The Most Wonderful Time of the Year

Our Christmas was so wonderful! I don't know what it is about Christmas, but I tend to have my most spiritual experiences of the whole year right around Christmas. This past Christmas, I had the wonderful opportunity to be in the Stake Choir for the Annual Christmas Program. We practiced for more than a month before the program, and we were singing the most beautiful music. It was hard for me to get through an entire practice without starting to choke up. I just love the songs about the birth of the Savior and the most tender and precious time that must have been for those who experienced it.

Another something that helped me to feel the Spirit more than usual this last Christmas season was that I taught the Presidency lesson the first Sunday in December. Mindy wanted a special little Christmas program or lesson for it, and I was having the hardest time coming up with a good lesson for it. A few weeks beforehand, I tried to pull together some musical numbers for it, but almost everyone I asked said no; no one was willing to do a number in Relief Society for Christmas, which really surprised me greatly. And irritated me, to some extent. And this made it all the more difficult to come up with something 'amazing' for my lesson. So, I pulled together what I thought was the best thing I could do with what I could work with. I based my lesson off the song "C is for the Christ Child", and had a scripture, quote and video/song for each letter of the word CHRISTMAS. I started out by playing that song, and then went through each letter, having some of the sisters read quotes for me after I read the scripture. We sang a couple of Christmas hymns, I showed a few videos, and then I bore my testimony of the Savior. It went rather better than I thought it would, and I got many compliments. But mostly I wanted the sisters to feel the Spirit and the true meaning of Christmas, which, I think they did.

But in my preparation for my lesson, I was looking up wonderful Christmas videos, I was listening to beautiful Christmas songs, and I was doing a lot of research and study looking for suitable quotes and scriptures. And I sure felt the Spirit, and it was wonderful. Although I was initially irritated and unhappy, to say the least, when I was assigned to teach in December, especially when I realized how unwilling people were to help, it ended up being really good for me personally. And I am really glad that I was able to do it.

The last thing that helped me to get into the Christmas Spirit was that I started reading the New Testament sometime in October, following along in the New Testament Institute Manual. It has such wonderful commentary about verses and stories in the New Testament, and I really have loved reading about the life of the Savior with all of that additional insight. It made my study of the scriptures more meaningful. There was one part that I particularly loved, that talked about the Atonement:

Elder Richard G. Scott of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles stated that in carrying out the Atonement, the Savior faced great challenges:

“First, an enormous sense of responsibility, for He realized that except it be done perfectly, not one of His Father’s children could return to Him. They would be forever banished from His presence since there would be no way to repent for broken laws and no unclean thing can exist in the presence of God. His Father’s plan would have failed, and each spirit child would have been under the eternal control and torment of Satan. 

“Second, in His absolutely pure mind and heart, He had to personally feel the consequences of all that mankind would ever encounter, even the most depraved, despicable sins.

“Third, He had to endure the vicious attack of Satan’s hordes while physically and emotionally pressed to the limit. Then, for reasons we do not fully know, while at the extremity of His capacity, at the time the Savior most needed succor, His Father allowed Him to shoulder the onerous responsibility with only His own strength and capacity” (“He Lives! All Glory to His Name!” Ensign or Liahona, May 2010, 76–77).

And also this one:

Elder Tad R. Callister of the Presidency of the Seventy described some of what Jesus endured in Gethsemane and later on the cross in order to free all mankind from the evil one: “With merciless fury Satan’s forces must have attacked the Savior on all fronts. … The Savior pressed forward in bold assault until every prisoner was freed from the tenacious tentacles of the Evil One. This was a rescue mission of infinite implications. Every muscle of the Savior, every virtue, every spiritual reservoir that could be called upon would be summoned in the struggle. No doubt there was an exhaustion of all energies, a straining of all faculties, an exercise of all powers. Only then, when seemingly all had been spent, would the forces of evil abandon their posts and retreat in horrible defeat. … The Great Deliverer has rescued us—saved the day, saved eternity. But, oh, what a battle! What wounds! What love! What cost!” (The Infinite Atonement [2000], 130–31). 

It's hard to imagine or believe or comtemplate everything the Savior had to endure to truly pay the price of our sins. Further on in this same chapter of the manual, it talks about how hard Satan was tempting Him, even right at the very end, because he knew that if the Savior slipped up once, just a little tiny bit, until it was completed, all would be forever lost. I'd never thought about that before! There were ample opportunities for Jesus to exact revenge on His persecutors and torturers; He could have saved Himself, for He was God; He could have allowed His pride determine His actions. But then, He wouldn't have been perfect, He wouldn't have been able to save us. That would be a heavy price to pay, indeed. But even amidst all that He went through in the last hours of His life, He did what no one else could! How grateful I am!

Elder Bruce D. Porter of the Seventy taught that the Atonement required the Savior to endure the abuses of the Jewish and Roman leaders without sinning: “The cruelties and indignities suffered by Jesus during the various trials represented a last-ditch effort by Lucifer to cause Christ to stumble. A single misstep—a cross word, an angry outburst, even a moment’s indulgence in self-pity or pride—and all was lost. Hence, every possible indignity was heaped upon the Savior: false accusations; blasphemous outbursts; a crown of thorns; the horrible scourging by bone-embedded whips; the mock robe of royalty; the spitting, taunting, and physical blows of the soldiers. The whole pitiable drama was masterminded by Lucifer in the hope that he might yet find a way to nullify the Redeemer’s triumph at Gethsemane” (The King of Kings [2000], 106–7). 

It was a wonderful Christmas, full of the Spirit. As with almost every Christmas season, I gained a greater insight into the Savior's life, I gained a greater sense of gratitude and love for Him and for what He has done, and I gained a more fervent testimony and a more fervent desire to do what He asks me to do.