In this sermon, the preacher discusses the gifts that the world gave to the Lord. He references three texts from the Bible to support his points. The first text highlights how the Father gave His Son, emphasizing the sacrificial nature of this gift. The second text emphasizes how the Son gave His life as a ransom for many. The third text encourages believers to support the weak and reminds them that it is more blessed to give than to receive. The preacher then urges the audience to consider what they should give to the Lord and briefly mentions the enemies of Jesus, but focuses on the glory and light that shines from His face. The sermon concludes with a call to give our hearts to the Lord and a reminder that the message is intended for mature believers.

Tonight, a companion sermon to the one I preached this morning. This morning I talked on our Lord's gift to the world. Tonight, on the world's gifts to the Lord, what the Lord, what the world gave Him. And I have a number of texts tonight. The old familiar one I used this morning, For God so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in Him should not perish, but have everlasting life. Then in Matthew 20, these words, Even as the Son of Man came, not to be ministered unto, but to minister, and to give his life for ransom for many. Then in the book of Acts, the 20th chapter, I believe, Acts 20, verse 35, I have showed you, said Paul, all things. And how that so laboring you ought to support the weak, and to remember the words of the Lord Jesus, how He said, It's more blessed to give than to receive. Now those are the three texts, and we learn from these three texts, these four things. We learn that the Father gave His Son, and then we learn that the Son gave His life, and we learn that both gave in order to supply a need, and we learn, fourthly, that to give is more blessed than to receive. Now from Him, our Lord, we have received so much, and I want to talk tonight about what we should give Him, and show a little from the scriptures of what, when He came that day, the world gave Him. Now I'm going deliberately tonight to pass over, with only a mention, what His enemies gave Him, because it isn't pleasant to think about this night, His enemies, and He had many of them, and they were enemies of their own doing and choosing, they were those for whom He died. I want you to notice this, that He died for His enemies, He died for those that hated Him, He died for the ones who put the thorny crown on His brow, but He had them, and they brought Him gifts, they brought Him the gift of blows, so that His face was marred more than any man, and His countenance more than any of the sons of men. They brought Him a crown, but not of diamonds, they brought Him a crown of thorns and pressed it upon His brow, they brought Him a cross, did His enemies, a rough cross, and nails to nail Him there, and they brought Him curses and mockeries and watched Him die, but we're going deliberately, I say tonight, with only a mention, to turn away from these and to talk a little from the scriptures of what, when He came that day, the world gave Him, and we learn, fourthly, that to give is more blessed than to receive. So we know about His friends and what they brought to Him, and while God doesn't need anything, I think we establish that, that God doesn't need anything, nevertheless, His friends brought Him things, and His friends are bringing Him things today. And I want to mention them, first of all, were those wise men. They were the Magi. Nobody knows very much about those Magi, and I should just like to drop this little word to you for your own instruction, that when you hear a preacher giving too many details about the Magi, you can be sure he's making them up, because we don't know very much about those wise men. But I, being a preacher now for a hundred years or more, I think it seems like it to me, I know the temptation of a minister to do what we say in journalism, put in filler. When he hasn't got enough to fill up the page, we put in a filler, a quotation from Andrew Murray or Spurgeon or Billy Graham or somebody. And when we don't have enough to say in our sermon, we are tempted very much, I don't know whether Brother Gray is or not, he probably isn't, but we older boys are, to fill in. And we talk a lot about these wise men, and I don't know who they were, I don't know how many there were, I don't know where they came from, and above all, I don't know their names. Though history has given them some real jawbreaker names. And they came, and they came bringing him gold, which stood for lasting treasure, of course, and frankincense, which stood for worship, and myrrh, which was the bitter herb of Old Testament sacrifices, and it stood for the bitter element in devotion. Now those wise men brought what they had, and they came and they gave it to him, and we'll mark them off and check and say, all right, the wise men brought gold and frankincense and myrrh. And then there was somebody else in that day that gave him something, and one section of the church, the so-called church, makes a great deal over her, her name was Mary. She must have been a lovely woman, though there's not as much known about her as we pretend that we know. We know a great deal about her now, according to what we hear. I heard a little