Don't be a P3 Smoker

At my old law firm, there were three levels of parking.  The tenants of each floor received a certain number of prime parking spots on P1, the highest level.  You didn't have to be on the elevator as long, and when you came in to park, you just zoomed right in.  Most of the associates, like me, parked in the unreserved spots on the second level, P2.  I eventually became valued enough that when we expanded and got more P1 spots, I got one.  In my many years there, I almost never went down to P3.

One day, I can't even recall the reason, I drove down to P3.  I had wondered whether anyone even parked there, because as far as I knew, everyone parked on P2.  There was plenty of room there.  So why keep driving?  I discovered on that day that the people who parked on P3 were the smokers.  When I drove down, there was a group of them, all huddled up, smoking together.

When I went back to get my car, there was another huddled group, smoking.  They looked so sad.  They looked so twitchy.  It made me think.  They didn't want to smoke on P2, or P1, possibly because  people complained when they did.  The smoke from their habit bothered other people or embarrassed them, or both.  They went down to P3 to hide.

Today's topic is the "Word of Wisdom" and how rules create freedom.

Many years ago, Emma Smith complained to her husband that every time they had a meeting of early church members, her house was filthy afterward.  She had to clean up cigars, ash, and clear out the smoky smells.  This eventually prompted what we now know as the Word of Wisdom.  You can learn more about it out here. It basically gives a guide for how to live healthy.  It discusses eating healthy foods, in moderation, following good sleeping habits, and more.

It also says not to use alcohol or tobacco.

I can't tell you how many friends have said the same thing to me.  "You guys can't drink?  You can't smoke?  You can't have sex before you're married? (Ok, that's a topic for another post, but they do marvel at that one, too.)  Why are you part of a church with so many rules?  I just want to do what I want to do, and it's my body, so why shouldn't I?"

Because, in case you didn't already know, some rules, the right RULES, create FREEDOM.

If you don't know someone who is an alcoholic, you may not know this, but there are some people in the world who take a single sip of alcohol and then they cannot stop drinking.  They got hammered their first time drinking, and pretty much every time since then.  There are other people who say, "Oh it's not a problem, because I have it under control."

Alcohol is diametrically opposed to control.

Smoking and alcohol are both addictions and they both impact your body.  Satan uses these to chain you down, to hold you back and to limit your potential.

I have chosen, despite occasional and sometimes even frequent, peer pressure, not to drink.  I don't smoke.  I adhere to the rules of the word of wisdom, and by so doing, my body is healthy and strong. I am able to go and do and work and exercise and my life has more freedom, more options.  Things like smoking and alcohol, they tie you down to more smoking, more alcohol.  They control where you park, where you go, how you spend your money and they impact how your body feels.

Sometimes following some rules, sometimes choosing not to make bad decisions will give you more freedom in the future.  God knows this, and that is why He gives us these rules.  We always have the freedom to choose.  We can choose to smoke, to drink, etc, but if we do, our bodies, our strength, our lives will be limited.  We will be less free.

I still have that image in my mind, those people all huddled together in a cloud of foul smelling smoke, chain smoking together.  I thought of how they have to park below everyone else, hiding away, destroying their lungs together, and shelling out quite a bit of money to do it.  I hope that I will always have the fortitude to follow the rules a loving Heavenly Father has set out for me, to keep me free from the bonds of addiction.  I hope you can, too.  And I hope you can see things in a new light, and recognize that rules do not always mean you are tied down.  Sometimes they are intended to help you soar.

Dirty

Note: I wrote this last week, because we are travelling this week. I thought it would auto post but I guess it didn't so I must not have done that correctly!

This morning, while I was working out, my two preschool girls were sitting at the "playdoh" table next to my work out room.  They were (miraculously) playing happily.  I was pretty excited.  Around the mid point of my workout, I smelled something bad.

Someone had pooped.

I asked, like I always do, "Emmy, did you poop in your pants?"

"No," she said, eyes wide.  "I didn't."

"Tessa?  Did you?"

She shook her head really big.  "No."

I look back at Emmy.  "Was it you, Emmy?  Are you sure?"  (She had already pooped just a few minutes before so my money was on Tessa."

"No, mom.  It was Tessa."

Tessa started to run away then, so I figured it was her.

I grabbed wipes and a diaper and wrestled her to the ground.  I was surprised to find she actually hadn't pooped her pants.  Darn, I corralled the wrong kid.

It was Emmy all along, lying to me about being dirty.

While I washed my hands after dealing with the mess, I got to thinking.  Why do my kids always say they aren't poopy when they are?  Don't they want that sticky, stinky, nasty mess off their body and somewhere they don't have to smell it and deal with it?  They aren't even doing the cleaning up themselves.  I do it for them!! All they have to do is tell me they're dirty, lay down and let ME clean it up!

It makes no sense at all, right?

Except you and I do the same thing all the time.  I can't tell you how many times in my life I've thought, okay so that was a sin.  I should not have done that.  I know my Savior atoned for me, he did all the heavy lifting, and I don't even have to do anything hard.  All I have to do is confess my sins (either to God through prayer directly, or to the Bishop) and the Savior cleans it up for me.  I mean, it may not be a super pleasant experience, but at the end, you are clean, you are comfortable and you are all around happier.

