Merry Christmas!

It’s been a beautiful couple of days. Church yesterday was joyful—and surprisingly full of people. For most residents, Canberra is less home and more just a temporary absence from somewhere else (which I think is a shame, but that’s a topic for another post). Consequently, major holidays and long weekends generally turn the city into something of a ghost town, a phenomenon which tends to extend to our church services. It’s not unusual for our attendance on such occasions to drop to only 40 people or so, which is what I’d feared would be the case yesterday.

Instead, we had at least 131 people in sacrament meeting, that being how many I quickly counted from the stand at the beginning of the service. As usual, a large number of our ward members had gone interstate, but this time visitors to our ward actually outnumbered those missing. It was great to see the pews filled as they should be on Christmas Eve.

One reason we had so many visitors was because two babies were blessed at the beginning of the service. One of these was Xander, son of my very good friend (and dutiful second counsellor), Scott. He had asked me to help with the blessing, which was a great honour.

After church, I swung ‘round to visit my home-teaching families, taking them plates of homemade chocolate chip cookies. I knew people were busy, so I’d planned just to stop by, say ‘Merry Christmas,’ and leave the cookies, but instead I was invited in at each house for warm conversation and Christmas goodies. By the time I got home, I’d enjoyed homemade almond tarts, mince pie, and sponge cake layered with cream and fresh strawberries and apricots.

I then spent the rest of the evening across the border in Queanbeyan, visiting my friends Wayne and Angela. They both come from Spanish-influenced cultures (Chile and the Philippines), so Christmas Eve is the focal point of their Christmas celebration. I was late getting there, but they were still eating dinner, so I happily joined them, the missionaries from their ward, and our mutual friend Sam for a feast of roast beef, roast pork, steamed prawns, mashed potatoes, Greek salad, and Caesar salad. It was an excellent meal, both because it was my first meal of the day (not counting the sweets from earlier) and, more importantly, because it was shared with warm, generous friends.

I didn’t get home til quite late, and I then stayed up to wrap presents, something I’d not yet gotten a chance to do. Consequently, it was difficult to wake up early this morning, but I did so, getting up at 7:00, because I didn’t want to miss our ward’s Christmas morning service. It was a perfect start to a blessed day of remembrance. We prayed, read scriptures, and sang carols together—the children still in their pyjamas—before returning to our homes.

I then started work on our Christmas lunch, preparing garlic prawns, pineapple chicken with red chilli, teriyaki beef, rice, and a salad of cucumber, bean sprouts, and pickled radish. I was joined by my friends Kali and Nita, Kali’s brother, Nita’s little sister, and Eric, a guy I met two weeks ago. He’s just moved to Canberra and has no family here, so I was glad to invite him to join us. It was great to have a houseful of good people to spend the afternoon with.

This evening was set aside for that great Aussie Christmas tradition: cricket. We met up with some friends from the south side of the city and played until the sun went down. I have to admit it wasn’t exactly cricket weather tonight, though. In fact, it felt a bit too much like a northern-hemisphere Christmas all day; despite the forecast, we never actually reached 20 degrees (68F), and it was only 13 degrees (55F) this evening, with a stiff breeze making it feel a lot, lot colder. I was glad whenever the batsman sent a ball my way; the running kept me a bit warmer.

The greatest source of warmth today, though, was the gratitude I feel for my innumerable blessings and all the good people in my life—all gifts through the grace of Him Whose birth we commemorated this day.