Insanity

Can you tell my heart has not been in this lately? It has been a really difficult month with the cancer thing. Honey is still home from work and probably will be for at least 2 more weeks. Who knew a little mole could cause such havoc? They removed all the cancer and the lymph nodes they removed were clean. So big deal huh? the incision on the arm is horrid, got infected, and is healing with big holes in it. Not going to be pretty! The armpit incision is pretty nasty but healing nicely. So it's been pretty hard to concentrate and focus. One of these days I will attempt to write some more. In the meantime, if you are new to this blog please do me a huge favor and read from the beginning post!
My best to you all.

The Weight of Glory

"It may be possible for each to think too much of his own potential glory hereafter; it is hardly possible for him to think too often or too

deeply about that of his neighbour. The load, or weight, or burden of my neighbour’s glory should be laid daily on my back, a load so heavy that only humility can carry it, and the backs of the

proud will be broken. It is a serious thing to live in a society of possible gods and goddesses, to remember that the dullest

and most uninteresting person you talk to may one day be a creature which, if you saw it now, you would be strongly tempted

to worship, or else a horror and a corruption such as you now meet, if at all, only in a nightmare. All day long we are, in some degree, helping each other to one or other of these destinations. It is in the

light of these overwhelming possibilities, it is with the awe and the circumspection proper to them, that we should conduct all

our dealings with one another, all friendships, all loves, all play, all politics.

There are no ordinary people. You have never talked to a mere mortal. Nations, cultures, arts, civilization—these are mortal, and their life is to ours as the life of a gnat. But it is immortals whom we joke with, work with, marry, snub, and exploit—immortal horrors or everlasting splendours. This does not mean that we are to be perpetually solemn. We must play. But our merriment must be of that kind (and it is, in fact, the merriest kind) which exists between people who have, from the outset, taken each other seriously—no flippancy, no superiority, no presumption. And our charity must be a

real and costly love, with deep feeling for the sins in spite of which we love the sinner—no mere tolerance or indulgence which parodies love as flippancy parodies merriment. Next to the Blessed sacrament itself, your neighbour is the holiest object presented to your senses. If he is your Christian neighbour he is holy in almost

the same way, for in him also Christ vere latitat—the glorifier and the glorified, Glory Himself, is truly hidden." C. S. Lewis The Weight of Glory

He is looking at us

A grieving young father and his two children sit before a television set in their home after a makeshift dinner. The children have been staying with Grandmother while their mother has slowly slipped away in a lingering illness; now they and their father are home again after her funeral. The little girl drops off to sleep and is carried to her bed. The little boy fights off sleepiness until he finally asks his father if tonight, just tonight, he can sleep with him in his bed. As the two lie silently in the dark the lad speaks: “Daddy are you looking at me?’ “Yes, son,” the father replies, “I am looking at you.”

The boy sighs and, exhausted, sleeps. The father waits a time and then, weeping, cries out in the dark, in anxious anguish: “God, are you looking at me? If you are, maybe I can make it. Without you, I know I can’t.”
 

Our Heavenly Father is looking at us. He loves us and he wants us to choose the path that leads us to happiness here and eternal life hereafter.

Tender Mercies

So we went to visit the oncologist. The dermatologist told us it was only .35 mm deep and that that was good. We have been blissfully ignorant and not really worried even joking about him having cancer. Until Tuesday. As they began to tell us all the gory details I began to feel sick and had to fight back the tears...after all I am the support team (scary huh!). I can't believe all they will be doing. Monday he will go in and be injected with dye so they can find the Sentinel lymph nodes in his left arm. Once found they will be removed. The next day he goes in for the surgery on the melanoma which is done under general anesthesia. they make about an 8" incision in a football shape and remove all tissue within 1.5 cm of the tumor. They continue removing tissue until they have that margin covered then they close it up. On Wednesday we go back to find out the diagnosis. To top it off it turns out the biopsy did not get to the actual depth so we don't know how deep it is. Right now they are classifying it as a stage 1B. If all is well after Wednesday he will go back every 4 months for a year to have his entire body checked. Once you have one melanoma the chances of having another increases dramatically. After that year he will be rechecked every 6 months for 5 years. We won't even address what happens if the results show cancer in the lymph nodes!
It is very surreal to sit there and listen to the whole cancer thing. I have to say it was very traumatic for both of us. The poor guy had no idea any surgery would be involved let alone the extent of it. He was overwhelmed. He kept telling me how sorry he is that I have to go through this and thanking me for being there for him!

