Litmus Test

          This week I'm taking a break from the normal format of my blog posts.  The following is an email that I sent to a close friend of mine:

Dear Xxxx,

    I've been thinking about how putting our hearts into anything that isn't God is wrong.  The scriptures teach that we should love God with all our "heart, might, mind, and strength."  That was true in the mission, too.  We knew that we had to serve God with all our hearts.  We learned that anytime we put our hearts into something else, like ties, food, writing home, etc., it compromised our ability to put our hearts into our missions.

    I believe that normal life is the same way.  We are required to spend our time on things that take our effort or attention that are  secular in nature, but if we put our hearts into those things, we compromise our ability to put our hearts into God.

    It's much easier to live life with our hearts placed on other things around us.  Giving our heart only to God is painful.  Caring about others more than ourselves is also important and does not compromise our ability to give our hearts to God.  But so many other things that seem good really do compromise our ability to give our all to Him.  Sometimes we think that we are doing something for others when we really aren't.  Sometimes we are really doing it for ourselves, and when we try to force it into a shape that benefits others in some way it seems to work for a little while, but ultimately leads us away from what is most important.  That is because the nature of our engagement with the activity is self-centered.  Because the activities are not inherently evil and seem to have the potential to really help people, it is easier for us to be deceived by it or even lie to ourselves about the nature of what we are doing.  We may feel like there is heavy opposition against us, when in reality it is just ourselves making a mess of things.

    A rule that have I developed for myself is that if any activity makes it more difficult to place my family in the center of my life I will cut it out of my life immediately, not matter how innocent or even good it may seem.  It has struck me that there are some people who I greatly respect that at times in their lives have had to repent and course correct in order to make their families the most important thing.  I think to myself:  "If I love and respect these people so much, and even THEY had to repent, I will have to exert every effort to avoid the same mistake."

     I never want to make that mistake, Xxxx.  I want my family never to doubt that I value them more than anything else in my life.  I want to be true  to them from the very beginning of my family until the ends of eternity.

     Here is a question:  Has your opposition of the idea that a prophet can never lead the Church astray made it easier or harder for you to make your family your top priority?  Has your work and schooling choices made that harder or easier?

    Remember that God said, "Yea, and cry unto God for all thy support; yea, let all thy doings be unto the Lord, and whithersoever thou goest let it be in the Lord; yea, let all thy thoughts be directed unto the Lord; yea, let the affections of thy heart be placed upon the Lord forever."  and "Look unto me in every thought."

     Does following the Prophets and Apostles as completely as if hearing the Lord himself make it easier or harder to make our families the highest priority?

     I know what my answer to that question is.

Love,

Gavin

          A litmus test is a question that is asked to determine, in a black or white manner, if something is good.

           Here are some of mine:  Does the activity make it easier or harder for you to care about another person's happiness  more than your own?  Does the activity make it easier or harder for you to genuinely help others when they need it?  Does it increase your ability to love?  Does it make it easier or harder for you to follow the Spirit?  Does it invite clarity or confusion?  Does it  bring you closer or farther from the promises in your Patriarchal blessing?  Does it put a piece of your heart into something that is not God or His children?  Does it make it easier or harder to make your future or current family your first priority?

          I believe that if we as we honestly evaluate our lives on the premise of these questions and act accordingly, our lives will truly be pleasing to God.

Blessings of Spiritual Rebirth

          I don't pretend to be an expert on identifying when a person has officially dedicated their all to the Lord.  I personally believe that it is most often a single decision followed by innumerable acts of self-sacrifice.  For some people it may be a gradual event that occurs over years or decades, and for others the choice might need to be made and reaffirmed multiple times until it truly sets in.

          Regardless of how the specifics play out, there are certain blessings that seem to come along naturally with increased consecration.  Elder Richard G. Scott said, "Spirituality yields two fruits. The first is inspiration to know what to do. The second

is power, or the capacity to do it."

          Those who consecrate themselves to God tend to receive more specific and frequent inspiration from the Spirit.  Often this inspiration will lead them to be miracles in other people's lives.  God will trust them more often to fill pivotal roles at critical moments in friends' and strangers' personal plans of salvation.  Rather than place artificial divisions in their lives, they see every issue as an inherently spiritual issue, even those that seem temporal.  They seek and receive guidance about many facets of their lives, but wisely balance that guidance against their own agency so that their decisions are both their own and the Lord's.

          They also have an increased capacity to make difficult decisions and sacrifices.  They do absolutely crazy things because the Lord asks them to, even when they never know all the reasons why.  They act in confidence, trusting that God will inspire the decisions that they make, even without them realizing it.  They know that the Lord will use their imperfect efforts to bless the people that they love perfectly.  There is a distinctive power that radiates from them when they speak about the Gospel that others can't match.

