This is a genuine Gucci bag, and this will probably be the closest I ever get to having a genuine Gucci bag.  Look, this is my hand touching a genuine Gucci bag! (Can you see the serial number?!?):

Selling things for my mom’s thrift store on eBay has brought me into contact with some very ‘valuable’ things. Over the past 9 months or so, my home has been decorated (temporarily) with Roseville and Baccarat vases, Northwood carnival glass, a fascinating assortment of random collectable things, and recently, several designer handbags . Along the way, I have also had short visits with things pretending to be designer handbags, and I have had a crash course in learning to spot “the real thing”.   Each time I have a new piece to research and authenticate, I scour the internet for useful tips on spotting counterfeits, and they all point to the same truth:  If you know what the real thing looks like, it’s easy to spot a fake.  (Great!  I’ll just go grab *my* Gucci/Chanel/Louis Vuitton bag and compare!)

If only finding *real* truth were so easy… or is it?  I was struck this morning at my wonderful Ladies’ Bible study by the lengths that God has gone to to authenticate Himself to us in the Bible.  We are told in Deuteronomy 18 that we will know whether a prophet is true or false by whether his words come true or not.  Simple enough.  This morning, our study in the book of Isaiah (so chock full of amazing prophecies about Christ that I won’t even touch in this post!) brought us to chapter 45, which talks about a king named Cyrus.  Isaiah (a prophet of God) says this in verse 1:” Thus says the Lord to his anointed, to Cyrus,whose right hand I have grasped, to subdue nations before him and to loose the belts of kings,to open doors before him that gates may not be closed”.  History knows about Cyrus.  He was a real king who really did these things, so why the fuss about Isaiah giving him a mention?   It is worth noting here that Isaiah spoke these words about 160 years before Cyrus would do these things.  In fact, Isaiah’s words were written down for all Israel to read before Cyrus was even born.  Amazing!

Time and time again the Bible confounds its secular critics, who bend over backwards changing dates and rewriting history in order to claim that these prophecies were written *after* they came true, but it’s all there for the reading. God proves Himself over and over in the truth of His Word (not to mention in the hearts and lives of those who believe in Him!)  It withstands the closest of scrutiny because it has nothing to hide.

Personally, I don’t really get what all the fuss is about with designer bags, but it sure is nice, as I look through photo after photo of real bags and read about the ‘tells’ of fake ones, to discover that I’ve got the real deal (as I write this, the above bag is selling for $135.52 with a whole day to go!)  What an incredible blessing it is, as I go through life getting to know my Creator and His Word, to find that the more I know about Him, the truer He is.