I decided it's because we don't want to admit to ourselves or to others that we are dirty, as though we can just ignore it and it won't be true.  Except we can smell it.  We can feel it, and others sometimes can, too.  Whether we accept the existence of our sin, or try to deny it, it's there.

This is a short blog, and a short message.  Don't be like a toddler.  Admit when you're dirty and GET CLEAN.  You don't have to do the heavy lifting, that has already been done.  Just admit, accept and move ahead.  :-)  Your bum will thank you for it, and so will your mom.

The Atonement of Jesus Christ

I gave a talk today in church, and I am shamelessly using the same material here.  I know, I am lazy.

In case you are wondering what it means to "give a talk," I will fill you in briefly.  Unlike most Christian religions, Mormons have a "lay" clergy, which is to say that almost all tasks performed are volunteer.  Instead of having a "sermon" every week, people who are part of the Congregation are assigned a topic and asked to speak for anywhere from 5-30 minutes.  A week or two ago, a member of the Bishopric called and asked me to speak today on: Jesus Christ is my Savior, and He atoned for me.

I have been asked to give quite a few talks at church over the years, and some of those topics have been odd, boring or kind of hard for me to wrap my head around, but I have never had a topic I felt was so important, so all encompassing, and frankly, so overwhelming.  Where to even begin??

I decided to just try and follow in the footsteps of the men who have been tasked to be Special Witnesses of Christ.  See, we believe God restored the gospel to his prophet Joseph Smith and that we still have a true and living prophet today to whom God speaks and reveals/clarifies things.  We believe God can speak to each of us through personal revelation with the help of the Holy Ghost, but He has chosen one person to lead His church, and for now, we believe that is the Prophet Thomas S. Monson.

I thought I'd start with a basic explanation of that the Atonement is.   I pulled this quote from LDS.org.

The Atonement is the sacrifice Jesus Christ made to help us overcome sin, adversity, and death. Jesus’s atoning sacrifice took place in the Garden of Gethsemane and on the cross at Calvary. He paid the price for our sins, took upon Himself death, and was resurrected. The Atonement is the supreme expression of the love of Heavenly Father and Jesus Christ.

Then that same page linked me to a talk by our prophet, President Monson.  You can listen to, or read the whole thing here.  He spoke about the Savior's life and discussed that ever since Adam and Eve "fell", or left the Garden of Eden, two main things took place.  The first is that mankind is mortal, or subject to death.  The second is that mankind is "separated" from God by sin.  Both those things needed to be reconciled before we could return to our Father in Heaven, which is all part of God's plan.  So, we needed a Savior.  

Jesus Christ was born to earth to be that Savior, and he lived a perfect life, and began his ministry.  All of that is just full of beauty, wonder and so much learning for us, but I am going to skip over it today, and get to the beginning of the atonement, which took place in the Garden of Gethsemane.  Christ had to sacrifice, he had to pay the price of our sins, and He had to do that alone.  Elder Holland in a conference talk in April of 2009 discussed this concept.  You can listen to or read that entire talk here.  In it, he discusses several groups of people who left Jesus, one by one.

At the beginning, while Jesus was in the Garden of Gethsemane, bleeding from every pore, his own disciples could not stay awake while He suffered.  They had not left Him, but I imagine He felt very alone.   The first betrayal came from the Jewish leaders, Annas and Caiphas.  They sentenced Jesus to death.  The second came from the Gentile leaders, Pontius Pilate and Herod Antipas.  They refused to commute the sentence and although PP tried to "wash his hands" of the whole thing, the fact was, he knew Christ was innocent and he sent Him to His death anyway.  The third betrayal came from the masses.  The general public voted to save Barabas, a horrible villian, instead of Jesus Christ.  They spit upon him, and booed him and mocked Him during His suffering.  They turned their faces away while the Son of God was crucified.  The fourth, and certainly most painful up to that point, was the betrayal of his own Apostles.  Judas sold him for 30 silver pieces, and even Peter denied him.  Jesus knew that was coming, but it still had to hurt.

But by far the hardest, and the worst departure was by His Father.  Honestly, this is something I hadn't really thought much about in the past.  I will quote Elder Holland here, because what he has to say is so beautifully written and profound.

Now I speak very carefully, even reverently, of what may have been the most difficult moment in all of this solitary journey to Atonement. I speak of those final moments for which Jesus must have been prepared intellectually and physically but which He may not have fully anticipated emotionally and spiritually—that concluding descent into the paralyzing despair of divine withdrawal when He cries in ultimate loneliness, “My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?”  

The loss of mortal support He had anticipated, but apparently He had not comprehended this. Had He not said to His disciples, “Behold, the hour … is now come, that ye shall be scattered, every man to his own, and shall leave me alone: and yet I am not alone, because the Father is with me” and “The Father hath not left me alone; for I do always those things that please him”? 

