The Gift

Today was Christmas #1 for the Shorter Family.  We will have at least three before the end of the season.  Joyce's side of the family was today, my side of the family will be January 1st, and of course the BIG event on the 25th of December.  Food, Family and Fun are in abundance at each of these events in addition to Presents.  On several different occasions today a GB would ask me, "Pop Pop, when are we going to open presents?"  Or the less direct method, "Pop Pop, what are we going to do after dinner?"  Eat desert I would say.  To which they would press, "What are we going to do after desert?".  So the questioning would continue till I finally mentioned the presents. 

Although an official, card-carrying Grown-up, the Presents part of the Holiday is still a lot of fun.  Kids ripping & tearing, paper flying everywhere, bows being stuck on uncles' backs, and the inevitable wrapping-paper-wad fight are highlights of a typical Shorter Christmas gathering.  And of course I love to get presents too.  Today I received this coffee mug.  My dear niece Katelyn picked it out for me.  Apparently she was helping the sister of a friend with some hand-made pottery sales and spotted this mug and thought of her Uncle Chuck.  What a fantastic gift!  Move over Opus. 

Hand-made items are always very special.  They are touched by their creator and often bear a mark of that creation.  Just as we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus.  We bear His likeness, and the texture of the precious hands that formed us.  God made you for a purpose, He crafted you into a vessel which is suitable for His use.  Consider the hands that have formed you and imagine what His hand-made creations are capable of achieving.

“If a man therefore purge himself from these, he shall be a vessel unto honour, sanctified, and meet for the master’s use, and prepared unto every good work.” 

(2 Timothy 2:21)


Chuck