The Fifth Day of Bringing Gifts – December 16, 2012
“On the fifth day of Christmas, my true love gave to me… five gold rings – four calling  birds, three  French  hens,  two turtle doves,  and a partridge  in a pear tree.”
How many gold rings have you received in your life? Five? All at once? That’s a lot. And given such extravagant generosity, why not diamonds? Because  diamonds’ resale value is always  less than gold? That’s not a reason  that befits true love!
Diamonds have been  treasured as gemstones since their use in religious  icons in the ancient world.  But the main reason  they have perceived value today is because of a century  of ingrained marketing strategy and the monopoly that DeBeers  enjoys.
Heaven knows  “true love” itself is marketed today.  You may pass by those magazines and tabloids  at the checkout lane of the grocery  store. And you may not have watched the PBS television special, “Finding Your Own  True Love” or purchased any of a number of bestsellers at Barnes & Noble  about  improving your love life.
But we can miss the real problem here.  It’s not so much that love is trivialized as that it begins  at the wrong  end. True love is not something we find and make real but something we’ve already  been  given! When  we cannot recognize how much  we are already  loved we “look for love in all the wrong  places,” as Waylon  Jennings sang. We’re drawn  to whatever feels good at the expense of what is good. We over-expect from loved ones – a spouse, a partner, our children, friends, and often enough the church.
No need  to put away that beautiful diamond ring! But the density  and luster of gold have made  it more venerable and the best expression of love since before  recorded history. No wonder gold and the five rings have been likened  to the first five books of the Bible – the Torah or Pentateuch – where  the story of God’s love begins.
God’s true love for us started a long time ago, since the foundation of time. It’s already  ours. Instead  of looking for it elsewhere, let’s live, and give, grateful for what we already  have!
According  to an annual study by a national financial institution, the cost of five gold rings is approximately $645. To explore  the life-giving possibilities of a $645  gift to the Christmas  Fund for the Veterans  of the Cross and the Emergency  Fund, visit http://bit.ly/CF12_12_12-5.