Let Him Know

This post is part of the General Conference Odyssey. This week covers the Priesthood Session of the April 1990 Conference.
Sometimes I tune out a bit when I read a talk about choosing friends, since I feel like I'm past the stage of life where I'm really finding friends or worrying about peer pressure or whatever. (Maybe it's because I already have such good friends, I feel like I couldn't possibly be lucky enough to make any more. I know that's shortsighted, though—the friends I have made as an adult are just as precious to me as the ones I found in childhood, so I would never want to close myself to the possibility!) But I was struck by this passage from Elder Malcolm S. Jeppson:

Above all, be a friend of the Savior. You, my young men, are the honored holders of a royal priesthood. If you have not done so previously, now is the time to let him know you consider him your true friend and that you will be a true friend of his.

I keep thinking about the part that says "now is the time to let him know you consider him your true friend." It's just so personal. How would I let the Savior know that? In his actions, He's obviously already been a friend to me, through all eternity. But to tell Him I love and value that friendship, and that I intend to return it—the way Elder Jeppson says it here, it sounds less formal than covenant-making. He didn't say "let him know by being baptized" or "let him know by joining the church." He acted like it was something you should do on your own, individually, directly to the Savior. It's a new thought to me that the Savior might want to hear that from me.

It makes me think of the part in Doctrine and Covenants 84 that I've always loved, where Jesus says he will call His servants "friends." I have a great longing to have that be my relationship with Him too! I'm content with "servant." I'd be honored to be merely that. But friend! I know He's mine, but it would be amazing to be HIS as well.


Other posts in this series:

Expound Scriptures with Bedrock Understanding—by Jan Tolman

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Even when we are bone weary

This post is part of the General Conference Odyssey. This week covers the Saturday Afternoon Session of the April 1990 Conference.
Last week felt ages long and yet not nearly long enough to hold all the things it needed to hold. I was exhausted at the end of every day and thus in the perfect frame of mind to read about endurance! :) Elder Maxwell's talk "Endure it Well" gave me a lot to think about! It made me think about personal goodness along the axis of time as well as space, if that makes sense—the idea that becoming like God involves not just being kind or being patient or being obedient—but doing those things repeatedly and persistently. Here are some sections of the talk I liked:
We tend to think only in terms of our endurance, but it is God’s patient long-suffering which provides us with our chances to improve, affording us urgently needed developmental space or time.

With enduring comes a willingness, therefore, to “press forward” even when we are bone weary and would much rather pull off to the side of the road. …

Paul wrote of how, even after faithful disciples had “done the will of God,” they “[had] need of patience.” (Heb. 10:36.) How many times have good individuals done the right thing initially only to break under subsequent stress? Sustaining correct conduct for a difficult moment under extraordinary stress is very commendable, but so is coping with sustained stress subtly present in seeming routineness. …
I love that acknowledgement of the difficulty of the everyday. That "seeming routineness" is where I find some of my greatest challenges! It's precisely the fact that these things aren't extraordinary that makes them hard, because you know you can't just give one big push of effort and have it over with! I suppose that's why people can become so refined through trials such as chronic illness or persistently wayward children. Those things give them a chance to be patient and wait in hope, just as God patiently waits for us.

Elder Maxwell goes on:
When you and I are unduly impatient, we are suggesting that we like our timetable better than God’s. And thus, while the scriptural phrase “in process of time” means “eventually,” it also denotes an entire spiritual process… 
By itself, of course, the passage of time does not bring an automatic advance. Yet, like the prodigal son, we often need the “process of time” in order to come to our spiritual senses. The touching reunion of Jacob and Esau in the desert, so many years after their sibling rivalry, is a classic example. Generosity can replace animosity. Reflection can bring perception. But reflection and introspection require time. So many spiritual outcomes require saving truths to be mixed with time, forming the elixir of experience, that sovereign remedy for so many things.
It's a bit daunting to think of the long road ahead to perfection, but it's also encouraging to think that God never intended us to be transformed immediately. I'm so glad He has given us enough time to grow and become all that He intends us to be!

Other posts in this series:
Our own cross, or someone else's—by Nathaniel Givens

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The joys of family associations

This post is part of the General Conference Odyssey. This week covers the Saturday Morning Session of the April 1990 Conference.

My nephew got married last week and I got to see ALL THREE of my brothers and their wives at the wedding! It was wonderful. The last time we were all together was at my Dad's funeral eleven years ago. I wish we had chances to see each other more often.


