“OF PRESENTS AND PRESENCE”

LUKE 2:1-20

It won’t be long now.  In just a few hours all the wrapping paper, ribbons and bows will come flying off of all the packages under the Christmas tree.  In a matter of minutes all your shopping efforts will be revealed.  I don’t know about you but I love buying and giving gifts.  I’m not like the woman who sat down with her husband to have a heart to heart conversation a few weeks before Christmas.  “Sweetheart,” she said.  “Why don’t we be sensible this year.  Let’s buy each other practical gifts for Christmas.  You know practical gifts for each other like socks and diamond rings.”   

I don’t know what you bought everyone on your Christmas list but there is one really awesome gift that I hope you’re going to give this year.  This gift is even better than a cashmere sweater because it will never go out of style.  This gift is even better than an ipod because it will never break. This gift is better than any of those unusual knickknacks that people open up and then say, “Thank you but you really shouldn’t have.” That’s because I guarantee you everyone will want this gift.

I got the idea for this gift while I was thinking about what happened in that dark and dingy stable on this holy night long ago.  The angels said to the shepherds, “For unto you is born this day in the city of David a Savior who is Christ the Lord.”  Felix Mendelssohn put it this way in the Christmas carol that he wrote. 

Hail in flesh the God-head see; hail the incarnate Deity,

Pleased as man with men to dwell, Jesus, our Emmanuel.” 

In the straw of that stable God came into this world and dwelt among us full of grace and truth.

Max Lucado one of the great Christian authors explains why God did that in a story that he tells about one of his neighbors.  One day he saw this neighbor out in his yard.  The neighbor was showing his six-year-old son how to shoot a basketball.  The father took a few shots and after every shot said the same thing. “Do it like that, son; it’s real easy.”  The little boy tried really hard but he just couldn’t throw the ball high enough  Each time he tried and failed he became more and more frustrated.  Finally, after hearing his father tell him how easy it was for the tenth time, the little boy finally said something. “It’s easy for you up there.  You don’t know how hard it is from down here.” 

Max Lucado tells that story and then goes on to say, “You and I can never say that about God.  When Jesus became man and lived among us, he walked where we walked, he suffered what we suffer, he was tempted as we are tempted.  He was Emmanuel which means ‘God is with us.’”

So, in the straw of that stable God gave us the best gift of all.  God gave us the gift of Himself and that got me thinking.  Maybe in the straw of that stable God showed you the best gift that you can give the people you love; the gift of yourself.

This Christmas make yourself a promise.  Promise yourself that you’re going to give the people you love the gift of yourself.  What better gift can you give someone than the gift of holding a hand, listening to a problem, laughing and giggling with children.  The toys and the trinkets, the gadgets and the gizmos, the gifts that make you go oh and ah, can never take the place of the gift of yourself.  The other gifts maybe what they want…but the gift of yourself is what they really need.  Your presence is far more important than all those presents.

That’s why I really like some words of wisdom that were written by an unknown author.  This is what the person wrote,

People are gifts which the Father sends to me wrapped. Some are wrapped very beautifully. They are very attractive when I first see them. Some come in very ordinary wrapping paper. Others have been mishandled in the mail. Once in a while, there is a "special delivery." Some people are gifts which come very loosely wrapped, others very tightly.

But the wrapping is not the gift. It is so easy to make this mistake. It's amusing when babies do it…

I am a person. Therefore, I am a gift, too. A gift to myself, first of all. The Father gave myself to me… I love the gifts which those who love me give to me: why not this gift from the Father?

And I am a gift to others. Am I willing to be given by the Father to others ... a person for others?

Love is a relationship between persons who see themselves as they really are ... gifts of the Father to each other ... for others. God grant that I may be a gift…tomorrow morning and each and every day after that.  Amen.

Rev. Dr. Richard A. Hughes

December 24, 2007 – Christmas Eve