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This devotional address entitled The Gift That Matters Most was given on December

6th of 1981 by J. Richard Clark, then second counselor in the presiding bishopric of the

Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.

Realizing the time of year it is,

that you're getting ready for finals and the kind of hours that you keep,

and realizing what I've been through the last few days,

I want you to know that I feel just like one of you.

I don't know which of you it is I feel like,

but whoever it is, probably ought to be home in bed.

I would like to begin tonight by reading his story by Rex Knowles.

He titles, Gifts of the Wise Children, or Gold, Circumstance, and mud.

He said it was a week before Christmas.

I was babysitting with our four children while my wife took the baby for his checkup.

Babysitting to me means reading the paper while the kids mess up the house.

Only that day I wasn't reading.

I was fuming.

On every page of the paper as I flicked angrily through them,

gifts glittered and reindeer pranced,

and I was told that there were only six more days in which to rush out and buy what I couldn't afford and nobody wanted.

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