Gift of Gold

…and when they had opened their treasures,

They presented unto Him gifts: gold…

Matthew 2:11

When my father died in February, and then my mother passed away in May, the terms of my parents’ wills left the dispersal of the estate in my hands.  I took the month of July off from work, flew to Phoenix and, with the help of my brothers, began the liquidation process of their physical assets. 

When Dad officially retired, he started each day with a very long walk, usually over to the parking lot surrounding the old Phoenix Coliseum, carrying a large black garbage bag to hold the empty soda cans he would collect.  His eagle eye searched every inch of that huge parking lot, discovering money (placed in a pants’ pocket) and other small treasures (placed in the other pocket).  When he arrived back home, he would put the bag of cans in the shop, place the money in a container in the kitchen, and toss any small treasures into the middle left-hand drawer of the huge desk sitting in the corner of the family room.

My father, a product of the Great Depression, had built the addition to our family home with evaporative cooling as the main means of comfort during the summer months.  If you know anything about swamp coolers at all, you realize that in the 100+ degree temperatures of a Phoenix summer, they are capable of producing no cooling at all.  What they do provide is an abundance of indoor dust – not simply on top of every available surface, but sifting inside doors and drawers as well.  Dad’s desk sat directly under the cooling vent, and the dusting process of many years had produced a 2-3 inch base of dirt in the bottom of the drawers.

On a hot, sticky July morning, I sat down to empty out that desk, filled with a lifetime of my father’s quirks and treasures.  When I reached the middle left-hand drawer, I pulled out old clocks and cameras, a couple packs of playing cards, restaurant flyers, tiny children’s toys, paper clips, several undetermined gizmos, and a dead bug or two.  When all the “valuables” were removed, I lifted the drawer to pour the dirt into a waiting garbage receptacle.  The dust shifted a bit, and a stray shaft of sunlight caught a slight glimmer in the muck.  I dug through the dirt and pulled out a gorgeous ring.

Whenever or wherever my father found the ring, it had absolutely no business in his “useless treasure” drawer.  It is an ornate cocktail ring that Dad might have mistaken for a cheap piece of costume jewelry.  The weight of the ring in the hand tells a much different story, however.  It is 14K gold [565 hallmark], with a center oval-cut blue sapphire, six marquise-cut blue sapphires (3 on each side of the center oval) surrounded by ten minute diamonds.  It is breathtaking, and one of my most cherished possessions.

The gold that the Magi brought to present to the baby Jesus was given to recognize His position as King of the Jews.  It was and is a wonderful gift for anyone, but was especially appropriate for royalty.  This gift of gold was from one king to another – from the ruler of an earthly kingdom to the Creator of the Universe.