My True Love’s Gifts

Missing God at Christmas is like picking up your phone and seeing you just missed a call from your best friend.

Unfortunately, when most of us think of Christmas, we picture crowded stores, rude shoppers, traffic nightmares and crazy schedules. We over-eat, over-spend and over-decorate. It is all too easy to miss the point of the season entirely.

Christmastime has become a fifty-five day sprint from Halloween to Christmas Day. During that time, we are constantly urged and pushed to do things we normally would not do in a timeframe that is impossible to accomplish. We are so busy preparing for Christmas that finding time to read the Bible, pray and enjoy our relationship with God is nearly impossible. How ironic that at one of the times of the year when we most want to feel God’s presence, we are too preoccupied and distracted to do so.

Yet we enter into every new Christmas season hoping that this will be the year we finally find time to focus on the true meaning of Christmas. When December 25th finally rolls around, however, these naive hopes often give way to the desperate, secret desire that it all might be over for one more year. “Next Christmas will be less stressful and more meaningful,” we whisper to ourselves.

In the midst of a recent, hectic Christmas season, I rediscovered God’s presence in the most unexpected of places, a carol written about four hundred years ago. From as early as I can remember, The Twelve Days of Christmas was nothing more than an odd little song whose verses were easy to confuse and difficult to remember. Of course there are five golden rings, but are there seven drummers and eleven ladies dancing or, let me think, was it eleven pipers piping? I never really understood what the song had to do with Christmas. No one who worships Jesus Christ as their Lord and Savior would ever put this tune in the same category of meaningful Christmas carols such as Joy to the World and Silent Night, right? The Twelve Days of Christmas falls somewhere on the spiritual significance meter between Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer and Grandma Got Run Over by a Reindeer.

Until one day the light bulb went off. There is a meaning to this song that is far greater than the superficial giving of unusual gifts. It reintroduced me to our Savior in a way that was profound and personal.

It seems we Christians have been missing something. While scholars have written about the song, the true depth and meaning of The Twelve Days of Christmas has eluded me. The mystery begins with the fact that the “True Love” is never identified. His name, nature and intentions are never revealed and may only be discovered by considering the significance of the gifts he gives. Thus, in order to identify the True Love, we must first understand the symbolic meaning of his gifts.

While this concept may at first seem mysterious, it is something that we are already quite familiar with in our own experience. For instance, when we receive a gift card, we do not just receive a piece of plastic with a magnetic strip. We also have the ability to convert that card into a product or service that is tangible and valuable. If we fail to understand the symbolism of the gift card (represented by the merchant’s logo and a dollar amount), then the gift is practically worthless. To get the most out of a gift card, we must understand that it points us to something that is greater and more valuable than just plastic. The same is true for The Twelve Days of Christmas. When the True Love gives a partridge in a pear tree, the gift points us toward something the True Love also gives us that is far greater and more valuable than just a bird and a fruit tree.

The beauty of the carol is also found in the repetition of its verses. The Twelve Days of Christmas is a cumulative song, meaning that once a gift is given, the same gift is given on each of the following days of Christmas as well. The sum of the gifts given over the full twelve days includes twelve partridges and twelve pear trees, eleven pairs of calling birds, ten trios of French hens, and so forth. When Christmas is finally over, the True Love’s generosity amounts to a total of three hundred sixty-four gifts over the course of just twelve days! That is a lavish display of giving by any standard. In light of this generosity, The Twelve Days of Christmas provides the most comprehensive expression of what true love really means. It turns out that what I most desire at Christmas has been right here in front of me all this time.

If you have ever found the Christmas season to be an emotional and spiritual letdown, this book is for you. We are about to discover the real message in The Twelve Days of Christmas and experience Christmas from a perspective that is broader and deeper than the traditional nativity scene. We will discover something entirely new, inspiring and encouraging in the words of a centuries-old lyric.

Joining in this journey requires accepting just one new gift from the True Love per day, beginning on Christmas Day. As the amazing scope and extent of the True Love’s generosity is discovered, there will be no post-Christmas blues this year. I hope and pray that you will experience a lasting and genuine joy this Christmas season and, most importantly, that the True Love’s goodness and love will be clearly revealed. Once this occurs, you will be blessed and the True Love will be most pleased.