From the Mormon Newsroom:
Participants have been posting their experiences and sharing the videos on social media channels about their random acts of service for the #LIGHTtheWORLD campaign. Others have been quietly participating in the initiative. Such was the case of a Utah man (name withheld to protect privacy) behind bars who performed a simple act of service by sharing a cherished candy bar with a new prisoner.
The inmate’s family has been mailing him daily service ideas during the initiative, but they weren’t sure how he could respond to the challenge on December 7: “Jesus Fed the Hungry and So Can You.” His mother said, “I wondered if I should send it at all — it made me pretty sad to ask him to share his food when I know he really doesn’t have any to share, and if he did, it would be such a small amount.”
Earlier in the week, the inmate had ordered the candy bar from the commissary with money sent to him by his family for snacks. After looking forward to eating it all week, he decided to give it to the other prisoner who had nothing. In a letter, his family said the “sacrifice” made by their son made him “feel better than he had for a long time.”
The inmate’s mother wrote that the candy bar stands as a symbol for several reasons. “This ‘Light the World’ project is giving me some happiness and the feeling that I can do something for him and myself that is positive,” she said. The mother said it “uncovers [her] gratitude” for her son’s “repentant attitude in his situation and his willingness to be kind in the awful environment he is in.” She added, “Being reminded that no matter how little we might think we have, no matter where we are, or what our situation is, we can always serve and give to others, no matter what.”
“It’s amazing how we can still find ways to be happy and focus on the most important thing, which is our Savior,” she said.
The “Light the World” website is available in English, Spanish and Portuguese. The Christmas initiative also features billboards in cities around the world, including New York City’s Times Square, and displays in the Church’s English-speaking visitors’ centers and the Mexico City Visitors’ Center.
There are so many different ways you can be involved. Below is a video of a true Christmas miracle of service that has now been seen over 240,000 times.
