I loved the words to one of the hymns we sang in Church today (despite the "stranger" reference to the baby Jesus...which is a bit odd in my book). Especially the third verse - let us all be wise men and women who still seek Him.
With wondr'ing awe the wise men saw
The star in heaven springing,
And with delight, in peaceful night,
They heard the angels singing:
Hosanna, hosanna, hosanna to his name!
By light of star they traveled far
To seek the lowly manger,
A humble bed wherein was laid
The wondrous little Stranger.
Hosanna, hosanna, hosanna to his name!
And still is found the world around,
The old and hallowed story,
And still is sung in ev'ry tongue,
The angel's song of glory:
Hosanna, hosanna, hosanna to his name!
The heavenly star its rays afar
On ev'ry land is throwing,
And shall not cease til holy peace
In all the earth is growing
Hosanna, hosanna, hosanna to his name!
My mission contained two Christmases. The first one was with a Russian companion and the second one was with a Ukrainian companion. Christmas on your mission is obviously a lot different from "regular" Christmases, but some things remain the same. I still got gifts and got to eat a special meal. However, it's the differences that I wanted to blog a bit about. I'll start with the first Christmas and maybe another day I'll talk about the second.
My first Christmas on my mission was in a tiny city 2,000 miles from the mission home. Missionaries called it "Pai" (Paradise) because it had a very high baptism rate. I thought it was a paradise because of the wonderful way members treated us. People in that city in Russia are just dang nice. During the beginning weeks of December, my companion and I had many progressing investigators and she decided to challenge all of them to get baptised. In the end, many of them did, some of them on Christmas.
Our district had a baptismal service on Christmas Day - the most beautiful expression of "White Christmas." Five people got baptised that day,* and I remember thinking what a sweet experience it was and that it would surely be among my top Christmases of all time. The baptism was in the "Yolki Polki" (literally, "Christmas Tree Sticks" it's an expression in Russian) Sauna. It was kind of an odd place to have a baptism, but I just remember being so very very happy. Even if I couldn't understand everything that was said, I felt the spirit of truth and was so happy for these people who had made a choice to follow Christ, the whole reason for Christmas.
The baptism was followed by a Christmas party with all the church members. Actually to be honest I'm not sure it was the same exact day as the baptism, but I know it was around Christmas. We missionaries arrived and found that no activities had been planned for the party!!! So, the party started 45 minutes late so that we could plan everything - spiritual thought, an acapella version of "O Holy Night" that turned out surprisingly well, me playing the piano very poorly, and a live manger scene involving some hastily conceived costumes. Again, I remember a feeling of warm contentment and happiness.
Another thing I remember about that Christmas was my companion's reaction to presents. My mom had sent me a big package (actually, two - just in case one didn't get there on time), and my companion was so excited she literally did not want to wait until Christmas morning! She had already received and opened her Christmas package days before (full of her favorite Russian candy). I would almost say she was childishly excited, but that has a pejorative connotation - except maybe at Christmas, when childish wonderment is all around. She was very excited about the gift that my parents included in the package for her. Then, I remember very distinctly what she did after I opened all my gifts. She gathered up all the discarded wrapping paper and used it to wrap gifts for so many people - she gave away a lot of things that were in her Christmas package, and didn't mind a bit. She wanted to create the same kind of excitement that she had in opening her gifts. That Christmas taught me that Christmas about giving.
"To Give is Better than to Receive" - much as I like receiving presents, I love giving something, especially when I find the perfect gift for someone.
*Not all of them our investigators, don't want you to think I'm some kind of super missionary!
Even though I don't normally like classical music a whole lot (it all sounds the same to me...I know, I'm an uneducated jerk), I'm nuts for the Nutcracker! Pyotr Illych Tchaikovsky really knew what he was up to, especially because he's Russian! I've had it in my head all day!
Enjoy the whole ballet (I think) via grooveshark widget:
Instead of doing what I planned tonight, which was silly, I'm going to post some quotes from the First Presidency* Christmas Devotional in 2000. For some people, Christmas isn't religious, but I think we all feel something special about it. I personally feel like it brings out the best in every person. I liked all three of the short talks at the Devotional, you can read them online here. This Sunday is this year's First Presidency Christmas Devotional, you can watch/listen to it online at 8 p.m. Eastern Standard time. The music and words will be fantastic!
From President Hinckley:
All of earth’s children are the sons and daughters of our Heavenly Father. Fatherhood denotes brotherhood and sisterhood. We are of His family, you and I. We have within each of us something of His divinity. We have an obligation one to another. We are commanded to love our neighbor as ourselves. It is the Light of Christ which has brought into the world an enlarged sense of brotherhood. While there is much of darkness and strife, of brutality and evil in our time, there is yet more of appreciation and respect, of reaching down and helping, of giving and loving than at any previous period in the history of the world, I so believe.
