Note: The following is the first of three devotionals by the Baptist Message
in preparation for the Christmas season. It was written by LBM Associate Editor
C. Lacy Thompson.
It is one of those typical Christmas Day home videos from some largely forgot-ten
past year.
Note: The following is the first of three devotionals by the Baptist Message
in preparation for the Christmas season. It was written by LBM Associate Editor
C. Lacy Thompson.
It is one of those typical Christmas Day home videos from some largely forgot-ten
past year.
The boy is young – perhaps five – and the center of attention. He
is surrounded by his mother and grandparents.
He sits on the floor in pajamas, opening presents. His mother slides a box
almost as big as the boy across the floor to him.
“Open that one. Its from me.”
The boys eyes widen. “What is it?”
The mother shakes her head. “Open it.”
As the boy tears into the paper, the mother and grandmother begin talking.
The camera holds the boy centerframe, but their conversation can be heard from
the edge.
They do not see the drama unfolding.
The boy has largely unwrapped the box, at least enough to see what kind it
is. Now, he sits on the floor, puzzled, quizzical, wondering at the mystery
of it all.
He tries to speak, only to find his stutter returning, as it did in times of
excitement back in those early years.
“T-t-t-thisss?” he says to his mom. “T-t-t-t-thhhis? Y-y-you
g-gott me th-this?”
He does not understand.
He has unwrapped box that once held a case of motor oil. And why would anybody
buy a seven-year-old a case of motor oil?
The wife is sitting with her husband on the couch as they decide how to spend
the afternoon and early evening.
“Oh,” she says suddenly, getting up and starting into the other room.
“I got you something for Christmas, but I better give it to you now, because
Im afraid youll buy it for yourself if you happen to see it.”
The husband stops her.
“Wait,” he says. “Keep it. Christmas is just a month off, and
you know me – whens the last time I went to the store?”
The wife is undeterred.
“Yeah, but if you see this -” she begins.
“Look, Ill make you a deal,” the husband adds. “If I see
something I might want, Ill ask you before I buy it. That way, you can
keep what you have for Christmas and not have to replace it with something else.”
The wife considers the idea.
Then, she smiles. “I just want to give it to you, want you to have it
now,” she says.
Gift-giving – what a tradition, even though it does not always turn out
the way one expects.
Sometimes, the gift received is not what one would want or like or even consider.
Sometimes, the gift given is the same.
Sometimes, the gift is hidden, disguised, tucked away in wrapping and a box.
Sometimes, the gift is deeply personal.
Sometimes, it is a last-minute thought.
Sometimes, it is simple, even self-made.
Sometimes, it is elaborate, costly.
Sometimes, it is cold.
Sometimes, it is perfect.
Who cannot remember instances of both joy and disappointment at moments of
gift-giving – maybe as a giver and a receiver?
Who does not have stories?
“You just wouldnt believe how he gave this years present to
me.”
“You just wouldnt believe what she ended up buying for me –
why in the world would she have chosen that?”
“We had agreed not to buy each other anything, but he went out and got
me the littlest old thing you can imagine – and it just made me so happy,
I cried.”
“I dont know. This was the first Christmas we could splurge a little
– and we did. And after we opened all the presents, I sat there and wondered
what we had missed. It seemed like those gifts in tight years meant a little
more somehow.”
For better or worse, the annual gift-giving extravaganza has begun once more.
Some will spend too much.
Some will have little to spend.
Some will glory in the tradition.
Some will out-and-out rebel at the commercialization of the season.
Certainly, gift-giving did not originate with Christmas – and it is not
limited to that time of year or that season of celebration.
But in the truest sense, Christmas transforms gift-giving, completes it, washes
it clean of all its commercialization and materialism and “gimme mine”
attitude.
At least, it should – and it does, if one allows it to happen.
At that point, gift-giving becomes what Henry Van Dyke once called “Christmas-giving”
– a giving based on the example of Jesus and how he offered all of himself
to others throughout his life.
In that fashion, the finest gift “is not the one that costs the most money
but the one that carries the most love,” Van Dyke says.
He continues:
“If every gift is the token of a personal thought, a friendly feeling,
an unselfish interest in the joy of others, then the thought, the feeling, the
interest, may remain after the gift is made. The little present – or the
rare and long-wished-for gift (it matters not whether the vessel be of gold
or silver or iron or wood or clay or just a small bit of birch wood folded into
a cup) – may carry a message something like this:
” I am thinking of you today, because it is Christmas, and
I wish you happiness. And tomorrow, because it will be the day after Christmas,
I shall still wish you happiness; and so on, clear through the year. I may not
be able to tell you about it every day, because I may be far away or because
both of us may be very busy or perhaps because I cannot even afford to pay the
postage on so many letters or find the time to write them.
” But that makes no difference. The thought and the wish will
be here just the same. In my work and in the business of life, I mean to try
not to be unfair to you or injure you in any way. In my pleasure, if we can
be together, I would like to share the fun with you. Whatever joy or success
comes to you will make me glad. Without pretense and in plain words, goodwill
to you is what I mean, in the spirit of Christmas.”
Van Dyke is right – that is Christmas-giving, dating all the way back
to the very first gift of the season.
What else could God have meant when he sent his son except that he was thinking
of us, demonstrating his love for us?
What else could he have meant than that he was expressing his commitment to
us?
What else could he have meant than that he was not ready – no, not now
or ever – to give up on us?
Yes, there are days when it is hard to believe that, days when God seems distant
and hidden and disguised, days when no assurance is handy, no sign is apparent.
There are dark days and days overrun with the world and days too full of ones
own self and days just wasted away.
There are trying days, bitter days.
There are days one unwraps the gift of life only to find what appears to be
a taped-up case of motor oil, unaware that the true gift is hidden inside –
just like the toy was for the boy in the video.
And then, there are days when the littlest thing brings it home, when the smallest
and most unlikely of events offer the strongest and most undeniable of assurances
– just as when a wife offers a small gift out of time to her husband, an
absolutely, delightfully perfect book he did not know had been written.
It is in those unlikeliest of moments that we are reminded.
Yes, the gift of that first Christmas was for all of us. But just as true –
it was for each of us – the absolutely, delightfully perfect gift for each
young, old, tired, plain, happy, confused, amazed, remarkable one of us.
Gods gift.
The Bible assures us – read it for yourself and read it to yourself.
“For unto You is born this day in the city of David a savior, which is
Christ the Lord.”
Unto you. Unto me.
Christmas-giving.