“Please Don’t Stop Singing,” Liahona, December 2021
Latter-day Saint Voices
Please Don’t Stop Singing
In a bus full of people and noise, we found a way to testify of the Savior.
Photograph by Rob Crandall/Alamy Stock Photo
We four missionaries had just left the home of a senior missionary couple when we waved down a bus to take us back to our areas.
We shouldered through a standing-room-only crowd and grabbed the metal bar above our heads. Standing, we soon had to lean our bodies over the seated passengers to make room for other passengers crowding in.
A middle-aged woman sat below me, her lap piled with shopping bags and boxes. Her dark eyes told me she was tired, and her long face spoke of her discomfort sitting in a crowded bus moving through the sticky, hot Panamanian air.
Closing my eyes, I imagined that I could smell the Chinese food my mom and sisters were preparing for Christmas Eve dinner. I also imagined that I could hear the Christmas music Mom always played. Those comforting thoughts soon washed away the heat and humidity, and I began to hum a Christmas carol. The eyes of the woman below me lightened a shade. I gained courage and started singing a Christmas hymn to myself in Spanish. Elder Glazier joined me, and then we fell silent.
“Please, don’t stop,” the woman said, her eyes tearing up.
Looking at my companions, I pulled out my hymnbook.
“Brothers and sisters,” I called out over the din of the bus. As my companions also grabbed their hymnbooks, I added, “We would like to sing some Christmas songs to share the spirit of Christmas with you—a small message from missionaries of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.”
We sang every Christmas hymn in the Spanish hymnbook. We weren’t a heavenly choir, but the power of the music and words about the Savior’s birth touched hearts. The excitement of serving in the mission field during Christmas filled the four of us elders with peace, joy, and light.
We sang until we reached our stop. The woman below me cheered and said, “Thank you, Christmas singers!”
After stepping off the bus, we waved goodbye to the crowded vehicle. Passengers applauded as the bus pulled away, and we climbed a hill into the tropical night. I always look back at that night with gratitude for the woman who gave us an opportunity to testify of the Savior through song.