First Gift of the Season

Pastor Ron Burcham

Sunday, December 5, 2004

Grace, mercy, and peace to you from God our Father and our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. Amen.

Are you all done? Have you gotten all the gifts bought or half of them wrapped, three quarters of them maybe? You're all set. You're just going to sit back for the next two or three weeks just watching everybody else sweat bullets, and you're going to enjoy yourself. Is that where you're sitting this morning? You need to know the rest of us don't like you very much. No, no. I haven't even started. Nope. I haven't ventured forth yet into a mall. I drive by them. I look at all the cars, and I see all the people streaming into the doors and I say, “No, I'm just not up to that right now.” No. It's not that I won't. I will. And it's not that I have to. No, no, no. I want to. I want to buy those things for those who are close to me. I want to buy those gifts for my loved ones. It's just that I haven't quite made it there yet.

You see, in giving gifts, they can really fall into one of two categories. Giving gifts can either be something which is highly enjoyable, something which is great to do or it can be just another chore that needs to be accomplished, something else on the To Do List. So you hit about this time of year and you make your list, you check it twice, and you head out to the stores and you get everything done just so you can check it off and say, “Whew, done for one more year. Good thing that's over with. Don't have to mess with it until next year.” So either gift giving is enjoyable or gift giving is kind of a chore. And it really all depends on the kind of gifts you give.

Now I'm not talking about what's inside the packages. I'm not talking about whether it's clothes or whether it's jewelry or whether it's toys. I'm not even talking about who you're giving the gifts to but the kinds of gifts you're giving. Now maybe you haven't thought of it this way before, but there are several kinds of gifts we give. And I suspect that maybe some of us at least have given all of these kinds of gifts at one time or another.

For example, there is the expected gift. We give gifts because it's expected that we'll give this person a gift. Now whether they give us something back in return is really kind of irrelevant. We just know that either we expect of ourselves or somebody else is expecting that we'll give them a gift. An example would be you go to the family gathering. So the family celebration is there, and there is some third or second cousin that you don't hardly know but it's expected that you'll buy some little something for them. Now they may or may not have gotten you something. That really doesn't matter. But either you expect it or maybe other members of your family expect that you will give them something. Lots of things happen that way. In fact, I'm kind of convinced that's how the fruitcake companies stay in business. Not positive. It's the expected gift.

Then there's the gift for a gift. The gift for a gift takes a little bit more thinking. You see, the gift for a gift is that you calculate in your mind all those people that are more than likely going to give you a gift. You don't want to be caught short, so you want to make sure you have a gift for them in return. Like I said, this one's tricky. This one takes a keen sense of intellect of knowing just exactly who it is that's going to get you something and who probably won't. There are some dangers here. You see, the first danger is you could get a gift for somebody expecting that they're going to give you a gift only to find out that, when you give them the gift, they have nothing to give you in return. So then you feel a little guilty but you think to yourself, “Man, I wasted a lot of time and money on that.” Or someone you hadn't counted on decided this year, of all years, to give you a gift and you don't have a gift to give them in return. So you feel bad. You feel guilty, and you rush out to the store. You try to find something for them, maybe a fruitcake, and then you give it to them like you planned on doing that all along. That's why Christmas Eve, all the stores are open. It's all those people who got a gift for a gift and, all of a sudden, they realize the didn't have a gift to give back to the person who gave them a gift. It gets very complicated, doesn't it? We've all been there, a gift for a gift.

There's the gift for a favor. The gift for a favor is a little bit different. The gift for a favor is given not expecting anything actually will be given back to them, well at least not immediately. The gift for a favor means we'll give something to someone knowing that maybe later on, maybe

3-6 months down the line, maybe we can call in that favor. They'll remember we gave them something at Christmastime. I don't know how much we do that as individuals, but I know companies do that a lot. Businesses do that for their customers. So maybe you're a real good customer someplace and you've gotten in the mail some calendar or maybe you've gotten a pocket organizer or some other trinket they want to send you as their gift to you this holiday season. It's already happened in the office here. We're getting good and fat on the fudge that came in two weeks ago. About three boxes of it came in. I looked yesterday and now there's a big tin of popcorn in there. Heaven only knows what next is coming. Coffee, mugs, organizers, calendars. It all comes in from the different vendors of the congregation. Now they don't expect that we're going to send them fudge back. No. But what they do expect is, the next time we order paper or the next time we want a sign or the next time we want office supplies, well then we'll think of them first. See? It's a gift for a favor.