At this glad season how grateful we should feel. “He, watching over Israel, slumbers not nor sleeps” (see Ps. 121:4). He walked the earth as our teacher, our leader, our exemplar, our Lord. Through His matchless Atonement, He did for each of us what we could not do for ourselves. “O death, where is thy sting? O grave, where is thy victory?” (1 Cor. 15:55). Through His great atoning sacrifice, He cut the knot of the cords that bound us and gave us freedom to go forward on the road to immortality and eternal life. He is our Lord, our Master, our Redeemer, our King, our Ruler, and our God. Without Him there is no salvation.
From President Monson:
Our opportunities to give of ourselves are indeed limitless, but they are also perishable. There are hearts to gladden. There are kind words to say. There are gifts to be given. There are deeds to be done. There are souls to be saved.
There is no better time than now, this very Christmas season, for all of us to rededicate ourselves to the principles taught by Jesus the Christ. It is the time to love the Lord our God with all our heart and our neighbors as ourselves. It is well to remember that he who gives money gives much, he who gives time gives more, but he who gives of himself gives all.
From President Faust:
I wonder why it takes the Christmas season to bring out the best in all of us. Parents have the same love for their children 365 days a year. We are all nieces, nephews, uncles, aunts, cousins, friends, and brothers and sisters in the kingdom of God each day of our lives.
I would hope that we can try to open our hearts a little more each day and not wait for the Christmas season. A gift given or an expression of kindness may be more unexpected and appreciated in July than in December.
*The First Presidency is the guiding body of the church, made up of the Prophet (in 2000, President Hinckley), and his two counselors (Presidents Faust and Monson).
I'll let this one speak for itself, as it's been around more than 100 years and is one of the most reprinted editorials of all time. As long as goodness exists in the world, so does Santa Claus!
"DEAR EDITOR: I am 8 years old.
"Some of my little friends say there is no Santa Claus.
"Papa says, 'If you see it in THE SUN it's so.'
"Please tell me the truth; is there a Santa Claus?
"VIRGINIA O'HANLON.
"115 WEST NINETY-FIFTH STREET."
VIRGINIA, your little friends are wrong. They have been affected by the skepticism of a skeptical age. They do not believe except [what] they see. They think that nothing can be which is not comprehensible by their little minds. All minds, Virginia, whether they be men's or children's, are little. In this great universe of ours man is a mere insect, an ant, in his intellect, as compared with the boundless world about him, as measured by the intelligence capable of grasping the whole of truth and knowledge.
Yes, VIRGINIA, there is a Santa Claus. He exists as certainly as love and generosity and devotion exist, and you know that they abound and give to your life its highest beauty and joy. Alas! how dreary would be the world if there were no Santa Claus. It would be as dreary as if there were no VIRGINIAS. There would be no childlike faith then, no poetry, no romance to make tolerable this existence. We should have no enjoyment, except in sense and sight. The eternal light with which childhood fills the world would be extinguished.
Not believe in Santa Claus! You might as well not believe in fairies! You might get your papa to hire men to watch in all the chimneys on Christmas Eve to catch Santa Claus, but even if they did not see Santa Claus coming down, what would that prove? Nobody sees Santa Claus, but that is no sign that there is no Santa Claus. The most real things in the world are those that neither children nor men can see. Did you ever see fairies dancing on the lawn? Of course not, but that's no proof that they are not there. Nobody can conceive or imagine all the wonders there are unseen and unseeable in the world.
You may tear apart the baby's rattle and see what makes the noise inside, but there is a veil covering the unseen world which not the strongest man, nor even the united strength of all the strongest men that ever lived, could tear apart. Only faith, fancy, poetry, love, romance, can push aside that curtain and view and picture the supernal beauty and glory beyond. Is it all real? Ah, VIRGINIA, in all this world there is nothing else real and abiding.
No Santa Claus! Thank God! he lives, and he lives forever. A thousand years from now, Virginia, nay, ten times ten thousand years from now, he will continue to make glad the heart of childhood.
This month my book club is reading "A Christmas Carol" by Charles Dickens, which is a classic Christmas masterpiece (Read online here). As I read it, I thought about changes of heart. When we first meet Scrooge, Dickens describes him thusly:
"Oh! But he was a tight-fisted hand at the grind-stone, Scrooge! a squeezing, wrenching, grasping, scraping, clutching, covetous, old sinner! Hard and sharp as flint, from which no steel had ever struck out generous fire; secret, and self-contained, and solitary as an oyster. The cold within him froze his old features, nipped his pointed nose, shrivelled his cheek, stiffened his gait; made his eyes red, his thin lips blue; and spoke out shrewdly in his grating voice. A frosty rime was on his head, and on his eyebrows, and his wiry chin. He carried his own low temperature always about with him; he iced his office in the dog-days; and didn't thaw it one degree at Christmas.
