The story goes that some time ago a man punished his five-year-old daughter for wasting a roll of expensive gold wrapping paper. Money was tight and he became even more upset when the child then used the gold paper to decorate a box to put under the Christmas tree.
Nevertheless, the little girl brought the gift box to her father the next morning and said, "This is for you, Daddy."
The father was embarrassed by his earlier overreaction, but his anger flared again when he found the box was empty. He spoke to her in a harsh manner, "Don't you know, young lady, when you give someone a present there's supposed to be something inside the package?"
The little girl looked up at him with tears in her eyes and said, "Oh, Daddy, it's not empty. I blew kisses into it until it was full."
The father was crushed. He fell on his knees and put his arms around his little girl, and he begged her to forgive him for his unnecessary anger.
* * * * *
Only a short time later, an accident took the life of that same little girl.
It is told that the father kept that gold-wrapped box by his bed for all the years of his life. And whenever he was discouraged or faced difficult problems, he would open this special box and take out an imaginary kiss and remember the love of the child who had put it there.
In a very real sense, each of us as human beings have been given a golden box filled with unconditional love and kisses from our family, our children, our friends and God.
There is no more precious possession that anyone could hold.
How often we allow ourselves to forget the things that are really important in life! If only we could live each day with the awareness of how special, and how fleeting, each moment is ---- then we would live in the moment and appreciate the love we have today.
No comments:
Post a Comment