The last kinds of gifts are grace gifts. Grace gifts are really what Christmas is all about. Grace gifts are given not because they're expected. Grace gifts are given not because you want something in return. Grace gifts aren't given because you want to call in some chips later on. Grace gifts are just simply given out of sheer love and for the joy of giving. Grace gifts are the kinds of gifts you give that really can't be earned nor can they be repaid. Grace gifts are just gifts that overflow with love.

I'll give an example of a grace gift, a gift that was given that cannot be repaid, cannot be earned. Maybe you saw the story in the Des Moines Register on Friday. The Register on Friday talked about a Cambodian teenager. There was a mission group from one of our local congregations that went over to Cambodia , and they were doing their work there. One of the people on the mission trip was a nurse and she noticed one of the orphans, a young teen, was rather sick. But she suspected that his illness was a little bit more severe than sort of what met the eye. So they saved up their money in Sunday School, and they paid for some tests to be done on this young man. Sure enough, through x-rays and various other things, they found out he had an enlarged heart. He was in desperate need of an operation. If he didn't receive the operation, probably within a year or two, he wouldn't be with us any longer. The problem is he could not get that operation in Cambodia .

The worker who saw this went up to tell the boy the results of the test, and the pastor from the church went along with her. They explained that his health was pretty severe. They prayed with him, but it was time for them to leave. The real surprise came a few months later. They contacted this young man again. They contacted him with some rather startling news. There was a doctor here in Des Moines who would perform the operation for free. One of the local hospitals here in Des Moines would waive all of the costs, the before care, the after care this young man would need. There was a Cambodian refugee family living in Des Moines who agreed to put the young man up as long as he needed while he was in Des Moines, and one of the airlines was willing to give a discounted fare so he could fly here and have the operation.

Long story short, they flew him from Cambodia over to Des Moines . He had the operation, a new valve put in his heart, literally a new lease on life. The doctor said he probably wouldn't have lasted over a year but now he should go on to live a regular life. That's a grace gift. How could that young man ever repay what was given to him? How could he ever give a gift back for such a gift that was given to him? He can't. The gift was simply given out of love. It was given out of love by the members of that church reaching out in God's name. It was given out of love and compassion from the doctor and the hospital, given out of love from that family who housed, given out of love even from the airline to fly him over here. Because there was nothing they'd get in return. That's a grace gift.

You see, grace gifts are what Christmas is all about. Grace gifts are what we're preparing our hearts for. We're preparing for God's gifts of grace to us, because God only gives grace gifts. That's all He knows how to give. When God gives us a gift, He doesn't give it to us expecting that we're going to do something in return for Him. God doesn't make a deal with us and say, “Well, I'll do this for you as long as you do this for me.” God's gifts are unconditional, and God's gifts are based not because it's expected of Him, but God's gifts are only given because of His love for us. And because of that love for us, God just gifts us.

The two gifts we center on this time of year are the gift of hope and the gift of salvation. God has given to us the gift of hope. In fact, God has given the gift of hope to mankind ever since the beginning of time because it's hope that mankind needs more than anything else. It started with Adam and Eve. Adam and Eve had the entire world that was theirs, and they threw it away when they sinned against God. They threw it away when they rebelled against Him. The relationship with their God was broken. All of creation fell at that time, but God stepped in and gave them hope. God stepped in and gave them a promise. He promised there would be one who would come, who would crush the head of Satan, one who would restore the relationship between God and man.

God continued to give hope. To Abraham, He said, “All nations will be blessed through you.” He was giving Abraham and really all people hope, hope that God would come and redeem His people, hope that God would be a part of His people's lives. The hope continued through Isaac and Jacob. The hope continued even through the prophets. This morning, we read from the prophet Isaiah. In Isaiah's time, all of the people had been displaced. They were taken out of the Promise Land , and they were carted over to a foreign country. There they were enslaved by those people. So away from their home, separated from their families, because they intentionally did that at that time in history, and then forced to do labor for no pay. Talk about a people who thought it was hopeless. And yet God comes in through the prophet, Isaiah, and he gives hope. He gives hope for the future, hope for what God would do. He even says that a virgin will conceive and bear a son, and His name will be God with Us, Immanuel. Isaiah was saying to the people that God was going to come and dwell among His people, that God would come as that righteous king and redeem them, pull them out of slavery, yes, but pull them out of their sin.

