I had one of those light bulb moments last night during scripture study that made me see the Temple in a slightly different light and I thought I'd pass it on. I was studying in 2 Nephi Chapter 2 where Lehi teaches about Adam and Eve.
2 Nephi 2: 19
And after Adam and Eve had partaken of the forbidden fruit they were driven out of the garden of Eden, to till the earth.
And I read this from Joseph Fielding McConkie, (Gospel Symbolism, p. 258):
"The events associated with the Garden of Eden make it the archetype of our temples. Here Adam received the priesthood, here Adam and Eve walked and talked with God; here our first parents were eternally married by God himself; here they learned of the tree of good and evil and of the tree of life; here they were taught the law of sacrifice and clothed in garments of skin; and from here they ventured into the lone and dreary world that they and their posterity might prove themselves worthy to return again to that divine presence."
Now that its been pointed out to me I'm wondering why I never made the connection before - its so very obvious! But nevertheless, last night, for me, this was an "Ah ha!!!" moment. The Temple is our very own Garden of Eden! Unlike Adam and Eve who were not allowed to return to the Garden, we are able to return to our own Garden of Eden, the temples, whenever we want, according to our worthiness. Its our job then to prove worthy while in the lone and dreary world so that we may enter again. Isn't awesome to think of the temple as our very own Garden of Eden; a place where not only do we make sacred covenants with the Lord, but we can also escape the lone and dreary world with all of its noise and chaos and filth. It is there where we can find answers, inspiration, peace and comfort.
It reminds me of a quote from President Hinkley:
"In this noisy, bustling, competitive world, what a privilege it is to have a sacred house where we may experience the sanctifying influence of the Spirit of the Lord."
I love the temple and the immediate feeling of peace and joy I receive every time I enter. Nate and I are planning to attend the temple next week with the other members of the Elders Quorum Presidency along with their wives. As we enter in and serve there, I'm going to try and view the temple in this new light - as my very own Garden of Eden, and remember what a blessing and privilege it is to be able to enter in.
Thursday, February 26, 2009
Monday, February 16, 2009
A Brief Post About Children
This evening we accompanied my extended family to the Draper Utah Temple Open House. We were handed a brochure to help guide us on the tour and on the front is printed the message: "We hope you find peace and inspiration during your visit here." I chuckled out loud when I read it for the first time later tonight because our own experience was anything but peaceful and inspirational.
Even though my kids are too young to remember this trip (both under age 3), I know they are not too young to form impressions about spiritual experiences or to begin learning about the importance of temples and family. I knew they would learn from our enthusiasm and excitement that we were in a special place with special people. So I thought it would be a good idea to take them along.
We picked a really great night to go to the open house. I know this because thousands of other people picked the very same time. We waited much longer than we were prepared to wait. Our scheduled time was 4:00pm but we didn't actually begin our tour until 5:30 or later. About 15 minutes into the tour my toddler had had enough. So my husband had to fight the crowded temple halls against traffic, searching for a way out of an unfamiliar building with my son screaming at the top of his lungs the whole time. Nate said it took him about twenty minutes to get out (poor guy). Anyway, I finished up the tour with my baby girl and the rest of my family members. It was a beautiful, beautiful temple and I'm so grateful I got to tour it, even if it wasn't how I'd imagined it. Anyway when all was said and done, Mom, Dad and kids were pretty tired and stressed and it was probably not the spiritual teaching moment I had hoped for. There's no denying that with children come many difficult challenges, but tremendous blessings as well.
One of the most touching accounts in all the scriptures, to me, is in 3 Nephi when Christ blesses the children and then the angels come and minister to them. As a mother, I can imagine no greater blessing than to have the Savior himself personally minister to my own children. Our Savior loves our little ones so much. The words he spoke and blessed them with were so great they could not be recorded. He wept, he loved them so much. And as a mother, I know why.
The reason I'm writing this post tonight is that I'm so grateful to belong to a church that values children because I certainly value mine. I'm so grateful to be their mother. I'm grateful also to know that there are seasons in life and that while this season may be a difficult one, it will pass and I will actually miss my children being so small. I love to have them with me and I miss them when we're apart. I'm just so grateful for those two precious little miracles sound asleep in their beds upstairs.
They are idols of hearts and of households!
