The magi lay before Jesus beautiful gifts, that of gold, frankincense, and myrrh. These gifts all represented who Jesus was and what His mission would be. Gold is a gift given to kings, frankincense is used by priests in sacrificial rituals, and myrrh is used for burial, indicating that Jesus is the only person in human history that was born for the sole purpose to die, i.e. to be our sacrificial offering. Although we all die, our purpose is to live, for Jesus the opposite was true. Christmas is the time that Jesus is born in our hearts, His gifts to us; Epiphany on the other hand is our turn to lay gifts at Christ’s feet. The magi brought great gifts, but Jesus desires not only “things” as gifts, He also wants us to render our hearts to Him.
So, what gifts can we bring the baby Jesus? Three gifts we can offer to Jesus could be our trust, our perseverance, and finally our friendship.
Trust is a difficult thing even among family and friends. All of us have been hurt to one degree or another and that hurt sometimes prevents us from trusting others. We sometimes do not open up to others or allow ourselves to grow closer to someone. We do this to protect ourselves; it is a self defense mechanism to avoid pain, i.e. future hurts. It is also difficult at times to trust Jesus implicitly. Doubt will creep in at times or just like in those relationships in which we were hurt we feel hurt by Jesus as well. When a loved one passes away, especially when they are young, we ask Jesus, “Why?” Or if someone becomes ill, we ask Jesus, “Why?” We feel that if we love Jesus He should look out for us and treat us better than allowing bad things to happen to us or our loved ones. Part of our faith journey is expressing anger, hurt, and even doubt. But we must also realize that Jesus does not let anything bad happen to us, He is constantly seeking out our good. Bad things that happen are the natural outcomes of a wounded world, sometimes extremely unfair, but that imbalance is gifted with eternal life. The promise of salvation is solidified by Jesus’ own sacrifice and we believe in the Resurrection, therefore our trust should be strong, for the promise is given and the one giving it is credible.
Perseverance is that virtue in which we “fight the good fight . . . compete in the race to win” As in all things we must endure and discipline ourselves in order to become more perfect. The student does this at school in order to do well; it takes an entire life of education to polish oneself as a great student, the same for our jobs, and even in our relationships. One day of practice does not make a champion. There is a feel good part to our faith and it is a vital part of it, Jesus wants joyous Christians, and yet there is an important part of our faith in which we must “work at it.” I don’t mean work in the sense that we hold something over God, rather we work to please our God so that He may be proud of us, and that work requires that we persevere.
Last but not least and actually the most important is our friendship with the Lord. Jesus wants to be our friend. There is no trick to Christianity or some difficult dogmatic test that we must pass, in a nutshell our religion is based on friendship, i.e. relationship. As Catholics we have obligations, to attend mass, follow the precepts of the Church, etc. Obligation though much to the surprise of many is secondary compared to friendship, for if I only go to mass strictly for obligation I miss the point, the same goes when I follow the rules. I go to mass because a great friend calls me to His wedding, I follow the law because it helps me to build up virtue – to follow and to do the good, which brings happiness where as sin brings sadness. John 15 is one of the most powerful Scripture chapters in the entire bible, “I no longer call you servants, but friends.”
Jesus desires the gifts of our very selves. Jesus has given us Himself, both at Christmas and at the Triduum. What will we offer in return? The magi have laid their gifts at Jesus’ feet, we in turn should lay our gifts at His feet as well for we have something much greater than just things, we have trust, perseverance, and most of all friendship.
Fr. John
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