Such As I Have, I Give
By Darla Isackson, with Peggy Barrus

In the 3^rd chapter of Acts we read of a man, lame from birth, begging alms of Peter and John. Peter's response to the man is profound:

Silver and gold have I none: but such as I have give I thee: In the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth rise up and walk. And he took him by the right hand, and lifted him up; and immediately his feet and ankle bones received strength (Acts 3: 6-7, emphasis added).

Peter couldn't give what he didn't have — and neither can we. However, the gift he willingly gave was infinitely more valuable than the coin for which the man asked. Peter, through the priesthood power that he held and honored, “lifted him up” to a new life.

And so it is with God-inspired or God-given gifts. “If ye then being evil, know how to give good gifts unto your children, how much more shall your Father which is in heaven give good things to them that ask him?” (Matthew 6:11). The Lord always gives so much more than we ask. He lifts us up; His gifts give us strength to walk, to continue our life's journey.

Christmas is a good time to think about such gifts. Oh, that our gifts to one another might lift and build and strengthen. Most of us don't have much “silver and gold” to give. But gifts that cost money are often insignificant compared to our gifts of self — our gifts of love.

Wanda Petersen wrote about a little girl named Julie, a lonely, “sorry looking little waif” who was in her elementary school class for only a couple of months. She wrote,

As Christmas week drew near Julie seemed to hang around my desk more than usual. When we went someplace as a group, she was at my side, and her grubby little fingers sought my hand. [When we were making gifts for parents] she sidled up to my desk and whispered, 'I don't have a mother to give a hot pad to.' [Now the teacher understood Julie’s unkempt appearance.]...

The last day of school [before Christmas] came to a close… and I was alone doing last minute chores. Julie approached my desk and murmured, 'You can have my star, Teacher.' [the children had each covered styrofoam stars with glitter for their trees at home.] 'We don't have a tree,' she explained, 'and we're moving tomorrow.' ...

I reached my arm around her waist. 'Is there anything I can do for you, Julie?' She hesitated, then she wrapped her thin little arms around my neck and whispered, 'I'd like to sit on your lap and have you hug me.' A tight lump filled my throat as I gathered her into my arms...

'My favorite Christmas song is that one you learned us, “Christmas Is for Loving and Caring,” ‘ she confided. 'It's one of my favorites, too,' I replied. 'Why don't you sit on your daddy's lap and sing it to him tonight?' 'There's not room on his lap for me and his girlfriend too.'

My heart ached. I held her close and stroked her hair. After a while she jumped off my lap, touched the glitter-laden star and said, 'This is the onliest gift I had for you, Teacher.' She kissed me, and then she was gone... Her piquant little face reappears before me every time I open my box of tree ornaments and hang that little, smudged styrofoam star on the topmost branch.” (Latter-day Woman Magazine, December 1986).

Julie gave what she had, and her gift was far greater than she realized. Wanda gave what she had — her love and caring — and wished she had given more of it. But who knows the difference her kindness made in that little girl's life.

“Because He First Loved Us”

Two of the most precious gifts we can offer, can be fully given only when we have received them first from the Lord: Christ-like love and forgiveness. We reach out to comfort others primarily because we have felt His comfort: “Blessed be God, even the Father of Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of mercies, and the God of all comfort; Who comforteth us in all our tribulation, that we may be able to comfort them which are in any trouble, by the comfort wherewith we ourselves are comforted of God. For as the sufferings of Christ abound in us, so our consolation also aboundeth by Christ. And whether we be afflicted, it is for your consolation and salvation (2 Corinthians 1:3-6).

We can only give back the love we have first received. We can't give Christ-like love and comfort if we haven't first received it. We feel love for the Lord because we feel His love for us. “We love him, because he first loved us” (1 John 4:19).

Feeling His Love for Us

The importance of feeling the Lord's love for us is showcased by our current general Relief Society presidency’s emphasis on this theme. President Bonnie D. Parkin said,

When I received this call, I pleaded with Heavenly Father to help me know what the sisters in the Church needed. I received a strong witness that we, His daughters, need to know that He loves us. We need to know that He sees the good in us. Feeling His love encourages us to press forward, reassures us that we are His, and confirms to us that He cherishes us even when we stumble and experience temporary setbacks... I know there may be some who have a difficult time imagining what His love feels like. Think of a mother with her newborn baby. The warmth, safety, cherishing, and peace of a mother's embrace can help us understand what it feels like to be encircled in the arms of His love (Ensign, November, 2006, p. 108-9).

