Since I had taken my home leave in November (another blog for another day) I opted to spend Christmas with my closest relatives. I was unable to take any time off so I flew out on Saturday afternoon, Christmas Eve, and arrived to their home around 7:00PM. Upon arrival I found a Christmas party in full swing with good food and good company. It was fun to visit with friends and hear what had happened since my last visit. I turned my camera over to a young man after teaching him how to use it and then enjoyed watching him snapping photos all night and using up all my battery. It finally felt like Christmas.
During the evening the leader of the congregation asked me if I'd be willing to share a Christmas message in church the next day. I gladly accepted the opportunity to share my feelings about Christ, feeling it would add to my personal celebration of the holiday. I didn't have much time to prepare since church began at 9AM the next morning but the ideas of what to say came easily after reading a few thoughts of others.
Sunday morning came and we headed off for the short drive to church which is held on floor 12A of a highrise building. Floor 12A and not 13 since 13 is an unlucky number and hence not used in Malaysia. In place of having a 13th floor it's called 12A. Up the elevator and into the church. Inside the church door we remove our shoes and place them on the shoe racks provided which is already full of tattered shoes of various shapes and sizes. You can tell which shoes belong to the 19 year old missionaries since they are the shined black ones. The others are well worn with soles and heals thinned from years of use.
Immediately we began greeting the church members with handshakes and hugs. The children were most eager to greet Sister and Elder Johnson and I. The love the church members have for my aunt and uncle is very apparent. The children swarm around them as if they were their own grandparents, negotiating who will sit next to them during church. As we make our way down the narrow hallway, through the kitchen, which also holds the above-ground baptismal font, down another hall and into the chapel we continue to greet church members young and old. Finally we make our way to our seats as we continue to greet and visit. We are accompanied today by a Hindu woman who has been living in Butterworth studying dentistry and who also lives in the same building as my uncle and aunt. It's her first time in our church and her second time in a Christian church. She was invited by my relatives to show her how we celebrate this special day.
The meeting begins with a Christmas hymn. The chorister stands at the front of the room, barefooted. The pianist, Chinese-Malaysian woman, newly returned from serving a mission in the Salt Lake City at Temple Square, begins playing at a fast tempo the chorister is having a hard time keeping up with with. Her hand beating and her voice following a much slower tempo she hears in her head. Everything is mismatched but somehow we all make it through the song ending at the same time...for the most part.
After the sacrament is passed to the members by young men between the ages of 12 and 16 the remainder of the meeting is announced. I will speak first, followed by a missionary from Utah who will be returning home in less than 2 weeks after his 2 years of service. The meeting will conclude with remarks by the recently returned missionary who had just been our pianist. I made my way to the podium with a few notes in my hand to remind me of the points I wanted to make.
"Joy to the world," I started by repeating the first 2 verses of this traditional Christmas carol. I talked about my experiences visiting Bethlehem and other historic sites where Christ lived and performed miracles throughout his life. I talked about being in the shepherds fields and reflected on the sign that was given of Christ's birth, reading scripture from both the Bible as well as the Book of Mormon describing the signs and events surrounding the shepherds. I then talked of recent conversation I'd had with a friend who asked me if I really believed in God. I shared my convictions rooted deeply in my heart of Christ and the role he plays in my life. I ended by asking the congregation what gift they would be offering Christ this year on his birthday, suggesting that some options might include giving up a favorite sin or developing a new talent. I then returned to my seat and enjoyed the remarks of the other 2 speakers feeling a deepening of my own feelings and gratitude for the blessings in my life. It was an enriching meeting for me.
Normally we would continue on at church to 2 more hours of classes and lessons but since it was Christmas the meetings were cut to allow more family time. The congregational family continued to visit and it was another 45 minutes before we left and headed home.
We weren't home long before it was time to head down the hall of the complex where we had been invited to our first of three Christmas meals. Friends and neighbors of my relatives invited us for the most delicious Indian turkey curry and other delicious dishes. I knew I'd need to pace myself if I was going to enjoy 3 meals in the next 5 hours but the first meal was so delicious I contemplated just filling up there but decided against it. That ended up being a good decision as meal #2 was in the home of friends from Nepal. The curry they served us in their small, sparsely furnished apartment was equally, it not slightly more, delicious. I helped myself to seconds. How could I resist!?
Luckily we had time to return home and take a nap allowing our food to digest before heading out for our last meal. At 7:30 we walked up the street a bit to our final appointment in the home of a Chinese Malaysian family (the home of the return missionary who played piano and spoke in church earlier). I could hardly think of eating more food but found just a little room to fit in a few bites of calamari, noodles and pineapple upside down cake (compliments of my aunt). Delicious!
After dinner and watching 17 Miracles, a movie about the miracles the Mormon pioneers experienced while making the trek to Utah from various parts of the world, we said our parting goodbyes and rolled ourselves home to crash on full stomaches into our comfortable beds.
Somewhere among all the eating we took time to open Christmas gifts. I had given my uncle a large box of his favorite cereal-Cherios, which I had hand carried from the US. To my aunt I gave detergent she wanted. I also brought a box of See's chocolates to share with them which I had received while in the US and a bag of carmel corn I found in a mall in Bangkok. I was surprised to find that Santa had found me in Malaysia and left me a gift as well. A beautiful purse from an Indian neighborhood in Malaysia. I was tickled.
It was a terrific Christmas full of Christmas spirit, good food and great company. Pictures to come!
I believe.
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