The Gift

GIFT

Persons are the gifts of God to me.
They are already wrapped, some beautifully and others less attractively.
Some have been mishandled in the mail; others come "special delivery".
Some are loosely wrapped, others very tightly enclosed.

But the wrapping is not the gift and this is an important realisation.
It is so easy to make a mistake in this regard, to judge the contents by the cover.

Sometimes the gift is opened very easily;
sometimes the help of others is needed.
Maybe it is because they are afraid,
maybe they have been hurt before
and don't want to be hurt again.
It could be that they were once opened and then discarded.
They may now feel more like 'things' than 'human persons'.

I am a person:
like everyone else I too am a gift.
God filled me with a goodness that is only mine.
And yet sometimes I am afraid to look inside my own wrapping.
Maybe I am afraid I would be disappointed.
Maybe I don't trust my own contents.
Or it may be that I have never really accepted the gift that I am.

Every meeting and sharing of persons is an exchange of gifts.
My gift is me: your gift is you.
We are gift to each other.

Anonymous