External heat and cold had little influence on Scrooge. No warmth could warm, no wintry weather chill him. No wind that blew was bitterer than he, no falling snow was more intent upon its purpose, no pelting rain less open to entreaty. Foul weather didn't know where to have him. The heaviest rain, and snow, and hail, and sleet, could boast of the advantage over him in only one respect. They often "came down" handsomely, and Scrooge never did."
Dickens goes on in his description, but you get the idea. Scrooge is an extreme example of someone obsessed with worldly wealth and with himself - cold to the warmth of loving, human relationships. In short, he doesn't have a heart.
We often think of the three ghosts of Christmas Past, Present, and Future who visit Scrooge, but as I reread the book this time, the Ghost that struck me the most was the first to visit Scrooge - the ghost of Jacob Marley, his old business partner. Marley is a mournful ghost because of his missed opportunities. Read Marley's reply to Scrooge's efforts to cheer him up:
"But you were always a good man of business, Jacob," faltered Scrooge, who now began to apply this to himself. "Business!" cried the Ghost, wringing its hands again. "Mankind was my business. The common welfare was my business; charity, mercy, forbearance, and benevolence, were all my business. The dealings of my trade were but a drop of water in the comprehensive ocean of my business!"
I love those words because they remind us that our business isn't business, it's being truly charitable and loving others. Marley, and the other three ghosts who visit Scrooge, make him feel much the same way - during each Ghost's visit he thinks of something kind that he could have done, but failed to do. So, take this Christmas opportunity to do something nice for someone - don't be a Scrooge! It doesn't take much, as the Ghost of Christmas Past reminds Scrooge. In this section of the book, Scrooge is given a glimpse of his old boss, who kindly threw a Christmas party and invited the entire neighborhood. The Ghost of Christmas past remarks that this was a waste of money:
“Why! Is it not? He has spent but a few pounds of your mortal money: three or four perhaps. Is that so much that he deserves this praise?”
“It isn’t that,” said Scrooge, heated by the remark, and speaking unconsciously like his former, not his latter, self. “It isn’t that, Spirit. He has the power to render us happy or unhappy; to make our service light or burdensome; a pleasure or a toil. Say that his power lies in words and looks; in things so slight and insignificant that it is impossible to add and count ’em up: what then? The happiness he gives, is quite as great as if it cost a fortune.”
Scrooge learns that much money is not prerequisite to sharing Christmas joy (a needful lesson for those of us with less wealth than Scrooge). Scrooge is changed into a generous and giving person. Though Scrooge's change of heart comes suddenly, I like to hope that it was sincere and lasting. By the end of the book, Scrooge is as happy as a school child, delighting in sending a prize turkey to his clerk (anonymously, which I love). Contrast the closing description of Scrooge with the beginning description. I'll let Dicken's masterful words close this post (don't forget to play the song at the end - in honor of my brother, it's Chanticleer). I hope we can all have a change of heart in seeking to do good, be charitable, and lift others with the joy of Christmas!
"[Scrooge] became as good a friend, as good a master, and as good a man, as the good old city knew, or any other good old city, town, or borough, in the good old world. Some people laughed to see the alteration in him, but he let them laugh, and little heeded them; for he was wise enough to know that nothing ever happened on this globe, for good, at which some people did not have their fill of laughter in the outset; and knowing that such as these would be blind anyway, he thought it quite as well that they should wrinkle up their eyes in grins, as have the malady in less attractive forms. His own heart laughed: and that was quite enough for him.
He had no further intercourse with Spirits, but lived upon the Total Abstinence Principle, ever afterwards; and it was always said of him, that he knew how to keep Christmas well, if any man alive possessed the knowledge. May that be truly said of us, and all of us! And so, as Tiny Tim observed, God bless Us, Every One!"
Deck the halls! It's Christmastime! I love Christmas because it tends to bring out the best in people, and encourages kindness and generosity - qualities needed greatly in the world today (More accurately, I should say I love the true Spirit of Christmas - not the crass commercialism that sometimes overtakes the holiday).
As a celebratory gesture from me to you, I'm going to be posting Christmas cheer (in small doses) each of the 25 days before Christmas. Fair warning: some thoughts will be funny, silly, mawkish, sentimental, and/or corny; and hopefully some will be downright spiritual. I'll be quoting Dickens, Longfellow, O'Henry, and a letter to a girl named Virginia in the coming days. I might even type up some favorite Christmas memories to share with you. Let me know if you have favorite Christmas stories/poems/songs to share.
This is post #1, and was inspired by listening to a choir performance in Salt Lake City's Temple Square on Sunday night. I love this song, because we all do "need a little Christmas" in our lives.
(Couldn't find a good choir version on YouTube, but Johnny Mathis will have to do)
