A Glimpse at Bethlehem

Exactly six months ago I was in Bethlehem. It was a fabulous experience. I went to the Church of the Nativity, built over a grotto where tradition holds that Mary gave birth to Jesus. I went to the fields where the shepherds were that followed the star. And I had the opportunity to gain new insights from my professor about the birth of Christ. I want to share some of those insights with you.

The average age at time of betrothal was 12 or 13 for a girl in that day, so Mary was probably about that age. Joseph would have been around 17 years old. What amazing faith in such a young couple!

Inns had a large courtyard for animals, a lower level for cargo, and an upper level for people. This made them ideal for caravans passing the night. There was no room for Mary and Joseph in the inn (upper level), so they may have stayed in the lower level with the cargo and animals or they may have been in a grotto underneath a home. (the Church of the Nativity is built over such a grotto. It was one of the three churches established by Helena, mother of Constantine, who was supposed to erect churches for the most holy sites of Christendom. She would ask around and find out where tradition had it that these events occurred. So even though the church was built around 300AD, it was an important enough event that tradition would have been strong, and the location is probably within a few hundred yards of the real one) However, the greek term used here could also mean “guest room.”

It was normal for young boys to stay with the flocks (recall young David), so the fact that there were older men there that night is significant. They would only have been there because it was the time of birthing. The shepherds were Levites who had been looking for the Savior their whole lives. The lambs being birthed that night were destined for temple sacrifices, being a type and shadow of the sacrifice that Jesus would make 33 years later. This is my favorite insight I picked up about the birth of Christ.

That night there were only shepherds, though—the wise men came later. They were probably Persians, and could be of the Zoroastrian religion. The Bible Dictionary says that they could see the star when others could not (!) and found the young child later on. The three gifts are symbolic:

Item: Use: Symbolism:

Gold Royalty Son of God

Frankincense Used in temples Priesthood

Myrrh Used in burials Coming death

The items were also quite valuable. We see from the sacrifice (a pair of turtledoves or two young pigeons) that Mary and Joseph brought at Jesus’ circumcision that they were quite poor. It is possible that the gold, frankincense, and myrrh were sold to finance the Holy family’s flight to Egypt. I love the way that God takes care of people’s material needs!

Anyway, I hope these insights and pictures help you to picture the Nativity this CHRISTmas season. I love being able to picture the spot in my mind, and I love knowing the deeper significance of certain things.

The Beautiful Parodox of Love

My friend, Jenna Kimble, wrote a song, and one particular line caught my attention: "And each time I give away my heart, there's room for more love, whether to give or receive...room for more love."

It's amazing! You would think that you would have less capacity to love after giving away pieces of your heart...but somehow my ability to love is always replenished. Giving love away doesn't diminish it. Somehow it's always filled back up.

I have found this to be true in a variety of situations. For example, on my mission I never stayed any place very long: 6 weeks to 3 months tops. So I routinely gave my heart away to people, and then had to leave them. It was painful! But whenever I went to a new place, I was able to love them just as well. The old people still held a piece of my heart, but I still had a full heart to give to the new people. And since I've come back, I've been amazed at my ability to love people here, even though I felt that I'd left my heart in Brasil. Now I feel like I left half my heart in Jerusalem and half my heart in Brasil; yet I still have a full heart to give to my 28 students!

Somehow I've picked up the ideal that choosing to love is never a bad choice. I don't know if someone taught me that or if it was from a catchy quote, or what...but somehow it entered into my ideology. Choosing to love is never wrong. And in my stage of life, living by this adage can be painful! Sometimes I give my heart to someone and then they decide they don't want it, and it takes a while for me to regain ownership of my own heart. But when I do, I always find that there is room for more love: more love to give and more to receive. And I'm always better for it. Even though it hurts, I've never regretted loving somebody.

I wonder if this is part of our divine heritage. I was listening to President Uchtdorf's talk on love this morning on my way to work, and he was talking about how we inherited the ability to love from our Father, who is all-loving. I think this is part of the miracle of love: that no matter how much of it we give away, the supply is always replenished. There's room for more love.

p.s. Jenna's song is amazing, and it is available on i-tunes. It's called "Bring on the Rain."

The Beginning of the Rest of My Life

I had an epiphany the other day that I want to attempt to put in the words.

You see, when I was a child, I was very me-centered. I feel like my focus/perspective gradually widened to include family and friends and maybe a little bit of the world as I grew up and went to school. Yet I was still quite self-centered. In college, as much as I would've liked to think that I wasn't, my focus was still on me. I got a brief taste of other-centeredness when I served as a missionary, and it felt like a breath of fresh air to not just be focused on me all the time.

Right now I'm entering a new phase of life--instead of studying, I have started my career as a school teacher! I spend probably 14 hours a day actively preparing to teach and teaching 28 ten and eleven year-olds. I'm constantly thinking about how to teach and help them. Even when I'm not at school, they're on my mind. At Thanksgiving, when I was "resting", I was thinking about them. When I can't sleep at night, my mind goes to them. Sometimes I wonder if it's unhealthy, but I'm constantly thinking about my "kids."

At times I feel overwhelmed/frustrated and want to have time for me. I expressed that feeling to my mom, who is also a school teacher. She said something to the effect of, "Well, Sabrina, just wait until you're a mother! It's going to be like this but more so." At the moment, that thought overwhelmed me even more, and I wondered if I would be able to do the whole motherhood thing. But I've been thinking about the concept ever since.

I wonder if life is a gradual opening of our perspective from self to others. I wonder if our experiences and progression from school to career to family is supposed to be a path to being other-centered. My career makes me think of others all the time, but I DO still have time to think about myself. But then I'm going to get married and have a husband to think about and care for...and then children! I could be selfish and think of this as a negative thing (indeed that is the message that the world is telling women), or I could have an eternal perspective and think of this as an exciting part of my progression--to becoming what I am supposed to become. It makes me think of the progression beyond the grave... my goal is to become as Heavenly Father and thus have infinite posterity. I will have tons of spirit children to be thinking about all the time. Does God think of himself very often? I think he spends all of his time being concerned with the eternal life of his children. It is an endless process of becoming less concerned with self and more concerned with others. And in losing ourselves, we will find ourselves. So I think that me being wrapped up with my 28 kiddos is the humble beginning of a long journey to being completely, happily other-centered.