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Is It All About the Gifts?

On a social media post, I once read that if it had been three wise women instead of three wise men, the gifts offered at the birth of Jesus would have been far more practical.  Every year when we celebrate the Epiphany of the Lord, I think of that, and chuckle.  This year, however, I have been reflecting a lot on gifts in general: what they represent, how they are given, how they are received and what gifts we bring.

As a child I thought nothing of what the gifts of gold, frankincense and myrrh meant.  If I thought about the gifts as an adult, I assumed they would make sense to those who first heard this story.  They seem proper to who this Babe in the Manger is – gifts which signify the kingship of Jesus.  Even today, as it was 2000 years ago, gold is a precious and valuable metal, fitting for earthy kingship. Frankincense is a perfume or incense appropriate as a symbol of divinity. Myrrh, I recently learned, was used by the Egyptians for the embalming of mummies.  Some writers suggest this gift alludes to the sacrifice made by Jesus through his suffering and death.  The hearers of Matthew’s Gospel today may not be as impressed by the gifts as those first hearers were.  Yet, we all understand the giving and receiving of gifts.  In fact, the birth of children is usually celebrated by the giving of (admittedly far more sensible) gifts.

Still in term of receiving gifts … what about the gift of who we are? the gift of our time and talents which can be used for so much?  St. Paul writes about the importance of gifts in a community and how each of us has a significant contribution to make to every Christian community.  That in fact, the community is less if we are not using our gifts to the fullest.  To the extent that the community itself is less if we are not present in it.

It seems to be somewhat problematic for us to think of ourselves as gifts.  It seems almost like boasting.  And most of us were raised to do the exact opposite.  I think of a sister who was always praising her children and the many talents they have which my mother found rather disconcerting.  Mom was of the mindset that we should not brag about our own or our children’s accomplishments.  For me the jury is still out on what is acceptable. 

Yet Marianne Williamson writes: “Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate.  Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure. It is our light not our darkness that most frightens us.  We ask ourselves, ‘who am I to be brilliant, gorgeous, talented, fabulous?’ Actually, who are you not to be? You are a child of God. Your playing small does not serve the world. There’s nothing enlightened about shrinking, so that other people won’t feel insecure around you. We are all meant to shine, as children do. We were born to make manifest the glory of God that is within us. It’s not just in some of us; it’s in everyone. And as we let our own light shine, we unconsciously give other people permission to do the same… “

“Make manifest the glory of God that is within us … [which] is in everyone.” That’s the nugget of the gift we are.  Maybe it’s when we think we are better than others that it is inappropriate to accept our gifts. However, everyone has gifts; we all have something meaningful to contribute, something that is necessary. And those gifts are not about us. They are about God; they are about God working within us to create something beautiful and important for the world that the world needs.

Those gifts of the Magi may not have been very helpful to a poor peasant family in first century Bethlehem. But the gift each of us is … that is something special, something to acknowledge and something to celebrate.

~Ellen Bennett