“Christmas Means Hope, Peace, and Love,” Liahona, December 2023.
Christmas Means Hope, Peace, and Love
The baby Jesus we adore and worship at Christmastime offers us hope, peace, and love during our trying times.
Hope Gentile, four days before her first chemotherapy treatment in March 2015.
Photographs of Hope by Nicholas Gentile
“Every time a child is born,” President Boyd K. Packer (1924–2015), President of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles, taught, “the world is renewed in innocence.”1 And because of the promised birth of a child long ago “in the city of David” (see Luke 2:11), the hearts of those who embrace that child and His mission can be renewed every day in hope and peace and love.
Hope, peace, and love are found in the “great light” (Isaiah 9:2) Jesus Christ brought to our darkening world. Hope, peace, and love are also found in the “good tidings of great joy” (Luke 2:10) that bless all God’s children through His birth.
Christmastime is the perfect opportunity to focus our hearts and minds on the Christ child born so long ago and on the peace and hope that the message of His gospel brings into each of our hearts as we willingly follow Him.
Hope in the Savior
A few years ago, a single word—cancer—thrust the young family of Nicholas and Christina Gentile into what Brother Gentile called “the uncharted depths of a life-or-death trial.” Their 19-month-old daughter, Hope, had been diagnosed with a tumor in her lower back.
“Over the next five months of surgeries and chemotherapy,” recalls Brother Gentile, “Hope’s battle for life created a kaleidoscope of experiences that ultimately strengthened our family’s testimony of the Savior’s grace.”
Hope’s trial and uncertain future drew the family closer—to each other and to the Savior.
“We knew that what we saw was only part of the reality that God saw for Hope,” said Brother Gentile. “Despite the darkness, we trusted in Him, regardless of the outcome.”
One dark night during Hope’s second five-day round of chemotherapy, Brother Gentile noticed how much hair she had lost in the previous few days. Her remaining strawberry blonde wisps painfully reminded him of her mortality. Nevertheless, he found solace in the Lord’s promise that “a hair of [her] head shall not fall to the ground unnoticed” (Doctrine and Covenants 84:116).
“I felt that Jesus Christ was deeply aware of Hope’s journey—and our heartache,” said Brother Gentile. “He did ‘not leave [us] comfortless’ [John 14:18].”
During bedtime one evening as he read a board book to Hope, Brother Gentile asked in a silly voice, “What does the owl say?” Giggling, Hope replied, “Hoo, hoo!” Then he asked, “What does the cow say?” Hope proudly responded, “Moo, moo!”
At that moment, a picture of the Savior on the bedroom wall caught Brother Gentile’s attention. The Spirit prompted him to ask, “Hope, and what does Jesus say?”
As he waited for his daughter’s reply, she snuggled into his shoulder, opened her big blue eyes, and whispered, “‘Hold you.’ Jesus says, ‘Hold you.’”
Brother Gentile gently pulled Hope’s tiny body close and hugged her as he sobbed. As Hope hugged back with her tiny arms, she whispered, “Love you, Dada.”
God had given Brother Gentile and his family that moment for a special reason: “Jesus was holding our family in His loving arms,” he said. “Since that sacred night, I have pondered the tender truth God taught me through my daughter’s words: Jesus will hold us and bless us during our trials if we let Him. These blessings come according to His perfect time, way, and will, but they do come. I know these truths because the Holy Ghost helped me to feel them in Hope’s room on that dark night.”2
Security Blanket, by David Bowman, may not be copied
Peace in Christ
I am happy to report that the Gentile family’s faith and prayers were answered. Today, Hope is a healthy, happy 10-year-old.
But what of those times when God’s answer is not what we had hoped? Can peace come in the midst of personal heartache?
As the Gentile family found, peace is always found as we turn to the Savior, whose birth in Bethlehem we celebrate this season. At Christmastime, when personal trials, grief, and illness can ofttimes temper our Christmas celebrations, our testimony of the Savior’s birth, death, and Resurrection provides peace.
Our beloved prophet, President Russell M. Nelson, taught us: “Just as the Savior offers peace that ‘passeth all understanding’ [Philippians 4:7], He also offers an intensity, depth, and breadth of joy that defy human logic or mortal comprehension. For example, it doesn’t seem possible to feel joy when your child suffers with an incurable illness or when you lose your job or when your spouse betrays you. Yet that is precisely the joy the Savior offers. His joy is constant, assuring us that our ‘afflictions shall be but a small moment’ [Doctrine and Covenants 121:7] and be consecrated to our gain [see 2 Nephi 2:2].”3
When the Lord speaks comfort to our souls, we can join with the “multitude of the heavenly host praising God, and saying, Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace, good will toward men” (Luke 2:13–14).
We can “come … joyful and triumphant … to Bethlehem.”4
We can “sleep in heavenly peace,”5 knowing that, ultimately, all will be well and made right according to God’s promises and perfect time, way, and will.
Left: Hope after her fourth chemotherapy treatment in June 2015. Right: Hope at nine years old.
The Gift of Love
The Father knows each of us perfectly—our trials and imperfections, our longings and losses. Because He loves us, He has given us the greatest gift we could ever receive.
“For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life” (John 3:16).
Because the Son likewise loves us, He willingly gave His life for us.
“[The Son] doeth not anything save it be for the benefit of the world; for he loveth the world, even that he layeth down his own life that he may draw all men unto him,” Nephi prophesied of the Savior. “Wherefore, he commandeth none that they shall not partake of his salvation” (2 Nephi 26:24).
As the Savior’s disciples in the latter days, we have the responsibility and blessing to share the love the Father and the Son have for us. We share that love as we bear testimony to God’s children of the precious knowledge we have that God lives, that His Son came to earth to save us from physical and spiritual death, and that in our day the Savior has restored His Church—The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.
The gift of God’s Only Begotten Son is why we celebrate Christmas. Christmas means lasting hope and peace made possible through the Savior’s Atonement and Resurrection wrought out of love for us. Christmas means everlasting life and eternal reunions made possible through sacred ordinances performed in holy temples.
“The main reason we celebrate Christmas is because of Easter,” President Nelson said. He added, “Because of Jesus Christ, we can repent and be forgiven of our sins. Because of Him, each of us will be resurrected.”6
We read sacred accounts in the New Testament of the birth of the Savior. This story is at the center of many of our favorite Christmas traditions. As we celebrate His birth, however, let us not forget that without His Resurrection and Atonement, we would not have Christmas.
The Book of Mormon bears witness of the reality of the risen Christ as well as of the richness and depth of the doctrine of Christ. During the Christmas season, those who use the truths about Christ found within its pages will add more meaning to their family’s Christmas celebrations.
I know that because of the Savior’s love and central role in the plan of salvation, we can receive His peace (see John 14:27) and “a more excellent hope” (Ether 12:32)—at Christmastime and always.