My own mother has been gone for years, but I remember as though it were yesterday, the warmth of her love — not only when I was tiny, but when I was fully grown. That memory helps me envision the love of the Lord.

The Lord gives a constant invitation to come and partake of the warmth of His love, to follow the path, hold to the iron rod, make our way through the mists of darkness and partake of the fruit “most precious and most desirable above all other fruits; yea, and it is the greatest of all the gifts of God (1 Nephi 15:36). “The love of God... sheddeth itself abroad in the hearts of the children of men; wherefore, it is the most desirable above all things... and the most joyous to the soul” (1 Nephi 11:22-23).

President Benson said, “The fruit that Lehi partook of in his vision and that filled his soul with exceeding great joy and that was most desirable above all things was the love of God” (Ensign, May, 1988, p. 4).

Parents Must Receive Before They Can Give

As parents we must first experience this love before we can help our children know Him and be encircled in the arms of His love. Why? Because until we have come to Christ and felt His love for ourselves we do not really know what true love feels like. No one else can counsel us as He can on how to bring our children up in His nurture.

We might think we love our children or our spouse, but until we know God's love personally, and have partaken of the fruit of the Tree of Life, our love is finite and can and will be used up. Sooner or later it will run out, be exhausted — and even before it’s run out, we will feel impotent, confused — at a total loss as to what to do next.

That is why His admonition and nurture must be in our hearts and minds, so we can interact with those we love according to His counsel. Unless we put Him first in our lives we will find ourselves “driven by the wind and tossed.” We won’t be able to give the Lord’s love to our children unless we feel it for ourselves.

Anne C. Pingree, second counselor in the Relief Society General Presidency, said, “His touch can heal ailments spiritual, emotional, or physical. He is our Advocate, Exemplar, Good Shepherd, and Redeemer. Where else would we look, where else would we reach, where else would we come but to Jesus Christ, 'the author and finisher of our faith’?” (Ensign, November, 2006, p, 113).

Humility, and Walking in the Light of His Love

Humility is the key that unlocks the door to His love. I have a new friend, named Peggy Barrus. I have been so impressed with her pure heart, and the spiritual power of the words she e-mails me — words from her heart. Peggy is living alone for the first time in decades; free at last from abuse, but struggling for peace with her past. She is stretching and growing as she learns from her pain and develops a deep trust in the Lord. With her permission I want to share some of her words with you. She writes of those “who truly humble themselves because of the word” (Alma 32:14).

She says:

And what is “the word” that causes me to humble myself? It is the Savior’s love! It is the word that sings in my heart all day long, and that lulls me to sleep at night. It is the word that comforts me in my loneliness, the word that takes my tears and makes them a sacred doorway to truth, and the same word that fills me with courage to admit the truth about myself.

I know You love me, Lord, and because You do, I know that whatever happens in my life is part of Thy plan for me, and that it is a good plan — one You want to share with me, because the hugest, most important part of that plan is for You to walk with me through all of it and teach me as we go along through my life.

John 4 8- 19 gives us a superb discourse on this whole idea:

He that loveth not knoweth not God; for God is love. In this was manifested the love of God toward us, because that God sent his only begotten Son into the world, that we might live through him. Herein is love, not that we loved God, but that he loved us, and sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins. Beloved, if God so loved us, we ought also to love one another...

If we love one another, God dwelleth in us, and his love is perfected in us. Hereby know we that we dwell in him, and he in us, because he hath given us of his Spirit. And we have seen and do testify that the Father sent the Son to be the Saviour of the world. Whosoever shall confess that Jesus is the Son of God, God dwelleth in him, and he in God.

And we have known and believed the love that God hath to us. God is love; and he that dwelleth in love dwelleth in God, and God in him. Herein is our love made perfect, that we may have boldness in the day of judgment: because as he is, so are we in this world. There is no fear in love; but perfect love casteth out fear: because fear hath torment. He that feareth is not made perfect in love. We love him, because he first loved us.

Feeling His love gives us our love for Him — and others too.

Seeking Understanding of His Love

Peggy Barrus continues,

Now, it is my turn. His love can only be fully perfected when it is received in me — in each of us, one by one, as we come to Christ and open our eyes to His presence. Suddenly, I saw Him here — Immanuel! (God with us) Life will never be the same, for now I can testify I know He lives in a way I didn’t know was possible before, living in the torment of darkness that kept my eyes shut tight, fearfully trembling — the blanket of all that is worldly pulled up over my head.

Bit by bit, as my eyes focus on His shadow, my spiritual eyes are learning to distinguish Him. “Lord, I love Thee,” I say, clinging to His hand. He answers me with reassurances of His love and holds me near.

