Charity and Forgiveness

The lesson in RS and Priesthood today was about forgiving (JS#34). There were examples from Joseph Smith's life of times when people harmed him and the church and he easily forgave them. There is a line in Moroni 7 about charity that I have often wondered about : "...pray unto the Father with all the energy of heart, that ye may be filled with this love" (meaning the pure love of Christ or charity). Why would charity be such a difficult thing to be blessed with that I would need to pray for it so earnestly and intently?

As we studied forgiveness I realized this application. When I have felt hurt or wronged, sometimes I have a hard time forgiving the person and letting it go. It is especially hard when they aren't repentant or if they don't know that they have hurt me. It starts to become painfully obvious that the anger or hurt that I am carrying inside is damaging me and I need to forgive. But, I'm angry and I feel justified in that anger. That makes it very difficult to pray to forgive the person. Sometimes all I can do is back up a step and pray to want to pray to forgive them. Finding the humility to say those prayers takes all I can muster, all the energy of my heart....But as I pray what I am truly asking for is charity. To feel as the Savior does toward that person, to see them as He does. When I have been blessed with the gift of charity I can easily give them the benefit of the doubt. I can feel like they were doing the best they could at the time. I can know that the Lord loves me and He loves the other person, and a feeling of forgiveness can come.

Connections

I have been studying ancient Greece in my Humanities class and put an interesting connection together. This picture is of the Altar of Zeus from the city of Pergamum (modern day Bergama Turkey). This temple-like building sat on the top of a hill and was an enormous (almost 400 feet long) open-air tribute to the gods with opulent sculptures showing battles between the gods and the giants. Serpents wreathing, satyrs, Athena pulling hair--exciting stuff! Pergamum, a Greek stronghold was one of the wealthiest and most powerful cities in the world around 200BCE.

In the book of Revelation in the Bible chapters 1-3 I have some notes from a Brother Millet Sunday school lesson a few years ago. There are 7 candlesticks and angels of the seven churches. My notes say those are seven of the branches or areas of the church at the time and the angels are servants or the church leaders of those areas. The angels of the church of Ephesus(2:1)Smyrna(2:8),Pergamos(2:12),Thyatira(2:18), Sardis(3:1), Philadelphia(3:7),and the Laodiceans(3:14). The deeds of the Nicolaitans are also mentioned. If you look at the map section of the Bible (Paul's travels) all of these cities are on the Aegean Sea (mostly the eastern side). These had been under Greek control for many years thus religiously influenced by the stories, rituals, etc of Greek Mythology. Any brief study of mythology of course includes awful stuff--think Oedipus, Antigone, etc. So here is the connection. In Rev (2:12) it says: ...to the angel (church leader) of the church in Pergamos (which is the city of Pergamum)...I know thy works, and where thou dwellest, even where Satan's seat (the Altar of Zeus) is: and thou holdest fast my name, and hast not denied my faith..." Then he goes on to tell them things they need to repent of and how they can be blessed. It was so interesting to me that even though these things sound so mysterious to us, they were familiar and meaningful to the people at that time. John (John writing, the Lord speaking) knew how difficult it must be for that little group of church members in Pergamum and the evils they faced within their community. He was advising them and giving them special help for their situation. Just like our church leaders now. The advice was the same: listen to the Holy Ghost, be morally clean, be faithful, avoid evil influences, and keep the commandments.

Look back and call it good

I heard today that Flying J filed for chapter 11. (What a mean thing to do so close to Christmas!) I felt a whoosh of gratitude pass through me (that Bruce no longer worked there). In September when they let Bruce go I felt over and over again that we were going to look back and feel like it was a good thing and that they had really done us a favor. It was a worrisome time, the stock market kept falling, the economy looked worse every day. He had 6-8 opportunities that were looking good when the company he is working for made him an offer. It would have been nice at the time to be able to wait a week or so and see if some of the other opportunities came through but we both felt good about it so he accepted. Within a couple of days Bruce found that because of the economy most of the other companies that were hiring had retracted the opening. We were so grateful that he had accepted the initial offer. Again today I feel so thankful to be able to look back and see the promise of "all things shall work together for your good" fulfilled in our lives.

Gratitude on Black Friday

Katrina, Krysta and I went out shopping at 4:30am to hit the day after Thanksgiving sales. Katrina thinks it is a tradition and really enjoys it. We made a plan the night before and decided where to go and what to look for. We don't have a high tolerence for long lines or standing in the cold or crowds of people. We also have the rule that we can't care if we get what we want, we're just going for fun. We got to Walmart at about 5:20. We laughed at the men with big grins on their faces loading their big screen TV's into their cars. We got inside and all the checkstands were open and lines from each one stretched back into the middle of the store. We were interested in two things, both electronics. A clerk in that department told us that the first one was gone and for the second thing we would need to get in a line that started at layaway and stretched almost back to the tire store. As we were learning this we became separated from Katrina. I looked around and then my phone rang, it was her. When we joined back up she showed us what she had found. She had both of the electronics on our wish list. She said that as the clerk was telling someone else that all of the one product was gone, she looked on the shelf in front of her and saw one. As she picked it up there was the second thing randomly sitting there also. It was amazing, it felt like gift, and I think it was. Later in the day I was saddened to hear of the shoppers in a very similar situation, where in a Walmart in NewYork the crowds were so pushy they bent doorframes, injured multiple people, and killed a man. What a sad thing that they cared more about a "deal" than the people around them. That they would feel like the only way to get ahead was to push and shove and look out for number one. What a comfort to know that we are not alone, the Lord is on our side. He blesses us in abundance with the things we need most and He also blesses us with occasional random gifts as he shows His love for us.

A little bit of this..explained

Someone asked me what my blog name was all about. As I brainstormed I had the idea of using something from a musical. My first thought was, (from the musical Annie) Little Girls. Here are some of the lyrics:

Little girls Little girls
Everywhere I turn I can see them
Little girls Little girls
Night and day I eat, sleep and breathe them...
Some women are dripping with diamonds
Some women are dripping with pearls
Lucky me! Lucky me! Look at what I'm dripping with Little girls!...

On second thought maybe some of that isn't too bad, hum..
Actually I felt it described my life of a few years ago better so I opted to use a line from the song "Anatevka ", from Fiddler on the Roof. I love musicals and this is a favorite. The obvious tie-in is "I have 5 daughters!!". I also love that religion is second nature to Tevya's. I love his relationship with God and how he views Him as a friend and discusses things with Him regularly. I love his tenderness about his daughters and his great desire for their happiness even when it causes him discomfort when it isn't following tradition.
So much of my life is about facilitating my daughter's lives. They bring a huge amount of joy to me. My religion is also a big part of who I am and like Tevya, through the ups and downs of life I need a spiritual connection.
I also don't know exactly what my blog will evolve in to. So for now I like the randomness of... a little bit of this, a little bit of that.