Tonight I shamefully succumbed to temptation. I decided this morning that I was going to devote my Saturday night to the homework that has been piling up ever since my extra long Thanksgiving break, and I was determined to hold true to that decision. When a friend called, inviting me to “Freeze Fest,” the school’s weekend fling, I dutifully turned her down. I wasn’t even going to let friends, free ice skating, and broom hockey distract me. I just couldn’t afford to have any fun tonight. I was going to get caught up no matter what. But, as I was sitting on my couch, finishing Hardy’s chronicle of the life of Tess Durbyfield, I happened to glance out the window.
That one innocent glance, perhaps not so different from King David’s casual glance from his palace roof, sealed my doom. Through the glass I saw something that I couldn’t resist: the white, delicate, crystalline fur of freshly fallen snow on the tree outside. I tried to go back to my reading, tried to focus on poor Tess doing all she can to resist Alec’s incessant advances, but that white seductress wouldn’t relinquish my attention. There was something outside that I had to experience. Something that was of far more worth than Tess and her struggles. Or rather, something of different, but equal importance, that wouldn’t wait patiently on a shelf for when I had time to give it the attention it deserved. Whereas my book was like a lifelong friend, always pleased whenever I find the time to pick up the phone and call, whatever was waiting for me outside was a temptress, and if I didn’t give her the attention she craved, she would move on to her next unsuspecting victim. I would lose my chance forever. Tess would have to wait.
I snatched a scrap of paper to mark my place, tossed the book onto the coffee table, threw on my coat and rushed out the front door. I stood on my porch for a brief moment, as if I expected my temptress to sashay out from behind the tree and bid me on. My breath billowed out in front of me and the cold air embraced every inch of my skin that wasn’t covered in multiple layers. Feeling the initial pull of the otherworldly landscape waning, I zipped up my coat. Then, like a bashful youth suddenly realizing what was at stake with my hasty decision to abandon my resolve, I hesitated. It’s freezing out here, I scolded myself. You have way too much stuff to do. And besides, you aren’t the kind of guy that takes an evening constitutional around the block. You’re only twenty-three. Just go back inside and finish your book.
My brain had some pretty good arguments, and I didn’t have anything to counter them. But it didn’t matter. I took a step forward. Then another. And another. And pretty soon I was out on the sidewalk, and I had no other option but to keep going. So, I started down the street. To alleviate that rational voice in my head, I decided that my rout would just take me around the block, a short walk so that I could get back and finish my studying. But that voice still wasn’t satisfied. It told me that everyone was going to think that I was one of those weirdoes who are into Zen and meditation and getting in touch with nature. There they all would be, snickering behind their mittoned hands at the lonely English major who was foolish enough to think that he could have a Waldenesque experience in the middle of Provo, Utah. But it didn’t matter. I kept on stepping on the ice crusted sidewalk, and gazing at the snow-clad trees and bushes.
There were a few other people out, but I’m sure they took no notice of the guy walking past enjoying his guilty pleasure. They were all much too busy. Like the couple holding hands. They had much more important things on their minds. Then, there were the people—whoever they were—in the 1980s Suburban doing donuts in a church parking lot. The tires of their car squealed over the fresh ice every time the bulky back end of the vehicle whipped around. My first reaction to this pesky racket was to complain to some authority in my head about how these thrill seekers were destroying the serenity of the moment, distracting me from the pleasure of the landscape. But my argument didn’t hold up. With all the other cars passing by, and the baseline from a nearby party echoing off the houses, there was not much serenity to begin with. Farther down the road were two guys having a snowball fight. I wondered why they were fighting. They were probably friends, taking this opportunity to pelt each other with a frozen projectile, which all guys secretly wish to do to their friends. Or, maybe they were bitter enemies, unable to forgive each other over some past misdeed—maybe the one stole the other’s girlfriend, or vice versa—and each saw the new snow as an opportunity to shame his nemesis with a barrage of icy missiles. I didn’t stop to ask. I figured that if they were enemies it would be best to let them settle their differences without getting involved.