piece on the radio the other night, and there was a lady called God's grandmother, and they didn't hesitate to use this. I'd heard it said that God had a mother. Mary was called the mother of God, but it never struck me, and it was rather shocking to learn that he also had a grandmother. That was Saint Anne, wasn't it, Saint Anne? Anyhow, the mother of Mary. And here was little Mary. We don't know much about Mary, but we get really sentimental when we think about her because she was a very young girl, probably in her middle teens or just a little older. And Mary had no gold. Mary descended from the royal line, but there are a lot of people who have descended from a royal line that don't have as much money as royalty, and Mary didn't have much money. She was a simple girl, almost naive, she was so simple. She might have been a country girl. Oh, she certainly wasn't. She came from a small town. But she hadn't any gold or frankincense, and if somebody had come to her and told her now, Mary, in order to please God, you've got to bring a gold and frankincense, she'd have said, Well, I get the gold, and well, I get the frankincense. These are expensive things, and I haven't any gold, and I haven't any frankincense. She was betrothed, that is engaged, to a carpenter, an older man, very much older than herself. She wasn't high in society, and she had no place in the social register at all. She had no money. No doubt she worked for around the house, and her hands weren't perfect. I imagine that they certainly weren't long and pointed and carefully enameled. I imagine they showed the signs of her work around the place. She was that kind of girl, and she hadn't anything to give the Lord Jesus, but she gave him one thing that I want reverently to say, she gave him her mortal body. She gave him that. He had to have that to come into the world, and someone had to give him the channel through which he might enter, and so Mary had that. Mary didn't have gold, she didn't have myrrh, she didn't have frankincense, but Mary gave what God asked her to give. She didn't offer this. She'd never have thought of that. But the angel came to her and said, Mary, thou blessed among women, and she was and is blessed because she bore the Messiah, the Son of God. Mary, you're going to be visited by the Holy Ghost, and the power of the Most High shall come upon you, and you shall conceive in your womb and shall bring forth a son, and thou shall call his name Jesus, for he shall save his people from their sins. And so Mary said, as it is all right with me, God, here I am thy handmaid, let it be even as thou hast said. So Mary yielded herself, and she gave herself up to the Lord, and I believe that this was something that we can take as an example. Mary gave him everything. I beseech you, therefore, by the mercies of God, that you present your body a living sacrifice, said the Holy Ghost through the Apostle Paul. And in giving her body, of course she gave everything her body contained, everything that dwelt within that mortal body. Then Mary had a husband by the name of Joseph, an older man, we learn. And I have, I think, made some people grieve because of some of the things I've said about Joseph, but I never could find too much to admire about the old gentleman. He must have been a fine man, and he had no gold and he had no frankincense. His hands were hard and calloused from using the saw and the hammer and the chisel and the plane on the ordinary wood of which he made buildings in his day. He was a carpenter, Joseph was, and Joseph wasn't a brilliant man. God had to put him to sleep in order to talk to him. He had to talk to him in a dream because obviously he couldn't talk to him any other way. So three or four times he spoke to him in a dream, and what Joseph said was what might have been expected. He was that type of man. He was just a good ordinary man, and yet he gave here to our Lord Jesus something so valuable, so precious, that it was more precious than gold or frankincense or myrrh. He gave to the Lord faith. When the Lord said, Fear not to take this girl unto you, for that which is conceived in her is of the Holy Ghost. He didn't get angry and doubt this. He believed it, and he gave faith to God, and he gave understanding. Now, I don't want to read into the record what isn't there, but have you ever stopped to think about the gossips in Israel in the day when Joseph was married and within a few months it was obvious that there would be a child in the home, and Mary knew that it was of the Holy Ghost, and Joseph knew that it was the Holy Ghost, but nobody else knew that it was of the Holy Ghost? And I wonder if it didn't take an awful lot of understanding on the part of Joseph to see the old gossips in Israel raise their eyebrows and shrug their shoulders and turn away. When Joseph appeared, Joseph and Mary, because Jesus was born too early for the thing to be conventional and right, because she was found to be with child of the Holy Ghost when they were married. Now there was protection that he gave Joseph, too. Somebody wrote in to the President and said, I'd like to be a babysitter in your home, and said, I'd jump at that chance. I'd love to babysit in Buckingham Palace and play with little Andrew, or I'd love to babysit in Washington and play with Carolyn. I love