Treasure

The Rev. Joseph Winston

Ash Wednesday, February 6, 2008

Sermon

Grace and peace are gifts for you from God, the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ.1
In 1906, O. Henry wrote a short story that described a couple.
Della Young had only one dollar and eighty-seven cents to her name and the
next day was Christmass. With this amount of money, she could not purchase
anything for her husband Jim. With grim determination, she realized that she had
exactly one possession that she could sale: her hair that reached down to her knees.
Putting on her coat and hat, she ran out the door and down the street to a
business that purchased hair. The owner offered her twenty dollars for her locks.
Della took the offer.
For the next two hours, Della was in heaven as she looked for Jim’s present.
Finally, she found it. A platinum chain that perfectly matched Jim’s prized pos-
1
Romans 1:7, 1 Corinthians 1:3, 2 Corinthians 1:2, Galatians 1:3, Ephesians 1:2, Philippians
1:2, 2 Thessalonians 1:2, Philemon 1:3

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session, his gold pocket watch that had been his father’s and grandfather’s.
With eighty-seven cents left in her purse, she hurried home to meet Jim. Now,
she needed to make herself ready for him. She took out her curling irons and did
the best she could with what was left of her hair.
At seven o’clock, Jim walked up the stairs to the flat. Her transformed appear-
ance took him completely by surprise. Della cried out to Jim that she had cut her
hair for one reason only. She had to give him a Christmass present.
O. Henry then writes:

Jim drew a package from his overcoat pocket and threw it upon the
table.

“Don’t make any mistake, Dell,” he said, “about me. I don’t think
there’s anything in the way of a haircut or a shave or a shampoo that
could make me like my girl any less. But if you’ll unwrap that pack-
age you may see why you had me going a while at first.”

White fingers and nimble tore at the string and paper. And then an
ecstatic scream of joy; and then, alas! a quick feminine change to
hysterical tears and wails, necessitating the immediate employment
of all the comforting powers of the lord of the flat.

For there lay The Combs–the set of combs, side and back, that Della
had worshipped long in a Broadway window. Beautiful combs, pure
tortoise shell, with jewelled rims–just the shade to wear in the beau-
tiful vanished hair. They were expensive combs, she knew, and her

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heart had simply craved and yearned over them without the least hope
of possession. And now, they were hers, but the tresses that should
have adorned the coveted adornments were gone.

But she hugged them to her bosom, and at length she was able to look
up with dim eyes and a smile and say: “My hair grows so fast, Jim!”

And them Della leaped up like a little singed cat and cried, “Oh, oh!”

Jim had not yet seen his beautiful present. She held it out to him
eagerly upon her open palm. The dull precious metal seemed to flash
with a reflection of her bright and ardent spirit.

“Isn’t it a dandy, Jim? I hunted all over town to find it. You’ll have to
look at the time a hundred times a day now. Give me your watch. I
want to see how it looks on it.”

Instead of obeying, Jim tumbled down on the couch and put his hands
under the back of his head and smiled.

“Dell,” said he, “let’s put our Christmas presents away and keep ’em
a while. They’re too nice to use just at present. I sold the watch to get
the money to buy your combs. And now suppose you put the chops
on.”

The magi, as you know, were wise men–wonderfully wise men–who

brought gifts to the Babe in the manger. They invented the art of giv-
ing Christmas presents. Being wise, their gifts were no doubt wise
ones, possibly bearing the privilege of exchange in case of duplica-

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 tion. And here I have lamely related to you the uneventful chronicle of
two foolish children in a flat who most unwisely sacrificed for each
other the greatest treasures of their house. But in a last word to the
wise of these days let it be said that of all who give gifts these two
were the wisest. O all who give and receive gifts, such as they are
wisest. Everywhere they are wisest. They are the magi.2

The reason for recounting O. Henry’s short story titled, “The Gift of the Magi”
on Ash Wednesday may not seem obvious at first since the tale of Jim and Dell
might sound more like a Christmass story. But there is a deep connection between
the young couple and tonight’s Gospel lesson. In the two thousand and seventy
words that make up the story, O. Henry paints a stunning account of a man and
woman deeply in love. These two individuals have deeply devoted their entire
existence to the other and they show their affection by giving up their priceless
treasure for their spouse. Dell sells her beautiful brown hair so Jim will have a
fob that makes him proud. Jim trades in his gold watch for a set of tortoise shell
combs that highlight Dell’s amazing hair.
These lovers show us what it means when Jesus tells us in tonight’s Gospel,
“For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also” (Matthew 6:21). O. Henry
informs us that Dell could not imagine a Christmass without a special gift for her
precious husband. She scrimped and saved but it was not enough. This awful re-
alization first brought her to tears and then it motivated her to do the unthinkable.
Sell her hair. While the author does not develop the character of Jim in such detail
2
O. Henry, The Gift Of The Magi, (1906).

