There are different kinds of gifts, but the same Spirit distributes them. There are different kinds of service, but the same Lord. There are different kinds of working, but in all of them and in everyone it is the same God at work.
1 Corinthians 12: 4-6
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The good news of the day: Gifts, talents, and graces litter the universe. The bad news? Why do we see so much trash?
Two friends this week texted to tell me that their cats had passed. Roshie left my friends, Dawn and Arelis, just as Dawn began chemotherapy treatments and I knew how crushing this source of emotional comfort would be to them. Then, my friends, Bill & Nancy, texted. Shane left them after suffering a long illness. He was with them many years. Like my family and our two cats, their cat’s grace wasn’t fancy tricks or clever circus acts. Both of these cats did what cats do best–they blessed each home with their stillness and with their company. God gives dogs certain gifts and cats, graces.
We sometimes overlook those graces surrounding us in our lives because they seem as ordinary as those two alley cats, Roshie and Shane. No pedigree. No cat show prize, but how invaluable they were in these people’s lives.
That’s the same for the everyday people we can overlook. That woman leaning against the wall in a blanketed heap. The dissheveled man pushing a shopping cart who earned those Purple Hearts. The threatening looking teen who walked in the subway car. They all have gifts and talents and graces. We mightn’t have the gifts or talents to help them but we certainly can find the grace to pray.
The Spirit distributes grace in the most magnificent ways and then sometimes in more modest creatures.
Most cats I know would suggest they qualify as the magnificent creatures and then most humans,… Well, you’d only understand if you’ve ever met a cat.
Thankfully, we have. And in memory of Roshie and Shane, my friends have and all of us have become better for it.
The Spirit does indeed distribute many graces and the universe is littered with God’s magnificence if we only open our eyes and just look! With proper insturction, I’ve learned that even a piece of crumbled paper can become a gift.
Shane
Roshie