I usually think about my own children when I read about "the family," but maybe because of being with my brothers and mom so recently, I read this quote from Elder Rex D. Pinegar thinking of them:
Our Heavenly Father has organized us into families for the purpose of helping us successfully meet the trials and challenges of life. The home also exists to bless us with the joys and privileges of family associations. Our family is our safety place, our support network, our sanctuary, and our salvation. 
Our homes should be “the strong place to which children can come for the anchor they need in this day of trouble and turmoil,” said President Harold B. Lee.  
…[And Dr. Paul Pearsall said] “No matter what the form of your family, from single-parent household to the largest multi-generation family in your town, your work at keeping families together is the job of saving our world.”
As we drove home from the wedding reception, my boys were all talking about how nice my brothers are. "They're not that much alike," one of my sons said. "But they're all so nice and so fun to talk to. It's rare you meet people who are so much the type of people we like." I wanted to shake him and yell, "Yes! Don't you see? This is how sibling relationships can be! Brothers don't have to be constantly arguing with each other and trying to show how wrong each others' viewpoints are all the time! You just have to be NICE to each other and then it's not so very difficult to like each other!"

I hope they will learn that for themselves someday! I feel blessed to have come from such a good family myself. One of my greatest wishes is that ALL my children will someday be friends with and grateful for each other! I'm not sure it's possible in a big family…but I hope so!


Other posts in this series:

The Name of the Church and a Prophetic Call Fulfilled—by Daniel Ortner

Big and Small Things—by Nathaniel Givens

Family Traditions are a Pillar of Freedom—by G.

Valuing our religious freedom—by Jan Tolman

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Permanent Waves*

When I was very young I always went out on the porch to wave to my dad and brothers when they went off to work and school, and later on my parents did the same to me. Now it's a habit, and it's happily one our kids have adopted as well (various repairmen over the years have probably thought it was kind of weird how the kids all pile outside to wave as they drive away)! It's not a rule or anything. Occasionally I'll drive off and feel a little forlorn because there's no one on the porch waving me off. But there is generally, in various configurations and various states of dress (or undress), at least one person, and often several, yelling bye! and blowing kisses. It's the best. 

Anyway, for twelve years now (or I guess not quite that long, since I didn't have a camera on my phone for several of those years) I have been periodically snapping a picture of the kids when they come outside to wave their goodbyes. I had some vague idea of gathering the pictures into a little book someday. Now that we're moving and I'm in this heightened state of sentimentality all the time, I can hardly look through them without feeling like bursting into tears! It's almost like you can see the whole breadth of family life in these images: sad children who followed me outside to cry at me. Pajama-clad orangutans. Toilet trainees in underpants. Costumed children nowhere near Halloween. Dancing children and children who should be in bed. "For what do we live, but to make sport for our neighbors, and laugh at them in our turn?" :)

I know it's a small thing. But our new house has a garage that opens on the back of the house, so there will be no more waving goodbye from the front porch. It's the end of that little era that I didn't even know WAS an era! It makes me feel very unmoored.
Where did these two little blond fluffy-heads go? I want them back!
Well, it's no good me getting started on that train of thought again…suffice it to say, in retrospect, that all the stress and exasperation and urgency and overwhelm—all the things I was probably feeling as I went off to wherever it was I was going to, all these times—have melted away and been forgotten. But the memories of my little family, loving me and missing me and trusting that I'd always come back—feel more precious than anything I could have left home to find.
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Messages divinely placed

 This post is part of the General Conference Odyssey. This week covers the Women's Session of the October 1989 Conference.
I really liked Sister Joanne B. Doxey's encouragement about studying the scriptures. She starts out quoting President Benson:

“I stress again the deep need each woman has to study the scriptures. …  

“As you become more and more familiar with the truths of the scriptures, you will be more and more effective. … After all, who has any greater need to ‘treasure up’ the truths of the gospel (on which they may call in their moments of need) than do women and mothers who do so much nurturing and teaching.” 

Then Sister Doxey continues:

If we treat the scriptures lightly, letting them gather dust on the shelves, unopened and unread, they are unable to bless our lives as planned. We will be denied the sweet whisperings of the Spirit in guiding our lives and the lives of our families unless we pay the price of studying, pondering, and praying about the scriptures. 
If we immerse ourselves daily in the scriptures, particularly the Book of Mormon, we will have increased discernment. We will have power to do good and to resist evil, and our ability to solve problems will be expanded. Messages to help us in our day were foreseen by the Lord and were divinely placed on the pages of the scriptures to assist us and our families.

