Every month has a birthstone. The birthstone for the month of January is the garnet. And it reminds me of Jesus.
The term "garnet" refers to a family of minerals. The garnet family contains gemstones that appear in every color except blue. The difference is what they are called and what extra minerals they contain. For example, within the mineral family of "garnet" are tsavorites (green), hessonite (orange, brown and pink), and rhodolite (purplish red). When we picture a garnet, however, most of us think of the deep blood red stone.
Blood red. The color of Jesus’ blood shed for us. A forever reminder of His sacrifice for us.
In gemstone symbolism, the garnet signifies eternal friendship and trust. Such as is found in Jesus, our eternal friend in whom we can place our trust.
Just like there are star sapphires, there are also star garnets. The "stars" are produced by a sphere of tiny rods composed of titanium dioxide. These rods reflect light back out of the garnet and appear to our eye as a 4 or 6-rayed star that moves across the face of the gemstone. Star garnets are only found in India and Idaho.
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| From Americanlisted.com |
Star? With our celebration of Christmas still fresh in our hearts, it would be nice to have a star garnet to always light the way to Jesus.
The garnet is known for its luminosity and high refractive quality. Because of those qualities, early travelers carried garnets, which they believed lit up the night and protected a person from evil. Many extra biblical sources suggest that Noah used a lantern made from garnet to help him see through the storms while on the ark.
Evidently, the garnet reminded Noah of Jesus, too.
Happy birthday to everyone born in January—especially my super husband Jim, whose birthday is TODAY!
PRAYER: Heavenly Father, thank you for placing reminders in this world of who you are. Please open our eyes to see you in everything today. Amen.
WHAT ABOUT YOU? Do you own a garnet?
Today I'm cross posting with my friend, Chris Vonada. Please visit him often at www.ChrisVonada.com.
4 comments:
This is so sweet! Loved the analogies to the blood, eternal friendship, and the star. Thank you!
@ Michael and Mary - thank you so much for stopping by. "Sweet" is a great compliment from you tough-but-need-it folks! I so love your tag line!
Happy Birthday, Jim!
@ Pam - thanks! And thank you for stopping by!
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