If you then, who are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father who is in heaven give good things to those who ask him! Matthew 7:11

 

            We all have favorite memories of Christmas from childhood.  To be able to remember those days when you could hardly get to sleep because you knew that Santa Claus was on his way made it all a magical experience.  In fact, I remember how the evening news broadcasts used to do something wonderful.  Right about this time of night they would have a special news flash that interrupted the regular broadcast.  A reporter with the most serious face said that radar had picked up an unexpected blip on the screen of a small object that was coming southward from the north pole at record speed.  Of course, I and every other child in America started screaming that it had to be Santa Claus on his way at last.  Well it is that time of the evening on this year’s Christmas Eve.  So I know that if I have any chance of making one last Christmas list of things I hope to receive it is now or never. 

            But it is a different kind of list.  This list for this year is not one of all the new gadgets and material things I hope to receive in the next twenty four hours. This list is the kind that I hope and pray will be acceptable to the Lord above, the greatest gift-giver of all, whose greatest gift long ago came in a very small package wrapped in swaddling clothes and which was placed not under a tree but on hay in a manger.

            For here are some of the things that perhaps we could all ask of the Lord to give us by His grace and mercy.  I hope and pray that among the many presents given out that I receive from the Lord the gift of listening.  Listening is not just hearing the words of another person.  It is hearing with the heart.  Sometimes the gift of listening prompts us to give an answer;  sometimes it just lets another person know that we cared enough to pause in our life’s hecticness to think about him or her or to just be there.  As my dear Aunt whom I think about this time of year a lot with Mom and Dad was fond of saying, “God gave us two ears and one mouth -  He did it for a reason if you think about it.”  I hope that my ears learn to listen more.

            I’m also asking for the gift of a loving touch.  I marvel at how many times in the Bible Jesus did not just speak words to someone.  He reached out and touched them.  Something about the human touch rekindles the spirit and acknowledges worth.  We do it in different ways.  Some hug; some pat you on the back; some slap five hand to hand.  But Jesus whose hands were always reaching out did it because it was a special way of Him saying, “You are important to me.”  And on the cross He reached out both hands for us all.

            Switching gears from that more serious thought I’m asking for the gift of humor.  Even in the darkest day when you can still laugh disasters can become bearable.  They also put things in perspective.  The crisis we think is all but insurmountable or has ended our life as we know it seems not quite as stark and glaring.  And in this weary world God has given us so much more to smile and laugh about than to moan and groan.

            I hope I remember the gift of writing.  I think I lost it in my ability to now write email which just isn’t the same thing.  How many times has your spirit been boosted even by one small brief sentence written to you or seeing a signature at the end of a short note of blessing.  God did not use email and He didn’t text message us about our salvation.  He wrote a note that started “In the beginning” and ended with “Come Lord Jesus” – it’s called the Bible.  It takes longer to write something by hand but it says something in a way nothing else can.

            I’m good at criticicizing;  maybe you are too.  It comes naturally to me.  I’m good at complaining.  That also seems to be a gift with which I have been born.  I wish it wasn’t the case.  So I am asking God for the gift of approval.  I know that by the grace of the Lord Jesus has won God’s approval for you and for me.  Well if God can feel that way toward me by mercy, to the least deserving in His entire kingdom, then I pray I can give my approval to others.  It may not change an entire life. But it may change a day.  A few positive statements may be all it takes to erase the effect of something negative that someone hears about himself or herself.  A minute or two agoI asked for the ability to use the gift of writing.  Now I am asking God to make me an eraser.  I hope I can erase hurt and bad self-images by reminding people that God has approved of them for Jesus’ sake, sinful and all.

            Because God is kind.  We don’t always put that adjective first when we speak of the Lord God Almighty.  But it is one of His ways.  Jesus was the kindest person on earth Who ever lived.  He found room in His heart and His world for the outcasts, the tax collectors, for widows and children and all the other outsiders in His world;  and even for me.  When I have so often greeted people with a grunt or worse or started a day by attempting to make everyone else in the room as miserable as I am how different it could be if I learned from Jesus to give hope and cheer and a moment of brightness to somebody, and especially to somebody who does not expect it.

            I am asking for the gift of “Being There”.  A wise person knows when somebody else needs to be left alone.  Mothers and fathers seem to have that gift with their children; at least most of the ones I know have it.  And I have needed to be alone at times too.  But once in a while I am reminded of the times I thought I needed to be alone but what I really needed was someone to just be there with me.  God is that way.  The Lord is with us and sometimes He just comes and sits with us.  He doesn’t say a word, not that I am always listening for it.  But just knowing that He is there makes a difference.

            I found that every once in a while when I will just come into this Church sanctuary by myself and sit.  I may flick on a light or I may sit in the darkness with just the lights outside shining through the window or the light of the eternal candle burning in the darkness.  Solitude is a gift from God that we do not seek out.  It is because someone once said that the devil is a creature of noise.  He wants to fill up every waking moment with noise and harsh sound that grates on our spirits from the moment we wake up to the moment we go to bed.  God is actually a God who can speak to us in the most beautiful music or the most gentle words.  Or He can speak to us in silence.  Since the Bible says that God occasionally uses a still small voice to send His message of love to us you may need the quiet to hear that voice.  One of His finest messages came to us in the cry of a newborn baby – most people in Bethlehem did not hear it.  Most people today still do not hear it.  A walk by yourself under the night sky that is still the same as it was 2000 years ago by yourself may allow you and me to get to Bethlehem in a way we never have before.

            But I won’t make it to the side of the Lord without the gift of forgiveness.  What a wonder to know that tonight Jesus says once more to each and every one of our hearts, “I forgive you”.  Not a sin exists which you have committed which the eternal God has not forgiven and forgotten.  He so freely forgives even at the cost of a cross and a crown of thorns.  He totally and entirely forgets the wrong and sin never will turn God from you – it’s the entire message of Christmas.  Good Friday and Easter too.  If only I can learn to forgive.  For when I can forgive then I can heal and I can live again.  But remembering my hates and my angers and my wanting revenge just sours life.  And if God will help me forgive a brother or sister who asks me for it;  I pray He gives me the ability to forgive even those who do not.  For Jesus forgave me all my sins when I never even asked Him to do it.

            May God give me the gift of prayer.  All of these sentiments tonight in some way could be voiced by any human being religious or not.  On their own they are no more Christian than any other activity or hope human beings have on planet earth.  But when they are voiced in a prayer to the Lord they are more than just variations on “Give me what I want” which is at the heart of so many people in our world this Christmas Eve.  To have the gift of prayer and the gift to pray for others is to bring God’s love into their lives and into ours too.  To know you can go to a Father above and pray for healing, wholeness, change, and peace but to also be able to say, “Yet Thy Will be Done” is a most wonderful gift to have.  For praying reminds us that God does all these things we have asked for in each one of our lives.  Because His greatest gift given at that first Christmas tells us that He is with us and knows what our world is like and He understands our greatest hurts and our greatest fears.  But it reminds us that someday we will go to be with Him where He lives where there is no more pain or sorrow or crying ever again.

            That’s my list for Christmas.  I hope I am not too late in giving it to the Lord.  They are ten priceless gifts – and yet they don’t cost a thing.  For they all come from the Lord Who cared enough for you and loved you enough to send the very best gift of all, Jesus, to you on that very first Christmas long ago.