"What happened to it?," the child asked.

"What happened to what?" someone replied.

"My gift for Mom and Dad. It was the smallest and it got lost," he sadly replied.

It happens that way. It seems that when it comes to gift giving we feel the need to

out do each other. The bigger the box, the more money we spend, the more love expressed.

It's simply not true. It's all a lie and we know it.

"Oh, you didn't have to..."

Yes they did. The world demands it of us. You know you would have felt rejected,

ignored and overlooked if they didn't give you something.

"I have to get a gift for Joe. He gave me something last year."

"I'm only sending cards to people who sent them to me."

How sad. Gift giving has become a matching game. Or worst yet, a competition.

So it was on this Christmas morning.

"I can't believe all of the presents!" someone said.

"This is even more than last year!" the oldest child confirmed.

"I guess Santa out did himself this year," Dad said.

"You must have been really good!" said Mom.

"Wait before you open them, let's get a picture of it all. We can compare it to

last year's gifts," said Dad.

Then the reds and greens of fancy Christmas paper flew across the room. The

bows and ribbons were crushed among the efforts to make get to the gifts.

The youngest child was lost at times in the rush to find his own Santa's treasures

but managed to survive somehow.

"Don't forget the gifts we got for each other!" one child yelled.

The youngest child stopped what he was doing. He wanted to watch his

parents when they opened his special gift.

But it was no where to be found.

"What happened to it?," the child asked.

"What happened to what?" someone replied.

"My gift for Mom and Dad. It was the smallest and it got lost," he sadly replied.

The others were too busy to help him find it. They already began clearing away

the paper and he feared they had tossed it in the garbage.

"You need to get bigger gifts. You don't lose big gifts," his older sister said laughing.

"But it was the biggest gift of all," the child replied.

He sat down in frustration and began to cry.

"Is this it?" his brother asked as he held the little box in his hand. "I almost stepped on it."

"That's the biggest gift of all?" the sister said mockingly. "What a joke!"

"It is! It is!" he shouted back. "You'll see!"

Then, grabbing it from his brother's hand he straightened out the bow and

handed it to Mom.

"Daddy, come here. This is for you, too," he said while sniffling away his tears.

Everyone stopped what they were doing to see what he had given. Perhaps

just out of curiosity, maybe just to laugh.

Carefully Mom unwrapped the gift and opened the box.

"Oh, my!" she said as she slowly sat down on the couch.

"What? What is it?" someone said.

Then Dad sat down next to her to share the special moment.

"Oh, I see." he said. Looking at his wife he humbly said, "It is indeed the biggest gift."

Then Mom reached in, pulled out the gift and placed it on her hand.

It was the Christ Child in the cradle.

Dad glanced over to look at their manger now buried beneath the all too many gifts.

"Clear away those things," he asked of his oldest child.

The dimly lit star attached to the manger shown down on the spot where the

Christ Child would normally be.

"But he took it from..." his sister began to say until Mom interrupted her.

"He took it from the story of Christmas. The real reason we should be

celebrating," she said.

The small child was standing next to the tree. The white lights sparkled

off the warm streams of tears that ran down his face. Quietly he explained...

"Every year we think about how to give the biggest gift. I thought that this year

I would give the best gift anyone could ever give. The pastor at Bible school

asked us to think about the greatest gift of all. Then I thought about Jesus and

knew that I could not ever out give God. So my gift to you and Dad was the

Biggest gift of all...ever!"

Suddenly it was silent. Mom glanced around the room and humbly said,

"I am ashamed. We had forgotten the meaning of it all."

Then motioning to her son she said, "Come here. You were right.