Wise Words from a Woman Acquainted with Sorrow

Elizabeth Edwards died of cancer on December 7th, 2010. She said the following a few days before she died - when it was announced publicly that she only had weeks or days left:

"The days of our lives, for all of us, are numbered. We know that. And yes, there are certainly times when we aren't able to muster as much strength and patience as we would like. It's called being human. But I have found that in the simple act of living with hope, and in the daily effort to have a positive impact in the world, the days I do have are made all the more meaningful and precious. And for that I am grateful."  

What a profound statement.  I hope I can say when my time has come that others can say of me that I learned and followed these words in my own life.

A Path Not to God's Love but to Know You Are Loved

From "Love, love, love and love" - Gwen (Back and then)

"The atonement is the path, but what it leads to is not God’s love - because His love is everywhere; it is there for us no matter who we are. It is a path for us to know we are loved.

It is like being in a dark room with no door or window or light of any kind and we get lost and start crying for food and water when it is actually in abundance everywhere. The atonement is not the food or the water; it is someone turning on the light."

Service as Sanctified Sacrifice

A friend once told me he found he wasn't serving others as much as he would like, and he asked what advice I had for him.  The following was my response:

Find people who need help badly that you haven't served in the past - and give them the help they really need, no matter how uncomfortable it makes you feel at first.

Go to a nursing home and sit with someone who has no family to visit her.

Go to a hospital and hold someone who is dying of AIDS.

Go to a school and read to little children.

Go to a homeless shelter for families and give them small gifts outside of the Christmas season.

Go to a battered women's shelter and help teach them job skills so they can survive on their own - or just hold a baby so a mother can get away for a few minutes.

Exactly what you do is up to you, but find someone who normally would qualify as a publican, sinner, leper or Samaritan in your eyes and serve them until you see them differently.

Choose whom and how you serve, but absolutely serve - and do it at a time and in a manner that is a real sacrifice, including giving up something else you would like to be doing.

My Emotional / Spiritual Testimony vs. My Intellectual Testimony: The Analogy of the Kite

My emotional / spiritual testimony is radically different than my intellectual testimony.

I have had a few incredibly powerful spiritual experiences that weren't just emotional, but I also have deep emotional attachments to the LDS community and people I love dearly. That combination keeps me firmly grounded within the community as a faithful, believing member.

My intellectual detachment, if you will, allows me not to sweat the details (what I personally see as the small stuff). I absolutely love the "grand cosmology" of Mormonism - the vision of eternity that is so unlike anything else within Christianity. I also realize that many of the things I see differently are only visible to me because of the foundation that I receive from Mormonism's theology. In other words, my testimony includes gratitude that I have an orthodox background in my life that is available to me and allows my personal heterodoxy to be as powerful for me as it is. I don't begrudge others the fact that they don't see what I see, since they see what is beautiful to them - and since, in a very real way, I only am able to see what I see because of them. I also realize that I might be wrong about lots of things.

I don't know if that makes sense to anyone else, but it's fundamental for me.

I liken my emotional and spiritual testimony to the kite string that keep my intellectual kite connected to a safe harbor, if you will. My intellectual kite can fly all over the sky trying to "figure it all out", but it's not going to get separated from the string and be burned by the sun or frozen in the atmosphere before it gets to the sun.

There are a lot of things I feel comfortable saying I know - and lots of things I believe - and lots of things I really do want to believe - and a lot of things I hope. I like being part of a religion where that is said to be ok in the actual scriptural canon - and, most recently, by President Uchtdorf in General Conference.

Seeing the Child of God in the Beggar

Refugee - Jacob (By Common Consent)

I Am Responsible to Build My Own Own Heaven on Earth

Our own individual lives - and our family lives - and our church lives - and our community lives - and all other aspects of our lives can be "heavenly" (or "heaven on earth") if we feel free and comfortable within each of those spheres. By "free" I don't mean sharing anything at any time, but rather able to choose freely what to do and say and be; by "comfortable" I don't mean totally at ease, but rather happy generally with one's self and one's life within the circumstances of life as they are.

