Finding Christ at Christmas

It's the day before Christmas, 2007. It's my seventy third Christmas...fifty fifth as an "adult". And still I struggle with the same earnest desire to become so close to my Savior that I can feel Him close to me, feel His love and peace, and more importantly feel the deep love and gratitude I know I should have for Him and my Father in Heavenly for the great sacrifice they both made that I might return to their presence. Don't take me wrong. I DO love the Savior and my Heavenly Father, but I guess what I desire is to feel more than the earthly love that I feel for my children and spouse, which is the deepest love I have yet to feel. I guess what I want to feel is true charity...the true love that Christ has for us especially during the Christmas season. You would think that at this season of the year when we as Christians and members of His church should focus on His birth and mission as the center of our celebration that drawing close would be easier. I have found it just the opposite. It has become the time that we get so encumbered with relatively unimportant things, so stressed by the demands on our time and energy, even so engaged in trying to do good things for others that we have no time left for peaceful solitude and reflection, for quiet and sincere study and prayer, to be alone out among God's beautiful creations and feel His presence there. I guess I'm talking about us wives and mothers.

This year I have been thinking back at Christmas past and trying to remember if perhaps there have been glimpses of this feeling that I desire that I may have missed because I wasn't paying attention. These are some of the things that came to mind.

• Christmas Eves as a child with family - definitely warm memories, but more of childhood excitement.
• The year I received the most beautiful doll in the whole world - definitely childhood excitement. No spiritual memories here.<>
• <>The year my little brother (Jr. High age) told mom he wanted to give the money that would be spent on him for Christmas (all of $10.00) to help a needy family that was adopted by his home room class. I was proud of him, but I'm sure it was he that had the feelings of love from the Savior.
• <>The first Christmas we were married. My mother had passed away that October and no one stepped up to planning a family Christmas. It had been mother who had always done that. The most sad and empty Christmas of my life. It could have been so different if I had stepped up to the plate.
• The next Christmas after our little Jeanie was born. This one became one of the best. Why? Jim was in school and we had next to nothing to spend on Christmas. I think that is one of the keys to having a more spiritual holiday. You become so grateful for what you DO have. And we had our little family. I remember buying three toys for Jeanie...a little four-piece plastic train (no track), a stuffed animal, and I can't remember what else. I just remember hiding them in the bottom of zip-up clothes bag...as if I needed to hide them from a nine month old. We managed a small tree, one string of lights, a dozen glass ornaments and finished decorating it with our Christmas cards as we received them. Definitely one of our more spiritual Christmas's.
• The year our landlord died and our low-rent house was put up for sale. We needed to save money for a new house so only gave the small children dime-store gifts (they didn't mind a bit) and the adults did white elephants, a tradition still going on today. Then our children gave us the best Christmas ever. They pooled their hard-earned money and gave us a down payment on a new house. How blessed we felt for having such wonderful, loving children.
• As our family grew and our Christmas traditions became established, we tried to make doing for others a part of those traditions. Each year we tried to do a service for someone in need. Surely this would bring those burning feeling of love I desired to feel. But even service projects require planning and shopping. I spent so much time and effort in preparation that I left no time for myself for those quiet reflective moments. I have often wished I had a grove of trees in my back yard where I could find the peace and quiet.

There are many more Christmases I could write about. But I want to get to this year. This year I have had brief glimpses of that elusive burning in the bosom type love of and for God and His son. And it is because I made the effort. I completed my preparations by the first of December so I could really concentrate doing what I needed to do to be truly worthy of the feelings I desired. I earnestly studied the New Testament this year and even completed the Institute manual on the New Testament. It was my desire to really get to KNOW God and His Son. It is hard to love someone you do not know. It's hard to describe how I felt as I read and studied. Christ became a person, not a story. I cried over the pain and suffering He went through and truly wanted to show my love and appreciation. Did I feel true charity as I desired and in return did I feel His love? Maybe my expectations aren't realistic, but I did have one experience in which I knew for a brief instance how that love feels. I was visiting one of the inactive sisters that I visit teach. Her inactivity is due to the fact that she feels she can never be forgiven of past transgressions. She has had a incredibly difficult life but has raised a good family. I felt inspired to buy her the book "The Miracle of Forgiveness" for Christmas. I wasn't sure how she would react, so I prayed hard before I went to give it to her. Although, since day one of meeting her four years ago, I felt a special bond today I felt such consuming love for that sister that I broke into tears as I hugged her. I thought to myself, "This is what it must feel like to have Christ-like love". I've really tried to serve God's children this year, and I've tried to give myself time alone with my Father and my Savior to express my love and feel Their love for me. They are always there for me. It is I who does not open that door to them by what I do or do not do. It is my hope and prayer that before I die I will have that constant burning love in my heart for not only my Heavenly Father and my brother, Christ, but for all of my brothers and sisters here on earth. May you all have the same desire and may you be blessed always for all your righteous efforts.

The Most Important Decision of my Life

I enjoyed my new classes at BYU following Christmas break, but as for my social life, that was a different story. I had no desire to date, so I just concentrated on my studies. That quarter I took an archery class along with my academics. My dad was an archer and made all his own equipment including his bows and arrows. He had taught me how to shoot when I was pretty young, and even made me my own bow. So I was not new to the sport. I guess that gave me somewhat of an advantage, and I ended up being the intra-mural archery champion in competition that year. I still have my medal. I still enjoy archery and have taught at several girls camps and was a merit badge counselor in archery for the Boy Scouts for quite a few years.

I believe it was towards the end of February that I was tired of thinking up excuses for turning down dates. I definitely had not been having any fun up to now and had no desire to keep trying. In my next letter to Jim I wrote that I loved him and was waiting for him whether he liked it or not. Actually, it was the first letter I had written in about a month because I was trying to decide what to tell him about those dates, what not to tell him about them, and if I was being a little presumptuous about his feelings for me. I had no idea how his lack of mail from me had affected him until he later told me that he had gone out in the nearby woods to pray. He asked the Lord to help him forget about me if I was not the right one. The very next day he received my letter and felt that he had received an answer to his prayer. The next letter I received from him was a proposal of marriage. We were pretty young to be talking marriage...I just eighteen and Jim just barely twenty. But it wasn't like we had just met. We had actually known each other for over five years.

About two weeks later, on April 1, 1953, I received a ring in the mail. (Jim still teases me that it was all just an elaborate April Fools Day Joke... getting engaged that is). Actually, he sent the set of rings because he had no place to keep the wedding band safe on the base in the Philippines. I didn't know until later that Jim had been saving his money to buy a motor scooter to ride around the base and to do some sight seeing. He gave up that motor schooter to buy those rings. I was so excited that I took a bus home to show my parents who were about as thrilled as me. I expected that of mom because she so wanted to see her children settled before she passed away. She knew she was living on borrowed time. But my dad surprised me. Everywhere we went he would hold up my hand to show off the ring...even to near strangers. It was embarrassing at times. I knew that they both liked Jim, and from their reaction to my engagement I knew that they approved.

It would be a wait of over a year before I would see Jim again. I spent the time finishing that year at BYU and then home to work. I knew I wouldn't be able to return to school that fall because I would have to earn the money for a wedding, which I knew I would have to pay for. And I wanted to have a trousseau before I got married. For you "young'uns" who don't know what a trousseau is, it is a collection of linens, dishes, silverware, etc. that all newly weds need. But back then we embroidered everything...sheets, pillow cases, even dishtowels. AND we crocheted the edges of the embroidered pillow cases. I had a beautiful cedar chest which my parents had given me for high school graduation, and I wanted to fill it up. But first I had to find a job. That was my next task.