Merry Christmas

 

Last week my face Book page said that they had collected my Christmas pictures since I had become a member over ten years ago. However, as I looked at their collection, I became confused. They just didn’t look like pictures that I would take for Christmas. One picture was of my daughter making a fleece blanket. Another picture was of my nieces wedding at the St. George Temple. One was of a quilt I had made for one of my daughter’s bridesmaids. A picture followed of the flowers at the Denver temple. Next came a photo of my niece holding her brother’s new baby at my mother’s funeral. The last was a picture of my Dad and a dozen of his great grand- children in the summer time. What did these pictures have to do with Christmas? I wondered.

In my reading of the October General Conference talks of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, shortly after, I read, Covenant Women in Partnership with God

By President Henry B. Eyring

“Becoming a covenant woman in partnership with God is how great and good daughters of God have always mothered, led, and ministered. Your call began when you were placed into mortality, in a place and time chosen for you by a God who knows you perfectly and loves you as His daughter. When you came out of the waters of baptism, you had accepted another call to serve. As a new covenant daughter of God, you made a promise and received an assignment in The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, of which you were then confirmed a member. You covenanted with God to take upon yourself the name of Jesus Christ, to keep His commandments, and to serve Him.

For each one who makes these covenants, the service that the Lord calls him or her to do will be suited perfectly to that person. The covenant daughters and sons of God, however, all share one important and joyful call. It is to serve others for Him. “To help another human being reach one’s celestial potential is part of the divine mission of woman. As mother, teacher, or nurturing Saint, she molds living clay to the shape of her hopes. In partnership with God, her divine mission is to help spirits live and souls be lifted. This is the measure of her creation. It is ennobling, edifying, and exalting.” You cannot know when, or for what length of time, your personal mission will be focused on service in calls such as mother, leader, or ministering sister. The Lord, out of love, does not leave us the choice of the timing, duration, or sequence of our assignments. Yet you know from scripture and living prophets that all of these assignments will come, either in this life or in the next, to every daughter of God. And all of them are preparation for eternal life in loving families— “the greatest of all the gifts of God.”  

You remember President Nelson’s perfect description of a woman’s divine mission—including her mission of mothering: “As mother, teacher, or nurturing Saint, she molds living clay to the shape of her hopes. In partnership with God, her divine mission is to help spirits live and souls be lifted. This is the measure of her creation.” Becoming a covenant woman in partnership with God is how great and good daughters of God have always mothered, led, and ministered, serving in whatever way and place He has prepared for them.” And then the light! I understood! Mathew 25:40

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.”

These have all been pictures of times when we have been of service to others, to show our love. Our gifts of love to Christ. Christmas pictures.