My Reason for the Season

  I’m very excited for Christmas. The lights, treats, music and overall good cheer warm my soul. I love that for a month (or more if you’re like me! I kind of smudge Thanksgiving and Christmas into one big giant celebration) we all come together, remembering the most important things in life: family, friends, love, and peace.

 Today I was reading Jayden a story about a little girl who worked in the inn where Jesus was born. She led Joseph and Mary to the stable and after Mary had her sweet little Jesus, the little girl offered the Christ child her favorite blanket.

  The story was simple and sweet. It wasn't anything fancy or especially profound, but tears filled my eyes and my heart burst full of love and gratitude for my Savior. For those who don’t know much about why the Nativity is so important to many people, let me explain why it matters to me. Before I begin, know that I respect all belief systems. I'm grateful to learn from others and know that there's so much good in so many different ways of thinking. The following feelings are from my heart, and though its possibly foolish to put them on the Internet, I can't help but hope they'll touch someone. Or at least perpetuate my feeling of peace and good cheer! If you completely disagree with me, that's totally fine, we can still be friends and drink hot chocolate together. In fact, I insist that we be friends. 

  I believe the purpose of life is to come to Earth and show our Heavenly Father*** that despite the trials surrounding mortality, we will love Him. We want to show him that, above all else, we want to live with Him again someday with our families. I believe that everyone will get the opportunity to learn about our Heavenly Father and Jesus Christ and choose if they will follow and believe. Whether that opportunity comes in this life or the next, it will come.

  We lived with our Heavenly Father before in a Premortal world. We lived as a giant family where we learned and grew and developed a desire to become like our Heavenly Parents (yes, parents. My church believes in a Heavenly Father and a Heavenly Mother). In order to do so, we would need to come to Earth and, in a world full of various trials and temptations, we’d need to choose to follow Heavenly Father.

  In this world, there’d be opportunities to learn and experience a lot of happiness. But there would also be opportunities to hurt inside, to be hurt by the poor choices of others, and to struggle with natural difficulties. We had to experience difficulties in order to show that no matter what, we would choose Heavenly Father.

  Heavenly Father knew that amidst this opposition, a lot of hearts would be broken. A lot of souls would ache for comfort. As we all would make mistakes, there had to be a way to remedy the damage. There had to be a way to grant us a clean slate so that we could try again. There had to be a way to heal the broken hearts and hurting souls.

  And so he provided a Savior. Our eldest Spiritual brother, Jesus Christ, was chosen to come down to Earth, live a perfect, sinless life, and then suffer in the Garden of Gethsemane for all of our sins, heart aches, and misfortunes. This is called the Atonement, and it is infinite and eternal. I don’t understand the natural mechanics of how that works. I cannot comprehend how Jesus Christ was able to suffer for each of our individual sins and heart aches. Maybe in a million eons I will understand, but for now I have faith that He did. In quiet moments, it has been revealed in my heart that He does know me personally. He knows my struggles, heart aches, and he understands me perfectly.

  Later, as Jesus suffered incredible physical pain on the Cross he died. Three days later he rose from the dead, overcoming physical death so that we all may live again. Death is not the end.

  Because He loves us, He suffered in the Garden, on the Cross, and He rose again. As we seek to build a personal relationship with Him by patterning our life after His we can find rest and peace.

Painting by Greg Olsen

  In this world of ours many people have suffered. It breaks my heart to think of all the atrocities that have happened, currently happen, and will happen. Sometimes I feel overwhelmed with guilt because of how much I can’t do to fix it. I can serve, love and promote peace in my little area. But that’s it, and often I don’t feel like that’s enough.

  But blessedly, our Savior came down to Earth, born in a humble stable to a carpenter and a young girl. He came to live a perfect life, to teach the world His Father’s will, to suffer in the Garden and on the Cross and to be resurrected. All so we could trust that death is not the end, this world’s difficulties and trials are not all we have. Because He understands us, as we seek to come to Him, we can find peace. We can find love. Our hearts can be made whole. We can find heavenly help through our trials. He gave us a life pattern to follow, He showed us how to love and the way to peace.

“He is despised and rejected of men; a man of sorrows, and aquainted with grief: and we hid as it were our faces from him; he was despised, and we esteemed him not.

Surely he hath borne our griefs, and carried our sorrows; yet we did esteem him stricken, smitten of God, and afflicted.

But he was wounded for our transgressions, he was bruised for our iniquities; the chastisement of our peace was upon him; and with his stripes we are healed” Isaiah 53: 3-5

  I know that because of him we can be healed from our hurts. Our mistakes can be made clean and we can be found sinless before God. We can live with our families forever in peace and harmony. This life can be very hard, but it is not the end. As we do our best, we can trust that all will be well.

  And so this is why I love Christmas, because no matter what horrible things are thrown in our way, we can trust that all will be made right. It’s a time to reflect on our Savior and focus on the love and peace He would have govern our lives. I am so grateful for Him. I know He lives. I know He knows each of us. And I know that each of us may come to know Him as we put forth the effort.

“Come unto me, all ye that labour and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest.

Take my yoke upon you, and learn of me; for I am meek and lowly in heart; and ye shall find rest unto your souls.

For my yoke is easy and my burden is light” Matthew 11: 28-30

   If you have any questions regarding what I’ve written feel free to explore this site. There are people there who will happily answer your questions if you don’t find what you’re looking for. Also, for a concise but comprehensive explanation of how members of the Church of Jesus Christ see Jesus Christ, read this. In the meantime…HAPPY THANKSGIVING/MERRY CHRISTMAS!

Painting by Greg Olsen

***link to my explanation of who Heavenly Father is

P.S. Some people have wondered what differentiates Jesus Christ from other fantastic world teachers. Why do we worship Christ when there are others who have taught great things about love, peace, and the way to best live life. Yes, there are many inspired, fantastic individuals who have graced our planet with truth and goodness (which I believe was inspired!) but what makes Christ different to Christians is His divinity as the literal, begotten Son of God. It is through His Atonement that we find salvation and eternal joy. Yes, He was a fantastic teacher, but to Christians He was so much more than that. He is the Savior of the world. And for that, I will love Him above all.