They are angels of God in disguise;
The sunlight still sleeps in their tresses,
His glory still gleams in their eyes;
These truants from home and from Heaven,
They have made me more gentle and mild;
And I know now how Jesus could liken
The kingdom of God to a child.
- Charles Dickens
Even though my kids are too young to remember this trip (both under age 3), I know they are not too young to form impressions about spiritual experiences or to begin learning about the importance of temples and family. I knew they would learn from our enthusiasm and excitement that we were in a special place with special people. So I thought it would be a good idea to take them along.
We picked a really great night to go to the open house. I know this because thousands of other people picked the very same time. We waited much longer than we were prepared to wait. Our scheduled time was 4:00pm but we didn't actually begin our tour until 5:30 or later. About 15 minutes into the tour my toddler had had enough. So my husband had to fight the crowded temple halls against traffic, searching for a way out of an unfamiliar building with my son screaming at the top of his lungs the whole time. Nate said it took him about twenty minutes to get out (poor guy). Anyway, I finished up the tour with my baby girl and the rest of my family members. It was a beautiful, beautiful temple and I'm so grateful I got to tour it, even if it wasn't how I'd imagined it. Anyway when all was said and done, Mom, Dad and kids were pretty tired and stressed and it was probably not the spiritual teaching moment I had hoped for. There's no denying that with children come many difficult challenges, but tremendous blessings as well.
One of the most touching accounts in all the scriptures, to me, is in 3 Nephi when Christ blesses the children and then the angels come and minister to them. As a mother, I can imagine no greater blessing than to have the Savior himself personally minister to my own children. Our Savior loves our little ones so much. The words he spoke and blessed them with were so great they could not be recorded. He wept, he loved them so much. And as a mother, I know why.
The reason I'm writing this post tonight is that I'm so grateful to belong to a church that values children because I certainly value mine. I'm so grateful to be their mother. I'm grateful also to know that there are seasons in life and that while this season may be a difficult one, it will pass and I will actually miss my children being so small. I love to have them with me and I miss them when we're apart. I'm just so grateful for those two precious little miracles sound asleep in their beds upstairs.
They are idols of hearts and of households!
They are angels of God in disguise;
The sunlight still sleeps in their tresses,
His glory still gleams in their eyes;
These truants from home and from Heaven,
They have made me more gentle and mild;
And I know now how Jesus could liken
The kingdom of God to a child.
- Charles Dickens
Sunday, February 1, 2009
A Satisfactory Explanation
I've often contemplated the reason why people who leave the Church are never just neutral after they leave. This is of course, a generalization, but most seem to be very anti-Mormon and even go so far as to fight against the church rather than adopting a "live and let live" attitude towards it. I've come up with my own various theories and feel I have a pretty good understanding of why that is, but I've never had a completely satisfactory answer; an answer that I could give to someone else if they wondered the same thing. Tonight, I came across something that seems to have nailed it on the head, at least for me.
The scripture reference comes from I Nephi 16:2 "...wherefore, the guilty taketh the truth to be hard, for it cutteth them to the very center." And in verse 3, "And now my brethren, if ye were righteous and were willing to hearken to the truth, and give heed unto it, that ye might walk uprightly before God, then ye would not murmur because of the truth, and say: Thou speakest hard things against us."
This all comes about after Nephi has explained his father's vision of the tree of life to his brothers. The brothers, as usual, "took the truth to be hard" and this was Nephi's response to their murmurings against their father, the Prophet.
Now, here's the satisfactory explanation: "The nature of men has ever been the same. Characteristically the righteous rejoice in the word of God, while the wicked are offended with it. Wickedness and truth are no more compatible than light and darkness. Those who leave the Church, clothed in deeds of darkness, find it difficult to leave the Church alone. All too often they are found attempting to expose the Church or demean its doctrines - activities necessitated by their guilt, for they realize that if the Church is true they are servants of darkness and must needs repent." (Doctrinal Commentary on the Book of Mormon, Joseph Fielding McConkie and Robert L. Millet, pg. 122)
This is the part that really hit me: "...They realize that if the Church is true they are servants of darkness and must needs repent." There you have it.
