Kingly Gifts

I hope everyone has been having a blessed Christmas, and especially I hope you received some great gifts. Maybe you got some of the gifts that we all heard about in endless ads and commercials. Or maybe you found yourself receiving, and grateful for, other gifts that don’t have a dollar value: your life, good health, blessings through the year, the presence and love of family and friends. Those gifts don’t have a price tag attached, because there’s no number that could quantify how much they mean to us.

In today’s Gospel, gifts of gold, frankincense, and myrrh are brought to the newborn Jesus – items that would have been very high dollar in the ancient world. We’re not told whether the Magi brought these gifts intentionally or gave them spur of the moment. But whether planned or impromptu, ultimately those gifts probably felt a little inadequate. Gold, frankincense, and myrrh were fitting gifts for a king, which is whom the Magi had come to venerate. But who they actually found was not just the newborn King of the Jews, but the true and living God in the person of a small Child. In the face of the One who has created everything and sustains everything in being, a bit of precious metals and aromatic balms must have seemed insufficient. That’s why, in the end, it’s the Magi themselves who receive the greatest gift in this Gospel story. More precious than the gold, frankincense, and myrrh they bring, they receive a glimpse of the Lord of all, present right here among us.

Adoration of the Magi (c. 1515) by Gerard David

Today, we come to celebrate anew that reality: that in the Child born in Bethlehem the Lord God has made himself manifest, visible in our midst. In his Epiphany, he has appeared among us, as One of us: living a human life while remaining Almighty God. That’s a difficult idea to try to wrap our minds around, but imagine if we beheld the Child, as the Magi did: if we understood the Epiphany not as a theory but by sight. To behold God himself, in human flesh – what awe, what joy, what fear might that have occasioned in us? And yet when the Magi beheld that sight, they understood that God has come into our midst not to terrify us, not to intimidate us, not to overwhelm us, but to assure us of his love, his tenderness, his abiding presence. He was born as a little Child, not because he is weak and helpless, but to make manifest to us the depth of his love – a love so powerful he came down from heaven to make it visible.

Perhaps we might feel envious of the Magi to not be able to see with our physical eyes the sight of that Child who is God. But our faith teaches us that we can behold just as truly as they did: by the light of faith, through the power of grace, in the eye of our mind and the center of our soul, we can encounter and adore Emmanuel, God-with-us, as truly as if we beheld him face to face. What’s more, we can remain there. The Magi eventually had to leave Bethlehem, returning to their own land, but we never need depart from the Lord’s Presence. We can make our home there with him, He who has made his home with us. Because God’s Son has come to share our human life, we can share – even now, even here on earth – in his divine life. How? Precisely by offering him the gift of ourselves and all of our experiences. Because Jesus shares our humanity, then every aspect of our lives – our joys, our sorrows, our hopes, our trials – they all become avenues of growing in his grace, and ways that we can deepen both our love for him and our awareness of his love for us.

Friends, as we begin a New Year, let's rededicate ourselves to encountering the Lord who loves us so deeply. Let’s offer him the kingly gifts that he truly desires: not gold, frankincense, or myrrh, but the gift of our adoration, our presence, all of our experiences. Let’s make our own these words of St. Gemma Galgani, found in our bulletin today: “During this new year, I resolve to begin a new life. I do not know what will happen to me during this year. But I abandon myself entirely to you, my God. And my aspirations and all my affections will be for You. I feel so weak, dear Jesus, but with Your help I hope and resolve to live a different life, that is, a life closer to You.”