As Leah followed Katya a day later in feeling
unwell, I accompanied Martin, Oliver and the baby to church. Ella and I retired
immediately to the nursery. (I’m sure Martin couldn’t believe his good fortune
– and is hardly used to it yet!) As could be expected, every time in the
nursery is an improvement over the last time for her. (This week she will
become an official 18-monther. Hurray! By the time I leave, she won’t be pining
for mommy or daddy – OR Auntie Honey Me.)
In sacrament meeting one of the youth speaker talked
about the importance of feeding the fire of our testimony on a regular basis,
to revisit Moroni’s challenge (Moro 10:4) often. She also talked where Alma and
Amulek were teaching the poor among the Zoramites and spoke of the results of
NOT nourishing the seed of the gospel sown in faith. Then I thought of another
passage, also found in the Book of Alma, where Alma travels about the land
sharing his strong testimony ‘with the spirit of revelation and prophecy’, as
stated in verse 26 of chapter 5, If ye
have experienced a change of heart, and if ye have felt to sing the song of
redeeming love, can ye feel so now?! A really good reminder we all need to
hear – often! Don’t you just love the use of the term ‘to feast’ that Nephi
employed (2 Nephi 31:20) when he also spoke of nourishing the good word of
Christ?! (As you can tell it was a
really good talk – well-prepared and referenced.)
The remainder of the time was left to David Amison
(Day 77, 98), who enters the MTC on my birthday, the week following this one. (Sunday
next is Fast Sunday, which is why his farewell talk was scheduled for today.)
He remarked how going out with the elders recently had really helped strengthen
his testimony, also about how excited he was to begin sharing the gospel with
his brothers and sisters in Zambia. (His family is having a farewell
get-together at the church on Saturday, and gave out invitations. I asked him
teasingly if I was invited, and he said, ‘of course - yes!’)
Lately I came across these thoughts that mirror
exactly my own feelings – What it Means to be a Mormon, from the blog with the
apt title, ‘Fancy Title Goes Here’:
I am not Mormon second to
anything. Rather it is who I am, it is what I believe. My faith shapes
everything about who I am. This attitude toward faith and religion is something
that we have tried to address recently in our bishopric meetings and in our
ward. We are noticing that a lot of people treat their faith casually. They’ll
show up to church and other related activities when it’s convenient, but allow
other things to take precedence over their worship. We have been talking about
commitment.
And isn’t that what this is really
all about? We are not a social club, we are not an organization, we are
not a church, but the Kingdom of God on earth, the power of salvation seeking
to exalt all men and women and their families. Religion has to have more
influence on peoples’ lives because the effect of religion is eternal.
And that eternal perspective that Mormons have helps explain why we tend
to take our faith a little more seriously than other religions might. We
are not looking for a church to entertain us or where we feel comfortable
during this life, we have found a religion that is eternal. The truths of
the gospel of Jesus Christ were true long before this world was formed, and
they will continue to be true long after this world has fulfilled the measure
of its creation.
In one of our Bishopric meetings
someone said something pretty profound: “Many are looking to find a church that
fits their lifestyle, but really it should be the other way around.” And
that reminded me of a passage from the book Sophie’s World by Jostien Gaarder,
from the chapter that quotes Søren Kierkegard, ”Either Jesus rose on Easter Day
— or he did not. And if he really did rise from the dead, if he really
died for our sake — then this is so overwhelming that it must permeate our
entire lives.”
That is what I feel, that is what
I believe. If we truly believe in Jesus Christ, if we truly understand
what the gospel is and can be in our lives, then it must change us. It
must change everything we do, everything we are. The gospel is an
invitation to “put off the natural man and become a saint” (Mosiah 3:19), it is an invitation to “deny yourself all
ungodliness” (Moroni 10:32), and if we deny ourselves of all ungodliness, if we
remove everything that is not godly from our selves, then we become godly.
We become as God is - we become perfect (Matthew 5:48).
To finish out the day, around 9:45 I had a call
from Ron Bernard. Brother Bernard is the high priest group leader in the
Harborne Ward - part of whose calling is to watch-care over the single adult sisters.
He started by saying he had heard I might be moving. What a thoughtful man –
never have had a priesthood leader inquire after me like that. We chatted for a
while. For one thing, knowing Weymouth was where I was headed, he said
something about Guernsey, how it was a skip, hop and a jump from where I’d be,
and suggested it as an excursion I might very well enjoy. (The funny thing was that just as he called I
had been writing an email to my kids and the relationship that interesting
little island has to my parents (on one of their three missions to the British
Isles, they had been stationed there) I had literally just written the word,
‘Guernsey,’ a handful of words before I got called away by the phone and he and
I had begun talking about it.
The day before Brother Bernard had taken new members (those not yet eligible to attend the temple) along other single adults to the temple to perform baptisms for the dead. I had spoken to him a week ago about my intention of going to the temple to be with Sven, and maybe also doing baptisms. I mentioned that as we’d been exiting (our group of riding buddies had decided to continue on home following lunch and our endowment session) I had seen those who were there from our ward but not him – seems he had been downstairs sorting some things out. He teasingly remarked that if he’d been sitting there – leaving or not – he guessed he would have to have drug me downstairs, in order to get me to participate. Hah hah. I allowed that I was going to miss everyone in the ward, how much I had come to love and care them all, and that their welcoming spirit had meant everything to me. He said, in return, that I had been like a ray of sunshine since the time that I had first come - that was an awful nice thing to say. Like I said – he is so kind.
The day before Brother Bernard had taken new members (those not yet eligible to attend the temple) along other single adults to the temple to perform baptisms for the dead. I had spoken to him a week ago about my intention of going to the temple to be with Sven, and maybe also doing baptisms. I mentioned that as we’d been exiting (our group of riding buddies had decided to continue on home following lunch and our endowment session) I had seen those who were there from our ward but not him – seems he had been downstairs sorting some things out. He teasingly remarked that if he’d been sitting there – leaving or not – he guessed he would have to have drug me downstairs, in order to get me to participate. Hah hah. I allowed that I was going to miss everyone in the ward, how much I had come to love and care them all, and that their welcoming spirit had meant everything to me. He said, in return, that I had been like a ray of sunshine since the time that I had first come - that was an awful nice thing to say. Like I said – he is so kind.
Photo_
British MTC - found on same large piece of property
as the temple in Chorley (while all this is entirely true, I discovered that seeing as how David is going to Zambia on his mission, he will fly to Johannesburg and attend the MTC there)