In my own case, my life is heavenly in most ways. I am comfortable and feel free within my own individual life; I am comfortable and feel free within my family; I am comfortable and feel free within my church life; etc. Of course, there are things that would change in what I perceive to be the ideal, but I am comfortable and feel free from micro-managing to a large degree. 

My work life has been different at different times. It has been a much more micro-managing and more restrictive (less freeing and empowering) environment in some cases; thus, it has been less "heavenly" and more difficult. I worked on that, however - which leads to . . . 

My final point is that there are elements of micro-managing in my family and church lives. I simply have chosen to accept their existence as part of being able to be part of a family (marriage) I adore and a church in which I believe and fellow members with whom I want to be associated. I have eliminated much of the micro-management that many find in the Church simply by choosing to ignore it without making huge waves - just going about my business in the way that makes the most sense to me without challenging others about it. If someone wants me, they get me.

In other words, I have created my own heaven by building it myself. 

Once I stopped trying to rely on others to build it for me (a form of reliance on micro-managing), I was free to build it myself. So, my mansion might look quite different than many others, but I'm happy and at peace because it's mine - and because I built it among people I really do love.

The Scriptures Don't Promise Justice in This Life - and That's a Good Thing

"No Justice, No Faith?" The Danger of Misunderstanding God's Justice - Jeff Lindsay (Mormanity)

I only will add here that I am glad we don't see God's justice fully in this life.  I like that the promise of justice applies specifically to our eventual end, not each step along the path toward that end.

Conversion Should Not Be the Central Goal of Service

I spoke in one of the units in our stake a few years ago about how we should recognize, understand and follow the promptings of the Holy Ghost outside our church lives - at work, in the community, in our interactions with other religions, at school, etc. To make a long talk short here, I stressed early on that "conversion" can't be our central goal - that unconditional love without expectation of ANY reward or reciprocation, or even acknowledgment, is the highest objective.

I also stated directly that our critics sometimes say we only help others in order to convert them to the Church - and that they are correct in way too many cases. I paused and repeated that slowly - then I went into examples of what I called Telestial, Terrestrial and Celestial service, distinguished exclusively by our motivation and the type of people we serve. I asked everyone to consider who are the "publicans, sinners, lepers and Samaritans" in our own communities and based on our own group standards - the ones who can't pay us back and probably won't join the Church - and start by finding a way to serve someone in one of those categories they naturally wouldn't serve. 

After all, what good is it if we serve only to make others do what we want them to do.  Do not even the worst sinners do that? 

Please Read This Talk, Even If You Heard It Delivered Live

Four Titles - Pres. Dieter F. Uchtdorf (2013 General Conference, Priesthood Session)

The section titled "Disciple of Christ" is particularly important. 

We Tend to Be Too Hard on Our Own

Within Christianity, Mormon theology is one of the most expansive, "universalist" in existence. Our entire structure of temple ordinances is based on the idea that absolutely anyone can "pass the test" regardless of the religion they believe during this life - or even if they are hard-core atheists.

It's also not correct to say that such universalism applies only to some degree of glory but not the Celestial Kingdom. Absolutely everyone (minus a few Sons of Perdition who are the exception that proves the rule) will receive salvation within Mormonism simply through the Atonement of Jesus, so temple work can't be about people qualifying for the Telestial Kingdom - or even the Terrestrial Kingdom, since that essentially is the same place just with nicer people. (Seriously, that's the best description of the difference I've ever heard.) It has to be about opening the possibility of the Celestial Kingdom to ALL - making sure ALL have a chance to pass the test, if you will.

The difficulty is that we tend to be harder on our own than we are on those we don't know. The standard is the same, but we tend to think those who have been in the Church have had their chance while those outside the Church haven't. We forget that we aren't judges of final rewards. It's one of the most deeply ingrained "natural (wo)man" tendencies that exists, and, as a result, it exists in many members and, thus, within the LDS Church - but it's not part of pure Mormonism. I believe it's REALLY important to understand that. 

Sure, too many members don't get that fully, but it's there in great big font and blinking neon colors within the theology itself.