A Most Remarkable Story - a Revelation One Can Never Forget.
Every very once in a while there appears in a person's life a revelational insight and inspiration that the person will never forget and that will change him or her her forever-- for the better! I share with you now such a piece. It is truly remarkable. I do not think I have ever come across anything so powerful. I received it several days ago from a friend, Rabbi Shmuel Spritzer, of the CHABAD organization in Brooklyn, NY. To my knowledge, the author of this story is not known. Here it is (EG):
"Some time ago, a man punished his three year old daughter for wasting a roll of gold wrapping paper. Money was tight and he became furious when he saw her decorating a box for a Chanukah gift. Nevertheless, the little girl brought the gift to her father the next morning and said, “This is for you, Daddy." The man was embarrassed by his earlier overreaction, but his anger flared again (he did have a very bad temper) when he found out the box was empty. He yelled at her, “Don't you know that when you give someone a present, there is supposed to be something inside?" The little girl looked up to him with tears in her eyes and cried, “Oh daddy, it's not empty at all. I blew kisses into the box. They're all for you, Daddy." The father was crushed. He put his arms around his little girl, and begged for forgiveness.
Only a short time later, an accident took the life of the child. The father kept the gold box by his bed for many years, and whenever he was discouraged, he took out an imaginary kiss and remembered the love of the child would had put it there. Each one of us has been given a gold container filled with unconditional love and kisses from our family members, friends, and the Creator, G-d, who conceived us in love and sent us here to earth with all we need to fulfill our mission. There is simply no other possession anyone could hold more precious than this conviction. We sometimes wake up, look at our lives, and see nothing but an empty box... but when we look deeper into the emptiness, we will find a kiss. We will find the love of G-d, who sent us to this place, these conditions, and who is there with us in the circumstances, helping us and empowering us to transform darkness into light."