Oh how it must have hurt for Jesus, who had never been without His father's presence, because He always did what pleased His father, to be alone, to be without that constant reassurance.  Elder Holland continues and explains even a little more about the importance of this final departure.  

With all the conviction of my soul I testify that He did please His Father perfectly and that a perfect Father did not forsake His Son in that hour. Indeed, it is my personal belief that in all of Christ’s mortal ministry the Father may never have been closer to His Son than in these agonizing final moments of suffering. Nevertheless, that the supreme sacrifice of His Son might be as complete as it was voluntary and solitary, the Father briefly withdrew from Jesus the comfort of His Spirit, the support of His personal presence. It was required, indeed it was central to the significance of the Atonement, that this perfect Son who had never spoken ill nor done wrong nor touched an unclean thing had to know how the rest of humankind—us, all of us—would feel when we did commit such sins. For His Atonement to be infinite and eternal, He had to feel what it was like to die not only physically but spiritually, to sense what it was like to have the divine Spirit withdraw, leaving one feeling totally, abjectly, hopelessly alone.

Oh how grateful I am for a loving Heavenly Father and a Savior, Jesus Christ, who went through this difficulty, who died and then was reborn.  I am so grateful He was willing to endure so He could feel how I feel when I make mistakes.  

I have felt hopelessly alone.  

I have felt abject.  I have felt truly abandoned.  

Have you?  

Well, I will promise you that if you don't want to, you don't need to feel that way again, not for long anyway, not if you will follow Christ's plan and accept His gift.  There are two ways we can avoid this feeling. We can pray and invite the Spirit in, and we can also reach out to members of our church family.  There's a reason God restored His gospel, and established a church support system.  It's so that He can work through us to help the others around us.  So my point here is two sided.  Don't wallow in feeling lonely, but reach out to God and to your friends and family, and also, when you see someone feeling sad, lonely, or desperate, reach out to them.  Follow the Spirit and do what it tells you.  It's our duty as disciples of Christ to do no less.  

Now, my final point. (Phew, my talk was really long!)  I wanted to talk about how I have come to apply the Atonement in my life a little bit.  After Jesus Christ was betrayed, was left alone, and was hung on the cross, He forgave every single one of those people.  He forgave His tormentors, He forgave His disciples, He forgave His crucifiers.  Almost everyone has heard the famous utterance, "Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do."  

So what does our Savior ask of us in exchange for this beautiful gift of forgiveness for all our sins?  Here's where my story comes in.  I was married before and it was not a good marriage.  I went through a miserable divorce and my ex-husband spent a lot of time talking to my brothers up in Dallas.  When I began to date my husband, Whitney, we made an effort to go up and see my family there.  Every time we went, it hurt my feelings to hear that my brothers were still in contact with him.  He would tell them things that weren't true, and he would insinuate things, hurtful things.  He was the quintessential manipulator. Later, my husband Whitney and I were sealed in the Seattle, WA temple.  Afterwards, we continued to make the trip to Dallas.  I wanted to build a relationship between my brothers and my husband.  I wanted our family to be strong and happy.  

No matter what I did, this same issue kept coming back.  I began to move from hurt and frustrated to angry.  My anger built.  One weekend, after a trip out there, things came to a head.  I had asked my brothers to stop talking to him to no avail.  They insisted he "needed friends" and they didn't feel they could, in good conscience, cut him off.  I called my ex and begged him to stop talking to them.  He refused.  I went to sacrament meeting with my older brother that Sunday morning, and on the way, Whitney and I talked.  We decided that it was making us too angry, it was hurting my feelings too badly.  We decided to stay away.  We would not come out to visit again until such time as they agreed to cut off contact with my ex.

In sacrament meeting that morning, I glanced down at my scriptures and began to read.  I was fuming, and I was hurt.  My feelings were raw and I wasn't in a very good mood.  Let me say here, that I have never been the kind of person who could have a problem, open the scriptures to a random page and find the answer.  Any time I tried to do something like that, my finger would inevitably land on the verse, "and they dwelt in a tent" or something equally unhelpful.  So imagine my surprise when the very verses I read that morning were from Matthew 6:14-15.  "For if you forgive men their trespasses, your heavenly Father will also forgive you.  But if you forgive not men their trespasses, neither will your Father forgive your trespasses."  

This was exactly what I needed to hear.  I am a sinner.  I need my Savior's atonement every single day and twice most days.  (Okay, more.)  All He required of me was this small payment, this small thing in return for His vast bequest.  I had to forgive my brothers (and everyone else in my life) and for that small thing, I would be forgiven.  I wrote the word, "quid pro quo" next to the verse to remind me that if I wanted to be forgiven, I had to forgive in turn.  I let go of my anger that morning, and I let it go again and again and again over the time that followed and I never let that issue turn into a stumbling block thereafter.  I won't say it was easy, but I am glad I did it.  

I didn't realize until this week that while I understood a small part of that verse so many years ago, I missed the most important part of it. I just didn't comprehend the point of it completely.  I thought that to receive the Savior's gift, He required something of me, a payment of sorts.  

That was so, so, so wrong.  

