A Christmas Carol

Today at church one of the speakers started by giving a synopsis of A Christmas Carol.  I love it when I get a chance to see the play at the Hale Center Theater.  It is my favorite and I cry over it every time.  I cry over Tiny Tim, and his family who is devastated when he dies, and I cry over poor miserable Scrooge.  But I am happy that he learns his lessons, and that the future he saw could be changed if he made better choices.  Tiny Tim could live.  The sad family could be happy.  And Scrooge could learn to be happy instead of miserly and miserable.  And he did.

The Scrooge who had yet to learn his lesson sees his business partner Marley covered in chains.

“You are fettered," said Scrooge, trembling. "Tell me why?"
"I wear the chain I forged in life," replied the Ghost. "I made it link by link, and yard by yard; I girded it on of my own free will, and of my own free will I wore it.”
― Charles Dickens, A Christmas Carol

We get to choose how we live.  We get to decide how to react to things.  We choose how we think, and what we do.  Agency, or choice, is one of the greatest gifts we have, and the way we learn.  As long as we live it is never too late to shed whatever chains we have girded.  We do this by using the power of the Atonement made by the Savior, who is the very reason we celebrate Christmas.  We can be like the Scrooge at the end of the story.

“I will honour Christmas in my heart, and try to keep it all the year"  Charles Dickens, A Christmas Carol