麻豆社

Good morning.

There鈥檚 a dusty box in my shed of plastic trophies, plated in metal and once proudly buffed to a high shine. They and the engraved plaques they bear tell a story about my dad; they witness that in the 1980s he was a champion player of darts, dominos and pool and achieved some measure of local success. The darts trophies in particular have come to mind as I鈥檝e watched sixteen year old professional player Luke 鈥淭he Nuke鈥� Littler, cause a sensation at the World Darts Championships by becoming the youngest ever player to win a match at the tournament. He鈥檚 become a viral social media sensation, inspiring millions of people with his amazing giftedness at such a young age and encouraging us to pick up some darts and have a throw.

The idea of gifts as God-given abilities or innate talents is something which can empower us to strive harder and achieve our goals, but it can also be used as a convenient excuse to not even try. January is often littered with good intentions. That time I was going to run a half marathon and never made it because 鈥淚 don鈥檛 have the right knees for running.鈥� The piano I gave up practising because 鈥淚鈥檓 too old to become proficient at it now.鈥� The watercolours I didn鈥檛 use. The foreign languages I never learned. All the things I never dared to try because I told myself I wasn鈥檛 gifted enough to do so. I wonder how many of our God-given gifts lie gathering dust like a box of trophies in a shed, reminding us (if we have the courage to look) of all we could have been, if only we鈥檇 tried.

Today is Twelfth Night, the eve of the Epiphany, when much of the church will celebrate the giving of the gifts of the wise men to the Christ who was the gift. Jesus didn鈥檛 need the things they brought, which were merely symbols of his giftedness: gold for his kingship, frankincense for his godship, myrrh for his death. Before the full reality of who he innately was could be realised he would have to face hardship and suffering, because real gifts are nothing without the hard things that must be done to bring them to fruition.

We鈥檙e not all cut out to be champions. We can鈥檛 all be first. Luke Littler lost the final of the darts championship but I have no doubt that he will return and one day triumph because he has the one thing that true giftedness really requires: the ability to never give up.

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