewise a gift, for no one can come to God unless He calls them (cf John 6.44, 6.65).  On this side of the door, it certainly appears to be otherwise, that we grope for and seek after God on our terms (Acts 17.27), that we in and of ourselves pull ourselves up by our bootstraps and we make the choice to believe and confess and love and obey (Acts 16.31, Romans 10.10, Matthew 24.13, Acts 2.21).  We call on Him, yet in reality He is calling to us, and that not merely for salvation, fire insurance.  No indeed, He has a plan, good works in which we should walk (Ephesians 2.10), prepared for us before we believed or were even born, a path laid out for each one of us, a plan for blessing and breathtaking goodness and unspeakable joy.  This then is the ultimate grace.  We don’t deserve this divine favor, not one of His gifts.  There is not one of our filthy rags which would ever commend us to the God of heaven.  He calls out to us, and gives us the gift of faith, which to be sure we must receive (John 1.12), but His favor is never deserved in the least.  All the more so in Paul’s case, where he was additionally called by grace to bear the glorious Message of God’s grace through Christ to the nations.  Grace upon grace, how can it be...