“On entering the house, they saw the child with Mary his mother, and they knelt down and paid him homage.  Then opening their treasure chests, they offered him gifts of gold, frankincense, and myrrh.”

     In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit.  Amen.

     Today is the Second Sunday after Christmas and we don’t always have a Second Sunday after Christmas.  It depends on what day of the week Christmas falls and hence on what day of the week Epiphany falls.  If there are two Sundays in between that interval, we get a Second Sunday after Christmas.

     The Second Sunday is also notable because the preacher gets to choose one of three possible Gospel readings.  I’ve chosen the one from the Gospel of Matthew that tells the story of the visit of the Three Wise Men to the Christ child, the same story that will be repeated on Epiphany.

     I don’t think it can be repeated often enough!  And I’ll bet you agree with me.  Pretty much everybody loves the story of the Three Kings. I’ve loved it ever since I was a kid.  I loved looking at their statues--their marvelous clothes, their turbans and their crowns.  The treasure boxes they held in their hands.  I liked seeing the Kings arrayed around the manger, standing or kneeling in front of the child Jesus.

     I like the part about the star too. We all have to follow our own star in life, don’t we?  It’s a wonderful symbol. And the gifts!  Ah, the gifts are really what the story is all about, it seems to me. Gold, frankincense and myrrh.  I always liked the sound of the word “myrrh” and its exotic uses as a precious ointment to anoint the dead and a rare perfume. 

     And today, the story also seems particularly relevant and modern.  One of the Kings, traditionally the one called Balthazar, is always black and in recent years it’s not unusual to see another one of the Wise Men with Asian features.  They came “from the East” after all.

     So I’m delighted (and I hope you are too) that we can hear once again, on this Second Sunday after Christmas, that perennial favorite--the story of the Three Kings.

     As I said, I believe the story is mostly about gift-giving and also about what the effect of gift-giving is--or can be--on us.

     I gained a bit of insight into what giving gifts can mean a couple of weeks ago when I listened to an interview on PBS radio with Jean Vanier.  Jean Vanier is the son of a former Governor General of Canada, but he has lived most of his life in France. He is not a priest, but he is the founder of a faith-based network of communities centered on people who have developmental or learning disabilities.

     They are called “L’Arche” communities.  The word “L’Arche” means ark--as in Noah’s ark.  These communities are family-like homes where people both with and without disabilities share their lives together. The people without disabilities invariably learn that those who have disabilities become their teachers about what is most valuable and important in life--to love and to be loved.

     In the course of the interview, Vanier said this:  “Our world is a world of incredible tension.  I found with Raphael and Philippe, the first two people I began to live with, that I began to discover myself.  I was never so happy as when I was living with them in a very simple way in a little house, working together, having fun together, praying together.  That is to say, I sensed a completely new meaning to my life, very different from when I was in the navy, very different from when I was teaching philosophy, but something much more fulfilling.  It was a place where it was quite clear that Jesus was present.”

     In the same interview, Vanier made another point that resonated quite a bit with me.  He said, “We can’t really change the world very much, although sometimes we can influence it a bit.  But what we really can do is to change ourselves. This we do by learning how to love.  And we learn how to love by learning how to give and to receive.”

     I agree with Vanier. Recently, it seems as if we’ve all been sensing more keenly than ever our inability to change much about the world.  It’s not an exaggeration to say that sometimes the world even looks and feels like it’s collapsing around us.  Collapsing?  Yes, collapsing.  The collapse of the world economy.  The collapse of the hopes and dreams of millions of people who’ve lost their homes and jobs and are now depressed and anxious.  The resurgence of the politics of selfishness and fear and appeasement and scapegoating.  The blow to our hopes that we suffered in Copenhagen when the world’s leaders failed to take any meaningful steps toward saving our planet.  The specter, again, of terrorism on our very doorstep.  Rampant and apparently out-of-control corruption in many governments around the world. The barbarous threat of state-sanctioned gay genocide in Uganda.  Intolerance and war in the name of religion everywhere we look.

     And that’s just the short list.  I could go on and on, just as you could.  But what’s the point?  It all comes down to the fact that it’s very very hard not to feel helpless and hopeless.  The bitter truth is this: we can’t do very much about the state of the world--a world that seems intent on going to hell in a hand basket --and fast.

     This is not to say, of course, that we should just sit idly by.  By no means. We need to raise our voices against injustice.  We need to feed those who are hungry and to promote democracy and to work and pray for peace everywhere.  “Send us out to do the work you have given us to do, to love and serve you” is our prayer after every Eucharist.  Of course we need to do all those things--and more. And in fact sometimes we do meet with limited success. But the old question we keep asking ourselves just won’t go away:  how  can I personally make a genuine and authentic difference in this world?  I want to. You want to.  Is such a thing possible?