I like that description of messages being placed in the scriptures just for us, almost like clues in a treasure hunt or Hansel and Gretel's breadcrumbs. (Or Elder Andersen's luminous stones!) I've encountered that kind of message when reading and it does feel like coming upon a treasure placed there just for me. I still read those verses years later and feel a little shock of familiarity or warmth, remembering. But I can't manufacture that feeling in myself. Sometimes I WANT to have a certain scripture strike me in a personal or prophetic way and I just can't get it to! So I am learning to pay careful attention when it does happen.


The important point, I guess, is that because the frequency of the messages varies and their timing can't really be predicted, I need to be studying frequently and consistently and earnestly enough that there is ample opportunity (with some room for error built in in case it takes me awhile) for me to receive those messages the Lord wants and needs me to receive!


Other posts in this series:

Children of the Light, Please Come Home—by Nathaniel Givens


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Once more looking back from the breach, dear friends

I've been working a little on our family photo books (after a hiatus of…years) and looking at all our pictures from 2014. Not so long ago, you might think…six years. But those six years have brought SO many changes! Six years ago my Abe, my oldest boy, was just turning twelve. He was a bright-eyed excited little Deacon, into Rubik's Cubes, thrilled to pass the sacrament and go to the temple to do baptisms. Seb was ten, still young enough to play soldier and not mind when his sisters wanted to dress up to match him. Malachi was a tiny boy of eight, barely baptized and living in a world of his imagination, full of birdies and spies and magic tricks. And those girls, those three little girls, still were the three little girls—babies, really. Old enough to make us laugh but not nearly old enough for anyone to take them seriously! They were like a litter of puppies, cute and eager and mostly brainless, always tumbling all over each other.


And then the three little boys—our current litter of puppies—not even born! Not even known! Wholly unimagined and unformed! 


We were so happy.


Of course I romanticize it. Certain children have always been difficult (and always will be? eek, I hope not). But they were golden years—oh, so are these; I know that. But maybe I can be forgiven for dwelling—just a bit wistfully—in that time, as I've been reliving and writing about it. The kids loved school, all of them—loved it! We were all learning together, and as their teacher I often had the enthralled attention of all my students at once. Every time I announced a field trip there was general rejoicing, and the older kids were big enough to be truly helpful so that I felt we COULD take field trips—go on adventures—spontaneously pack a picnic lunch and head for the hills. Sam started his new job at BYU that year, so there was uncertainty and apprehension around that, but such excitement, too—and having him home more often, with weekends truly free, was such a gift. "And we lived after the manner of happiness."


I wrote last year that changes were in the wind. I didn't even know, then, what they all were, but I could feel them coming like you can feel Fall in the air beneath the August heat. Children grown and leaving. Our rhythms disrupted and needing time to settle again. I didn't anticipate the pandemic, of course, and in many ways it's been a welcome respite keeping our family all together a little longer, but I've known all along it was only a postponement of what must come.


There are people that adore teenagers. I aspire to be one of them (ha ha). Certainly I love MY teenagers, and the ones I worked with in Young Women—their forthrightness, their humor, their surprising insight and compassion. But for years now I've noticed a certain hollow-eyed look in parents of teenage children; something just beneath the surface that I couldn't quite identify. I could see it in the set of their shoulders, and in the parched, fervent way they answered when I said, "I just love your daughter; she's such a nice girl"—with "Is she? You are kind to say so."


Now I feel that same weariness in myself, and catch glimpses of it staring out of my eyes. An awareness—or a resignation—I'm not sure what to call it, but it comes with realizing how helpless a parent is; how much we must leave in God's hands. As I was telling a friend, I can't be who I was ten years ago—I've seen too much. Not that it's been all bad, far from it, but perhaps it's the Fall from Eden all over again, that archetypal loss that my teacher Leslie Norris said will play out in our lives again and again.


At any rate, the changes are here now—the first wave of them, at least. Abraham has graduated from my homeschool and is at BYU (the strange, semi-online BYU). Sebastian has likewise chosen to graduate from my homeschool and attend public high school. Both changes feel inevitable and right—I wouldn't have it another way. They've both grown so much. They're ready to jump into the world, they're confident and well-prepared, and I'm so proud of them. I'm lucky they're still going to be close by for a little while yet, but I already miss them—or miss what was—as I see that necessary turning of their hearts to places I can no longer take them.


