Hello, my friends, and happy Easter.

This is one of the most glorious times of year, and I can't think of a better group of people to celebrate it with than all of you.

I'm actually really thankful that the church is elevating our Easter game, because this is no game.

This is one of the most important things we can do all year.

I've sometimes pondered, if you were to rank the holidays from most important to least

important, where would you rank them? Maybe Halloween down near the bottom, as far as important as

candy might be. But as far as real meaning of it all, I don't know how much there is in that one.

A lot of the other holidays are going to rank somewhere else in between, but I'll bet that Christmas and Easter would vie for the top of the list as far as importance

is concerned. But if they're neck and neck as far as importance, as far as how much we do to

celebrate and honor those days, I don't think that's neck and neck. And that's a problem.

It's amazing for me to see how early they start stocking Christmas things on the shelves

at Walmart and things, to how early in the season, I mean, it's not even Halloween and we're listening

to Christmas music or putting out the Christmas lights. Do we start celebrating Easter

in January? Maybe we should. When do we start playing our Easter music? And do we have enough

to fill days on end 24-7? What do we do to set out, do we set out an Easter basket and have it there just building

anticipation for the entire month?

Most people don't.

And I'm grateful that the first presidency in the gorm of the 12 have been emphasizing

over the last few years that we need to elevate our appreciation of Easter, our celebration of Easter.

We can't elevate Easter. It's already at the top.

In fact, if I had to rank them in importance, I would put Easter first above Christmas.

That Christmas actually is only important because of Easter.

...