Hi, and welcome to the Five Word Prayers Daily, a five-day-a-week, daily devotional where we share the word, prayers, in our heart.

I'm Lisa Whittle, and I welcome you to just five minutes with me, which I trust and pray will be five minutes well spent.

If you're just joining for the first time this week, we're diving into all things giving on the daily, the gift God most wants from you, what I've learned about giving

this year, and today I want to tap into an aspect of the Christmas story you probably all know about,

but is really important as it relates to how we give to others in this world. And no, I'm not

talking about those kinds of gifts under the tree.

So before this show airs, I had planned to take a poll and ask how many of you have heard the Christmas story and know what it is, but I felt like it would be a waste of time because

I was pretty sure almost 100% of you would say yes.

And no, I'm not talking about that movie that we watched in the 80s with the leg lamp and the tongue frozen to the post.

And you'll shoot your eye out.

If you don't know what I'm talking about, Google it.

Google will back me up.

But I'm talking about the story about Mary and Joseph, of course, and Jesus and no room at the end and the shepherds and the three wise men following the star and bringing their gifts to

Jesus and all of the whole thing. You know the Christmas story, right? If you don't, it's told

in Matthew and Luke and Luke, and we're going to link the Luke account in the show notes for you to go

and read. But I want to talk about the wise men today because they brought to Jesus gifts of their

hands, and this is important because their gifts not only

symbolized things, but also brought benefits beyond what people might have even known.

Gold was brought by one, and it represented God's kingship and regality.

Frankincense was brought by another, and it represented worship, and Mur, which represented

death and mourning.

All of these were very symbolic of Jesus, the King of Kings, who many would worship,

...