January 9, 2000 | 9:30 and 11:00 a.m.

A Gift for the Child

John Wilkinson
Executive Associate Pastor, Fourth Presbyterian Church

Matthew 2:1–12

Mark 1:4–11

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The seed for this conversation was planted somewhere in the last millennium, November 1999, I believe, as we were preparing for worship. It was a baptism Sunday, not unlike this morning, and a visitor, an acquaintance of one of the families whose child was being baptized, was looking, almost frantically, for one of the ministers. My clerical collar, rather than any projection of deep spirituality, gave away my identity. Do you have a gift shop? he asked. Do you have a gift shop, because I would like to buy a gift for the little baby that is getting baptized this morning? The short answer was no, but that seemed so un-creative. Putting my church long-range planning hat on, I simply, and truthfully, said, “not yet.” And I almost asked him to join a committee!

And the question remains. Do you have a gift shop, because I want to buy a gift for the child.

Whether we know it or not, we stand this morning at a really interesting moment, in the shadow of two extraordinary biblical events. One is more familiar to us, rehearsed in song and poetry and painting: Epiphany, the following of the star and the visitation of the magi, the three wise men, to Bethlehem. The second event is less well-known, more mysterious, but bears equally in terms of high human drama and theological significance: the baptism of the Lord—Jesus’ baptism by John the Baptist in the River Jordan some thirty years after the three kings came to Bethlehem. And the seed that was planted now some several months ago—do you have a gift shop?—becomes the tie that binds this whole conversation together, and connects these long-ago events to the explorations and trajectories of our own lives.

There are many ways to encounter the Epiphany story. Scholars and poets and musicians and artists have invested great creativity in inviting us to think about the kings themselves, who they were, their agenda, their aspirations. We certainly think wondrous thoughts about the star of wonder, the star with royal beauty bright, its astronomical and theological impact. This morning might we focus on the gifts themselves, gold and frankincense and myrrh.

We are still swimming in the wakes and eddies of gift-giving season, aren’t we. Perhaps some of you packed away Christmas things even yesterday, finding places for gifts you didn’t even know you needed. Across the street at Water Tower Place at the Warner Brothers Store, on a big poster, Batman and Superman were exchanging Christmas gifts—an interesting concept. Superman, using his x-ray vision to see what Batman is giving him, says, “O great, another tie.” Do you have a gift shop, the question remains, as we remember the gifts of the magi.

On Christmas Eve John Buchanan recounted an internet story that was making the rounds; perhaps you received it. Had the three wise men been three wise women, things would have been different. They would have asked for directions, arrived on time, cleaned the stable, helped deliver the baby, brought a casserole, given practical gifts. What would those practical gifts have been? Socks, a Target gift certificate, perhaps. Instead the magi brought lavish gifts, gold and frankincense and myrrh.

And so our minds wander to lavish gifts. What might they be? The seven year old that lives with us would treasure something Pokemon. Others would value a great insider tip on an IPO. Others might dream about a long-coveted automobile. Or to move beyond stuff—how about bleacher seats on a warm July afternoon, or a perfect meal with our beloved or a Lake Michigan sunrise. The three wise men brought lavish gifts, gold and frankincense and myrrh.

Perhaps you saw NBC’s November sweeps event on Mary. Mary, the mother of Jesus, was portrayed by the same women who played Anakin Skywalker’s mother in the latest Star Wars movie, the boy who became Darth Vader. Jesus’ mother and Darth Vader’s mother. I make no theological assessment, but I would love to meet her agent. Anyway, in this TV show, the wise men show up, bearing gifts, and look genuinely confused. What are we giving away here. Gold and frankincense and myrrh. Lavish and extravagant.

In some quarters, the extravagance gets bad press. “The gifts (they) brought,” Frederick Buechner writes, “seem hardly appropriate to the occasion. Maybe they were all they could think of for the child who has everything.” (Peculiar Treasures, p. 172) Perhaps, but perhaps there is more to it than that. They invested their wisdom and energy and reputation and maybe even their very lives by following the star, by kneeling at the cradle of this little baby—quite the un-kinglike thing to do—and by giving him the very best token they could to represent who they were. Of course, any gift is inadequate at that point. The real gift was their presence, and the fact that they went home another way as people transformed.

Transformation in unexpected places, in surprising ways, in times that are never our times, in directions that are never our directions.

Jesus appears to John the Baptist for baptism. Mark’s gospel is a lean re-telling, missing Matthew’s exchange between John and Jesus—John’s protest at Jesus’ request and John’s reluctant consent to be the vehicle for this extraordinary moment, to be the one who administers baptism.

Mark sets up the story with John’s background—his call to repentance, his zeal, his words about the one who would follow him. We might think of John as a fanatic, and that’s OK. He was. But I always like to think that if we could have looked at each other in the eye that he would have seen into me, known me as I truly am, and that I would have wandered closer and closer to the river’s edge, certainly not at the front of the line, stuck my toe in, retract, repeat several times, and because of the perseverance of the call, finally let the water flow over me. At least that’s what I hope I would have done.

Perhaps some of you remember your own baptisms or the baptisms of your children. What gifts. My own happened when I was three months old. What a gift. I had no awareness of anything, no clue about what I was getting into. That is, I would submit, is not a bad thing. There are now only stories, stories and trajectories of where that day led me. Stories and trajectories for all of us, I suppose, about where that day leads us. Transformations.

