Joy

A friend recently confided that she just couldn’t forgive herself for her past mistakes. She said she kept dwelling on the fact that she made them and that she should have done things differently. I know I have felt that way at times, but as I was talking to her I was reminded of a scripture story. It was the one where the Pharisees brought the adulteress for Jesus to condemn, so they could stone her. Then Jesus said, he who was without sin should cast the first stone. When all the men had gone, Jesus finally said, “Neither do I condemn thee. Go and sin no more.”

To me, that story embodies the true meaning of repentance. Repentance is not about beating yourself up or ‘stoning yourself’ over the mistakes you make. Repentance is about turning away from sin and getting back on the right path. It’s about never giving up. It’s about picking yourself up when you fail and keeping on trying. We do this by taking the sacrament each week and trying to keep our covenants as best we can. We all fall short. And that was part of the plan. It’s how we were supposed to learn and progress. When we don’t allow Christ to free us from the sorrow of sin, we stop our progression and learning.

Someone once said that life is like an airplane ride. Airplanes don’t go straight from point A to point B. They are continually making adjustments to get back to the path that will take them to where they want to go. In a similar manner we also must continually make adjustments to get back in harmony with God’s laws. This is not sad! It is happy! That Christ made it possible for us to do this! Each time we repent we should rejoice, not sorrow. I know that in heaven they are rejoicing over us. It says so in the scriptures that there is joy over each sinner who repenteth.

The Lord doesn’t see us as this bundle of sins and imperfections. He sees yesterday, today, and eternity all at once. He sees us right now, as we will be, beautiful, and clean from the atonement of Christ. I hope we can learn to see ourselves that way, and know the great love the Lord has for each one of us. Because of Christ, we are beautiful…today.

Seize The Day

Each of us has only one life, but some of us behave as if we believed we were cats with nine lives. At times we live on the edge, giving little thought to the fact that at any instant we could lay our bodies down and depart this life. We eat, we drink, we make merry, not realizing that our loved ones and friends could die or be taken from us at any time. As John Lennon and Paul McCartney once wrote, "Life is very short, and there's no time for fussing and fighting, my friend."

We dare not live out lives without taking advantage of each and every day. We must seize the day! We must live and love each day as if it were our last. This is the essence of being good and doing good. We should never wait until tomorrow to make things right. There may be no tomorrow.

A great teacher taught: "Mend a quarrel. Seek out a forgotten friend. Dismiss suspicion and replace it with trust. Write a letter. Give a soft answer. Encourage youth. Manifest your loyalty in word and deed. Keep a promise. Forgo a grudge. Forgive an enemy. Apologize. Try to understand. Examine your demands on others. Think first of someone else. Be kind. Be gentle. Laugh a little more. Express your gratitude. Welcome a stranger. Gladden the heart of a child. Take pleasure in the beauty and wonder of the earth. Speak your love and then speak it again."

My Father's House.

I was thinking earlier about posting something else, but the Spirit said "No". It was the first time that happened to me with this blog, and speaks to the fact that the Lord has something very specific in mind for what I need to write tonight. (Please don't hesitate to contact me about anything I've written here. My email link is located on the side bar.)

A few minutes ago, I was thinking about the day, and how grateful I am for some very specific blessings. This time, the Spirit was overwhelming - "This is what you need to write about." Interestingly enough, I had originally wanted to post Elder Ballard's request that we share our testimonies through the internet, blogs and other electronic media. I will share that request at another time. Tonight, what the Lord wants me to share is my testimony. (It's just a bit ironic that I didn't pick up on THAT when I read Elder Ballard's request that we do that very thing.)

I was able to attend our Fast and Testimony Meeting today. I have been feeling for a while that I needed to share my testimony of the Temple, and what a blessing it has been to me in this last year. As I sat listening to the testimonies, trying keep my brood of 5 active children quiet enough so that I could hear, I realized that there had been a long period of silence. I waited, and I thought I heard someone get up, but the pause continued. Finally the Spirit said to me, "We are waiting for you." What I will share here is actually much more detailed than what I shared in the meeting today, but essentially the same.

Last November, my Bishop encouraged me to begin attending the Temple regularly, at least once a month. I cried there in his office. I hadn't wanted to go without my husband. I had come to a place where I knew my husband, to whom I was sealed in the San Diego Temple 14 years earlier, was no longer interested in Christ or the LDS Church, much less the Temple. My own convictions, regarding the truth of the gospel and the power of Christ to comfort as well cleanse and save, were stronger than ever. I knew I needed the strength that would come from the Temple and I knew my husband wouldn't be coming with me again. I told my Bishop that I would go each month.

