A Parent's Perfect Temperature

In neonatal intensive care units, doctors have long prescribed something remarkably low-tech for premature babies: kangaroo care — holding the infant skin-to-skin against a parent's chest. What researchers discovered is extraordinary. The parent's body temperature automatically adjusts to regulate the newborn's. If the baby runs cold, the parent's chest warms. If the baby overheats, the parent's skin cools. In studies at Karolinska University Hospital in Stockholm, mothers' chest temperatures shifted by as much as two degrees to stabilize their infants. The parent's body doesn't deliberate. It simply gives what the child needs, perfectly calibrated.

James writes that "every good gift and every perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of lights, with whom there is no variation or shadow due to change." Notice — no variation. God doesn't weigh whether to be generous on any given Tuesday. His giving isn't conditional or moody. Like that parent's chest responding to a fragile newborn, the Almighty's goodness flows toward His children automatically, perfectly suited to the need at hand.

But here is where the analogy breaks. Human bodies tire. Parents fall asleep. Fevers disrupt the system. The Father of Lights, however, has no shadow of turning. His warmth never dims, never falters, never takes a night off. Every sunrise, every provision, every moment of unearned grace — these stream down from a God whose very nature is to give, without ceasing and without change.