Our Heavenly Father, our loving Savior, they don't require that we forgive because we must pay for the gift Christ freely gave.  Not at all.  In fact, it's not for them that they require us to forgive.  My forgiveness only benefits one person.  

Me.  

When we let go of our anger, our resentment, our sense of mistreatment, entitlement, and frustration, when we forgive, we open our hearts and allow Christ's atonement to free us of our sin.  We allow our hearts to become purified.  In John 14:27, Jesus says, "Peace I leave with you, my peace I give unto you."  

It was for ME all along, and not for my Savior, that I was required to forgive.  This is not quid pro quo, but just another in a string that goes on throughout eternity, of gifts from my God.

I conclude my blog today with a promise for all of you.  If you will forgive, if you will open your heart, I promise you that Christ's atonement will work a miracle for you.  Don't wait.  Do it today.  All of this took place in my life in the Fall of 2006.  I let it go that day and over and over afterward.  

My little brother Jesse passed away suddenly in March of 2007.  

If I hadn't forgiven and moved on, I would have been deprived of the time we spent those last few months.  I would have denied my husband of the relationship he developed with my beloved brother.  Our Heavenly Father and our older brother Jesus Christ know us and love us.  They want us to have the most joy, the most peace and the most love that we can find in this life.  Don't wait.  Forgive today, and be forgiven in return.  

Not everyone has evolved to the point of owning a Minivan yet... and that's okay.

When I turned sixteen, many of the kids I knew didn't have a car of their own.  For quite some time, the kids in my family were among these ranks.  If I had somewhere to go, I borrowed a car from my parents to get there.  Many of our friends were in a similar situation, and consequently, we frequently rode around in the minivans owned by friends' parents.

My own mother drove a full size van.  It was definitely not cool, but my younger brother, Jesse, and I deemed it to be "slightly less uncool" because at least it wasn't "underpowered."  If you are a teenage boy, there isn't much worse than an "underpowered" car.   After lamenting about the fate of our poor friends forced to drive their parents' minivans, we wondered why anyone would ever purchase such a vehicle.  I mean, here are a few of the many reasons why a minivan makes no sense:

1.  It is the height of uncool.
2.  It is underpowered.  (See also, number 1)
3.  It cannot go quickly or turn efficiently.  (See also, number 1.)
4.  It is usually crusted with any number of gross family snacks, treats, and other garbage that has accumulated during its years of service.  (See also, number 1.)
5.  It's big, but on a car frame.  I am not sure why that was bad but I think it's still safe to say, see also number 1.

I could go on, but I think you get the point.  Jesse insisted we both agree on this point, and after hearing his logic, I didn't really have much of a choice.  I mean, see number 1!  What else could we do?  Jesse and I made a pact: we vowed never to own a minivan.

Years passed.  Jesse and I both got married.  I got pregnant, and so did his wife.  And then, my little brother passed away, before he even met his beautiful children.  He only had to honor this pact for 24 years, but I knew that at least I would be here to honor it for him.

I had my first baby.  No problem, I was rocking the Explorer.  Then I had my second.  My red Explorer was still more than enough for us.  Then I had a third and our family upgraded to the slightly larger Tahoe.  After I got pregnant with my fourth, we decided it would sure be nice to have something with an easy access back seat.  My husband insisted that I test drive a minivan.  Ugh.

I really did intend to honor honor our pact, Jesse.  I tried, I really did.

But after doing a little test driving, my husband compiled a new list about minivans, and it didn't leave me much room to argue either.

1. They are cheap.
2. They are convenient to use and easy for kids to access the back seats.
3. They are comfortable in the front and back, and designed for people with small children.
4. They are fuel efficient.  With gas prices above $3.50/gal at the time, this was a major consideration.
5. They have automatic doors, double TVs, light screens on the windows, and a remote, keyless start.

I broke my promise and we bought a minivan.

If I were given a job as a car salesman, and tasked to sell ONLY minivans, I doubt my sales skills would matter very much.  Honestly, people are either ready for one, or they just aren't that evolved yet.  It took me almost six years of being a parent, and four kids, to reach the point where I was ready.    I would guess that car salesmen could talk to someone for two minutes and know right away whether people are ready.  I would also submit to you that there's no way for them to know, without at least approaching and talking to the person, whether that person might be ready.  

Let me tell you how this is like the gospel of Jesus Christ.  We are all born of man, and we are all tempted to do bad.  We are all full of the desire to be good and an opposing desire to be bad.  (The natural man is an enemy to God and so on.)  In our lives, there will be times when we are very concerned about being cool.

Being a disciple of Christ is not cool.

In fact, Jesus Christ's teachings, throughout almost all time, have been closer to the antithesis of cool.  We can probably determine pretty quickly whether someone we meet is "cool," but we don't know many of the circumstances in the lives of people around us.  In fact, the state of the hearts of the people you know the best may still sometimes be a mystery.  It's easy to look and guess whether people are "ready" to be reborn as sons and daughter of God.  It may be simple to predict that someone with lots of tattoos, for instance, or someone drinking a lot of alcohol, or someone putting work before family, would not be interested in hearing about God.