children, and here was a little boy growing up in the home, and he had to have somebody to protect him. Have you ever thought that the Lord of glory, who made heaven and earth and all things that are therein, was being protected by a humble, simple man with calluses on his fingers and stain under his fingernail that he couldn't get out? Have you ever stopped to think that there was protection there? That quiet old man watched over young baby Jesus with great care and kindness, knowing that he was not the father of that boy, but that there was something mysterious and wonderful about this boy, and there was the patience that he must have had. So Joseph gave something. That's what Joseph gave to Jesus. I say that he gave faith and understanding to the mother. He gave care and protection to the child. And I don't know, I'd settle if I had, if God were to say to me, now would you like to have your reward in heaven, or would you like to have Joseph's reward in heaven? I wouldn't have to think twice. I'd say, Oh, God, if it pleases thee, give me Joseph's reward in heaven. I have never done anything like this. I have never been faced with anything like this, and I have never had the patience or the care or the faith or the understanding that this man must have had. So let us bow to the man Joseph and say, Thank God for a good man who was the husband of a good woman who gave her mortal body to the Holy Ghost, that he might be born who was to save his people from their sins. And then after he was born in Bethlehem in the days of Joseph or in the days of Herod, you'll remember that the shepherds came and they brought him something. You know, we're incurable romantics, you and I are. We're incurably romantic, and artists are so romantic. And, of course, we get all our opinion of what Bible subjects look like from the artists, and the artists got their ideas out of their heads. And so we look at these shepherds and we see them, handsome fellows, beautiful of countenance and graceful of form, and dressed so beautifully and carefully, but highly and beautifully colored robes, walking with their sheep under their arm and all that. Well, the simple fact is that these shepherds were pretty plain men, and they're nobody that you'd want to take into your home because they stayed with the sheep, and they had rancid lanolin on their garments. Consider, beloved, you know what this lanolin is. That's the stuff you put on your hair, and they get it from sheep wool, and after it's become rancid it doesn't smell so good. And these shepherds were that kind of men. They hadn't been subjected to such a barrage of advertising as we have, and they've never heard that expression, your best friend won't tell you. And so they were just plain country men, plain country men. And I don't want to be offensive, but the shepherds living among the sheep, shearing them and washing them and feeding them and looking after their bruised heads, they were that kind of men, plain men. And you know, I believe that the Lord must have loved plain people, or he wouldn't have come to Mary to get born, and he wouldn't have had Joseph as his stepfather, his supposed father to look after him, and you wouldn't have shepherds coming to him. But these shepherds came. They didn't have such gifts either. They merely managed to make a living, and yet they brought to him, and they were the first ones to come, they brought to him reverent fear and wonder and praise. And the angels appeared to these shepherds. So the Lord must love plain people. You know the reason I like to emphasize this? Anybody can be a plain person, but we can't all be royal, and we can't all be brilliant, and we can't all be gifted. If the Lord had come only to the gifted people, I can't think of a thing that I could have done. I took six lessons on the piano when I was a boy, and that's my musical education. And I tried to paint, and I tried for years to paint a horse that looked like a horse and gave up in despair. It might have been a horse all right, but it didn't look like a horse. I have no artistic gifts, and I have no musical gift, just a musical appreciation. That's all. I do have that, but no musical gift. I can't carry a tune, and I never am sure that anything is on pitch. And I am so delighted that I am having a good ear for pitch, because I can hear a choir number or a solo. I don't mean here, but I mean on records. Some people with perfect pitch will say, Oh, she's off pitch. But I'm enjoying myself tremendously. I didn't know it at all, thank God. I was enjoying it. Well, if the Lord had said, Now you people that are gifted, you saw a great light, and the glory of the Lord shone upon you, I'd crawl off somewhere. I haven't got gifts. I'm more like these shepherds here. I could keep a poor, dumb sheep. Milton called them silly sheep. I never knew quite what he meant by that, but he said they kept their silly sheep. Well, I could have probably kept a silly sheep, but that's about it. But I could bring to him fear. I could bring to him reverence. I could bring to him wonder, and I could bring to him unceasing praise, and anybody can do that. Anybody. And then I think also of Lazarus and his two sisters, Martha and Mary. They had a little home in Bethany, and Jesus was an itinerant preacher, and he used to go around there. And