I'll be taking a break from the forum for a while.
I care deeply for Shiz and Casi, and I am saddened more than I can express. At this point, I'm not able to understand the situation objectively or express my thoughts and feelings in a manner appropriate for a public forum. And that colors everything else I try to discuss here.
I'll be back in a few days.
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The ability to qualify for, receive, and act on personal revelation is the single most important skill that can be acquired in this life. - Julie Beck
roper, I believe it is normal to want all the blessings the gospel has to offer for those you love. For instance I want all my children including my adopteds to have those blessings but a few have chosen different paths. It is one of the hardest things I personally do, NOT to lecture and pester them. From a parent of love ones perspective agency is sometimes not as nice and easy as it sounds...
This principle of personal choice encourages me to love the Lord more than ever and beg to have trust in His wisdom. He KNOWS what he is doing... He KNOWS and LOVES us all... I believe that nothing changes that, though our choices do have consequences. I also believe we those who choose different choices than I do will be content once we have all the answers we don't have now...
Whenever my heart is cast into a deep lament, most often in situations like this, I remember the scripture in Jacob in which Jacob pours out his heart preaching to the people, trying to convince them to remain faithful to the basic principles of the Gospel after they've gone out and have started to look for ways to justify and rationalize their personal hangups and abominations... Jacob 4:18 "Behold, my beloved brethren, I will unfold this mystery unto you; if I do not, by any means, get shaken from my firmness in the Spirit, and stumble because of my over anxiety for you."
Sometimes our over anxiety becomes a spiritual detriment.
Another great passage that resounds in my mind at times like these comes from Alma chapter 4, after being blessed with prosperity, having their prayers answered, it simply wasn't enough for them... they began to treat each other with disrespect... when the people of the church became a stumbling block to themselves...
Alma (chapter 4) describes it as such...
12 Yea, he saw great inequality among the people, some lifting themselves up with their pride, despising others, turning their backs upon the needy and the naked and those who were hungry, and those who were athirst, and those who were sick and afflicted.
13 Now this was a great cause for lamentations among the people, while others were abasing themselves, succoring those who stood in need of their succor, such as imparting their substance to the poor and the needy, feeding the hungry, and suffering all manner of afflictions, for Christs sake, who should come according to the spirit of prophecy;
14 Looking forward to that day, thus retaining a remission of their sins; being filled with great joy because of the resurrection of the dead, according to the will and power and deliverance of Jesus Christ from the bands of death.
and I find it particularly interesting how Alma suffered because of the inequality, the wording is extremely curious to me in the next verse...
15 And now it came to pass that Alma, having seen the afflictions of the humble followers of God, and the persecutions which were heaped upon them by the remainder of his people, and seeing all their inequality, began to be very sorrowful; nevertheless the Spirit of the Lord did not fail him.
I remember as a missionary feeling as Nephi. Wanting so much to help people and let them experience the "marvelous light of God". I have felt (as Nephi) to water my pillow by night for the investigators of the church, who would come and go like wisps of smoke.
2 Nephi 33:2-3: "2 But behold, there are many that harden their hearts against the Holy Spirit, that it hath no place in them; wherefore, they cast many things away which are written and esteem them as things of naught.
"3 But I, Nephi, have written what I have written, and I esteem it as of great worth, and especially unto my people. For I pray continually for them by day, and mine eyeswatermypillow by night, because of them; and I cry unto my God in faith, and I know that he will hear my cry."
God will hear your cries too, Roper. Perhaps not in the ways you would like, but in ways you never foresaw--in ways you never dreamed possible. I am grateful for those souls who CHOOSE to believe, despite all their adversity, challenges, doubts, blessings--whether they prosper or languish in poverty--you are an inspiration. Thank you Roper for being an inspiration to me. For being there to strengthen me. There are times when I think of your written words, your example, and dream of being as valiant. I am a better person just by reading your good words.
Don't let the grief of love overcome the joy of love. For there is both suffering and sacrifice in true love, as there is wonder and true happiness...
May you dwell in the rest of the Lord, whatever you choose to do...
Your friend forever in Christ,
--Ray
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I'm not slow; I'm special. (Don't take it personally, everyone finds me offensive. Yet somehow I manage to live with myself.)