The Third Day of Bringing Gifts – December 14, 2012
“On the third day of Christmas, my true love gave to me…three French  hens,  two turtle doves,  and a partridge in a pear tree.”
French  hens?
Imagination often gets a bad rap. Maybe  you have a childhood memory  of a parent, not believing  your story, telling you, “You’ve got quite  an imagination.” But so did Jesus! The parables he told were not necessarily actual events  but were often drawn  from his own imagination to teach  eternal  truths. And what he imagined was drawn from daily life: cloth,  wine,  lamp,  seeds,  birds, fishing nets, vineyard, sheep, goats. On it goes…
Jesus described himself as a hen! “How often I have longed  to gather  your children together, as a hen gathers her chicks  under  her wings” (Luke 13:34).  So, following Jesus is like following…a hen?
It is hardly  surprising  that Christians  could  imagine significance in a popular folk song apart  from anything originally  intended. How many pastors  have been surprised to hear what their sermon  meant  to people apart from anything  they thought  they were saying! The Spirit works as it wills and often in strange  ways indeed!
So it is that three  hens – “French  hens,”  the most delicious of all, first bred in France  centuries ago – came  to classify faith, hope, and love. These are the “theological virtues,” so called  because they cannot be shared  with others  until first received as gifts of true love, the love of God (theo-).
We know  it’s more blessed  to give than to receive. But sometimes the best gift of all is the willingness to receive. When  we give, we’re in control. When  we receive, someone else is. And it can be hard to receive  because then we’re dependent. Most of us would  prefer to be independent. But where  does that leave someone who really wants  to give us something special  – like God? Are we as good at opening gifts as we are at giving them?
How well we ourselves give depends on how much  we appreciate what we receive. In faith, hope, and love may we give back,  thankful  for all we have been  given.
According  to an annual study by a national financial institution, the cost of three  French  hens is approximately $150. To explore  the life-giving possibilities of a $150  gift to the Christmas  Fund for the Veterans  of the Cross and the Emergency  Fund, visit http://bit.ly/CF12_12_12-3.