P.O. Box 53055    
Los Angeles, CA 90053   

THE GIDDY GOD

There was a December TV commercial on not so many seasons ago; maybe you remember it. The unsuspecting spouse looks out the window on Christmas morning, and parked right out there on the lawn is a brand new Jag. I mean, top of the line. It’s got a big red bow on it, that factory-fresh smell — and I imagine the interior of a Jaguar is a bit above what some of us ever sniff on the 25th. What an incredible moment that’s got to be, for the giver and the “giv-ee” both. By the way, I know my wife doesn’t always manage to tuck into her schedule listening to all 260 of our daily radio broadcasts per calendar year, but honey, if you happen to be tuned in here on this Monday, there are still about 48 shopping hours left and the Thousand Oaks Auto Mall — well, you know where it is.

In his marvelous football book, Instant Replay, Jerry Kramer describes the magical 1967-1968 NFL season of the Green Bay Packers. Coach Vince Lombardi was driving them toward a third straight championship and another Super Bowl ring. They’d just beaten the L.A. Rams in the first round of the playoffs, the Western Conference championship, and a big rematch with Dallas – some of you remember the famous “Ice Bowl” game – was coming up in a week. Everything was clicking; the team was firing on all cylinders. Christmas Eve a bunch of players and wives were over at the home of linebacker Ray Nitschke having some eggnog and just hanging out, enjoying the fruits of victory. For some strange reason, nobody was leaving; they were just kind of loitering, waiting for something to happen. Around 9:00 p.m., Ray’s wife, Jackie, asked him to check out the front window; she thought she heard a noise or something. He peeked out there, and parked in the yard, in the gleaming white snowy moonlit landscape, was a brand new 1968 Lincoln Continental — one of those great big, luxurious monster cars with cruise control and everything. And this huge lumbering linebacker, 6'3", 240 pounds, who grew up in poverty, just began to bawl. He’d always wanted a Lincoln. As a little kid he’d ridden in a Lincoln one time. And now here it was. He had to put on an overcoat and go out there right now, with his wife snuggled up next to him, and take that baby out for a spin. What a sweet story.

Do you remember a perfect present someone once gave you? The minute you saw it, you said to yourself, “Now my life is complete.” Or maybe almost like the prophet Simeon, in Luke 2, who is so happy to see the baby Jesus, so thrilled that the Bible’s prophecies have been fulfilled, that he sighs contentedly to God, “Lord, now let thy servant depart in peace.”

Well, friend, best of luck to you as you Fed Ex your last-minute list to Santa. But all this week we want to turn that metaphor of “perfect Christmas gift” on its head and ask ourselves the question this way: What would God like to get on December 25? Does He make a list? What would gladden His heart? What has He been pining for ever since Christmas night of a year ago?

A lot of the carols you’ve been hearing down at the mall these past few weeks — or months, in some cases — talk about the fact that we want to exchange presents with the King of kings. Do you recall a little-known carol entitled “As With Gladness Men of Old,” written by William C. Dix in the late 1800s? Verse three is about those three Wise Men, and goes:

“As they offered gifts most rare, At that manger rude and bare, So may we with holy joy, Pure, and free from sin’s alloy, All our costliest treasures bring, Christ, to Thee our heavenly King.”

But you know, I think as mere mortals, we have a difficult time conjuring up a picture of God really WANTING anything. Can He desire something on Christmas Eve? Can He anticipate, and feel either giddy joy or the dull pain of disappointment when you or I leave a bare spot under His tree December 25? Actually, the Bible has verses where even God wants things, where He has a wish list just like we do. In Psalm 132:13, we get a glimpse of it:

“For the Lord has chosen Zion,” David writes; “He has desired it for His dwelling.”

Hosea 6:6:

“For I desire mercy, not sacrifice,” God tells His children, “and acknowledgment of God rather than burnt offerings.”

Well, friend, there’s no point in being coy. You know and I know what I’m going to say next. What is it God wants as a Christmas present? What does He dream about at 11:30 p.m. on the 24th of December? Obviously, the Ruler of the universe, who OWNS the universe and all the cattle on a thousand hills, doesn’t want packages and bows and tinsel and toys. The one gift He wants is me. And you. He wants our love and our loyalty and our friendship. Maybe you remember the classic gospel hymn:

All He wants is YOU. No one else will do. Not just a part, He wants all of your heart. All He wants is all of you. All He wants is you.

And friend, just as you and I feel Christmas joy and anticipation and intense pleasure when our dreams come true around the Yuletide tree, God is capable of that and much more when He gets that dream gift of a person’s heart. In his exceptional book, The Knowledge of the Holy, A. W. Tozer comments about our usual picture of an unfeeling Scrooge-in-the-sky:

“The Lord takes peculiar pleasure in His saints,” he writes. “Many think of God as far removed, gloomy and mightily displeased with everything, gazing down in a mood of fixed apathy upon a world in which He has long ago lost interest; but this is to think erroneously. True, God hates sin and can never look with pleasure upon iniquity, but where men seek to do God’s will He responds with genuine affection. Christ in His atonement has removed the bar to the divine fellowship. Now in Christ all believing souls are objects of God’s delight. ‘The Lord thy God in the midst of thee is mighty; He will save, He will REJOICE over thee with joy; He will rest in His love, He will joy over thee with singing.’” That’s Zephaniah 3:17.

Friend, I wish you could picture — and believe me, I know I can’t paint the word picture right — of God unwrapping the gift, as it were . . . and it’s you. Not someone else: YOU. You’re one-on-one with Him right now, and He discovers as He undoes the bow, that you’ve decided to really let Him have your life in 2004. “Not just a part”; you’ll give Him all of your heart. Your whole life. You’ll put Him first and best this next year and really mean it. As that gospel song continues:

All He wants is me, unreservedly. Not just a part, He wants all of my heart. All He wants is all of me. All He wants is me.

And as He opens the gift — and sees that it’s you, all of you — He turns to His Son, Jesus . . . who helped pay for the present, of course. And to the Holy Spirit. And to the angels. And a watching universe of holy beings who never tire of Christmas morning around the throne. And God the mighty Father smiles like a little kid. “It’s perfect,” He says. “This is absolutely awesome and perfect. It’s what I always wanted.”