It would also often be wrong.

Remember that when Christ was criticized for teaching people considered to be beneath Him, He basically said that it's the sick who need a doctor.  Similarly, it is those you think might not be ready who may be most prepared and most in need of selling their convertible and buying a minivan.

My point is this.  You are all surrounded by friends and family.  You know them and you love them, but you don't know, until you talk to them about it, whether they want to hear about the gospel of Christ.  You don't know whether their heart is ready to be changed.

I had a friend I was sure would not be interested in learning more about Christ's restored church.  For some reason, the Spirit prompted me, despite somewhat awkward circumstances, to offer to have her over, and sit with her while the missionaries taught her the basics of our faith.  To my great surprise, she agreed.  In fact, she was delighted to learn more and she was possibly the most eager, the brightest shining light of an investigator I've ever been blessed to see.  I am so glad I didn't judge based on my preconceived notions (she did not have tattoos or drink a lot, but she did have a grandfather she loved and respected who was a pastor in another faith, and she did regularly attend church at another congregation.)  She was baptized less than two months from the day we began the lessons and she continues to rock that minivan.

I am so grateful for the beautiful joy the gospel brings to my life.  I am blessed beyond measure through my faith and I am so glad when I find other people who want to learn more.  If you are already a Christian or other religious person, and you are not interested in learning about our faith, that's fine with me.  I hope you can take away from this a renewed desire to bring your friends and family to Christ's teachings.  But if you are interested in learning about being a mormon, if you have questions, or want to meet with the missionaries, please reach out to me, or another mormon friend you know, or look up the missionaries in your area on your own by going here.  Finally, if you're already a member, listen to the Spirit and take the time to find out if any of your friends have evolved to the point of wanting a minivan, too.  It might surprise you who has.

All My Sins

My kids wanted to give me gifts for Christmas.  They wanted to pick out something fancy.  They went and asked dad to buy something for me.  They also drew me photos.  None of these took much time or cost them any money.  So although they are sweet, they didn't mean so much to me.  One kid (okay, it's Dora, she's my most angelic child!) decided to do something nice and spent quite a bit of time cleaning up "my house" (the main living areas and my bedroom) a few times.  She told me her gift was cleaning up my home, and let me tell you, that gift made me beam because I knew it required something of her.  It wasn't easy, and it was from HER.

Now bear with me a moment, because these things seem disconnected, but they aren't.

I love the scriptures.  I love the old testament, especially the book of Job.  I love the New Testament, especially the stories of Christ's life.  I love Christ's teachings.  I love the Book of Mormon and the Doctrine and Covenants and I love that we have a living prophet and receive ongoing revelations.  I love the stories, the admonitions, the parables.  I love almost all of it.  I tell you this so you will believe me when I say that for me, saying one verse is my favorite scripture of all time is a big deal.

So here it is.  This week I will share with you my favorite scripture of all time.

Let me set the stage.  In Alma 22 the four sons of Mosiah have left the Nephites to go visit the wicked, wicked Lamanites.  Ammon has had a lot of good luck and faith and been met with success in teaching King Lamoni, who happens to be one of the sons of the biggest baddest king of all the Lamanites.  Ammon meets the big bad King and after an altercation, Ammon promises to go see the big bad King (who I will hereafter call Big Bad) later on.

Ammon breaks his promise and sends his brother Aaron instead because he gets bogged down in missionary work.  Aaron is recently reprieved from jail and probably a little nervous.  He might even be scared.  He goes to meet with Big Bad.

Aaron starts very basic, with a few simple questions.  It turns out Big Bad is willing to take Aaron at his word that there is a God.  Then after seeing Big Bad's faith, Aaron lays it all out there.  He tells Big Bad about the fall of man, the coming of Christ, his atonement, the plan of salvation.  Big Bad takes it all pretty well and he makes a big offer.  He offers Aaron everything he has, his kingdom, and all his possessions to have the badness rooted from his breast and to have the joy of God replace it.  He begs to be born of God.

Aaron tells him it's simpler than that.  He just has to kneel down and pray, ask for forgiveness, and he can be forgiven.

Big Bad's prayer is my favorite verse.  Alma 22:18 O God, Aaron hath told me that there is a God; and if there is a God, and if thou art God, wilt thou make thyself known unto me, and I will give away all my sins to know thee, and that I may be raised from the dead, and be saved at the last day.  And now when the king (aka Big Bad) had said these words, he was struck as if he were dead.

I bolded the part I love the most.  If you believe in God, and you believe He made us all in his image, and you believe He blesses us, then you know that every time we do good, and we are blessed, He is repaying us.  Sometimes it's literally, sometimes it's something of spiritual value, but either way, He pays us for our work, our sacrifice, our love.  Thus, no matter what, our ledger is always red.  We never enter the black, we are never ever profitable servants.

We have one thing, one single solitary thing, to give to God.

I hope that this year you had a wonderful Christmas and enjoyed the time with your family.  I hope you gave and received some wonderful gifts.  And now, with this new year, with the time and blessings and joy you have been given, I hope you will take a moment and give God a special gift.

