The Spirit of Christmas – Sunday, December 14, 1980
We have entered one of the most loved seasons of the year—a time when we openly encourage each other to extend ourselves in a spirit of brotherhood—and yet, the world seems filled with tension and increasing stress. There is much hardship and distrust on the earth.
Sometimes it seems 2,000 years have done little to change the world’s need for peace and goodwill. But we are always willing to try a little harder during the Christmas season.
We reaffirm the principles taught by the man known as the Prince of Peace.
At Christmas, the best in all of us is born again. And from this seasonal outpouring, the well flows over into other months of the year. The meaning and the spirit of Christmas give us the perspective we sorely need—plus a hope that the problems of this age will somehow, sometime pass, and that the ideal of peace will become reality.
That is why Christmas is a season for true and sincere worship, We must not forget that on that first Christmas day nearly 2,000 years ago, the creator of this world came to earth as the babe in the manger. His memory makes the Christmas season more than a time for festivity, and merrymaking, and exchanging gifts. Let it also be a time for the contemplation of eternal things and of brotherly love, a time to make the golden rule an integral part of our lives. It was He who said, “Whatsoever ye would that men should do to you, do ye even so to them.”1 Is not this the true Christmas spirit?
One religious leader summed it up this way: “Christmas is a fitting time to renew our desires and to strengthen our determination to do all that lies within our power to make real among men the message heralded by the angels when the Savior was born . . . Let us strive to establish peace on earth by exercising that same goodwill toward one another which God has shown toward us.”2
Yes, this Christmas Season, let us find the glow that comes from the simple and genuine things of life. Let us open up our hearts so that the spirit of love and brotherhood may enter in. Let us once again rededicate our own lives to those principles of truth which offer all humankind the promise of peace.
1 New Testament, St. Matthew 7:12.
2 David 0. McKay.
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December 14, 1980
Broadcast Number 2,678