And then there's another change I hadn't anticipated. We're moving, from our house of twelve years. Not far—just over a mile away, though it will be a new ward and a new stake in our church. You will have to indulge me here in what may seem unjustified sentimentality! People move all the time. They move further, more drastically, less fortunately, and with less certainty—and probably still handle it better than I am handling this move! It's happy! And it's right! We are awed and grateful to have received so much heavenly help throughout our decision process! But it just feels like so much to me, sometimes I can hardly bear the weight of it. I get attached to places. I mean, I didn't know that I did—but I never had so long to get attached before! Our family became who we ARE here! And I've loved this house almost like it's a person. One morning I was listing in my head all the holy, sacred moments that have happened here, and by the time I was done, I was in tears—feeling that I could never possibly bear to leave it behind! Every little corner is somehow luminously and pathetically infused with meaning—this space here where Junie used to stand and dance on top of the baby clothes box, this space here where Sebby would stand with baby Malachi and watch the dryer spinning, and this space here where Abey marched and yell/sang "The Twelve Days of Christmas." My closet where I've retreated and cried a billion tears—the playhouse where the kids sleep in the summertime and always forget to turn the light off when they're done—even the bulging coat closet door that I've cursed a thousand times under my breath when it won't close. And my babies! Six babies born within these walls, and angels attending every one. How can anyone else love this place like I have?


I know—I'm layering memories onto places, and the memories won't disappear when the places change. But some of them might! Mightn't they? When I no longer have the visual cues to trigger them?


More and more I feel like I'm reaching out, but—how to describe this? It's as if I'm attached to some enormous robotic arm, like they have on the International Space Station—and my slightest adjustment here creates some drastic sweep of movement there—only I can't know which way my touch will set it swinging—or what the far-off arm is reaching for! I don't know what tiny things I set in motion years ago without meaning to, that are now plunging us forward to this future we didn't know we were choosing. I suppose the potential for far-reaching ramifications was always there, but I didn't use to know it—or realize how quickly time would sweep us forward—and now that I DO know, I feel almost paralyzed with the weight of that knowledge. And yet I can't STOP it happening, for even in my paralysis I set the arm swinging again…


Ha! Well. Those are my somewhat melancholy thoughts in this season of change, made more melancholy by the awareness that this is only the beginning, and all you mothers a step ahead of me are probably thinking "Just you wait." In five years…ten years…who knows? "Thus the whirligig of time brings in his revenges." And it is nearly Fall, after all, which is always my cue to become nostalgic.


I should end with this: there are a thousand good things about this time, a million moments ahead to look forward to. We're so lucky to be moving to a new house with a little more space and all kinds of new adventures! Most of the time, we're breathless with excitement, counting down the days! I'll write about all those good things in time. We are blessed and happy. Someday, I suppose I'll be looking back wistfully to 2020—What a year that was! I'll say. So strange. So many changes. But so full of goodness!

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School starts for the big and the small

What is it about kindergartners that is just so HAPPY? They love life. They love school. They love everything! It's so fun to teach them. I'd say I can't believe Teddy is in kindergarten already—and for sure, I can't believe it's been five years since he was born—but the truth is, he is so ready for school, ready for reading, reading for learning. I'm just delighted to have him officially in our school!

New bunny backpack!

Teddy has already requested that we have units about: Space (again), Mars Rovers, Garbage Trucks, Galaxies (distinct from Space, apparently), Bunnies, Penguins, Elephants, Electricity, Lightning, Volcanoes, Shakespeare, Ice, and UPS Deliveries. It will be a joy to accommodate his requests. :) I love him so much!

Other kindergartners through the years: Abe, Seb, Ky, Daisy, Junie, and (belatedly) Goldie.

