Hello everyone, and Merry Christmas! It's been a fantastic day thus far - you'll hear all of the good stuff later in this email. First, though, I need to say thank you for all of the wonderful letters, home-baked treats, and presents that I received! Dad, I'm just like you - I woke up somewhere between three and four this morning (5 or 6 Georgia time, so I think I'm still on my Georgia Christmas clock in that regard) super-excited about Christmas. Thankfully I was able to calm myself down enough to go back to sleep, but still... I love Christmas. The MTC was extremely nice and didn't schedule anything official until 9:30, so we pretty much had all morning to open presents, reminisce with roommates about Christmasses past, say a few prayers, and enjoy being alive. We also got to watch the MoTab broadcast this morning - they closed with the Hallelujah Chorus, which I feel like was a tender mercy just for me. I love that song so much, and it just made my morning to hear it with the organ, orchestra, and choir!
And now I'm emailing you! I thought that I'd be writing a letter, so this is much better than I expected! It's what my roommate would call "a Christmas mircale!" I've been trying to take account of the "Christmas Miracles" I've been having lately, and so I thought you might like to hear about twelve of them (in honor of the 12 days of Christmas, of course!):
1. Did you know that if you combine a package of cake mix with a can of diet coke and put it in the microwave for 8 minutes, you get a fluffy, homemade cake>? If you put chocolate frosting on top, you can't even tell the difference. THAT is a Christmas miracle! Dallin, thank you so much for your awesome gift - I loved the whole thing so much, but I think my roommates might've enjoyed the 8-minute-cale the best. :) I took it out of the microwave and it was like Christmas came early! It was so incredibly thoughtful of you, and we really did love it so much. You're great - Merry Christmas (and I can't wait to hear about Jason - I've been praying for him )!
2. I was able to take out the seam of one of my two pairs of pants and then hem it with some non-sewing iron-on material. THAT was a miracle. :) My pants are so much longer now - I feel like I got a new pair!
3. Speaking of seams, I was wearing my lovely red coat in honor of the Christmas season yesterday. I love it, except there aren't any pockets - they're fake. Well, I put my hands up to the pockets and saw that part of the seam was coming out - I stuck my finger in, and there were pockets! I quickly took the whole seam out, and enjoyed keeping my hands warm in my new-found pockets. That was a Christmas miracle.
4. At service yesterday, the person in charge was missing - we couldn't find him. So we went to work and started folding rags for about 20 minutes. I got to do my favorite service job on Christmas Eve! It was a Christmas miracle.
5. We got back from service and found out that gym was cancelled, thus allowing me to work on some things (such as Christmas miracles #2 and #3) and finish planning our lesson which we were previously not completely prepared for. The lesson went well, and both that and the extra time we had to plan it were a Christmas miracle.
6. When I went to get my favorite soup for lunch yesterday, I looked into the cracker bin and saw only ONE package of crackers left - it was like it was left there just for me! Another Christmas miracle.
7. We haven't been able to listen to music here, but we can go on lds.org. I was online yesterday and saw that there's a link off of lds.org where you can stream the "Mormon Channel" Christmas music! It was on lds.org, so I thought it was okay. I was a little disappointed at first that I hadn't done that every day of December, but when my productivity of my language study declined as I happily listened to Christmas music, my attitude changed and I was grateful that I was productive during the month of December. Still, finding that extra bit of music on Christmas Eve was a Christmas miracle.
8. The ribbon that came with another elder in our district's bag of popcorn that someone sent him perfectly matched the wrapping paper that I'm using to make my Chinese Book of Mormon case with. :) Christmas miracle.
9. The Christmas Eve devotional we had last night was in the same format and style of the ones we have at home, which was really nice. They also had someone play a Jenny Oaks Baker arr. of Silent Night, which soothed my soul. :) We got to watch A Christmas Carol (which was surprisingly good and slightly creepy in some parts) and then read that book, Christmas Day in the Morning - it's by Pearl S. Buck though and we read it each year, about the barn) with my roommates! Our branch president's wife had it and let us borrow it. The whole evening was so nice, and such a Christmas miracle.
10. I had sacrament meeting with Elder David A. Bednar from the quorum of the twelve apostles today. THAT has been one of the greatest Christmas miracles of all. He talked about the character of Christ - how Jesus in every instance of anguish or sorrow, He fought the natural man impulse to turn inward, and instead turned outward. He always did this - that's why it was part of His character (character needs to be consitently lived in order for it to be part of your character). It was an especial delight to hear Elder Bednar refer to the natural man as the Cookie Monster and do impersonations of him over the pulpit - he definitely got his point across! Elder Bednwar also talked about conversion - that conversion is CONSISTENTLY being true to what you know. He said that we need to pay the prioce to obtain our own conversion. Conversion is turning away from the natural man -it's having the character of Christ because you're converting to Him. He promised us that we'll notice that we're converted in our own service when we quit worrying about the natural man. "Repent" can be replaced with "turn to the Lord" - so when we're calling people to repentance, we're asking them to turn to the Lord, to be converted in Him. Pretty cool, right? I also gained some more very clear insight on questions that I've been thinking about for the past few weeks. Losing yourself in the service = having the character of Christ. The grace of Jesus Christ enables us and allows us to do good and to become better. However, you can't focus on the blessings that you want to receive, because if you do, you won't get them. You need to lose yourself in order to find yourself. And with the help of the grace of Jesus Christ, we'll eventually be able to develop His character. Very gradually. It was a beautiful, beautiful talk - one that I know I'll always look back to as one that's changed my life. It was a Christmas miracle.
11. Having lunch with my brother, being there with him and opening our stockings together was a little miracle - I loved it. I think my favorite part was having both of our eyes well up with tears as we tried to express the things that both of us had learned from an apostle of the Lord earlier that day. We knew that even though we missed our families, we wouldn't have been able to hear that fantastic talk unless we were missionaries. And we knew that's where we were supposed to be.
12. The greatest Christmas miracle of all is the birth of our Savior, Jesus Christ. I love Him and I am so very grateful to be His personal representative every day, every hour, and every minute for the next 16 months. May we all strive every day to look to Him, to become more like Him, and to recognize the "Christmas miracles" that we receive every day - be it big or small - because of His birth, His life, and His Gospel.
Love,
Sister Rebecca Winters
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