The Beggar

When I chose a name for my blog, I wanted to use “a beggar’s bowl”, but I discovered I needed to modify it because someone else had that name. I especially wanted to keep beggar in the title to emphasize the neediness and dependence of the one (me) lifting up the bowl.

I am not holding out my bowl and pleading with the giver. The giver is not stingy or mean or begrudging. He wants to provide what I need. I did not choose the beggar imagery to reflect on the character of the giver, but on the condition of the recipient.

Sometimes what fills the beggar’s bowl is tasty and abundant. Other times it is sour or hard to digest, prickly or bony. But if the beggar throws away the gift, he will be malnourished and weak. In his need, the unacceptable must become the acceptable. He does not have the luxury of sorting through what has been provided for his sustenance and growth and discarding what he deems unpalatable if he is to be filled and reach his full stature.

If I believe the giver (God) is good (and I do), then the items in the bowl should be received with thankfulness, even the hard-to-digest or unpalatable ones.

Ann Voskamp in her book 1000 Gifts talks of the hard “gifts”, the pain and suffering and loss universal to the human condition. These are the hard to swallow, the things that must be accepted as necessary though bitter. We could debate whether the donor directly provides them or simply allows them to fill our bowl, but He has made them part of our rations. They supply something needful for us to grow.

To truly accept, one must lift the bowl believing everything put in it has a purpose that will work together for good and God’s glory. Am I willing to receive it with that perspective? Sometimes I am, other times I want to cover the bowl with my hand and say no more spinach, God; more candy, please. There are indeed hard gifts.