The Day Faith Told Me About; Part
5 Wrapping for Christ
The two most important days in a
person’s life are the day you’re born and the day you find out
why. (Mark Twain)
Read: Matthew 2:10-11
We’ve had a lot of help along the
way in the last few years, not the least of which is from the
membership at GPUMC. We’ve also had several dozen attendant care
girls come to help for a while. Our favorite is Michelle. She’s
closer to our age than most, and has been within 2 classes of
becoming a registered nurse so she’s got a pretty good head on her
shoulders. She laughs easily and doesn’t let our particular ways
get to her. Jeri and I are both very detail oriented and OCD is our
favorite understatement. Michelle, however, not so much. Good enough
is usually a little better than good enough, which usually leads to
some more of the aforementioned laughter, when most of the girls
would just get mad and leave.
One day Michelle was helping Jeri
wrap some Christmas gifts. Jeri was trying to explain how to wrap
them so there were no wrinkles in the pretty wrapping paper and so
the seams and tape wouldn’t show and how to put on a ribbon etc.
Michelle usually just puts them in a pretty store bought gift bag and
calls it good.
Then that little angel I’ve
written about started speaking through Jeri. She started explaining
to Michelle how she thinks of the person she’s wrapping this gift
for while she’s wrapping it, and how she hopes they’ll respond
when seeing it after removing the wrapping. She thinks of how she
came to choose this gift for the person and how she envisions their
using it. It’s a form of prayer for the person receiving the gift,
not unlike tying a knot in a prayer quilt. It’s like any other
simple labor task, and it all depends on what you put into it that
determines what others will get out of it. She was no longer
explaining the mechanical process of wrapping, Jeri was delivering a
short sermon on the love instilled in a gift, and so the care it
deserves during its final preparation. I was reminded of the old “wax
on, wax off” in the Karate Kid movie. Michelle still didn’t quite
get it, preferring to drop it in a bag and get to the next thing.
With one last unmarked gift box to go, I asked Michelle to take
particular care to wrap this one exactly the way she would like to
receive a gift and see how well she could do. That one worked out
pretty well, and that was a good thing because without knowing it,
Michelle was wrapping the gift we had gotten for her, I had her wrap
her own gift.
At the end of her last shift before
Christmas, we exchanged gifts with her and also with Jeri’s nurse
and her driver. Michelle laughed out loud for a while when she saw
the one I handed to her. We all enjoyed a good start to Christmas and
the story of the wrapping lesson gave us all something important to
ponder as we celebrate the coming of our Messiah with the gift of
giving.
Prayer: May we all remember those
who have given to us, and we pray for our continued gifts to all who
need.
Ron Draper; Christmas Day, 2015
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