the three of them sort of formed a friendship for Jesus, and his little crowd of rather ragged disciples, plainly people, off the street and away from the fishing nets, plain people, they would take him in. So they gave Jesus a place. They gave him a home. You know, we've pretty much forgotten that. Civilization has done some good for us, but it's also done us a lot of harm. There was a day when you could take people into your homes, but you can't anymore, much because civilization has streamlined our homes until there's barely room to squeeze in, and you can't squeeze another party in. So we don't have the joy of hospitality as they had then. They gave to Lazarus, or Lazarus gave to Jesus, a home and a welcome as he passed through the little town of Bethany. And then there were the women. Now, I don't know who these women were, but they made him his seamless robe. I can hear them as they talked about Jesus. Now, we like to read back into their conversation very high theological views. We'd like to imagine that one of these women said to the other one, this is he of whom Moses and the prophets, this is him of whom Moses and the prophets did write. This is the Messiah, and he was born by a hypostatic union. We would put big theological words in their mouths and, oh, let's not do it. These were plain women, and they knew more about a baby with croup than they did about theology, and they knew more about how to sow than they did how to have a career. They were just plain women, but they saw this wonderful man walking among them, and they saw him heal the sick. They heard the story of his raising the dead, and they saw him take children up in his arms and bless them, and their hearts were melted. And one would say to the other, you know, there's something wonderful about this man. You ever hear him talk? When he talks, even if you don't quite understand what he says, you've got a feeling you're hearing from another world. I have a sense that this one, this Jesus, is somebody in particular. He's from God. And another one would speak up and perhaps interrupt and say, you're right, you're right, this Jesus. Well, they said, what can we do for him? Well, they said, I noticed that that robe he's been wearing is a little bit fraggled around the edges. Couldn't we make him a robe? And the other one came up and said, yes, let's make him a robe, and let's go all out. None of these with pieces sewed on. Let's make him a seamless one. Let's make him a robe from head to foot, the best that can be found. We can't buy it, but we can make it. And so they went to work, and they made a seamless robe and gave it to Jesus. And they didn't know, these blessed women, that when he died on a cross for the sins of the world and when the light of free worlds were focused upon him, they didn't know that they would have stripped that seamless robe off, and that that robe that they had made would become probably the most famous robe in history, because it was the one for whom the Roman soldiers gambled and shot dice to see who would get it. Nobody ever found out what happened to this seamless robe. Some Roman soldier took it away, but we don't care. And if we were to find it tomorrow, it wouldn't add anything to our spiritual stature. It wouldn't purify our hearts if we would find it tomorrow miraculously preserved. But we do know that Jesus walked around wearing this garment given him by the women, the Lord of Glory, who was clothed with the stars and the sun above his head and the moon under his feet, and who walked on the wings of the wind and made the clouds his chariot. He took a robe from a woman and thanked them and said, Thank you, sisters, for this robe. I'll wear it and I'll cherish it in memory of you. And they went away smiling at each other, and they didn't know how famous they'd become, and they didn't know how famous this seamless robe would become, and they didn't know that he would wear it till they stripped it from him and gave it to the Roman soldier that had won it in the lottery. And then there was that other Joseph. We've talked about Joseph, the husband of Mary. But there was that other Joseph who gave Jesus his own grave. You see, people used to make their grave ahead of time. Nowadays we don't like to do that. It seems rather a gloomy thing to do, to buy your grave and know where you live and know where you're going to live or die, or be after you're dead and stop living. We don't do that much anymore. But they did in those times. A man would get a grave, and if he was a rich man, he would get a very important grave. They didn't dig them below the surface. They chiseled them out of the rock. And Joseph, that was the kind Jesus was buried in. Joseph had his already for him, and he had fixed that all up. I don't know what they did. I don't know what the decor was inside or what the particular decorative scheme they followed. I don't know that. But I do know this was Joseph's grave, and Joseph had watched Jesus die. And Joseph had known who Jesus was, and when there was no place to bury him, they didn't want to put him out and bury him in the potter's field. So Joseph said, I'll give Jesus my grave. Here, take my grave. And they took it, and they buried him in the new tomb of Joseph. Now, we don't know too much about it, I say, but we wonder at least