A CHRISTMAS Story of GRATITUDE
We received this letter today and thought it most appropriate to share with you as a special, Christmas Day message...
"President – For our weekly report to you I have copied the email we sent out to friends/family this morning. We are so very grateful to be here serving under your leadership and with you and Sora Ashby!"
"It is early Sunday morning and I wanted to get this out while we have a minute or two. It is beginning to look a lot like Christmas! Our apartment is decorated with a small crèche we finally found to buy and an 18” Christmas tree. I downloaded a bunch of Christmas songs from the Internet and we have been playing those on Joyce’s i-pod. And we will be doing Christmas things today and tomorrow – including going with the young missionaries caroling to less active members and investigators. And having the missionaries over to our apartment Christmas Eve for a program – we will likely put on some variation of the program our family does every Christmas Eve. We have had an eventful week – again. I think I will not recap it here this time, but instead relate one experience that we had this past week."
"It is cold here. Very cold. At least for us. Morning temperatures are in the teens and sometimes it doesn’t get any higher than mid 20’s during the day. That may not seem too cold to some of you. But when you are walking 3 – 5 miles a day in it, it is pretty cold! Last Tuesday morning as I got out of my shower, Joyce called me over to the window overlooking the garbage area (We are on the 7th floor of our apartment building). And there sat a little woman in rags by a fire she had made from the paper and cardboard she found in the garbage bins.
The temperature was in the teens and my heart was broken. I decided I was going to break a mission rule – to not give to the beggars who are plentiful here. I guess technically, she wasn’t begging – just sitting by her little fire trying to keep from freezing to death. I dressed quickly and took some garbage with me to throw in the bin. And then walked over to this woman and handed her three 10 lei bills – about $12. That is many times what is normally given. She just looked at it as if she couldn’t believe it. Joyce was watching as I walked away and she said the woman just kept looking at me and crossing herself. As I took the elevator up to our apartment I began to think about the surprise gift that we had received last night when I discovered large insurance commissions had been deposited into our account – hundreds of times more than what I had given to this woman! In relationship to that, I had given her nothing. And as I came into our lovely apartment with its warmth and furnishings and food and kitchen range and oven and refrigerator and bathroom and hot and cold running water and bedroom and comfortable bed and me dressed in my warm overcoat and waterproof shoes I just broke down and wept. And wept. This woman and all of the countless ones like her here in Romania and throughout the world are, like me, a child of God. My brother and my sister. And for whatever reason, they have nothing of this world’s goods. Often times not even enough to survive. And me . . . ! And I was overwhelmed with the feeling that I had no right whatsoever to take or use more of the bounties of this earth than what is sufficient for my needs. And that everything I have ever been given or will be given belongs to the Lord and I have, by covenant, the responsibility to use it as He would use it if He were where I am, doing what I am doing. And I was saddened by how inadequately at times I have done this. I want to do better. And with His grace, I will."
"The great equalizer, of course, is the gospel of Jesus Christ. Our time here on this earth is so very fleeting. To know who we are and to be striving to become who we are capable of becoming through the Savior’s grace is all that ever counts. The warm coats and the comfortable bed and the bank accounts and the fires made out of paper and cardboard from the trash bins will all pass away. And all that will be left is who we have become -- a result of who we have wanted to become. It is the gospel of Jesus Christ that makes sense of all of this. And without it, there is nothing."
"Jesus Christ lives. His gospel, with its declaration of our eternal nature and divine potential, has been restored. And we are so very, very blessed to represent Him in carrying this truth that means everything to these extraordinary Romanian people. We thank God for this privilege."
"We love you and pray for you and are so very grateful for your friendship. Have a wonderful Christmas."
Love
Elder Steve &
Sora Joyce Hanson
"President – For our weekly report to you I have copied the email we sent out to friends/family this morning. We are so very grateful to be here serving under your leadership and with you and Sora Ashby!"