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as Dell, it is easy to imagine a similar story line with the few characteristics that
we are given. When they first moved into the flat, Jim brought home thirty dollars
a week. After paying for the furnished apartment, they had twenty-two dollars left
over for the necessities of life. The cut in pay had been a terrible blow to Jim’s
ego but in actuality, it was much harder for Dell. She no longer had a financial
cushion she could use to soften the blows of a harsh economy. Now every penny
needed to be watched. Jim could see the change before his eyes. Dell’s red eyes
gave it away every night. There was only one way he could show his love for her.
Sell the watch.
The life shown to us by Jim and Dell might appear to be easy when we are
young and deeply in love but all too soon this will pass. We age and in this trans-
formation, we change. For some of us, our spouse no longer is the person that we
look forward to seeing at the end of the day. All that we want to do is grab a bite
to eat and then head off into our own little world before going to bed. For others,
our beloved is no longer with us. Differences or death may have taken them away.
Our home now is a bit darker.
This time of the Church year, known as Lent, is when the body of Christ here
on earth focuses its attention on its shortcomings and works on correcting them.
This description of how God changes us is much more than a metaphor. It is
actually what is happening. The Holy Spirit, the force that animates us, is moving
us to change, to remove the distance that we have imposed between ourselves, the
rest of creation, and God. This is the work of the Spirit, to call us back into the
fold.

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 God has given us several different tools that we traditionally use to accomplish
this task set before us. The most common ones were given in the exhortation:
repentance, fasting, prayer, and the works of love.
Repentance is something that we practice here during the liturgy. We ask God
for pardon and we receive God’s complete and total absolution for what we have
done. This gift of grace from God is also the first step in restoration. The distance
that separates us from God is removed. The exact same pattern of asking for for-
giveness must occur outside of these four walls. This work is difficult because we
no longer have a pastor leading us through the words. Instead, we must put into
action what we have learned here. We must recognize what we have done and ask
for absolution. Since all of our deeds change the world, we will have to work at
undoing what we have done.
As a culture, we have forgotten the work of fasting and the idea of giving up
food sounds strange to us. The only required fast in the Law is on the Day of
Atonement, which falls on October 9 this year.3 The primary purpose of any fast
is not to deprive you from food or to make you miserable in any way. Rather,
fasting gives you extra time to devote to the other activities of the believer like
repentance, prayer, and good works. This is why the Church still asks for fasts.4
3
S.J. Daniel J. Harrington; Idem, editor, The Gospel of Matthew, Volume 1, Sacra Pagina Se-
ries, (Collegeville, Minnesota: The Liturgical Press, 1991), p. 96. This is the time of the year that
the priest, by God’s power, removes the sins of the people and the land (Leviticus 16:29-34; 23:26-
32). Other fasts were called during times of trail or when national emergencies were remembered.
ibid..
4
One specific example that Martin Luther teaches us can be found in the Small Catechism. He
writes that fasting along with preparing oneself is a good way to train oneself for Holy Commu-
nion.

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 Prayer is a blessing from God that we should take advantage of at every op-
portunity. No matter what you might have heard from others, it is not difficult to
pray. God does not care about the form a prayer takes nor is God concerned about
the words that we speak because it is one of the jobs of the Spirit to bring God our
prayers (Romans 8:26). This alone should be enough reason to have a conversa-
tion with God. More importantly, we trust in God’s promise that He will answer
our prayers (Psalm 50:15; Matthew 7:7).
Good works are the last discipline that we focus on during Lent. These are
the acts of love that the Holy Spirit works through us. They include the everyday
tasks that each of us performs in our specific situation. It could be something as
simple as picking up the phone and calling a friend that you know is lonely. The
assignment could be as complex as helping a complete stranger understand God’s
love for them.
O. Henry’s heart-warming story of the young couple’s Christmass presents is
a classic that we know to be true. He has accurately captured a key part of our
human behavior. Our focus in life can be clearly seen where we invest ourselves.
The same can be said off each of us. We serve whatever we love.
Love your spouse, spend time with the children and grandchildren, hug the
dog and play with the cat. These also are part of the disciplines of Lent because
they fulfill half of the great commandment to love God and those around us.
“The peace of God, which passeth all understanding, keep your hearts and
minds through Christ Jesus.”5
5
Philippians 4:7.

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References

Daniel J. Harrington, S.J.; Idem, editor, The Gospel of Matthew, Volume 1, Sacra
Pagina Series, (Collegeville, Minnesota: The Liturgical Press, 1991).

Henry, O., The Gift Of The Magi, (1906).