CHRISTMAS GIVING

As the Christmas Season Approaches you may be finding yourself trying to find ways to help your family focus on the true meaning of Christmas. During the month of December we turn our thoughts to the Savior. We reflect on his glorious birth and what his life meant to each us personally. This is a time to commit to living a more Christlike life. This is the time to show our love and appreciation to our loved ones, our neighbors, or to the kind people we come in contact with on a daily basis who make our lives easier. It is a time to say thank you to people like our postal delivery person, the young person who delivers our newspaper and carefully places it on the front porch so that it doesn't get rained on, or our children's teachers or bus drivers. It's a wonderful time of year when we gather in the kitchen to make holiday treats to take to these special friends and neighbors. These traditions that we share with our families help to teach our children the true meaning of Christmas. The scriptures teach us that when we serve our fellow man we serve our God.

"I tell you these things that ye may learn wisdom that ye may learn that when ye are in the service of your fellow beings ye are only in the service of your god. " Mosiah 2:17
What better way to celebrate the birth of our Savior then to serve him.

While we have been on our mission we have received letters from friends and family who would like to help with our Humanitarian efforts here in Ukraine. . We are so grateful for your sweet offers of service. As Humanitarian Volunteers for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-fay Saints we have been instructed not to accept personal donations instead to direct people to the church's Humanitarian Fund to make donations. It is not that your help is not needed or appreciated it is just that it is best if it goes through the proper channels. I would like to encourage you to go to the church's website and read about what the church is doing worldwide and how you can help personally or as a ward or stake, or any other group.You can help by organizing friends, and family or fellow church members to do service projects that can be donated to the Humanitarian Department. You can make a personal donation on your tithing slip or by going to the website here and your donation will be used as part of the Humanitarian efforts worldwide. They can't guarantee where the donation will be used but it definitely will be used to do the types of projects that you have read about that Elder Kinghorn and I have been involved in.

I have included a list of organizations here whose focus is to help Ukrainian Children. There are some wonderful ideas of ways that you can personally support an organization here in Ukraine or you could get a group of friends or fellow church members to work on a service project together. Some of these organizations were started by members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints however these sights are not endorsed by the church. Thank you for your kind offers of assistance. I know that we will all have a much more meaningful Christmas season as we turn our thoughts to the Savior.