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Jesus was born in Bethlehem and grew up in a country that became for Him, as for us, symbolic of the marvels of His mission.
Christmas is a joyous season, when our thoughts often turn to children. Their eyes sparkle as they see the colorful lights, smiles fill their faces as they see toys stacked to the ceiling in stores, and their hearts beat rapidly as they climb onto Santa’s lap to tell him what they want for Christmas. Loving parents yearn to give their children the gifts that will make their sugar-plum dreams come true, but, in the process, too often forget to give the best gifts of all.
One of the most beloved Christmas songs celebrates that sacred, silent night when Christ was born. Other carols and hymns likewise call our attention to the stillness and the hush attending that holy birth. The gifts that come wrapped in silence are among the most cherished we know.
This is a wonderful season. Around the world people and families gather to reflect upon their blessings and to thank God for His watchful care.
The Psalms are filled with verses of thanksgiving and praise. In a repeated celebration of God’s goodness and mercy, the Psalmist connects these vital expressions: “Enter into his gates with thanksgiving, and into his courts with praise: be thankful unto him and bless his name.”1 Thanks and praise fulfill a similar purpose. In thanks, we turn heavenward. In praise, we glorify God. We are lifted as we worship the Giver of all good gifts.
The word home can send a flood of emotions, feelings, and memories without another word being spoken. For some, single words, such as comfort, warmth, or safety spring to mind. Others recall the smell of Mother’s chocolate-chip cookies, the sound of Father’s shoes on the stairs, or giggles shared with siblings while playing under quilts hung on kitchen chairs.
Who has not seen a little child holding out its arms and looking up to a parent—looking up for comfort, for security, for love? There’s safety in a parent’s embrace. There’s a feeling of well-being, where the world doesn’t seem as hurtful or frightening.
Peace of mind is a treasure available to every person on earth, and is lost only when we allow it to be taken from us. There are many culprits that linger in the shadows of our existence, waiting to prey upon our peace. One of the worst of these is resentment. When someone does something that causes pain in our lives, we can deal with it by taking action, trying to resolve it, dismissing it; or we can languish in feelings of resentment.
True friendship may be the highest expression of what it means to be human. Learning to rely on others and to care about them requires us to live outside ourselves and to suppress the selfish impulses that so often govern our lives. True friendship is a gift two people keep giving each other. Friendship expresses love in many ways, including listening, sharing, trusting, and serving.
What is this marvelous gift we call friendship? We say hello, we welcome or are welcomed, we chat, we become acquainted. Something draws us together. Most often, our closest friendships are harmonized in a symphony of shared tasks, goals, service. We struggle with problems together, we raise children in the same parks, backyards, family rooms, and churches. We serve on committees together, and we share tools, talents, and troubles. We sing together, play games together, pray together, weep together. And liking grows to love. Then, too soon a new job, new house, or new opportunity arises, and it’s time to pack the boxes and hug the hugs. It’s time to say good-bye.
One of the difficult things about life is deciding what’s worthwhile and what isn’t. Many of us have had the experience of pursuing something, only to be disappointed when we finally obtained the goal. Sometimes we’re surprised by the fact that what we thought was so important has brought us no joy or benefit. At other times we find that what we’ve been pursuing didn’t get us even close to where we wanted to be—like climbing a ladder, only to find that it’s resting upon the wrong wall.
Faith is essential to life. Almost intuitively, we recognize a need for it. We seek it; we live by it. But sometimes we yearn for more.
Many adults remember a familiar summons from childhood days—a wake-up call that urged us to “rise and shine!” Arising itself was often enough of a challenge for a sleepy boy or girl, but the possibility of “shining” seemed so unlikely as to be a bit of parental irony. When we understand the origin of the admonition to “arise and shine,” we realize that it is neither ironic nor impossible.
A father recently dropped his young daughter off at school and watched as she hurried up the steps. Then, just before opening the door, she turned back and waved. It was one last way to connect—one last assurance that everything was all right.
Perhaps we’ll never fully understand why good music is such a source of comfort and peace. Most of us have experienced music working its magic in our lives. We’ve felt good music easing our worries and disappointments, lifting clouds of discouragement, and soothing our fears.
Memories made in early childhood stay with us. They are fixed points of reference throughout our lives: how a beautiful flower smells, the softness of a kitten, the sound of a well-loved voice reading a story. This first, fresh view can color all our later experiences. A wise man wrote, “The web woven around [us] in childhood’s days lasts, and seldom wears threadbare; . . . in many instances it grows brighter and brighter and stronger and stronger.”1 Our first-time wonder at the world can serve as a compass, and those memories can give us valuable direction for where we’re going in life.