None of us are perfect.  I can think of several things I do wrong.  For me it's easy, for some of you it might be very hard, but I want you to think of a sin.  It could be a sin of commission (drinking--for non-members who don't abide by our word of wisdom, pretend I said, drinking too much--, lying, stealing, or something a little less dramatic) or a sin of omission (not doing things you should.)  It can be large or small, but think about your favorite sin.  That thing you do (or don't do) that you should change.  You should want to keep doing (or not doing) this thing.  It should be like me asking you to … gasp… give up cookies.  (I am so glad a eating a few cookies is not a sin!)  The thought of giving this thing up should sting, that's my point.

Now, give it up.

Don't just say you will, but do it.  That's the hard part, of course.  Then when you have made that a habit, or eliminated a bad one, give up something else.  That is the only meaningful gift we can give our Heavenly Father.  He probably smiles when we serve others, and He probably grins when we go to church, or pay a tithe to His church.  But those things are gifts from Him that we are merely returning to Him.  If you want your Father in Heaven to beam, then you know what you have to do.  Give up all your sins and then (and only then) can you know Him.

He wants all of us to know Him because He already sees all of us as we can be, if only we will follow His plan. Now all we have to do is get there, so get going already.

There is always Hope

I am a crazy chicken lady.

My husband grew up on a farm.  I grew up in the suburbs.  When we met, and he told me his family were all farmers, I thought he was kidding.  I was the kind of clueless idiot who thought all our food today was grown on commercial farms, owned by Simplot or Green Giant, and that there weren't really people who did "farming" anymore, unless they were working for some big company.

So when Whit asked me about three years ago to get chicks around Easter, I thought he was nuts.  He was so adamant about it, and reassured me that the kids would love them.  He told me that he would do everything, that they're super easy, and that I wouldn't have to do a thing.

The kids did love them.

That was the only thing he said that turned out to be true.  They were in a box in our garage and they made big messes.  They pooped in their water, they scratched and ate and drank and made messes and pooped and pooped and pooped more.  Did I mention the poop? Then they ate and pooped enough that they grew pretty big and they were hopping out of their stinky box and wandering around pooping in the garage.  I had cleaned the box to the best of my abilities, but they needed a bigger box.  And the coop I ordered never came, so I tried to go buy one at the store, but the season had passed and they didn't have them anymore! Crisis!  On Whit's next day off, Whit and I spent the whole day getting stuff, building a coop and painting it.  This was pretty much the opposite of what I had been promised, and I was not super happy about it.

Egads they were messy and I worried and worried and worried about them.  It was cold, it was rainy, so I was outside putting heat lamps and changing the coop shavings and buying them special supplemental foods and taking them scraps and putting up fabric to block the rain.  (I did get over that.  I mean, a chicken's gonna get wet.)

But then on my birthday, disaster struck.  They'd been laying for a month or so when an opossum found them.  And killed my favorite one!  Did I mention this happened on my birthday??  I was so sad to lose Trip and I really didn't want to lose anymore, but then the opossum got another, and a dog got two more.  I was down to just three.  I did what any sane person would do--I bought more!

This was the first step on my descent down to crazy chicken lady-ness.

It was not my last.

So I bought TEN more chicks.  Because I loved the first seven.  But first, I secured my coop from predators.  I prepared a room and a heat lamp and a space for the chicks.  I took way better care of these little guys.

I still lost two to hawks when I let them out too early.

But the worst, the lowest moment of my chicken parenting was the night of the raccoon.  I had a little four month old puppy who weighed about 2.5 pounds.  We went out to lock up the chickens for the night at dusk and I could just make out the shape of a raccoon ahead of me.  My puppy went charging for it, and I called Foxy back because I knew the raccoon could end her.  I shouted and waved and the big old raccoon ran up into a tree.

I kept walking and found that the chickens, instead of being holed up in the coop, were in complete disarray.  All over the yard.  The raccoon had already killed one, Whitney's (my husband's) favorite one.  I found another one huddled at the far end of the coop.  I couldn't get her to move, or come to me.  It was one of the young ones, and I locked the rest in before going to get her.  I couldn't make out much outside but she wasn't moving at all.  I was worried she might be dead.

I carried her inside and she still wouldn't move.  I could see why in the light.  See, raccoons like to eat chicken's heads.  If they have several around, they will ONLY eat the head before they move on to another chicken head.  (Delightful, right?) I interrupted the raccoon, so it hadn't really eaten this one, just gnawed on it.  Both eyes had been mangled beyond repair, and I was heartbroken.

Whitney offered to wring it's neck.  He told me it was really the only thing to do.

I just could not let him do it. I googled what to do and found out it was in shock.  I got antibiotics and put them in its water.  I pushed its beak down and made it drink.  It would not move otherwise.  I put it in a box and kept it inside, since it was March and it is vital to keep a chicken in shock warm.  Foxy was beside herself, but we put her far enough away that she would leave the chicken alone.