But I didn’t see the guilt hovering over any of these people like I could feel it hovering over me. Didn’t they have important things to do? Didn’t they have duties that they were shirking by playing in the snow? Maybe they didn’t have the same load of homework as me. Or maybe they had managed their time better, and were already done with it. Or maybe they hadn’t made the resolve I did this morning. If they had, and if they were in the process of breaking it like I was, I didn’t notice the downcast eyes of shame that usually accompany the sinner. Or maybe they were still too wrapped up in the moment. They just hadn’t realized their guilt yet. But they would. Oh, they would. And then they would forever feel the chastisement for their transgression. That knowledge that they are weak. That they will give in eventually. That they can’t be as good as they want to be. And no matter how much they try, it won’t make any difference.
Then, I start to look at what I came out to see in the first place—the snow. I see the mighty junipers hunch under the weight that has been gathering on them, imperceptibly, flake by flake throughout the day. I also see the leafless branches of the ash trees, the crystallized snow covering their pencil-thin fingers like a coat of polar fur as if it were protecting them from the cold. And looking at this scene, the trees, the bushes, the snow covered yards, the chill, my guilt goes away for a moment, and I think about Christmas. But I don’t know why I think about Christmas. Is it just because there is snow? Just today I was driving home from work, soft flakes falling against my windshield with the Mormon Tabernacle Choir singing “I Saw Three Ships” on my stereo, and I marveled how the Christmas season was starting with an ideal bang this year. But when did snow become so inextricably connected with Christmas in our heads anyway? Growing up in California, I knew that no matter how much dreaming I did, it would take nothing less than a miracle for me to wake up to a white Christmas. But still, no matter how fun, festive and Christmasy my Christmas was, I knew that snow would have made it more fun, more festive and more Christmasy. But was it just so I could walk in a winter wonderland, or ride in a one-horse open sleigh? Or is there something else that connects snow with Christmas? Surely Joseph didn’t spend his first Christmas shoveling the walk so the wise men could approach the manger, first, because Jesus wasn’t born on December 25th, and second, because even if he had been, the average low temperatures in the Holy Land don’t even get below freezing. Yet Christmas without snow, or at least the impossible wish for snow, is a letdown. Is snow more than a form a precipitation in the form of crystalline water ice? Maybe all the other people out here know the answer to that question already. Maybe that’s why I can’t see the guilt hanging over them—because it’s not there.
#
I discovered my favorite word this past week. I say discovered, because that is exactly what it felt like. Like chancing upon a great, unknown work of literary genius. It was always there, silently calling to me, and it was only a matter of time before I unearthed it from its hiding place.
I was thinking about Tess and her inability to forgive herself and Angel and his inability to forgive Tess, and I was frustrated at their utter foolishness. Couldn’t they see that one mistake doesn’t ruin you for the rest of your life? Couldn’t they put the past behind them and move on, becoming better, more understanding in the process? They were so despairing and narrow-minded. And that’s when I stumbled upon my word.
Redemption.
#
I spent two years—from nineteen to twenty-one—as a missionary in southern New Jersey. It was an unforgettable experience that taught me about service, and faith, and prayer, and scripture, and power, and redemption. Most of the people who would listen to us were the people who had hit rock bottom. They had messed up their lives as much as they possibly could with alcohol, promiscuity, gambling, and the like. In Jesus’ time, these people probably would have been categorized as publicans and sinners. But He would have called them the lost sheep. And if my missionary companion and I were going to represent the Good Shepherd, we were going to have to go to them in the slums and ghettos, and do everything we could to draw them back into the fold.
The people who come to mind are Mauricio, who told us that he wanted to be baptized with his whole being, Rosy, who wanted to bring her daughter up so that she wouldn’t make the same mistakes as her mother, and Orlando, who we thought was only listening to us because his girlfriend wanted him to, but surprised us one day by telling us that he was ready to make a covenant with God. And all these people were washed clean as they came up out of the water. There past was behind them. Or, more importantly, in God’s eyes, it hadn’t even happened. They got a fresh start to make themselves into what they wanted to be.