          Even more than what a consecrated person says or does, the very essence of who they are reflects the decision they made to follow Christ in everything.  There is often something almost magnetic about them that draws people in closer.  They find great joy and satisfaction from their lives and feel peace and a sense of inner stability no matter what is going on around them.  The Lord blesses their efforts in every area and causes them to blossom and be more effective than they would otherwise be.  Devoting oneself to God is difficult, and elicits strong opposition from the Adversary, but it is also the vehicle for personal mighty change.

          In short, the consecrated life is the good life.  It turns everyday men and women into heroes.  It brings to a head all that is beautiful about life and makes the morning stars sing together and the sons of God shout for joy in the soul and causes the heart to burn.  With your hand in the Lord's, despite inconceivable difficulty, every minute a piece of heaven dances softly on your fingertips.

Spiritual Rebirth III

          The message of the Book of Mormon is really one message:  to make the decision here and now to accept the Lord's timing and keep His commandments.  President Packer put it this way, "Most of you have been taught the gospel all your lives.  All of you know the difference between good and evil, between right and wrong.  Isn't it time then that you decide that you're going to do right?  In so doing you're making a choice.  Not just a choice, but you're making the choice.  Once you've decided that, with no fingers crossed, no counterfeiting, no reservations or hesitancy, the rest will all fall into place."

          Elder Maxwell said the same thing, but in a different way:  "I do not believe that any soul can be exalted  that does not sacrifice every choice and action to the Lord--broken heart, contrite spirit."  These two quotes sound like they're talking about somewhat different things, but they are not.  The choice that President Packer refers to is the choice to sacrifice every decision and action to the Lord.  It is the choice that I believe constitutes what it means to be born again.  The prophets through the ages have all made this decision.  Even though only a hundredth part of the Nephite history was recorded, much of what we do have documents their experiences of rebirth.  Nephi made such a choice before he decided to kill Laban.  Enos did the same through long, devoted prayer.  King Benjamin's people, who were already baptized members of the Church, made "a covenant with [their] God to do his will, and to be obedient to his commandments..."  Alma the Younger made such a decision when he was in the "gall of bitterness" and later proclaimed that he was born of God (Mosiah 27:28).

          Modern prophets are not exempt.  Some have shared their stories of spiritual rebirth in General Conference.  All have testified of the divinity of the Savior and have dedicated their lives to Him.  One of the best descriptions of the decision to dedicate everything to God was written by C. S. Lewis,

           "Christ says “Give me All. I don’t want so much of your time and so much of your money and so much of your work: I want You. I have not come to torment your natural self, but to kill it. No half-measures are any good. I don’t want to cut off a branch here and a branch there, I want to have the whole tree down. I don’t want to drill the tooth, or crown it, or stop it, but to have it out. Hand over the natural self, all the desires which you think innocent as well as the ones you think wicked – the whole outfit. I will give you a new self instead. In fact, I will give you Myself: my own will shall become yours.”

The terrible thing, the almost impossible thing, is to hand over your whole self – all your wishes and precautions – to Christ. But it is far easier than what we are all trying to do instead. For what we are trying to do is to remain what we call “ourselves,” to keep personal happiness as our great aim in life, and yet at the same time be “good.”

          For thousands of years men of God offered animal sacrifices.  We often shrug this off, saying something like "When Christ came he ended animal sacrifices.  Now all he asks of us is a broken heart and contrite spirit--having good intentions, or something like that."  Some part of us believes that the sacrifice of a broken heart and contrite spirit is easier than animal sacrifice.  Those who think that way don't understand Christianity.  The sacrifice He asks of us today is even greater than the ones proscribed before His death.  And not only is that sacrifice important, it is mandatory for our reception into the Kingdom of God.

Spiritual Rebirth II

          Spiritual rebirth starts to have an impact on our lives in response to our own agency.  Relentless, consistent agency is the only source of true miracles, and spiritual change is the true miracle that Jesus Christ works.  He is the author of our salvation.  His atoning blood spots the ground on which we walk when we return to live with the Father.  His Atonement is the power of good in the world.  It flows from eternity to all eternity, and is the fire my which all things burn and have life.

          Jesus Christ took upon himself the burden of all creation.  We cannot understand life without understanding Him.  "And this is life eternal, that they might know thee the only true only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom thou has sent."  He is the core and center of life.  I know that He lives and that He will stand in the latter days on the Earth.  We will be eyewitnesses to His glory.  He is our Champion and our King, and He labors among us even now.  I love Him.  My life and my light and my every action are in the process of being given to Him.  There is nothing I wouldn't change for Him. 

