Growing up, my family always had a Christmas program family night on Christmas Eve.  We have a fire in the fireplace, read Luke II in the New Testament, my mom recited A Visit from St. Nicholas, we sang Christmas hymns, and most years (mostly when we were younger, but even some years that we were older as well) we would act out the nativity.

This movie was also always part of our program — its a DVD from the LDS Church entitled Luke II, (re-released later as The Nativity), with Amy Grant’s Breath of Heaven overlaid in the background.

Family, Life, Religion - No Comments »

I found this clip from A Charlie Brown Christmas in which Linus reminds us all what Christmas is really all about.

Religion, movies - No Comments »

I was on Google Maps today, and saw that Google is offering a 3D live Santa tracking application integrated with Google Earth!  It looks like it is integrated with NORAD — they’ve got a fun little 3D video with Santa flying around different world landmarks.

Life - No Comments »

The LDS Church published a list of ideas on their Christmas website of how to have a “more worshipful” Christmas. These ideas help us find ways to have a more Christ-centered remembrance of His birth. Here are a few that I liked:

Religion - No Comments »

I was reading from President Henry B. Eyring’s message for this month, entitled Home For Christmas, and thought I would share a few of the points he made that I really liked.

It helps to see the kindness of others at Christmastime. How many times have you gone to leave a gift on a doorstep, hoping not to be noticed, only to find more than one unmarked gift already there? Have you felt, as I have, the impression to help someone only to find that what you were inspired to give was exactly what someone needed at that very moment? That is a wonderful assurance that God knows all of our needs and counts on us to fill the needs of others around us.

You have already felt the joy of giving alms and receiving them. That joy in this life is a glimpse of what we will feel in the life to come if we are generous here out of faith in God. The Savior is our great exemplar. At the Christmas season we contemplate anew who He is and what generosity He extended to us by coming into the world to be our Savior.

As the Son of God, born to Mary, He had the power to resist all temptation to sin. He lived a perfect life so that He could be the infinite sacrifice, the unblemished Lamb promised from the foundation of the world (see Revelation 13:8). He suffered the agony of the guilt of our sins and all the sins of the children of Heavenly Father that we might be forgiven and go home clean.

He gave us that gift at a price we cannot fathom. It was a gift He did not need for Himself; He was without the need for forgiveness. The joy and gratitude we feel for His gift now will be magnified and will last forever as we honor and worship Him in our heavenly home.

The Christmas season gives us encouragement to remember Him and His infinite generosity. Remembering His generosity will help us feel and respond to the inspiration that there is someone who needs our help, and it will let us see the hand of God reaching to us when He sends someone to succor us, as He so often does. There is joy in giving and in receiving the generosity that God inspires, especially at Christmas.

That light is easier to discern at Christmastime, when we are more likely to pray to know what God would have us do and more likely to read in the scriptures and so more apt to be on the Lord’s errand. When we forgive and feel forgiveness, when we are lifting the hands that hang down (see D&C 81:5), we are being lifted ourselves as we move toward the Source of the light.

We can with confidence set a goal to make this Christmas brighter than the last and each year that follows brighter still. The trials of mortality may increase in intensity, yet for us, darkness need not increase if we focus our eyes more singly on the light that streams down on us as we follow the Master. He will lead us and help us along the path that leads upward to the home for which we yearn.

Religion - No Comments »