This month, October 2008, was the 12th consecutive month that I have fulfilled that commitment. In some ways it seems like much more time has passed because so much has changed in my life during this year. In most ways, the year has flown by. I will never let any excuse keep me from the Temple again. In the Temple, I feel peace about my road - which has been incredibly rocky and filled with struggles I never dreamed I'd face. In the Temple, I feel the deep and endless love of the Lord. I feel like I'm 'going  home' in many ways. It is My Father's House. He is there for me when I go for a visit. He sits at my side and listens to me as I pour out my heart. He lets me know that he has heard me. Amazingly, what I feel to do most when I am there is to Thank Him. I am renewed in the Temple. It has been a much greater blessing to me than my Bishop promised.

Last November, as I sat waiting in a silent Temple room, My Father said quietly to my heart "Thank you for coming to My House. Now, I can bless you even more." I felt completely overwhelmed by His love, and I desperately needed that. I had recently told my husband that I wasn't willing to go on the way things were. In the previous year things had worsened in our home to such an extent, his anger and misery were so entrenched, that I had begun to fear for our children and their emotional health. There was strength rising up in me that I didn't know I had. I wasn't afraid anymore to face life without him. I had given him one last opportunity to treat his family with kindness and love, to be the father his children deserved. I could live with him not embracing the gospel the way I did, but I couldn't live with the emotional explosions that seemed to be more and more common and vicious - turning more often directly to family members. I had come to a very difficult place. I needed My Father more than ever, and He was there for me, in His House.

I can think of so many precious moments in my visits to the Temple during this year when the Spirit has lifted me like a buoy, helping me to float through what would otherwise have been almost unbearable trials. The Spirit made me sure of my course, sure of the things I knew I had to do. It has been far more difficult than I imagined, but most often more peaceful. There have been moments so painful, I thought there was no way I'd find my way through the struggles. Soon after however, a little light would come, a little miracle would find its way into my life, My Father would reveal His hand. It is not the life I planned. It is so far from the life I planned that I know I would never have been able to withstand the mounting pressures without my monthly visits to the Temple, Daily Scripture Study and Prayer. My road has brought me to a divorce.

Your road may be a different road, but your answers and strength still lie in the Temple, in Your Father's House. He knows you just as well as He knows me. He is waiting for you to come and sit at His knee, tell Him of your pain and find rest in His love. I Know. I have been there. He and our Savior Jesus Christ Live and they Love us so desperately. They want to see us. It's what they always say, isn't it? "Come unto me, all ye that labor and are heavy laden and I will give you rest." 

Rest is waiting for you. 

Come.

Search In The Light Of Christ

Moroni knew that in the latter-days people would call good evil and evil good. He therefore included in the last pages of the Book Of Mormon counsel his father, Mormon, gave to the Saints who lived in the last days of the Nephite civilization. They too had difficulty clearing this mist, so Mormon gave them a key:
"Every thing which inviteth and enticeth to do good, and to love God, and to serve him, is inspired of God. Wherefore, take heed, my beloved brethren, that ye do not judge that which is evil to be of God or that which is good and of God to be of the devil. For behold, my brethren, it is given unto you to judge, that ye may know good from evil; and the way to judge is as plain, that ye may know with a perfect knowledge, as the daylight is from the dark night. For behold, the Spirit of Christ is given to every man, that he may know good from evil; wherefore I show unto you the way to judge; for everything which inviteth to do good, and to persuade to believe in Christ, is sent forth by the power and gift of God...And now, my brethren, seeing that ye know the light by which ye may judge, which light is the light of Christ, see that ye do not judge wrongfully...Wherefore, I beseech of you , brethren, that ye should search diligently in the light of Christ that ye may know good from evil; and if ye will lay hold upon every good thing, and condemn it not, ye certainly will be a child of Christ." (Moroni 7:13-19.)

For a wise purpose.

Words of Mormon
7 And I do this for a wise purpose; for thus it whispereth me, according to the workings of the Spirit of the Lord which is in me. And now, I do not know all things; but the Lord knoweth all things which are to come; wherefore, he worketh in me to do according to his will.

This scripture says in a nutshell how I feel about my life’s ups and downs. I don’t know everything, but the Lord does.

The Best Within Us

I loved this quote.

“The whole process of raising a family is one of perfecting our own lives. That which we transmit consciously and unconsciously to our children in their rearing in the home and in the community must be the best within us.” Henry D. Moyle, formerly of the 1st Presidency of the church.