But I also think about the little Olivares girl—eight years old—whom I baptized. Being a relatively new missionary, I was nervous to perform the sacred ordinance. In the locker room beside the font, I paced back and forth, repeating over and over in my mind the girl’s long, Hispanic name. I would have to say it fully and perfectly for the baptism, and I prayed that I wouldn’t mess it up. When the awaited time came, I stepped through the doors and down into the font. When my bare toes touched the water, I felt a chill travel from my foot up to my brain. Whoever filled the font forget to turn on the hot water. With the impact of the cold, my mind let the girl’s name out of its grip for a split second, and that was all it needed to attempt its escape. As I scrambled in my head to hold onto her name, I took the girl gently by the wrist, said her name perfectly and dunked her in the freezing water. But in my efforts to get her name right, I forgot a part of the prayer. I hadn’t said the right words. She came out of the water shivering, and I had to tell her that we would have to do it again, so that we could get it right. She meekly consented. Then, I baptized her. When she came up the second time, she was pure and smiling, though still shivering. Her sins probably consisted of getting angry with her older sisters, or maybe disobeying her parents every once in a while, nothing compared to all the other people I would later baptize—nothing compared to my own sins—but she got the same washing. The same washing Jesus himself got.
During those two years, I spent most of my time in places I would be afraid to take my family. Crime is a part of life there. In Trenton, a guy told us of a killing that happened the night before on a street we walked down every day.
“It’s a good thing we have to be in by nine-thirty,” I said.
“It happened at eight,” the man replied.
My companion and I stood in shocked silence for a moment.
“Right here?” asked my companion.
“Right here,” said the man.
The neighborhoods we worked in were strewn with trash—beer bottles, fast food wrappers, dime bags—and the brick walls of the apartment buildings were decorated with graffiti where they weren’t cracking and falling apart. They were depressing surroundings, except in the winter.
With the first snow, the city was transformed from the site of crime and violence to a Thomas Kinkade painting. It was magical how the snow concealed everything from the past, practically erasing it from the record of time. A place that once instilled fear at every corner, became the ideal setting for a holiday rendezvous. And even the people who lived in these neighborhoods—possibly the same people who were littering the streets with beer bottles and dime bags—seemed to feel the change as well. They came out onto the street, not to furtively look over their shoulder to be sure that nobody was following them, but to play. To sled. To make snow angels. To throw snowballs at the kids next door, or maybe at the two guys in white shirts and ties walking down the other side of the street.
#
Could it be that snow and what I saw in the baptismal font aren’t that different? “Though your sins be as scarlet, they shall be as white as snow.” Redemption. So, there is a reason why snow is associated with Christmas. A reason that I was missing in my guilt riddled ruminations. Earlier, I compared myself to King David, but now I think there is a better comparison. Maybe I am more like the shepherds keeping watch over their flocks by night. Maybe they had decided that morning that they were going to keep a careful watch that night; that they weren’t going to take their eyes off their livelihood for a single moment. But the angel came and had different plans for them. That was when they were faced with the same choice I had been faced with. But I misunderstood the message, and for twenty minutes I resisted the lesson I was supposed to learn. That snow on Christmas means far more than walking in a winter wonderland, or riding in a one-horse open sleigh. It means something for all those people I saw washed clean. And it means that all my sins could be covered over and made clean like the streets I walked along. That’s when I started to see myself in the juniper—needing my pride pulled down just a tad—and the ash—desperate for some protection against the chill winds. And I saw myself in the entire neighborhood, which just a day before was drab and boring, but now gave the impression of newness and purity.
And as I climb the steps back up to my front door, I understand why I was drawn so mercilessly out into the cold, snowy night. I guess I came out to get in touch with nature after all. Because, “all things denote there is a God,” and I wanted to be among them. I needed to hear what they had to say about Him.