Along with Teddy starting kindergarten, Abraham started college this year! This picture isn't technically from his first day of school—he attended Spring semester as well—but it feels more like a "first day" in Fall than in Spring somehow! Abe decided not to take classes on campus during this strange time, so his are all online this semester, which was a bit of a disappointment for him. But he's taking it in stride and will hopefully get more of a campus experience next semester! I haven't taken any First Day of School pictures of him since he was this tiny…
…so he could hardly begrudge me this one! Here are the two school-beginners together. Little Teddy reminds me SO much of little Abey. How I love them both!
Speaking of new beginnings, Seb also had HIS first day at Herriman High last week. (I was not foolish enough to request a first-day picture of HIM…but he likes it when I take race pictures, so these will have to suffice.) I always thought my kids would stop homeschooling once they got to high school, and was quite surprised when Abe chose not to go that route! But Seb is totally ready and excited for the new experiences public high school will bring him. He's been running cross-country with the Herriman team since Summer 2019, so he has lots of friends already. He's worked so hard and spent SO many hard-fought miles and SO much time with them that they are very close! And they're a great bunch of kids.
These pictures are from Seb's race last week, which, to everyone's great delight…he WON! It was the JV race, and he is mostly running with Varsity these days, so it wasn't totally unexpected, but it was just so happy and fun to see him looking so strong and confident (and far ahead!). Some of the meets haven't allowed spectators, but this one did, so I got to bring ALL the other kids with me and we were going crazy cheering him on! It was very exciting. I hope the rest of his school year is equally exhilarating! :)

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Permitted to see so much more

 This post is part of the General Conference Odyssey. This week covers the Sunday Afternoon Session of the October 1989 Conference.

I've said this before, but I'll say it again here: maybe the reason it took me awhile to really love Elder Maxwell's talks was that I always heard them quoted in snippets (which is…the whole point of a quote, so that makes sense) and his little aphorisms always sounded so polished and clever, I thought they couldn't be heartfelt as well! But ever since I've been reading his talks in context—I mean, reading the whole talk—I feel like I see the clever snippets more clearly. They aren't glib after all—just well-considered, and well-developed, distillations of what are clearly much larger truths. One of Elder Maxwell's talents was that ability to distill doctrine so concisely, while directing your thoughts in an ever-widening circle toward eternity, and I guess that's a lot of what people love about him! He's quotable, of course, and I'm about to quote him myself—but he isn't MERELY quotable. So you should read this whole talk if you can!

It's a good one, as you can tell it will be as soon as you read the title: Murmur not! You know immediately you should brace yourself. :) Here are some parts I liked:

…Some murmurers seem to hope to reshape the Church to their liking by virtue of their murmuring. But why would one want to belong to a church that he could remake in his own image, when it is the Lord’s image that we should come to have in our countenances?

I've thought about that a lot, and it comforts me when I'm confused or surprised by something the prophets say. Isn't that when I need them most? When their advice runs counter to my instincts?

Here's another thing I thought was interesting:

Those of deep faith do not murmur. They are generously disposed, and they are reluctant to murmur, even while in deep difficulties…

The pleading of one filled with faith who is also concerned with the welfare of others, as with Joseph Smith in Liberty Jail, is not murmuring. This is not the murmuring of a superficial follower who is quick to complain and who is slow to endure. Reassurance and further instruction followed with Joseph being told: “My son, peace be unto thy soul; thine adversity and thine afflictions shall be but a small moment.”  

I'm not sure I meet these criteria very often, but it's nice to know there's a version of pleading for relief that isn't the same as murmuring! President Nelson did tell us to "pour out our souls" to God, and I've taken that to heart. I hope my pleadings don't cross into murmuring too often!

Now here is my favorite part of all:

Finally, nonmurmurers are permitted to see so much more. Ancient Israel was once compassed about with “a great host” of hostile horses and chariots. Elisha counseled his anxious young servant, “Fear not: for they that be with us are more than they that be with them.” The prophet then prayed that the Lord would “open” the young man’s eyes, “and he saw: and, behold, the mountain was full of horses and chariots of fire round about Elisha”!

Elisha’s counsel can help Church members today to silence our murmuring. Regardless of how things seem, or come to seem, in troubled times, “They that be with us are more than they that be with them.” My brothers and sisters, if our lips are closed to murmuring, then our eyes can be opened.

This story about the chariots of fire is probably my favorite one in the whole Bible, and I have prayed SO many times to have my eyes opened as the young servant had his! I want so much to see God's hand and the angels that are aiding us in this battle. I want to see things as God sees them! So it's exciting to hear that it goes both ways—obviously, having our eyes opened gives us courage and reason not to murmur, once we see that "they that be with us are more than they that be with them." But likewise, choosing to trust and not to murmur—before we've seen the chariots of fire for ourselves—is a way to qualify for that blessing of opened eyes and expanded vision!

This is something I'm going to work on, because I really want to be someone who can "see so much more!"


Other posts in this series:

Closed Lips, Open Eyes—by Nathaniel Givens

Even though there is crisis, we are calm—by Jan Tolman

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