When I was a boy, to receive Christmas presents that were squidgy parcels was always disappointing because It meant they had got clothes in, not much fun at all as far as I was concerned as a 9 year old.
It is also disappointing to receive a gift that you already have, for instance a Take That CD. It’s not that I don’t like Take That but I already have that CD.
It is even worse to receive a gift that shows just how much the giver does not know you; like a tie. I never wear a tie nowadays, only for a wedding or funeral. Maybe they are trying to say something!
Gift giving is never easy.
Gift receiving can be just as hard. I know some people who have queued up as soon as the shops are open to take back the presents they have been given to get something they really want. WE can be ungracious when we receive gifts.
We nearly bought Jack and Daniel two large cardboard inner tubes from the inside of wrapping paper because they spent hours fighting with them last year.
What about the well intentioned relative who doesn’t seem to realise that you have grown up and are 16 now, or even 45!
Gift giving and receiving is at its best when you are known. When someone has taken the time and thought themselves into who you are and what you enjoy.
The boy on the advert can’t wait because he wants to see the look on his parents faces as they open the gift he has taken the time and thought to get for them. We don’t get to see how they receive the gift but I like to think it will make them smile and there will be hugs involved.
One of the most looked forward to events over the Christmas period will be the Dr Who Christmas Special. It will certainly vie for the most watched TV programme over the festive period.
Who is looking forward to 7pm on Christmas Day?Who is not interested at all?
What will be for certain is that the Doctor will have the solution to whatever problems he and his friends will face. He can be trusted to get his way out of almost impossible situations and always just in the nick of time.
The writer of the Gospel stories was a 1st Century Doctor. Let’s see what he has to say about the birth of Jesus.
About that time Caesar Augustus ordered a census to be taken throughout the Empire. This was the first census when Quirinius was governor of Syria. Everyone had to travel to his own ancestral hometown to be accounted for. So Joseph went from the Galilean town of Nazareth up to Bethlehem in Judah, David’s town, for the census. As a descendant of David, he had to go there. He went with Mary, his fiancée, who was pregnant.
While they were there, the time came for her to give birth. 7She gave birth to a son, her firstborn. She wrapped him in a blanket and laid him in a manger, because there was no room in the hostel.Luke 2; 1-7 The Message Bible
The birth of a baby in first century Palestine. Nothing unusual there then, no but not until we go and read a bit further. The texts from the bible get read at carol concerts and events the length and breadth of the world. But how many people go further than just the few chapters of the good Doctors book? It is interesting because a little later this grown up baby says these words;
Jesus heard about it and spoke up, “Who needs a doctor: the healthy or the sick? 32I’m here inviting outsiders, not insiders—an invitation to a changed life, changed inside and out.”
Luke 5:31 The Message Bible
An invitation by THE Doctor through the words of Luke the Doctor to be changed – changed inside and out.
This Jesus knows us, this healer knows what our ailments, faults, character flaws, insecurities, all are. This healer knows us better than we know ourselves.
You know what I love about the John Lewis advert – the look on the boys face, the excitement of giving a gift to the people he knows and loves. The boy reminds me of God the Father giving to us the gift of his Son.
A little later in Luke’s Gospel we read about a woman who had spent every penny she had on doctors but not one had been able to help. She was still sick. The Doctor Luke knows that sometimes his powers of healing are just not enough. It is only when the women encounters Jesus is she healed.
In the crowd that day there was a woman who for twelve years had been afflicted with haemorrhages. She had spent every penny she had on doctors but not one had been able to help her.
Luke 8;43 The Message Bible
We celebrate the gift of Jesus at Christmas, the gift of God made human, the gift of a Doctor to heal us, the gift of a changed life, changed inside and out.
You only have to decide will you go to the healer Jesus to be made well?
Or to put it another way how you will receive the gift of Jesus that is given to you?
Christmas,…. It’s all about Jesus.