The injured chicken stank.  By the next day it was way worse.  She would not eat.  Nothing.  She wouldn't move.  I kept making her drink at intervals all day.  When I went outside that day, I discovered the darn raccoon had eaten another chicken.  I spent a lot of time re-securing the coop.  I was beside myself.  I went out and bought this kind of expensive spray-on antibiotic and Whitney helped me clean the wounds on her eyes as well as we could.  We put neosporin on them and later I used the spray like clockwork.

She still would not eat.

Although her eyes looked better and better, she would not eat, even a bit, despite my best efforts.  By day three, the internet said that if she didn't eat she would die.  I had read a lot on blind chickens and I knew that if the rest of the flock helped her, she could survive.  The odds weren't good, but it had happened.  The blind chicken could follow the sounds of the other chickens to find the food and eat the grain.  I thought maybe she would eat in her old surroundings, so I took her outside. She perked up right away and I was so hopeful.

The second I stepped away, she felt my absence and hunkered down.  I was delighted to see her sisters/friends come running over.  Then they reached her and immediately began pecking at her injured eyes.  I was crushed.  I can't tell you how much it upset me, to see her friends, her family, trying to tear at her when she was down.  I cried and cried, so concerned for this little chicken who I had been trying to help (all to no avail) for three days. I can't tell you how many times people suggested I put her down, or let her die.  They told me that I was prolonging the inevitable.  She was in pain.  She was miserable.  Stop trying and let her go.

I just couldn't do it.  I couldn't let her die.  So I read about force feeding chickens.  I read about how they have this little area where their food goes before it goes to their stomach and you don't want to overfeed them or it will burst and they'll die.  Small frequent meals, then.  Whit helped me at first.  I tried to feed her alone and could not get her to eat anything.  She squirmed and flailed and turned away and I made a huge mess.  I was trying with yogurt, which they say is the thing to kick start a gut when it's been going hungry.  We were on day three, the make or break day.  If she didn't eat she would die on her own.

With Whit's help (he's unfailingly supportive, even when he thinks I am being crazy) I fed her.  Then an hour later, we fed her again.  Then an hour later.  Whit made me go to bed after that third feeding.  I wanted to feed her through the night.  After all, we were on day three.  How much was enough to save her??

We did the same thing the next day, but Whit came up with a way to shove her down in the sink so one person could feed her and water her alone.  We gave her a bath and cleaned her eyes again so they didn't stink so bad and a small miracle--one of her eyes was THERE!! I had so much hope.

So that day, she started eating by force and she had an eye.  I started to really hope (for the first time) that she might live.  I told the kids I hoped she could make it.  They would say, "is she gonna die?" and I would say, "I sure hope not."  Eli and Dora started to say "we hope she lives.  We sure hope so."  And Emmy picked up the refrain and began calling her Hope.

Each day I force fed Hope and I put her outside whenever it was nice, but in a pen so no dogs, cats or other chickens could harm her.  They all wanted to.  She was so scared she would hardly move.  I also think she was adjusting to the loss of one eye.  We still don't know exactly how well her "good eye" works.  During those days, she would not eat a single thing I did not force on her.  She would not drink a single thing without me forcing her.  We were at day 11 and she was eating grain, watermelon, yogurt, bread, greens, and on and on, but she still she had not eaten or drunk a single thing without my help.

The problem was that in two days, I was leaving to go to Moses Lake Washington to visit Whit's family.  I had no choice but to dump her into the coop with the rest of the flock to pick her to death or for her to starve because she couldn't eat alone.  I was so scared for her.  I felt sick.

I had asked my mom over the phone if she wanted to take her and feed her and my mom laughed.  My mom had grown up on a mini-farm and she said the same thing everyone else did.  "At some point she has to either reintegrate or die."

"No chance you want to take her to your house?  Have a pet chicken??"

My mom laughed.

And then she came to get Eli's fish the night before we left.  She saw Hope, eating now from my hand without force.  She would not eat on her own, but she loved me.  She would open her beak up for me to feed her.  She never ever tried to get out of her little box.  She let me carry her around like a lapdog.  She loved me and I loved her.  Her eye was getting better.  She didn't stink anymore.

My mom, with her heart the size of Texas, could not resist.  "Oh give me her stuff," she said.  "I'll take her with me."

I will not bother with the rest of the story, since this is already super duper long, but let's just say that Hope survived, one eyed and all.  You would never know she only has one eye unless you looked close, and she still thinks she's part of the family.  She loves kids, she loves people and the only thing she would ever do to hurt someone is peck at their toes if you have a flower on them, because she loves little yellow flowers.  Tasty.

She will jump up in the air to get a treat, she lays a beautiful brown egg, and she is the sweetest, kindest chicken you've ever seen.

There were many moments, many hours, many days and yes, even weeks, when I thought she would not survive.  I had a baby, a puppy, twelve other chickens plagued by a persistent raccoon, a husband and three other kids and it was very very very hard for me to care for little Hope.  I am so glad that I did.

In our lives, there will be many such times, times where we feel like giving up.  Times where people are telling us we are stupid to keep trying.  There will even be times when our family and friends try to tear us down.  Satan wants you to give up in those hard moments.  He wants you to give in.  He wants you to throw in the towel and by the way, he's the one behind you telling you to pick at those family and friends who are down.