Communicating with those we love can be one of our most difficult challenges. The words we use can make or break a relationship. A father, who was deeply troubled over the lifestyle his adult son had chosen, took advantage of every opportunity to preach him poignant little sermons punctuated with his condemnation. The son loved his father but avoided spending time alone with him because he didn’t want to hear the preaching and the railing against him.
One of the many ways that God shows His love for us is the guidance and inspiration He sends into our lives. As children of our Heavenly Father, we can rest assured that He will lovingly lead us if we are willing to listen and to learn.
As we stumble our way through a world full of shadows and confusion, we find ourselves wishing for firmer footing and clearer vision. So many of life’s challenges can seem as difficult to us as long division to a small child. Like a child, we wish we could sneak a glance in the teacher’s desk, where all the answers are written. In the classroom of life, answers don’t always come easily. Faced with dilemmas and challenges and trials, we cry out in exasperation, “What am I to do?” This is especially true for the most difficult family challenges—what mother hasn’t wished her children came with owners’ manuals.
The prophet Isaiah gives us much hope with his description of a future when “the wolf
Of all the wonders of the natural world, perhaps none intrigues us more than the stars. As children, we hear the nursery rhyme “Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star,” known in many languages. A few years later we learn to make a wish on the first star seen of an evening. Around the world, on clear evenings, people look up at the stars and contemplate their beauty, possibilities, and great distance. Poems and music celebrate the splendor and mystery of these lights in our firmament. For centuries travelers have navigated over land and sea using the stars as reckoning points.
All great achievements have one thing in common: They were doubted—sometimes even scoffed at—by others with less vision. Every great leader, inventor, and pioneer has chosen to ignore the skeptics who said it couldn’t be done. In many cases, these remarkable heroes endured years of persecution and loneliness in order to make life better for the very people who scorned them. Something inside kept telling them not to give up, but to stay the course and believe in their ideas.
A man flying home from a business trip was surprised when the woman in the seat next to him asked how he could possibly know there is a God. The man explained that he had often felt God’s presence in his life, guiding and directing him as well as comforting him in times of need. Unsatisfied with that answer, the woman wanted to know what God’s presence felt like and how he could possibly know that what he felt was indeed God. The man struggled to find the right words but finally told the woman he couldn’t explain the feelings he had—he just knew.
The blessing of freedom is easily taken for granted—until it is lost.
A businessman, exhausted from a lengthy trip that yielded far less than he had anticipated for all his hard work, sat gazing out of his office window one late afternoon. He felt overcome with discouragement. Even the sky was overcast. He sat, as it were, marinating in his misery when he noticed a break in the clouds that widened into a tiny patch of blue. He was held spellbound as he witnessed visible rays breaking forth from that tiny patch—a shaft of light that illuminated a clouded sky and his own sad heart. As he drank in the view, he felt a warm, reassuring comfort fill his soul. It was as though a loving Father in the distant heavens was saying: “I am with you. All will be well.”
Who can measure the extent of a father’s love or place a value on the power of his example? The same loving father who quiets a five-year-old’s nighttime fears can speak across generations in the memories of his adult children, who are now raising five-year-olds of their own. In so many ways, for better or worse, we follow in our father’s footsteps.
In times of distress or anxiety, most of us find comfort in prayer. Just as a child runs to his parents’ bedroom when a dark night turns frightening, we grown-ups turn to our Heavenly Father when we’re troubled or in pain. We know the comfort sincere communion with our God can bring. And most of us also find time to pray with others, whether blessing our families at bedtime or saying grace over a meal. We pray for comfort, we pray in gratitude, and we know that God hears our prayers—and we find joy in uttering them.
Sometimes the words we use to describe the good and beautiful things of life make them seem too difficult to achieve. But when we examine the words more closely, something like holiness is not so far out of reach. The dictionary says holy means “belonging to, derived from, or associated with a divine power.” In other words, we don’t have to be perfect in order to be holy. We need only to associate ourselves with the divine.
A teacher felt compassion for a young boy in her class whose father had been out of work for some months. The family had moved several times and was currently living in a government shelter. Sympathetically, the teacher said, “It must be difficult to have no home.” But the boy quickly and emphatically explained that his family did have a home—at the moment they simply did not have a place to put their home.
A father of five children, who lost his job a year ago, had to survive on part-time work while looking for a steady job. He was sure the financial strain would intensify conflicts at home. But to his surprise, the layoff became a blessing. Every one of his children expressed joy in the extra time they had with him; they enjoyed his smiles and big hugs at the end of their school days, his time to help them with projects, and the riddles he tucked into their lunches. They also began pitching in to help run the house—and to help one another. And when employment was eventually found, he continued to act upon the important lessons he had learned.