What if all you got for Christmas was an orange?

You’d no doubt feel disappointed and short-changed, as though Scrooge had been put in charge of the gift-giving this year.

A measly orange? Where was the new big-screen TV you were expecting? Or the latest iPhone you thought would be in your Christmas stocking?

Actually, there was a time when receiving an orange for Christmas was considered a special treat. Oranges were once so rare in northern countries that Christmas was the only time you would splurge on them, and they came to symbolize the holiday season. In some families, an orange would be the only present you’d receive, and you would be thankful for it.

These days, we receive so many gifts that one individual present doesn’t stand out as much. Not only that, we seem to expect increasingly expensive gifts as the years go by.

Surveys show that the average American will spend about $1,000 on Christmas each year, which includes gifts, food, and decorations. Parents spend an average of $200-$300 per child on Christmas presents for their offspring.

That would buy a lot of oranges!

But with all this spending, we don’t seem to cherish the most important gift enough:

Jesus.

Somehow the incalculable worth of the gift of Jesus to humankind gets lost in the mix.

So how do we return to viewing the celebration of the birth of the Christ child as central to our Christmas celebrations?

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