          The Atonement should be the power and focus of change in our lives.  Psychological therapy is baseless and shallow because it attempts to use man's wisdom to solve symptoms of deeper problems.  Only the Gospel can save the world from its own self-destruction.  Without it, single living souls will likewise perish.

          The Lord faced great uncertainties and pain during His lifetime.  There were many things He didn't know in His mortal life.  However, the power of who someone is always outshines the power of what He says or does, and that power allowed Him to perform at a level that we couldn't match.  His was the power to choose the right without perfect knowledge, in darkness and unfairness.  The power of who we are can shine forward toward the future, through the Atonement of Christ.  We believe that through the Atonement of Christ, all mankind may be saved, by obedience to the laws and ordinances of the Gospel.  That belief must be the driving power behind everything we say and do.

          Spiritual rebirth is the process by which the spirit part of us bleeds through the mortal part.  It is the process by which we begin to  wield spiritual power.  It is the night at the end of the dark day that is more beautiful than anything perceive by the physical senses.  The Atonement is the great dividing link between mortal and spiritual, symbolized and epitomized by the mortal Son of God.  Thus, only through the Atonement can spirit and matter be  inseparably connected and receive an fullness of joy.  But the only way to the Atonement lies through the pathway of pain, uncertainty, and darkness, just as it did for Him.  It lies along a thorny pathway that scratches and cuts us until our hearts bleed and seems to stretch on forever, just as it did for Him.

          In a way, the path is open and obvious to everyone, but no one chooses to walk it.  We know what we should do, but we don't do it.  Not because we can't, but because we are unwilling to pay the price.  But He was.  He was because He loved us.  And because He loved us He died and personally sustained the order and progression of mankind.  May we ever worship Him and decide that another's salvation, temporal or spiritual, is worth that price.  Let us place offerings on the sacrificial alter until our heart breaks and our spirits become contrite.  There is an inner part of all of us that always sees the correct path and whether or not we are on it, but sometimes we do those things that take us in a different direction anyway.  On a single act of agency once hung the very fabric of existence.  So too does our eternal destiny, by way of the actualization of rebirth, depend on a single individual decision. 

To the Recently Returned Missionary Part II: Consecrating Our Souls

            This theme of consecration is a most important topic of discussion when it comes to returning from a mission.  One of my good friends put the main challenge of coming home best when he said that it's easy to get lost because there are so many distractions in the world.  Now, initially when a person comes home from their mission, there are certain difficulties associated with assimilating back into society and resuming activities that we didn't do on our missions such as dating and normal recreational activities.  Sometimes it feels like all those things we did before are just kind of....lame compared to what we did as missionaries.  Sometimes we feel a little lost without missionary things to focus on, so we try to fill our lives with worthwhile activities and try to find things to put our hearts into.  At first, getting distracted by the things of the world may even be more difficult for us than banging down someone's door to teach them about the Restoration.  Over time, however, especially as our lives become occupied with things that we really do need to do, like going to school or working, our closeness to the Savior can slip away without us even realizing it.

            The scriptures tell of a man who had kept the commandments "from [his] youth up," that one day approached the Savior and asked the penetrating question:  "What lack I yet?"

            Because we know the outcome of the story it's easy for us to be a bit judgmental of him and to see him almost as a less-active member of Christ's day.  In reality, though, aren't each one of us members that have kept the commandments "from [our] youth up?"  Or at least for the last two years?  Have you ever prayed to God to ask Him what you could do better?  I have.  I think that the man in the scriptural story in question must have been far more than quasi-committed to have the desire and wherewithal to ask the Savior that kind of question.  It's a question that I feel like has special pertinence after the mission field.  If you're anything like me, you worry about losing the spirituality you had on your mission, and you understand that the only way of guaranteeing that is by constantly moving forward.

            I feel like when it comes to personal weaknesses, we fall into two groups:  people who see their weaknesses more easily than they do their strengths and thus tend to underestimate themselves and be impatient with their progress, and people who see their strengths more clearly than their weaknesses, who oftentimes aren't sure what they should be focusing on improving.  The people in the first group tend to ask, "I've been struggling with this weakness for so long.  What effort lack I yet so I can overcome it?"  While those from the second group ask "I know I'm not perfect.  Even though I can't see any weaknesses in particular that I should be improving at the moment, I know that there are still vitally important improvements to be made.  What lack I yet?"  Christ's answer was direct, "One thing thou lackest: go thy way, sell whatsoever thou hast, and give to the poor, and thou shalt have treasure in heaven: and come, take up the cross, and follow me."

            Why did Jesus ask that of him?  He doesn't ask us to sell everything that we own and give it to charity, at least not at this point in our discipleship.  The Joseph Smith Translation of Luke 18:27 reads:  It is impossible for them who trust in riches, to enter into the kingdom of God; but he who forsaketh the things which are of this world, it is possible with God, that he should enter in."  The command to sell all his belongings was a personal prescription for the diagnosed condition of a personal trust in riches.  For us, that might be translated into putting our heart into our recreation, our careers, our social lives, or even our education instead of putting it into God and His work and Glory.

