a Christmas Eve I will always remember

A couple nights ago we were sitting beside the Christmas tree and trying to recall the events of the past couple Christmases. It took me several minutes to remember what actually occurred in these separate years. I, of course, cherish all of them but they seem to melt together in a single "Christmastime memory" with little distinction between them.

I doubt that that will be the case this year...




This holiday season has been so different from any other that Ive experienced. It has been a refining time for me and a time of great trial for many people that I love. I have had a hard time in balancing my desires to give all I have in helping and loving the ones that I know need it and in trying to sustain myself.
I feel quite certain that I will distinctly remember this Christmas Eve for a long time.

The interesting thing is that I have felt a closeness to my Savior that is different than at any other Christmas in my life - simply because of my inability to stand without Him. This closeness has come because of need as opposed to desire. Because of utter reliance.
And that makes this Christmas so much more special to me. I am not only feeling gratitude for the times in my life that I have felt the relief, blessings, joy, etc that has come because of the birth of my Lord and Savior Jesus Christ - I am feeling such extreme gratitude for the very feeling I have at this moment through Him.

As I got on blogger this morning I got to read The Most Timely Blogpost written on NieNie Dialogues.
I share it with all who are having an out of the ordinary or difficult Christmas. And with those who arent - to remember those times when you have felt the atonement heal your heart, purify your spirit, make you more like Christ. To remember when things were difficult, but you knelt down and felt of the love of your Savior and knew with surety that He knows you, is mindful of you, and has not left you.

I wish I could praise my Savior in a way that is worthy of Him. My efforts in obedience, my trifle service to His gospel, my exertion in discipleship - my own gold, frankincense, and myrrh - will never be deserving of the blessings I have received.

During this very Christmas Eve, I have felt the love of my Savior and my burdens have been made light. No earthly words can express that feeling, that love.

As I listened to 'I Celebrate the Day' by Relient K yesterday - I realized it comes pretty close to the feeling I have this Christmas

"And so this Christmas I'll compare the things I felt in prior years
To what this midnight made so clear
That You have come to meet me here

To look back and think that
This baby would one day save me
In the hope that what You did
That you were born so I might really live

And I, I celebrate the day
That You were born to die
So I could one day pray
for You to save my life"


I end this post with a portion of a talk that has always brought my perspective back to where I want it to be. Although it is for Easter, how are those two really separable?




to reiterate Elder Jeffrey R. Holland:

"As we approach this holy week . . . may we declare ourselves to be more fully disciples of the Lord Jesus Christ, not in word only and not only in the flush of comfortable times but in deed and in courage and in faith, including when the path is lonely and when our cross is difficult to bear. This week and always, may we stand by Jesus Christ "at all times and in all things, and in all places that [we] may be in, even until death,' (Mosiah 18:9) for surely that is how He stood by us when it was unto death and when He had to stand entirely and utterly alone."

Merry Christmas Eve.

Let all within us praise His holy name.