We must all come to Him and ask Him to open our eyes and unstop our ears so we can see His face and hear His voice. When we hunger and thirst, if we come to Him for bread and living water, He performs the miracles of feeding the 5000 and turning water into wine all over again in the abundance of nourishment He blesses us with.

He walks with us on the stormy waters of our lives, and lifts us up when we cry out for Him to save us. And in our kneeling in the Garden of our own Gethsemane, submitting our pain to Him and being willing to learn His will for us, we experience the wash of His blood, and rise with Him in a new life with Him as we cross ourselves from our idolatries of desiring any other beauty than His. He already accomplished the Atonement, but His love is only perfected in our heart's belief and acceptance of His love.

Peggy writes beautiful things about this first Christmas in her new life.

Christmas is all about You humbly coming to me (and all of us) in my lowly stable (in all the straw and filth where my “animal,” natural self is), being born into my heart (my “manger,” or the seat of my spiritual nourishment), blazing as a “new star” to guide me through my life, singing in a glorious song of angel’s voices walking with me (Thy words — the “words of Christ” spoken of in 2 Nephi 32:3) and bringing me good cheer in this worship of my King.

This is my Christmas anthem, Lord.

I set up my tiny living tree; it had to be a living tree, to symbolize the new life in Christ I have. It’s no more than three feet tall, planted in a pot so I can use it as a houseplant the rest of the year. On it, I hung about two dozen small red ornaments (drops of Thy atoning blood), a sparkling rhinestone garland to catch the light (Thy light that I seek to capture), a tiny manger scene carved of olive wood (purchased in Bethlehem on my trip to Israel), the crystal bow that reads: “Support our troops” (from Jessica, last year), the pictures of my children and grandchildren, and a glass angel with these words: “Sing like you know the words; dance like no one’s watching; and love like it’s never going to hurt.” Isn’t that the way I need to live, Lord?

I also have three amaryllis bulbs, growing in a pot, which will hopefully bloom by Christmas, and a Christmas cactus. Its spiny leaves and sorrowful buds, dripping like tears from the ends of the leaves and opening into joyful pink blooms, bring to my mind again thy Atonement. I am brought to sing, “How great Thou art, Lord, to lift me up and carry me into hope.“

Giving What I Can Give

I’m grateful to Peggy for opening my mind and heart wider to the Lord’s love so I can give more. I need that right now. This is no ordinary December for me. My daughter-in-law Heidi went into the hospital early in the month, threatening premature delivery of their sixth child. She will be there until the baby is born. The oldest of their five children at home is eight; thank goodness they live only a few blocks from me.

Another son and his family are in process of their first major move.

My elderly father-in-law is undergoing radiation therapy five days a week for a malignant tumor in his neck; Doug and I are trying to offer extra encouragement to him and to Doug’s devoted and worried mom. My best friends and other family members are experiencing similarly serious trials. I try to remember in each of these situations that although I don’t have the stamina or youth or money or health I wish I had, such as I have, I give.

I know God lives and that prayers have real power. This assurance I share — and I keep the names of all the challenged on several temple prayer rolls. I can’t load trucks or pack boxes — but I can locate and deliver empty boxes and offer hot meals in the midst of their mess. I can’t carry the load of five children by myself, but I can help a lot. I can’t erase Heidi’s physical discomfort or anxiety, but I can take her fuzzy socks to warm her feet and good books to read. I can give her foot rubs and back rubs; I can speak encouraging words and express my love. Such as I have, I give.

As I finish this article I’m enjoying dancing flames in our fireplace and twinkling lights on my Christmas tree. Utah’s winter world has been made new and clean with a thick blanket of sparkling white snow. It’s still snowing! The air, washed by the snow, smells fresh and biting cold. Snow and Christmas lights create a winter wonderland.

I’m grateful for a few quiet moments tonight to reflect on my blessings and thank the Lord for all He has and all He gives — for the strength to live another day, and faith to trust in His loving care. I know Jesus Christ is the way, the truth, and the light. He is my joy and my song, my only light in the darkness of life. His love lights the way.

As each of us feel His love we are made carriers of it. When we have it, we can give it!

God bless you with comfort, and the assurance that the Lord is oh, so willing to give of His bounteous goodness to the full extent that we are willing to receive. May Christmas be a time for each of us to give what we have and spread His light and love to all in our circle of influence. And may our giving lift and build — as a tiny reflection of His giving. As Peggy e-mailed me last night: “Joy to the world, the Lord is come… Let every heart prepare Him room… and sing the song of gladness… the song of His redeeming love.”