            As a missionary, the purpose of our lives was to help people to receive the Restored Gospel.  That should still be our purpose.  Nothing else will have any lasting significance.  Of course, as returned missionaries, we will spend a lot of our time on our recreation, our careers, our social lives, and our education, but that is different than putting our heart into those things.  As a missionary, when we were truly living our purpose, we bent everything we said or did in any situation towards that purpose.  That can still be true.  We can choose to bend the choices we make in the worldly aspects of our lives so that they gain divine purpose.

             For example, is the purpose of our social life just to have fun, get girls, and blow off steam, or is it to build up those people the Lord has entrusted to us so that we can help them return to His presence?  If the answer is the latter, all the fun, the girls, and the blowing off of steam will still happen, but it will no longer be the focus behind your interactions with others.  Are your career goals focused on what you like to spend time doing, on having a stable financial future, or on doing the greatest amount of good in the world?  Only you can respond to that question.  The answer is different for everybody.

            In essence, the only things that keep us from progressing as well, if not better, than we did on the mission are those parts of our heart that we no longer have placed on the sacrificial alter.  Many times the Lord does not ask us directly for those things like He did from time to time on the mission.  He wants the decision to be our own.  I have decided that He doesn't have to ask me for those sacrifices that I know He wants; I will give it to Him anyways, pray for help so to do, and continue to seek out ways to consecrate more for Him.  It is a very personal decision.  Only you can make it.  But if you do, it will change the rest of your life.  I promise you that, as one who has covenanted to represent the Lord's teachings to the best of my ability in every circumstance until the end of my mission in mortality.  In fact, you covenanted to do the same, if you think about it.

            True discipleship is difficult.  It was not lightly that Jesus said "few there be" that find that narrow road.  But those who love Him always, always, do.  The following is adapted from Elder Holland's talk "The First Great Commandment," interpreted by my own additions so that it applies to missionary work.  My words are not italicized to differentiate them from the words of the original talk.  The original talk can be found here:  https://www.lds.org/general-conference/2012/10/the-first-great-commandment?lang=eng 

            In effect, you, the returned missionary said to your associates: “Brethren, it has been a glorious two years. None of us could have imagined such a few short months ago the miracles we have seen and the divinity we have enjoyed. We have...labored with the very Son of God Himself...On the night all our investigators dropped us, no one wept more bitterly than I. But that is over. We have finished our work in the mission field, and He has delivered us home safely...‘What do we do now?’ I don’t know more to tell you than to return to your former life, rejoicing. I intend to ‘go back to doing the same things I did before.'...

...Looking at your battered little list of personal ambitions Jesus says..., “Elder, do you love me more than you love all this?” You say, “Yea, Lord; thou knowest that I love thee.”¹⁰

The Savior responds to that reply but continues to look into your eyes and says again, “Elder, do you love me?” Undoubtedly confused a bit by the repetition of the question, the great fisher of men answers a second time, “Yea, Lord; thou knowest that I love thee.”¹¹

The Savior again gives a brief response, but with relentless scrutiny He asks for the third time, “Elder, do you love me?” By now surely you are feeling truly uncomfortable...Perhaps you are searching your heart, seeking honest confirmation of the answer you have given so readily, almost automatically...You say  for the third time, “Lord, … thou knowest that I love thee.”¹²

To which Jesus responds.. “Then Elder, why are you here? Why are we back in the same routine, doing the same things as before the mission, having this same conversation? Wasn’t it obvious then and isn’t it obvious now that if I want you to achieve the things you wanted before the mission, I can give you those things with almost no effort on my part? What I need, Elder, are disciples—and I need them forever. I need someone to feed my sheep and save my lambs. I need someone to preach my gospel and defend my faith. I need someone who loves me, truly, truly loves me, and loves what our Father in Heaven has commissioned me to do. Ours is not a feeble message. It is not a fleeting task. It is not hapless; it is not hopeless; it is not to be consigned to the ash heap of history. It is the work of Almighty God, and it is to change the world. So, Elder, for the second and presumably the last time, I am asking you to leave all this and to go teach and testify, labor and serve loyally until the day in which they will do to you exactly what they did to me.”

            May we ever live with the decision burning in our hearts that we will never abandon He who has never abandoned us.  May we exclaim with Elder Holland every minute of our lives, "'Yea, Lord, we do love thee.' And having set our 'hand to the plough,' we will never look back until this work is finished and love of God and neighbor rules the world."

             That we may do so is both my prayer and daily battle cry.