Christmas Gift

We waited impatiently in the hall, lined up smallest to tallest. We knew that through that doorway waited Christmas plenty, and splendor. I had awakened my parents at 2:30 in the morning too excited to sleep one more minute. I had no idea that my beloved parents had just barely fallen asleep. Mama pulled me into their warm bed and tried to calm seven year old me down. It worked in reverse. Instead of Mama calming me down I got her more excited.

Pretty soon we both were coercing my exhausted Papa to get up NOW and see the gifts, then we could go back to bed. Carla-Rae and Howard were NOT cooperative about getting up at 3:00 in the morning to see their gifts. Carla-Rae was 13 and Howard was 17 and they preferred to get more sleep before the unveiling. Teenagers, they actually preferred more sleep to instant present viewing!

My mind slid back to the night before. We always had a special family Christmas Program on Christmas Eve. On that night Mama shared with us the story that her Papa had always shared with her family on Christmas Eve. It was a story of the greatest gift ever given to the world. Heavenly Father sent his precious son Jesus Christ to the world. This loving Father did so knowing that his precious son would suffer persecution, betrayal, torture, and ultimately death.

He also knew that this gift would bless all of his spirit children, that's you and I. We could repent because of the gift of Christ, and return to the presence of our Heavenly Father.

It will be hard for me to send our daughter Sarah amongst total strangers on a mission not knowing how they will respond to the message she will carry. Yet that scariness is tiny compared to Heavenly Father's...He KNEW for a fact all the hard things Jesus would face.

Christmas Gift is THE gift...the greatest ever given by Heavenly Father to his spirit children. So each Christmas morning we greet each other with the salutation of Christmas Gift to recall that sacred blessed gift.

I wish you all Christmas Gift...may you remember the sacred reason for this season.