The Christmas towel

It’s Christmas Eve and more than ever we need to believe in the magic of this season. This year it is a season that has been stripped of festivities and gatherings to spread warmth’s and joy. Where there are usually bustling Christmas markets, family gatherings and a time that is spent together, we are facing loneliness and isolation. More than ever we need to believe in the magic of life and the world itself, no matter how difficult it might get.

I remember back to a holiday when a neighbor gifted me a Christmas towel. It came attached with a poem called “The Christmas towel.” Something so simply, yet so profound and meaningful. In all honesty, I don’t think I ever truly captured it’s meaning and value until recently. All of a sudden it strikes a different chord and stirs something that sinks deeply within the heart to be cherished and held onto for all eternity.

Years later, I hope to pick a beautiful towel, perhaps the next time while shopping, wrap it up beautifully and write the poem on festive paper. Years later I feel the need to pay it forward to someone in the hopes of spreading a little Christmas spirit. Have you heard of the poem and this tradition before? If you have I’d love to hear your experiences with it, and if not…well I’d like to hear your thoughts anyways. Here is the poem.

The Christmas towel

At first glance, it is easy to look at a towel as a most ordinary object. Have you ever stopped to think that for thousands of years, the towel has been used for many wonderful purposes? For example, the mother who wipes the tears of a child, the physician who binds the wounds of a patient, or the woman in her home wiping her hands as she moves from task to task.

Perhaps the most significant use of the towel happened nearly two thousand years ago when our Savior, only hours before He hung on the cross, took an ordinary towel in His loving hands and dried the feet of His disciples. This simple, loving act personifies the selflessness and loving service we seek to give during our lives. It illustrates that an ordinary thing like a towel, in the right hands, and with a giving heart, can lighten another’s load. As with every action performed by the Savior on this earth, His act of service reminds us that simple day to day kindnesses are the Savior’s way to bless and comfort.

This towel is given with love and with the hope you will do works of goodness with it as the Savior did so many years ago. May the absorbing spirit of the season blot out our problems, soak up our sorrows, wipe away difficulties, and may your Christmas be shining and bright!