I love Christmas music, from Mariah Carey to Handel's Messiah. There's one contemporary Christmas song that I love among all others; The Little Drummer Boy. There is something about the lyrics of this song that can bring tears to my eyes. I can just picture a young boy, a child of seven or eight with an innocence that we as adults can only dream about.
The King has come, as a newborn baby. A child himself, the little drummer boy, eager to see the Infant, curious, antsy, and perfectly content with his state as a poor boy with nothing for his King, marches cheerfully to the manger where our baby Jesus lay. We as adults are fretting and concerned with petty matters, while the little drummer boy knows his talents along with his inadequacies, and does not attempt to hide them. Mary nods, giving the boy permission to entertain the baby Jesus. I can picture the ox and lamb trampling along keeping time with the pa-rum-pa-pa-pums of the drum.
"I have no gifts to bring that's fit to give to a King." Don't we all feel like that? Some of us are able to give greatly to God through lives in martyrdom, the priesthood, and religious life. Some of us use our gifts in matrimony, or the single life. Some of us have been blessed with more gifts or a higher call to holiness, but whether a rose in God's garden, or a violet, although one may be greater than the other, each one, when perfected is a delight to God, as "perfection consists in doing His will, in being that which He calls us to be," (St. Therese, Lisieux).
During this preparation season of Advent, I want to keep this image close to my heart of the eagerness to seek Jesus, let the world drift behind me, to know that the gifts I have, regardless of how small, are sufficient to do His Will, if we would only "Become As Little Children" (Matthew 18:3).
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