21 December 2008
Sharon’s Sunday Blog
Posted by Joy Bischoff under: General; Guest Blogger .
Christmas Gifts for You
I would like to share with you three things that I hope will bless you this Christmas: a story, a poem, and a song.
About the Story:
We have all heard of Christmas miracles and perhaps we have even experienced miracles of our own. (If so. I hope we have preserved them for future generations by writing them down.) Perhaps the story below is one you haven’t heard yet. As we consider all the miracles of the season may we remember that the greatest miracle of all is that “God so loved the world that He gave his Only Begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in Him should not perish, but have everlasting life!”
The Least of These
By Richard M. Siddoway
We married in August and settled into a small apartment near the university where both of us went to school. We each had a year until graduation and scrimped and struggled through the autumn quarter. Now Christmas was approaching and we had little money between us to squander on Christmas gifts.
We walked through the department stores of Salt Lake arm in arm with the confidence of better days ahead. My bride paused before a winter coat, caressing it with her eyes and fingers. Together we looked at the price tag—seventy-five dollars. Tuition for a quarter was eighty-five dollars. We both knew the coat was out of the question. Her old coat, seam-split and stained, would have to do for another year.
We agreed to spend no more than five dollars apiece in shopping for each other. While my wife drove the car to do her shopping, I walked the half dozen blocks to the Grand Central drugstore to see how far I could stretch five dollars. After considerable searching, I selected a paperback novel my wife had commented about and a small box of candy. Together they came to $4.75. As I approached the checkout stand, I was met with a long line of shoppers, each trying to pay as quickly as possible and get on with the bustle of the season. No one was smiling.
I waited perhaps a half an hour, and only three people were ahead of me in the line when I became aware that the line had grounded to a halt. The clerk was having an animated discussion with an elderly customer.
“Sir,” barked the clerk, “the price of insulin has gone up. I’m sorry, but we have no control over that. You need four more dollars.”
“But it has been the same price ever since my wife started taking it. I have no more money. She needs the medication.” The man’s neck was turning red and he was obviously uncomfortable with the situation. “I must have the insulin. I must.”
The man standing behind him put a hand on his shoulder and said, “Come on, pop, you’re holding up the line.”
The lady in front of me grew more agitated. The dozen or so people behind me began craning their necks to see what was holding up the line. Suddenly I stepped out of line, reached into my pocket, withdrew my wallet, and handed five dollars to the old man. “Merry Christmas,” I said.
He hesitated a moment, then his blue eyes grew moist as he took the money. “God bless you, my son.”
I turned and walked back into the store aisles. I counted the money I had remaining in my wallet—four dollars. I replaced the box of candy and got back in line to pay for the novel.
Snow was falling in soft white feathery flakes as I walked up the hill toward our apartment. I turned in our driveway and saw an envelope stuck in our screen door. I removed it and found written on the front of the envelope simply, “Matthew 25:40.”
I opened the door, stepped inside, and turned on the light. I ripped open the end of the envelope and withdrew a hundred-dollar bill. There was no other message.
It was only after I had purchased the winter coat for my wife that I took time to get out my Bible and read the scripture written on the envelope: “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.”
To this day I have no idea who blessed our lives that Christmas.
Excerpted from Sharing Christmas; Deseret Book http://ldslivingmagazine.com/articles/show/1792
The Poem
I have written much about the life our Savior Jesus Christ and His great sacrifice for us. As we ponder His coming and all He has done for us, may we grow in our love for Him and in our desire and ability to follow where He leads.
In Bethlehem
Not far from Mount Moriah
where the Father of the Faithful
built an altar of native stone,
and binding Isaac, laid him
on the fire-ready wood
of sacrifice, before he saw
the thicket-caught ram,
Mary lays her first-born son,
wrapped in swaddling bands,
on tinder-dry hay in limestone
manger of a stable-cave.
Fulfilled again are words
of Abraham–
God will provide himself a lamb.
Sharon Price Anderson
(This poem was first published in the Ensign magazine, Feb. 2008)
The Song
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