"It is early Sunday morning and I wanted to get this out while we have a minute or two. It is beginning to look a lot like Christmas! Our apartment is decorated with a small crèche we finally found to buy and an 18” Christmas tree. I downloaded a bunch of Christmas songs from the Internet and we have been playing those on Joyce’s i-pod. And we will be doing Christmas things today and tomorrow – including going with the young missionaries caroling to less active members and investigators. And having the missionaries over to our apartment Christmas Eve for a program – we will likely put on some variation of the program our family does every Christmas Eve. We have had an eventful week – again. I think I will not recap it here this time, but instead relate one experience that we had this past week."
"It is cold here. Very cold. At least for us. Morning temperatures are in the teens and sometimes it doesn’t get any higher than mid 20’s during the day. That may not seem too cold to some of you. But when you are walking 3 – 5 miles a day in it, it is pretty cold! Last Tuesday morning as I got out of my shower, Joyce called me over to the window overlooking the garbage area (We are on the 7th floor of our apartment building). And there sat a little woman in rags by a fire she had made from the paper and cardboard she found in the garbage bins.
The temperature was in the teens and my heart was broken. I decided I was going to break a mission rule – to not give to the beggars who are plentiful here. I guess technically, she wasn’t begging – just sitting by her little fire trying to keep from freezing to death. I dressed quickly and took some garbage with me to throw in the bin. And then walked over to this woman and handed her three 10 lei bills – about $12. That is many times what is normally given. She just looked at it as if she couldn’t believe it. Joyce was watching as I walked away and she said the woman just kept looking at me and crossing herself. As I took the elevator up to our apartment I began to think about the surprise gift that we had received last night when I discovered large insurance commissions had been deposited into our account – hundreds of times more than what I had given to this woman! In relationship to that, I had given her nothing. And as I came into our lovely apartment with its warmth and furnishings and food and kitchen range and oven and refrigerator and bathroom and hot and cold running water and bedroom and comfortable bed and me dressed in my warm overcoat and waterproof shoes I just broke down and wept. And wept. This woman and all of the countless ones like her here in Romania and throughout the world are, like me, a child of God. My brother and my sister. And for whatever reason, they have nothing of this world’s goods. Often times not even enough to survive. And me . . . ! And I was overwhelmed with the feeling that I had no right whatsoever to take or use more of the bounties of this earth than what is sufficient for my needs. And that everything I have ever been given or will be given belongs to the Lord and I have, by covenant, the responsibility to use it as He would use it if He were where I am, doing what I am doing. And I was saddened by how inadequately at times I have done this. I want to do better. And with His grace, I will.""The great equalizer, of course, is the gospel of Jesus Christ. Our time here on this earth is so very fleeting. To know who we are and to be striving to become who we are capable of becoming through the Savior’s grace is all that ever counts. The warm coats and the comfortable bed and the bank accounts and the fires made out of paper and cardboard from the trash bins will all pass away. And all that will be left is who we have become -- a result of who we have wanted to become. It is the gospel of Jesus Christ that makes sense of all of this. And without it, there is nothing."
"Jesus Christ lives. His gospel, with its declaration of our eternal nature and divine potential, has been restored. And we are so very, very blessed to represent Him in carrying this truth that means everything to these extraordinary Romanian people. We thank God for this privilege."
"We love you and pray for you and are so very grateful for your friendship. Have a wonderful Christmas."
Love
Elder Steve &
Sora Joyce Hanson
posted by Grandma Chubby | 3:13 AM
1 Comments:
Brother Hanson,
Thank you for your moving account of the woman by the fire.It is so true how we all take so much for granted in our comfortable lives. I was especially appreciative of your comments since I know how hard you and your wife are working there in Romania. My daughter, Sora Davison, has mentioned you many times in her emails home. I am very grateful for your service and kindness to our missionaries, especially during the holidays when they are so far from home. I know Maureen had a lovely Christmas there in Romania due in part to your efforts. THANK YOU! sincerely, Becci Davison
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