where they buried Joseph. Joseph, being a man of wealth, no doubt would have been able to get himself another place before nature laid him away. But it's something to think about anyhow. He gave Joseph, or he gave Jesus this Joseph, this other Joseph. He gave him his grave. Well, now that's what they gave him, the wise men, and Mary, and Joseph, and the shepherds, and Lazarus, and Mary, and Martha, and the women, and that other Joseph of Arimathea. And we ransomed sinners. Here we are tonight. We ransomed sinners. And should we let anybody outdo us, I ask you? Should we, in the ripe light of the New Testament gospel, should we let anybody outdo us? Should we let them bring anything more valuable than gold and frankincense and myrrh? Should we not find something more valuable to bring? Should we not bring more than Joseph brought, and more than the shepherds brought, and more than the women brought, and more than the Joseph of Arimathea could bring? And yet when we have gone over all our poor treasures, what have we to bring? We certainly don't have very much. When we've counted and weighed and evaluated, what do we have to bring? Can we bring him who owns the stars and every shining diamond of the mind? Can we bring anything to him and make him rich? No, no. Did you ever try to buy a gift for somebody that didn't need one thing in all the world and could buy everything he needed? Did you ever try that? It's a hard job to give anything to anybody that has everything. So what can I give him? Maybe they're well-to-do, but they're your friends. And you say, What can we give? If we give a token present, it won't look right. And if we give anything worthy of anybody up in the upper brackets, why, we can't afford it. What do we do? So I say, What can we ransom sinners, give to Jesus Christ our Lord? Were the whole realm of nature mine, it were a present far too small. Love so amazing, so divine, demands my life, my love, my all. So we can only bring him our little human toys, just the little human things we have. Does this discourage you to hear me talk like this? Do you want to be chucked under the chin and patted on the back and smoothed on down the spine and talked to as I would talk to a kindergarten child? I haven't done it, and I'm not going to do it. I'm not teaching kindergarten kids. I am preaching to grown-up men and women and young people capable of understanding anything that I can understand. And if you want toffee and soft soap, there are churches that will give them to you. But we can't afford them here. They cost too much. It costs too much to teach anything but the truth, and I can't afford it. So I say, Our talents, our human toys don't really amount to much. Our talents, we say. Somebody can sing beautifully, somebody can do something else, has some other gift, and says, I'll give that to the Lord. And the Lord smiles, for there are his angels, the spirits that he has sent forth. There are the cherubim and seraphim and the holy watchers in heavenly places. What do our little talents mean to them, and what does our money mean to them? We think now in vast terms, billions now, billions and millions. I don't think that the Canadian government or the United States government would be satisfied to think in anything less than millions. Anybody would say to anybody in Washington or Ottawa, here's a thousand, and say, what's a thousand? Nobody knows what a thousand is anymore. It's millions now, millions. We don't have millions, but all that they have, he gave them. And all that we have, he gave them. And all that the world has, he gave us. So we can't give him anything that he wants, really. We come to him bringing him our little gifts. As our children come to us on Christmas time, I have a brown paper bag full of little presents that I was given by a certain little girl. And I'm going to keep them. I'm keeping them like a silly old, teary-eyed, sentimental old daughter. I'm keeping them. And some of them are pretty awful, really, you know, pretty awful. And signed proudly with the artist's name. But I'm keeping them because of the love and not because of the value. I couldn't sell them, you know. Nobody would take them. Nobody would say, what's that? I don't want that. But they mean something to me, and they're in a brown manila envelope. And I thought sometimes that, I don't suppose I will, but I'd just like, sort of like to have them with me when they put me down in that little bed and cover me up and sing over me. But those are presents that our children bring us. And they don't amount to much, but they mean an awful lot to us. You and I can bring him not too much. But you know, when our child comes to us with a present, they always take away more, so much more than they bring. We come to Jesus with our little toy and we go away bearing forgiveness. Forgiveness from our sins. We bring our little gift and we go away bearing eternal life. Not a trade, not a transfer. We didn't bring our gift and get forgiveness for the gift. We didn't bring our gift and get eternal life. No, no. His gifts are without money and without price. But I say we bring him what we have and we go away with safety and assurance and peace in life and peace in death and immortality in heaven at last. These are the gifts. The great preacher Paul Rader used to say, you can