I am here to tell you the following:

DO NOT GIVE UP.  HAVE HOPE.

If you do, you never know how good things can get.  Even with one eye, life is pretty good.  God loves you and he has a plan for you.  It's a plan you can't see, and it's a plan you can't predict, and that makes it so hard to have hope, to have faith that it's there.  But it is.

If a little bitty three pound chicken can do it, so can you.  And when I say your Father in Heaven loves you more than He loves that little chicken, you should believe me, because it's true.  He has so much beauty and joy in store for you that you can't even take it all in right now, and you can't comprehend it's magnitude.  Just have a little hope and keep on going. Your good times are right around the corner, I promise.

Crusty

Just after we moved into our new home, I purchased a venus fly trap.  It sits in a little clear plastic cup that you keep full of water so when it needs water it can suck it up from below.  I'm not sure if this is really how you're supposed to do it, because as a kid I remember misting them, but in any case, it's what the directions said when I bought it and I believe in following directions, for the most part.  

A few weeks ago, I noticed the peat moss around it looked kinda moldy.  So I thought I should let it dry out a bit.  Last week, I noticed it was dying!  The little trap parts were turning black.  I realized it was… CRUSTY!  I had gone from probably overwatering to under watering and it wasn't going to survive unless I did something.  I did not go to great lengths.  I just refilled the plastic cup.  You can't dump in a lot of water or it's too much.  You can't ignore it or it's too little.  As with many things, it requires a delicate balance.  

This got me thinking.  There are a lot of things in life that require constant maintenance.  In fact, most everything does.  No matter how often you feed your family, or yourself, if you wait a few hours, you will be be hungry again.  Sometimes I feel like all I do is feed the kids, clean up and feed them again.   Similarly, bath times.  Clean them up and they're messy again.  But you can't stop, because then they will get stinky and CPS will come and take them away.  

If you look around, you will see this principle everywhere:  plants, animals, working out, teaching kids, cleaning, work, and on and on.  I tried to ride a bike a few years ago and discovered that, in fact, that phrase, "like riding a bike" is not correct.  I had a lot of trouble because I hadn't been on one in years and years.  Everything requires maintenance or it will fall into disrepair.  I learned about this as a child, the tendency of everything to fall apart if not maintained.  In science, it's called Entropy.  I think I will bag that term and just call it being Crusty.  

This week, I got Crusty.  

I was thinking about the gospel and I got all Crusty.  I was mad.  I won't bother you with details, but I was angry.  My faith was shaken.  I went to talk to my husband about it, one of the few people in the world I can say anything and everything to.  Instead of being appalled, mad, condescending or many other responses, he was his normal humble self.  He tried at first to explain his positions to me, but it was too late for that.  I was Crusty.  I needed more than reasoning because I was past reason.  I realized that we began the conversation sitting on either end of the sofa, but we had moved even further apart and were raising our voices.  

In fact, we were approaching a fight.  But I didn't want to fight with him--I love him.  So I moved over right next to him and I hugged him to show him I wasn't mad at HIM.  I loved him.  I wanted us to be on the same page.  That's when he bore me his testimony.  You know the gist of that, because after we spoke last week, I wrote my blog, about him and his testimony.  You might have noticed his words factored very heavily into last week's blog because folks, I was not feeling it much last week.  I was still a little Crusty. 

But that was a turning point for me.  Whitney (my husband) pointed out that I hadn't been doing everything I should have been doing.  I hadn't been going to the temple.  I've been in nursery for what feels like years now, and if you aren't mormon, I will explain.  It means that after Sacrament meeting (which is an hour long meeting in which I typically watch all my kids alone because Whit's working), I head straight to babysit the kids aged one to three.  I referee fights, give snacks, help them go potty and generally just babysit.  While everyone else is in Relief Society and Sunday School, getting uplifted, I am just being beaten down.  They usually limit people to a year, I think, but I am in a brand new ward, I know no one and I am still in nursery.  That means I haven't gotten any nourishment from church.  I haven't been reading enough in my scriptures or praying with enough fervency.  These things are the ways we water the plant of our testimony and mine was drying up.  

It finally occurred to me this week that maybe God is teaching us something with all this entropy stuff all around us.  It takes constant vigilance, continuous effort, never-ending enduring to the end for us to become what our Heavenly Father wants us to become.  And even then… news flash, it won't end.  Because our lives are not static.  Like it or not, we are living beings and so we are always either growing and progressing or we are falling backwards, becoming Crusty.  

The only way we can become like our Father in Heaven, fulfill our potential is to study the things of God. We can't learn about the sky by looking at the ground.  So this week, I've tried to study the scriptures, pray, and focus on pondering the things of God instead of the things of man.  It has helped me tremendously.  My hope to all of us this Sunday before Christmas is that we may all turn to Christ and focus on learning of Him, this week and every week so that we don't get Crusty.  And I hope you all have a Whitney in your life who will bear their testimony for you, or spray you down, when you need that little bit of extra nourishment and can't see it yourself.