Who doesn’t enjoy seeing piles of presents under the tree on Christmas
morning? We all love getting presents! Young and old alike, we eagerly tear
away the wrapping paper, a sense of excitement and anticipation filling us –
what might be in the box we’re about to open?
But Christmas calls us to focus on the giving, not on the getting. After
all, the first Christmas gifts were given – given to our Lord Jesus Christ by
the Magi: On entering the house, they
saw the child with Mary his mother; and they knelt down and paid him homage.
Then, opening their treasure-chests, they offered him gifts of gold,
frankincense, and myrrh.
A gift should be something that reflects affection and thoughtfulness; it should be as meaningful to the one who gives as to the one who receives. When I was a youngster, my mother used to take me and my sisters to Hengerer’s, the big department store in downtown Buffalo, to shop for presents. My list was not long and my budget was small, but oh how I used to scour the floors and aisles of the store looking for just the right gift for grandparents, parents, and sisters. To find just the right gift is such a joy.
A gift should be something that reflects affection and thoughtfulness; it should be as meaningful to the one who gives as to the one who receives. When I was a youngster, my mother used to take me and my sisters to Hengerer’s, the big department store in downtown Buffalo, to shop for presents. My list was not long and my budget was small, but oh how I used to scour the floors and aisles of the store looking for just the right gift for grandparents, parents, and sisters. To find just the right gift is such a joy.
And even as you look for the perfect gift for each person on your list,
don’t forget the one whose birthday we are celebrating. What will you get for
Jesus? What gift will you put in our Lord’s stocking? Love? Kindness?
Compassion? Generosity? What our Lord wants from each of us costs no money and
need not be wrapped. What our Lord wants, as the lovely carol “Midwinter”
reminds us, is our hearts: “What I have, I give him: my heart, my heart.”
The weeks leading up to Christmas can seem like an endless and exhausting
shopping expedition, with stores incessantly trumpeting their “specials” and
“one-day-only mark-downs”. As long ago as 1897 the playwright George Bernard Shaw complained
that “Christmas is forced on a reluctant people by shopkeepers…” It’s up to
each of us to “keep Christmas” in our hearts, even as we shop for the perfect
gifts. As the Reverend Henry Van Dyke reminds us, it isn’t what we get that
matters, but what we give, for we have been given the greatest gift of all.
“See—I am bringing you good news of great joy
for all the people:
to you
is born this day in the city of David a Savior,
who is the Messiah, the Lord!”
Glory to God in highest heaven!
Pastor Skip
