The Gift of Gifts

O Source of all Good,What shall I render to thee for the gift of gifts, thine own dear Son, begotten, not created, my Redeemer, proxy, surety, substitute, his self-emptying incomprehensible, his infinity of love beyond the heart's grasp.

Herein is wonder of wonders: he came below to raise me above, he was born like me that I might become like him.

Herein is love; when I cannot rise to him he draws near on wings of grace, to raise me to himself.

Herein is power; when Deity and humanity were infinitely apart he united them in indissoluble unity, the uncreated and the created.

Herein is wisdom; when I was undone, with no will to return to him, and no intellect to devise recovery, he came, God-incarnate, to save me to the uttermost, as man to die my death, to shed satisfying blood on my behalf, to work out a perfect righteousness for me.

O God, take me in spirit to the watchful shepherds, and enlarge my mind; let me hear good tidings of great joy, and hearing, believe, rejoice, praise, adore, my conscience bathed in an ocean of repose, my eyes uplifted to a reconciled Father, place me with ox, ass, camel, goat, to look with them upon my Redeemer's face, and in him account myself delivered from sin; let me with Simeon clasp the new-born child to my heart, embrace him with undying faith, exulting that he is mine and I am his.

In him thou hast given me so much that heaven can give no more.

From The Valley of Vision