What do you get the person who has everything? We’ve all struggled with family and friends who are a challenge when it comes to gift-giving. But what about the One who truly has everything, since He created it all: God? 

Matthew’s Gospel contains the visit of the magi, or wise men (Matt 2:1-12). What did these learned men give the newborn king? Gifts of great value which included gold, frankincense, and myrrh. These also correlate to Jesus symbolically to indicate His Kingship, His Divinity, and His Sacrifice. These men took the time and effort to visit the newborn and they were not about to bring Him cheap and worthless trinkets. It’s not like they were in the area and figured they would pop round to the nearest market to pick up a few baubles and drop in for a quick congratulatory visit. They undertook this journey, which itself was probably costly to each of them, because of the significance they understood from their study of the stars. While they are not named, they do not seem to be known by the Jews, even though they are familiar with the Jewish prophecy to be able to correctly understand and interpret the sign of the star. They did bring gifts for the baby, but the biggest gift of all was their time and attention, willingly given.

God has given us everything we have. Perhaps the greatest gift of all is our free will. This means that we always have a choice: to serve God or to serve ourselves. God wants us to freely choose Him. If we want to have a relationship with Him, then all our words and actions need to mirror Him. And God is magnificently generous with us. Even in our trials and challenges, we can find little blessings amongst the thorns. Sometimes the very painful events of our lives end up being transformed into the greatest blessings, even if we can’t see it when we are making our way through. 

Advent gives us a special opportunity to ponder the gifts of God and to think about how we respond to them. Do we wholeheartedly accept them, or do we treat them like an ugly Christmas sweater an old family member gave us and we force ourselves to smile and say a hollow thank you? What about the gift of the sacraments within the Mass and of reconciliation? Have they become items on our holiday checklist that we accommodate within our schedule out of a sense of obligation instead of approaching them humbly to make them the greatest joys of the season? While we can receive these sacraments outside of the Advent and Christmas timeframe, the preparatory nature of the liturgical time urges us to fully embrace the ability to have our sins forgiven, as we forgive those who have wronged us, as well as to receive Jesus, not just in a symbolic gesture, but really and truly in the Real Presence. Do we ask God to help us be as generous to others as He is with us? Or do we play it safe when creating our gift lists? 

Christmas is a lovely time of tradition, but we need to be cautious not to get mired in a sense of obligation, not just towards the celebrations with family and friends, but more importantly to specifically avoid celebrating Jesus’ birth as a duty. The best gift we can give the Giver is to freely choose to celebrate His birth by opening our hearts to Him and being receptive to all the graces, blessings, and challenges He bestows upon us. Why are we preparing ourselves during Advent? Because we believe in Jesus, we have been touched by Him, and we want to continue walking towards an eternity with Him.