“Give, and there will be gifts for you” (Luke 6:38).
One of the characters in John Steinbeck’s novel, “Burning Bright,” is a middle-aged man named John Saul. What John desires most in life is to have a good marriage and home life, and to be a father. Consequently, when his young wife tells him that she is expecting their first child, he is overjoyed. He becomes “a one-man celebration,” is the way Steinbeck put it.
To the expectant father there comes a tremendous desire to symbolize his joy in a gift to his wife. He wants desperately to give her something so beautiful that she will say to herself, “Who am I that I should have such a beautiful gift?” John Saul begins to see the gift taking shape. He visualizes something that she can hold in her hand or wear on a ribbon around her neck. “Maybe something white,” he says, “like a pearl, like a great sacrament. Or maybe a red-flaring ruby that…
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