     Well, yes and no, replies Jean Vanier. We can’t in fact change the world very much and we often can’t even do very much to help those around us who need help. (A spouse who drinks too much maybe or a friend who is suffering from terrible depression.)

     But there IS one thing we can do:  we can change ourselves.

     We are reminded of this again and again at this time of year, every year, when we hear the story of the Magi. And we discover once again that that fanciful old tale somehow renews our hopes and strengthens our resolve.  And tells us how we can indeed made a difference in the world by making a difference in ourselves.  An ancient story that contains a perennial truth.  The message is this: we may not be able to change the world  or even to change others very much but we can change ourselves by giving away our best gifts--our gold, our frankincense, our myrrh--by giving the very best that lies within us.  We can do that.

     The Three Kings couldn’t turn King Herod from his evil ways.  And it didn’t lie within their power to change the cruel world of the Roman Empire.  But they themselves left Bethlehem, after giving their gifts, changed forever and each returned to his own country “by a different way.”  They traveled home on the road of love.  We can do that.

     “On entering the house, they saw the child with Mary his mother; and they knelt down and paid him homage.  Then, opening their treasure chests, they offered him gifts of gold, frankincense, and myrrh.”

     They gave the tiny vulnerable child the best things they had brought with them and laid them at his feet.

     In his book called “On Becoming Human”, Vanier asks the question--just what is this love we are meant to give away; what does it look like, what is its shape, what does it sound like.  And he comes up with seven different aspects of love, which he admits are only a few of the facets of that many-splendored thing we call love. 

     The first aspect of love that he names is revelation.  To reveal another person’s beauty to that person by loving them is to reveal their value to them. This act of revelation can help both them and us when we give another person our time for example, or by a simple gesture perhaps, by our eyes, or by embracing them if it is appropriate.

     The second aspect of love is to understand.  To listen intensely, to focus on the other.  To really hear him or her.  And to understand not just their text, not just their words, but their subtext.  Not to slough them off but to hear them on as deep a level as we can.

     The third is to communicate.  To speak from our hearts,  Often it is easier just to “let it go”; “what good will it do” you may say.  No.  Speak the truth as you understand it gently and kindly and carefully, but communicate.  And if you have a friend or a wife or a husband or a partner, or a child, it’s not enough to love them in your heart.  You  have to tell them that you love them.  To communicate your love enables you to love more and better. 

     The next facet of love is to celebrate with those who are joyful and to mourn with those who are sad.  The celebration part is fairly easy, but the mourning part is sometimes hard.  Losses are not easy to take. “Bear one another’s burdens” says Peter in his First Epistle, and “thus you will fulfill the law of Christ.”

     The fifth aspect of love for Jean Vanier is to empower.  Encourage other people.  Say to them (if indeed it’s what you believe to be true): “Well, that sounds right to me!  Go for it!  You can do it.” Empower them with love; it will empower you.

     The sixth facet of love is to be in community. We need both to be alone sometimes and to be in community sometimes. Don’t neglect community life. Get yourself to church on Sunday.  Every Sunday. Volunteer. Get involved.  Community life is hard, but so what?  It offers such rich rewards.  We need to spend time in community in order to learn to love.

     The final aspect of agape, or Christian love, is to forgive. No matter how hard it is, no matter how long it takes.  To forgive the other is the one and only way to heal ourselves.

     And finally it should be pointed out that the gift of love should not be given away by us so much to change and improve or to heal or save others (although sometimes, almost miraculously, good things do happen.)  Rather, we should love others just as much to change and improve and heal ourselves.  It is the great paradox of love.

     Do these gifts and ways of love sound impractical or overly idealistic? I don’t think they are.  We can do them--if we choose to do them.  They lie within our power, with God’s help, to accomplish them.  They are the best  things that lie within us. The very best things.  Give... those... things... away!

     “On entering the house, they saw the child with Mary his mother; and they knelt down and paid him homage.  Then, opening their treasure chests, they offered him gifts of gold, frankincense, and myrrh.”

     The Christmas carol “In the bleak mid-winter” is such a gorgeous hymn--so filled with hope and practical advice.  The final verse goes like this:

What can I give him,
Poor as I am?
If I were a shepherd
I would bring a lamb;
If I were a wise man
I would do my part;
Yet what I can I give him,
Give my heart.

     Amen.