The hope continues. Mary in the gospel lesson. She's afraid and troubled when the angel first comes to her, and the angel says, “No, no, no, Mary. I've come with a message of hope.” He says to Mary that she's the one, that all of God's promises and all the prophecy are going to come to fulfillment in her, that she would bear a son, even though she was a virgin, she would bear a son. And it would be the Son of God she would give birth to. This was the Messiah. This was the long-awaited one, and Mary was there. She was going to deliver. The salvation of mankind was in her womb. God was giving her hope and all people hope through her.

God continues to give us the gift of hope even more so today. We see through the thousands of years how God has consistently always kept His promises. No matter how miraculous that promise may be, God has always kept that promise. So we know God keeps His promises to us. We know when God says don't worry about what you'll eat or what you'll wear, God's provision is there. God will give us what we need. We know that when God says to us He's going to dry our tears and He's going to comfort us, we know that because of God's promises, the loved ones we have lost, those who are near and dear to us that have died, we know they're up in heaven. And we know that because of the faith that is in their heart, they are up there with their Savior right now and one day we're going to be with them again because that's what God promises. And God gives us hope, hope to know that's true. God gives us hope that no matter what our circumstances may be, whether life is going really great for you right now or it seems like life couldn't be any worse right now, God says He'll never leave us. He'll never forsake us. God tells us all things will work together for the good of those who love Him, that God will even take the worst circumstance and turn it around and use it for His purposes.

God gives us hope, eternal hope. And God gives us the gift of salvation. Our relationship with God cannot be earned. There's nothing you and I can do that somehow would make God love us. There's nothing we can do to make up for all the wrongs we've done in our life. No, it's a grace gift from God. It's something God gives to us, not because it's expected, not because He demands something in return. He just simply, in love, gives it to us. The prophet, Isaiah, was right. The virgin did conceive, and Mary gave birth to a son and it was the Son of God. Paul talks about it in Galatians 5. He says, “When the fullness of time had come, God sent forth His Son, born of a woman, born under the law to redeem those who are under the law.” God gives us the grace gift of salvation, the gift of forgiveness through His Son, the gift of eternal life. That's the grace gifts of God, given purely out of love.

Grace gifts can't be repaid. Grace gifts can't be earned. Grace gifts can only be received and then responded to. The Cambodian teenager returned to Des Moines this past week, 10 years after his operation. He didn't return with a checkbook to try to pay off the hospital or the doctors because he couldn't. He didn't return to somehow work for them and make up for what they'd given to him. He came to say thanks, to thank the doctors and the medical personnel who cared for him

10 years ago, to thank the church that sponsored him, to thank the family he lived with while he was here, to thank them and to tell them what he's done with his life. Because they reached out with the love of God to this young man, God took a hold of him and now he's leading a life of reaching out with love. He's started one congregation already. It's grown to the point where he's handed it off to one of his assistants there, and now he's going back for further schooling so he can continue on with the work of God. He can continue on reaching out to people with the love he experienced from God. Now he's going to share that love with others. Grace gifts. They're not earned. The most we can do is receive them in gratitude and respond.

The challenge for us this year is to only give grace gifts. We're not going to give the gifts that are expected unless we want to. We're not going to give a gift for a gift just because we're trying to calculate who's going to give us something. We're not going to give a gift for a favor. Only grace gifts. Only gifts that are given from our heart, given because, as we've been touched by God's love, we want to share God's love with other people. Maybe that's going to be in the form of presents underneath the tree or maybe they're going to be the kind of gifts that really can't be repaid. Maybe it's going to be the gift of time, the gift of yourself to your family. You may not be able to wrap it up, but it lasts a whole lot longer. Grace gifts.

In a moment, we'll have an opportunity to respond back to God's grace gifts to us, to respond back in thanksgiving and gratitude and to respond back in love to God. Because that's really for the members of Gloria Dei what our pledges are all about. As God has blessed us and gifted us, then we respond back to God. And we respond back with that same love offered to Him in a real and tangible way following His Word. Make sure if you walk down the aisle in a few minutes and you put that pledge on God's altar that it's truly a grace gift, that you're not giving it because you feel you must, you're not giving it out of guilt, you're not giving it because everyone else is but you're giving it out of love, out of true response for what God has done for you. Make sure that it's a true grace gift.

In fact, as the weeks go by, as all of us hit the mall, including me, let's keep that in mind. It's every gift we buy and every present we wrap. Ask ourselves, “Is this a grace gift?” And if it is, it's the greatest gift you can give. Amen.

Copyright 2004 Gloria Dei Lutheran Church