never beat God giving. Give all you give and when you're finished, God will give more back to you. God will give more back because you can never beat God giving. But we ransom sinners should see to it that we bring everything that we can bring. Well, I've made it difficult up to now and you're saying, what can I give him? Wait, just let me finish, as they say. You know, we used to sing a hymn. I quoted one this morning. We often sang and I enjoyed singing. Here's another one written by Sears, same man who wrote one of the famous Christmas carols. Say, shall we yield him in costly devotion? Odors of Edom and offering divine. Gems from the mountains and pearls from the ocean. Myrrh from the forest and gold from the mine. No, Sears didn't write it. No, no, this was written by the famous English hymnist. Vainly we offer earth's richest oblation. Vainly with gold would his favor secure. Richer by far is the heart's adoration. Dear to God are the prayers of the poor. Reginald Heber. So it's this, my brethren, the heart's adoration, the prayers of the poor. Who wrote this? A bishop wrote this. What kind of bishop? A missionary bishop. The man who had gone to the field to preach Christ to the heathen in India. Vainly we offer our richest oblation. Vainly with gold would his favor secure. Richer by far is the heart's adoration. Dear to God are the prayers of the poor. We remember what his enemies brought and we're sorry. And we don't want to add a blow to the blows that rained upon his face. Nor a nail to the nails they pounded into his hands and feet. We don't want to add anything. We want to be among his friends. We ransom sinners. And we have nothing to bring, nothing to bring. But what does he want? I hear him say, son, give me thy heart. And we sing, give me thy heart, says the Father above. No gift so precious to him as our love. So this is what we bring him. And after all, wasn't this what the wise men brought him? They brought him their hearts and gold and frankincense and myrrh. But he would have accepted their hearts without the gold and the myrrh. Mary and Joseph and the shepherds, they each gave what they could give. But what made their gifts valuable was they gave their heart. Nobody wants a gift tossed to us as a bonus, tossed to a dog. We want the heart. And what makes a gift valuable is that it is given to us. Paul said they first gave themselves to the Lord and then they gave to the Lord. So the Lord doesn't turn away our toys. No. We have a little talent and we bring it and the Lord takes it and loves it. We have money and we give it and the Lord receives it with a smile. We have our gifts as Joseph and the shepherds and Lazarus and the women had. And he accepts them all because we have first given him that which makes all gifts valuable and without which no gift can have any meaning to God. Son, give me thine heart so it is the heart that matters. Now, only a few can bring gold and frankincense and myrrh. And certainly only one woman in the history of the world could ever give her body to be indwelt in this sense by the Lord of glory to be born. Nobody else could take the place that Joseph took. Nobody could do what the shepherds did quite. Nobody could offer the peripatetic Jesus as you walked about over the earth. Nobody could give to him a home for he is now at the right hand of the Father. He cannot wear any robe made by any of you women, however skillfully you so. For the robe he wears now shines above the brightness of the sun. And there is nobody that can offer a tomb to him now because death has no more dominion over him. And he'll never die again and all the graves of the world will be empty for him. He'll never go into a grave again. But you can give him your heart. Son, give me thine heart, he says. So I say anybody can do that. You can do it tonight. What's your heart? Your love and your will. You will to serve him and you will to love him. You give him that and he takes that. I believe that when the shepherd came back carrying the lamb on his shoulder, it was a little picture of Jesus coming back carrying his ransomed one upon his shoulder and said to the Father, Father, these follow me. They know my voice and they follow me. They're a one-man sheep. They've given themselves to the shepherd and they'll follow no other. He wants us to be that kind of people. I hope that over these hours ahead, you'll keep Jesus in focus. I hope over these hours ahead, the light of his face will shine above the light of all the decorations which you might legitimately have on your tree. We have a little tree that some dear brother brought us and that our friends have decorated for us, daughter and son-in-law from New York. So we're having a nice little bright place there in the corner and we're glad. But above it all and beyond it all, we see a face that shines with a light that never was on land or sea, a light that never flowed out of any electrical socket, the light of glory in the face of Jesus Christ. So anybody can give him our heart, his heart. We can do that. I want to ask you tonight, and I'm going to let you go. I'm not going to press you. I know you want to go home, and I do. You can pray anywhere, anytime, beside your bed. So we're going to stand and sing all the stanzas. Al, I'd like to have you come up and lead it if you will.