It reminds me of a web site I stumbled upon while preparing a lesson last month. It was basically a blog for LDS people who feel like they don't really fit the mold, I guess, to find companionship or understanding. But to me, really it seemed like just a forum for people to air their griefs or complaints against the Church. It bothered me so much that these intelligent people were wasting so much time tearing apart doctrines and documents, looking for those little loopholes that would prove the Prophets were wrong this time or that; looking for a justification for their murmurings against the Prophets now. It seemed so very arrogant and proud of them to say basically "because this doesn't sit right with me, because this is a hard thing the Prophet has asked of us, it must be wrong."
I feel sad that they don't feel they fit in but at the same time I wondered how much a site like that is helping anyone's testimony to grow at all? Seems to me if the same effort were spent searching the scriptures (modern and ancient), for Gospel truths they would be so much more satisfied with what they found there than with any answers that a blog could offer them. And it really got under my skin for quite a while. I just couldn't understand why people who claim to love the Church and the Prophet would establish and support a blog dedicated to trying to discredit the servants of the Lord. What do they think it will profit them? Why do they seek to tear it down or disprove it? Here's the answer: "If the Church is true, they are servants of darkness and must needs repent." We never like being told we're in the wrong. Never. The wicked have always taken the truth to be hard. I hope I will always be able to recognize that my shortcomings in the Gospel are my own and not the fault of the Lord's servants. And I hope I will always be worthy of the companionship of the Holy Ghost that testifies of truth.
It is such a blessing to live in a dispensation where I am able to hear the voice of the Lord through his servants. It is also a blessing to have the agency to choose whether or not to follow that council. I'm truly grateful for my testimony of the truthfulness of the Gospel of Jesus Christ.
The scripture reference comes from I Nephi 16:2 "...wherefore, the guilty taketh the truth to be hard, for it cutteth them to the very center." And in verse 3, "And now my brethren, if ye were righteous and were willing to hearken to the truth, and give heed unto it, that ye might walk uprightly before God, then ye would not murmur because of the truth, and say: Thou speakest hard things against us."
This all comes about after Nephi has explained his father's vision of the tree of life to his brothers. The brothers, as usual, "took the truth to be hard" and this was Nephi's response to their murmurings against their father, the Prophet.
Now, here's the satisfactory explanation: "The nature of men has ever been the same. Characteristically the righteous rejoice in the word of God, while the wicked are offended with it. Wickedness and truth are no more compatible than light and darkness. Those who leave the Church, clothed in deeds of darkness, find it difficult to leave the Church alone. All too often they are found attempting to expose the Church or demean its doctrines - activities necessitated by their guilt, for they realize that if the Church is true they are servants of darkness and must needs repent." (Doctrinal Commentary on the Book of Mormon, Joseph Fielding McConkie and Robert L. Millet, pg. 122)
This is the part that really hit me: "...They realize that if the Church is true they are servants of darkness and must needs repent." There you have it.
It reminds me of a web site I stumbled upon while preparing a lesson last month. It was basically a blog for LDS people who feel like they don't really fit the mold, I guess, to find companionship or understanding. But to me, really it seemed like just a forum for people to air their griefs or complaints against the Church. It bothered me so much that these intelligent people were wasting so much time tearing apart doctrines and documents, looking for those little loopholes that would prove the Prophets were wrong this time or that; looking for a justification for their murmurings against the Prophets now. It seemed so very arrogant and proud of them to say basically "because this doesn't sit right with me, because this is a hard thing the Prophet has asked of us, it must be wrong."
I feel sad that they don't feel they fit in but at the same time I wondered how much a site like that is helping anyone's testimony to grow at all? Seems to me if the same effort were spent searching the scriptures (modern and ancient), for Gospel truths they would be so much more satisfied with what they found there than with any answers that a blog could offer them. And it really got under my skin for quite a while. I just couldn't understand why people who claim to love the Church and the Prophet would establish and support a blog dedicated to trying to discredit the servants of the Lord. What do they think it will profit them? Why do they seek to tear it down or disprove it? Here's the answer: "If the Church is true, they are servants of darkness and must needs repent." We never like being told we're in the wrong. Never. The wicked have always taken the truth to be hard. I hope I will always be able to recognize that my shortcomings in the Gospel are my own and not the fault of the Lord's servants. And I hope I will always be worthy of the companionship of the Holy Ghost that testifies of truth.
It is such a blessing to live in a dispensation where I am able to hear the voice of the Lord through his servants. It is also a blessing to have the agency to choose whether or not to follow that council. I'm truly grateful for my testimony of the truthfulness of the Gospel of Jesus Christ.
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