Postscript for Jan 8th

One of my favourite seasonal cartoons was published years ago in the Christmas edition of Private Eye. It showed three delighted wise men in a shop, the shelves piled high with gold, frankincense and myrrh. The sign above them read, in large letters, BUY TWO, GET ONE FREE. There’s something about the economics of giving and receiving that lies at the very heart of Christianity. For it’s a central insight of the Christian faith that the most important things we have in life come to us as gift and we, as human beings, rely for our happiness and well-being on the gift that others give us – especially the gift of their love. But living like this is never straightforward. Mostly, we aspire to be emotionally and financially self-sufficient, dependent upon our own resourses, self made men and women. We sometimes imagine the magi making their way to the stable with their presents all carefully wrapped, ready to lay before Jesus. But Epiphany isn’t so much about giving as receiving. It is the point where Christ’s identity is unwrapped for those who were least expecting it. St Augustine, in the 3rd century, said that the birth of a child “startles us out of our lethargy” and the birth of the Christ Child is an unexpected gift which pushes us even further beyond our comfortable
moorings. So now we take down the decorations, and look through the debris of our Christmas gifts, many of which have already been discarded or consumed, and reality slowly resumes for us again. But today Epiphany challenges our lethargy and points us to a quite different and much more lasting kind of gift –the gift of God’s love.
Ven Lynda Patterson