We have debated over centuries, and into this century, about baptism, about who and when and where and why. About what happens and what doesn’t happen. Historian Brian Gerrish reminds us of John Calvin’s thinking—“The baptism of infants becomes, for Calvin, an astonishing testimony to the goodness of God that constantly surrounds us and takes us into God’s adopted family. The goodness is there before we were born; it will still be there to bless our children when we ourselves have passed on. . .” (Grace and Gratitude, p. 122)

The late New Testament scholar Raymond Brown detects a rhythm that moves beyond the particular story to the full arc of our biblical faith. God acts to identify Jesus as the Messiah, as Christ the savior. Identity is established and authority is sealed in this beloved one. And we respond. (see The Birth of the Messiah, p. 165-201) The rhythm initiated in Bethlehem repeats itself at the River Jordan.

Mary Anderson, writing in our favorite magazine, Christian Century, says that the baptism of Jesus is Mark’s Christmas story. “Mark begins with a full-grown Jesus meeting the grimy baptizer at the Jordan and going under the water in solidarity with those he came to save.” (December 12-22/29-99, p. 1249)

The rhythm happens again, profoundly, as the story moves to Galilee and finally to Jerusalem. Always the rhythm of birth and death and resurrection, happening once and always and happening many times.

The rhythm happens at our own baptisms. Baptism means many things for us Presbyterian and Reformed Christians—the cleansing of sin, being sealed by God’s spirit, God’s grace and covenant and sign, being welcomed into God’s family, the household of faith. But it means this also: dying with Christ so that we may be born with Christ, being baptized into his death so that we may be baptized into his resurrection. Transformation at its deepest and most profound.

That is the rhythm to which we are invited, the rhythm in which we participate, the rhythm to which we cling for dear life, the rhythm we celebrate with every parent who in hope presents their beloved children at this font to encounter baptism’s waters.

New Testament scholar Lamar Williamson Jr. writes that Jesus’ baptism matters because in it Jesus becomes who God says Jesus will become, God’s beloved, God’s messiah. (Mark, Interpretation series commentary, p. 33-36) And so our own baptisms matter because we become who God says we are to become—God’s beloved, God’s children. Our identity as children of the covenant of grace unfolds in the rhythm of giving and receiving, the rhythm of God who acts graciously in Christ Jesus and the human family who responds, humbly, feebly, not from fear or guilt, but from profound gratitude, the very rhythm of birth and death and resurrection.

Let us linger one more time at those original gifts. Gold we understand. Frankincense as well, a valued perfume, used for anointing royalty. What about that myrrh? “Sealed in the stone cold tomb,” we sang, because myrrh was often used in burials. It was a prized commodity but it carried a biblical meaning that foreshadowed from the very beginning the path of the man this baby would grow to be.

And so the giving and receiving of myrrh suggests to us that the baby is already able to receive who we are, to transform our hurts and anxieties, our addictions and isolations, understands even at his most helpless moment the rhythm that leads from birth to death to resurrection. So like the helpless babies who can’t really give anything except their unconditional response, we would only receive and live into our baptismal promises with hope and joy.

Do you have a gift shop? That remains the question this day as we consider the gift we have received. What might we give?

Might we give our hearts. We will sing that in a few moments, of giving our hearts. Let us do so, not as some sentimental cliché, but honestly, profoundly, hearing the words of repentance coming out of John the Baptist’s mouth as a gracious invitation into newness, a new direction, a transformed life. . .

Might we give our citizenship, our politics, whether left or right or middle, that they would have integrity and compassion in this election year, that they would make a difference in our city, in the human family, because we believe that the one who enters the water calls us to make a difference in the world that God so loves. . .

Might we give our work, re-commit ourselves to work. . . to integrity of relationship with co-workers, to a sense of decency and civility and authenticity. . .

Might we give our vocations, our time, and if we cannot respond to this invitation in the same manner that Dalia and Bob Baker and so many others have, let us look again at our time, our commitments, our allegiances, the stewardship of our moments. . .

Might we give our relationships. . . with ourselves, our family, our partners. . . our parenting.
Might we understand the people who come into our lives, friends and strangers alike, as gifts, as reflections of God’s beloved, and might we seek always to respond with tenderness and compassion. . .

And might we give our journeys, who we are, where we are going, who we shall become. Whether we journey as the sophisticated wise men from the east or out of the wilderness with John the Baptist, let us give our very journeys and know that they lead us to our knees, to Bethlehem, to Jerusalem, to the star and to the river and to the cross and beyond, to transformation. . .

And having received the gift of our baptism, having been transformed, might we give that away as well, lavishly, extravagantly, every gift inadequate, any gift appropriate.

As always, the promise is better expressed through the poet’s vision rather than the minister’s logic, and so let us hear finally from William Carlos Williams: The Gift.

As the wise men of old brought gifts
guided by a star
to the humble birthplace
of the God of love,
the devils
as an old print shows
retreated in confusion.
What could a baby know
of gold ornaments
or frankincense and myrrh,
of priestly robes
and devout genuflections?
But the imagination
knows all stories
before they are told
and knows the truth of this one
past all defection.
The rich gifts
so unsuitable for a child
though devoutly proffered,
stood for all that love can bring.
The men were old
how could they know
of a mother’s needs
or a child’s
appetite?
But as they kneeled
the child was fed.
They saw it
and gave praise!
A miracle
had taken place,
hard gold to love,
a mother’s milk!
before
their wondering eyes.
The ass brayed
the cattle lowed.
It was their nature.
All men by their nature give praise.
It is all
they can do.
The very devils
by their flight give praise.
What is death,
beside this?
Nothing. The wise men
came with gift
and bowed down
to worship
this perfection.

Amen.

Sermon © Fourth Presbyterian Church