Giving with Joy

Giving with Joy

Henry B. Eyring

I’ve always had a daydream of being a great gift-giver. I can picture someone opening my gift with tears of joy and a smile, showing that the giving, not just the gift, had touched a heart. Others must have that dream, too, and many are likely already experts in gift-giving. But even the experts may share some of my curiosity about what makes a gift great.

I’ve been surrounded by expert gift-givers all my life. None of them has ever told me how to do it, but I’ve been watching and I’ve been building a theory. My theory comes from thinking about many gifts and many holidays, but one day and one gift can illustrate it. The day was not Christmas, or even close to it. It was a summer day. My mother died in the early afternoon. My father, my brother, and I had gone from the hospital to our family home, just the three of us. Friends and family came to the house, and went. In a lull, we fixed ourselves a snack; then we visited with more callers. It grew late, dusk fell, and I remember we still had not turned on the lights.

Dad answered the doorbell. It was Aunt Catherine and Uncle Bill. When they’d walked just a few feet past the vestibule, Uncle Bill extended his hand and I could see that he was holding a bottle of cherries. I can still see the deep-red, almost purple, cherries and the shiny gold cap on the jar. He said, “You might enjoy these. You probably haven’t had dessert.”

We hadn’t. The three of us sat around the kitchen table, and put some cherries in bowls, and ate them as Uncle Bill and Aunt Catherine cleared some dishes. Uncle Bill asked, “Are there people you haven’t had time to call? Just give me some names and I’ll do it.” We mentioned a few relatives who would want to know of mother’s death. And then Aunt Catherine and Uncle Bill were gone. They could not have been with us more than twenty minutes.

Now, we can understand my theory best if we focus on one gift: the bottle of cherries. And let’s explain our theory from the point of view of the person who received the gift: me. That’s crucial, because what matters in giving is what the receiver feels. As nearly as I can tell, the giving and receiving of a great gift always has three parts. Here they are, illustrated by that gift on a summer evening.

First, I knew that Uncle Bill and Aunt Catherine had felt what I was feeling and had been touched. I’m not over the thrill of that yet. They must have felt we’d be too tired to fix much food. They must have felt that a bowl of home-canned cherries would make us feel, for a moment, like a family again. And they felt what I felt. Just knowing that someone had understood meant far more to me than the cherries themselves. I can’t remember the taste of the cherries, but I remember that someone knew my heart and cared.

Second, I felt that the gift was free. I knew Uncle Bill and Aunt Catherine had chosen freely to bring a gift. They weren’t doing it to compel a response from me; the gift seemed to provide them joy in the giving.

And third, there was an element of sacrifice. Someone might say, “But how could they give for the joy of it and yet make sacrifice?” Well, I could see the sacrifice. I knew, from the cherries being home-bottled, that Aunt Catherine had made them for her family. They must have liked cherries. But she took that possible pleasure from them and gave it to me. That’s sacrifice. But I have realized since then this marvelous fact: It must have seemed to Uncle Bill and Aunt Catherine that they’d have more pleasure if I had the cherries than if they did. There was sacrifice, but it was made for a greater return to them my happiness. Anyone can feel deprived as they sacrifice, and then let the person who gets a gift know it. But only an expert can let you sense that his sacrifice brings him joy because it blesses you.

Jesus gave his gift freely, willingly to us all. He said,

“Therefore doth my Father love me, because I lay down my life, that I might take it again.

“No man taketh it from me, but I lay it down of myself.”

John 10:17–18

And so what shall we do to appreciate and give a merry Christmas?

“Freely ye have received, freely give.”

Matt. 10:8

This Christmas, let us learn how we can give our own Gifts of Love.

I hope that each of us this Christmas season will be touched by the feelings of others and give freely, without compulsion or expectation of gain. I hope we experience the joy of sacrifice, of giving something of ourselves. If we do so, we will learn this final lesson about giving that those gifts are truly great which are given simply for the joy they bring to another heart.