During the Christmas season we are often inspired to the virtue of giving. In the midst of packages and wrapping and shiny ribbons, we desire for something more, something of more lasting value. At a time that should be all happiness and sweet memories, many of us struggle with a feeling that we are falling short. Short of money to buy all that we desire to give, short of time to do all that we desire to do, short of patience with our little children who want it all.
The thing we often forget is the greatest gift we can give and the best one to receive, is the one that has the greatest ability to last all year, and for years to come after that; the gift of oneself. Give of yourself, your time, your love, your efforts and memories are the lasting gift that carries on for a lifetime.
President James E. Faust, a leader in the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints (commonly known as the Mormon Church) wrote in his article “Our Search For Happiness” (Ensign, October 2000):“May I suggest a further requisite in the continuing quest to live happily every hour, every day, every month, and every year of our lives. Love is the direct route to the happiness that would enrich and bless our lives and the lives of others. It means that you show love even to your enemies, “bless them that curse you, do good to them that hate you, and pray for them which despitefully use you” (Matt. 5:44.) In so doing you will be fulfilling the greater commandment to love God Himself and to enjoy His love. You will soar above the ill winds that blow, above the sordid, the self-defeating, and the bitter. You have the promise that “your whole bodies shall be filled with light, and there shall be no darkness in you; and that body which is filled with light comprehendeth all things” (D&C 88:67.)
What a glorious promise President Faust gave us. This is the best kind of gift: one that gives while we receive. But how can we give of ourselves when we feel too low to lift another? How can we cheer a friend when we ourselves are need of cheering?
The Savior said, “Verily I say unto you, Inasmuch as ye have done it unto one of the least of these my brethren, ye have done it unto me.” (Matt. 25:40.) What better way then to feel the Savior’s love, but to do His work?
The kinds of service that Jesus gave during His earthly ministry were often the small, deliberate deeds that meant the most to the despised, hurting, lonely. Charles Henry Parkhurst described the Lord’s style of compassionate service this way:
“Christ’s ministry, from Baptism to Ascension, … is mostly made up of little words, little deeds, little prayers, little sympathies, adding themselves together in unwearied succession. The Gospel is full of divine attempts to help and heal, in body, mind, and heart, the individual. … The completed beauty of Christ’s life is only the added beauty of little inconspicuous acts of Beauty—talking with a woman at the well; showing the young ruler the stealthy ambition laid away in his heart that kept him out of the Kingdom of Heaven; … teaching a little knot of followers how to pray; kindling a fire and broiling fish that disciples might have breakfast; waiting for them when they came ashore from a night of fishing, cold, tired, and discouraged. All of these things … let us so easily into the real quality and tone of [Christ’s] interests, so specific; so narrowed down, so enlisted in what is small, so engrossed in what is minute.” (“Kindness and Love,” in Leaves of Gold, Honesdale, Pa.: Coslet Publishing Co., 1938, p. 177.)
It is my hope that you might find happiness this holiday season, not in the baubles and bows, not in what lay in wait for you to receive, but rather in what lies within you to give to another. Give of your love, your time, your kind words, and feel your heart swell with joy, pure and sweet.
