Gift-Wrappings & Jewels

I discovered a wonderful 92 year old lady through a video clip and her poetry.  Her name is Wanda Goines.  She wrote a poem, profound in simplicity yet deep in meaning, called "The Gift Wrap and the Jewel".  Since I am a visual person,  I looked for images to try to depict an illustration to deepen meaning to her words. The first image signifies a wrapped gift box in full life and energy of the seasons of spring, summer and fall.  The second gift box is wrapped in burlap with plain ribbon in a representation of the winter season in our lives, as our bodies become aged and worn.  

The beautiful jeweled photo below is my attempt to find an image that remotely serves as an illustration of the essence that lives inside of our physical bodies.  We can all have our own interpretations of the energy in form that exists in spirit.... who has seen spirit? But who has felt the dynamics of spirit!   Both are alive - the human and the spirit, throughout all the seasons of our lives but spirit does one better.  When the body dies in its mortality,  the spirit lives on in its immortality.  

We come in variety of boxes in wrappings of color, pattern and style - shaped by the dynamics of human living and circumstance.  However, the jewel always was and placed within the setting of human by the breath of God.  Let Wanda's poem speak to you in the destiny we yearn for in the Master's hands as the gift-wrap fades and the jewel brightens.
                                                           
                                                            "The Gift-Wrap & The Jewel" by Wanda B. Goines

                                                       "I looked in the mirror and what did I see?
                                                        But a little old lady peering back at me.
                                                        With bags and sags and wrinkles and wispy white hair
                                                        And I asked my reflection, how did you get there?

                                                                 You once were straight and vigorous

                                                        And now you're stooped and weak

                                                        When I tried so hard to keep you from becoming an antique.

                                                        My reflection's eyes twinkled and she solemnly replied

                                                        You're looking at the gift wrap and not the jewel inside

                                                        A living gem and precious of unimagined worth

                                                        Unique and true, the real you, the only you on earth.

                                                        The years that spoil your gift wrap with other things more cruel

                                                        Should purify and strengthen and polish up that jewel.

                                                        So focus your attention on the inside, not the out

                                                        On being kinder, wiser, more content and more devout

                                                        Then when your gift wrap's stripped away

                                                        Your jewel will be set free, to radiate God's glory throughout eternity!"      

You can also watch the video at this link and hear the poem in Wanda's words:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2YxCR2a-sxI

Until we meet again, may God hold you in the palm of His hands..... and here is a reminder out of Malachi 3:17, "They shall be Mine, says the Lord of hosts, On that day I make them My jewels.  And I will spare them"

Join me in two weeks at The Turn-Up Patch on Monday, October 12.