Sharing Something Precious

It feels like Sunday.  I think that is because SK wore a suit all day and I wore a dress, and I wasn’t cooking or cleaning up.  It also felt like a Sunday because I spent a good portion of the day in the chapel being spiritually fed. (There was an hour or so where we were physically fed with a Danish Christmas feast....it was incredible.) 

We left at 9:15 to go to the church over by the temple for Zone conference.  We stayed until it was over at 5:30.  It was a lovely day.  How can it be anything else when you are with a group of young people who are so fun and so good?  Throughout the day, a lot of the young elders were a little more giddy than usual with Christmas coming up.  It is an interesting thing.  Have you ever been in a room where a group of 7 or 8 young men start laughing out loud at something?  I guess it depends entirely upon the situation, but it could be very uncomfortable.

Each time it happened I looked at them and just had to smile.  They were happy….they were enjoying a joke and having a great time.  When they are conducting meetings or training or bearing testimony or simply making a comment related to the topic, I sometimes forget how young they are….just barely out of high school.  They were all in suits and looked so scrubbed and clean.  The young women all looked lovely and like the elders were so happy to all be together for training, for a Christmas feast and for a change from the routine.

We watched two short videos that were wonderful, and then the Assistants and the President spoke to us about them.  This Christmas season our initiative is to share the videos with everyone we meet.  They gave us special pass-along cards that will help.  I think we all came away with a strong sense of the special mission we have to bring people to Christ…who is mighty to save.  This time of year is a wonderful time to share that message.

Go to Christmas.mormon.org and watch “He is the Gift” and if you have 7 minutes and would like to watch a beautiful portrayal of “The Nativity” go to this website:

https://www.lds.org/media-library/video/2011-10-067-the-nativity?lang=eng

“The Nativity” made me cry…it was very tender.  We were asked to turn to someone near us and role-play engaging them in a conversation about Christmas and give them a card.  Sister Hamblin began talking to me and I was pretending to be someone not interested.  Then she asked why I thought the Savior was born….I couldn’t answer because my heart had been touched by the video. 

It is so amazing to think that Jesus Christ would come to earth as a helpless infant – to an inexperienced young couple.  I hope someday we will be able to see his childhood the way we watched the video today.  Mary must have been beyond description in her faith and purity and wisdom….Joseph must have been an exceptional father. 

I never tire of the Christmas story.

We all sang Christmas carols together….I love being surrounded by all those strong young voices….singing out with enthusiasm and love for the Savior.  Then a surprise….the last couple of hours we watched “Frozen.”  I was delighted to watch and listen to their reaction to that show.  They laughed at little Olaf and they oohed at the appropriate places.  Where could you find a group of people in their late teens/early twenties who could enjoy a Disney movie with such relish?

We came home with Elder and Sister Middlemas who will stay with us tonight and tomorrow night.  They came into town from a little island called Borneholm which is out in the Baltic Sea somewhere between Denmark and Sweden.  After serving in a ward on Jutland for a year, they were transferred to this little island where Elder Middlemas has been called as the branch president and his wife as the ad hoc relief society president (she just naturally puts people at ease and loves to serve).  They are stalwarts who serve where ever they are called and give their calls great relevance because of their diligence.