My last blog was about the Box. In the interest of time, I will not go over that post here. If you haven't read it yet, you might want to read that one before this one. This one will make more sense if you do.
Last time, I talked about the great gifts that God sends to our planet. One of them is you and I described what these gifts looked like to me. The people that God sends to earth look like very pretty presents. Now over time here on earth, the Boxes get holes and tears in them. Sometimes stuff gets inside the box that doesn't belong. Instead of character strengths, there are character flaws. But know this, God never took the talents and gifts out of any of the Boxes. In other words, when He placed gifts inside of you, he never took them out again. Well, you might say, I know this person or that person and they are not nice. Osama Bin Laden was not a nice person was he? He is responsible for the deaths of many people. But did you know that God put great gifts inside him when he sent him to the earth. Guess what. Those gifts were still inside him when he left the earth. Unfortunately, they were never seen like God intended.
Most of us don't know anyone like that. But many of us know people who just aren't nice. Guess what. God put those gifts inside them too and they are permanently there. No matter how bad the devil would like to get them out of us, he simply doesn't have the power to take them out. We can choose not to develop them but Satan can't steal them from us.
Here is another interesting note. Have you ever noticed that we are quick to point out the holes in the box or the tears in the paper but we typically don't notice the gold on the inside? Well it seems like that happens regularly. Take the kid at school who doesn't dress like you do or maybe she is just a little shy. Maybe she sits by herself at lunch and everyone thinks she is strange. There is something great inside that person that should be celebrated. Let me illustrate with a story I once heard.
There was this church that got a new member. The new member was a very pretty lady who happened to wear shorts that were too short and a shirt that was cut way too low to church every Sunday. This went on for several weeks and the ladies of the church got more and more upset about the whole thing. They were calling her all sorts of ugly names. But right in the middle of it all, someone decided that they were going to buy her a dress and make her clean up her act. Well when they brought the woman the dress she was overjoyed to have something so beautiful to wear to church. It turns out that she came from a very bad situation and the short shorts and low cut shirt were the best things she had to wear. She was very thankful to have something much less revealing to wear to church. That woman had a very admirable trait. What was it you ask? She learned to do her very best even if it wasn't as good as someone else. Also, she had the courage to go to church when she wasn't able to dress like everyone else. I like that.
Let me tell you about a boy I know. Now on the outside, he is not the most athletic. He is in middle school and he is just like every other sixth grader struggling to cope with this new phase in his life. I remember my time there and would not want to do it again. This particular kid loves to build things. Now it would be easy to push him to do more athletics like football or baseball but instead the right thing for his parents is to encourage him to build things. See he may never be the captain of the football team but what if he builds the next Golden Gate bridge or what if he invents something that will get us off of oil for fuel? It would be a waste to try to make him something he is not. Instead, we need to celebrate the gift for building things that God put inside his Box.
So what am I telling you? Take a little time to look inside someone's box and celebrate who they are today.
That's another Opinion of the Minion