He was on a trip to Philly this week for just a few hours. He left the day after our traumatic office visit and he forgot his cell phone. It was difficult not to be able to talk. In addition I was hoping he could get with our son and get a blessing while he was there. I wasn't sure how he would feel about that. He borrowed a cell and called me. I told him my thought about him getting a blessing and he seemed open to it. He gave me his hotel phone number and I called my son and gave it to him.
He returned home the next day and I inquired as to whether or not he was able to connect with our son. He said they had connected and our son met him for dinner. When I asked if he got a blessing his demeanor and tone change ....almost reverential as he said that he had given him a very touching blessing. I was grateful to Heavenly Father not only that he would get a blessing but that it would be meaningful to him.

"Withhold not thou thy tender mercies from me, O Lord: let thy lovingkindness and thy truth continually preserve me." Psalm 40:11

Greater Love Hath No Man...

I know! I have been a slacker and I apologize.
Last week I attended my brother's ward where his youngest son spoke prior to leaving for a mission. During the sacrament hymn I had a moment. We were singing Oh God the Eternal Father. In the third verse it states "When Jesus, the anointed, descended from above and gave himself a ransom to win our souls with love--..." I was touched by His incredible love not just for His father but also for us--for me. Then it occurred to me that this is what I have learned (and certainly talked about in the blog at times) in our relationships especially the difficult ones. We win them over with love. Withholding love, inflicting pain, punishing, nagging which may seem at times to be the way we need to react do not win souls. Souls are won with love. The only way we can love those who hurt us, is if we love our Father and Savior and let their love fill the void left by the hurt. We can't do this with an ulterior motive. Our only motive can be to be an instrument in our Father's hand to lift and bless another. People are drawn to those who extend our Father's love for that is what we all miss and are searching for.

Who among us has not felt the great comforting love through the holy ghost of our Father and our Savior when our hearts have been broken, our minds confused, our lives overwhelmed, and our path unclear? How grateful I am for a wise Father who knew how much we would miss him and his love and so provided the way for us to access him even in that absence.

There are many touching evidences in the scriptures of our Father’s love. None touch me more than that found in Moses 7. Enoch has seen Satan with a great chain enslaving the children of god. As they succumb to his temptations he looks up and laughs. Then Enoch testifies that the God of heaven looked upon his children, and he wept; Enoch wonders how this can be seeing that there are numberless creations of God and touchingly states “and yet thou art there.”

Imagine this God who weeps for our sorrows who is involved in the details of our lives. This is not the passionless, incomprehensible God of the Nicene Creed. This is not the all-in-one god much of the world believes in. This is our father who loves us intimately and infinitely. Who is revealed to us through the Holy Ghost. To whom we are led by our Saviors example, sacrifice, and unending love.

I love this by Elder Nelson:

"I would like to share a remarkable quotation I found in a rare book in London one day while searching through the library of the British Museum. It was published as a 20th-century English translation of an ancient Egyptian text. It was written by Timothy, Archbishop of Alexandria, who died in a.d. 385. This record refers to the creation of Adam; premortal Jesus is speaking of His Father:
“He … made Adam according to Our image and likeness, and He left him lying for forty days and forty nights without putting breath into him. And He heaved sighs over him daily, saying, ‘If I put breath into this [man], he must suffer many pains.’ And I said unto My father, ‘Put breath into him; I will be an advocate for him.’ And My Father said unto Me, ‘If I put breath into him, My beloved Son, Thou wilt be obliged to go down into the world, and to suffer many pains for him before Thou shalt have redeemed him, and made him to come back to his primal state.’ And I said unto My Father, ‘Put breath into him; I will be his advocate, and I will go down into the world, and will fulfil Thy command’ ”

Truly what greater love?

“Miracle of miracles and wonder of wonders," said President Hinckley. "They are interested in us, and we are the substance of Their great concern. They are available to each of us"

D&C 76: 22 And now, after the many testimonies which have been given of him, this is the testimony, last of all, which we give of him: That he lives!

23 For we saw him, even on the right hand of God; and we heard the voice bearing record that he is the Only Begotten of the Father—

24 That by him, and through him, and of him, the worlds are and were created, and the inhabitants thereof are begotten sons and daughters unto God. 

Message to self: Let Them fill you with Their love!

A Half of Stick of Gum

He has spent so much of his life in the sun. Grew up in a beach city. He surfed and became a life guard. I remember every year he would come home sun burned after his first day of the summer. When we left the beach life he took up running, biking, swimming. Always in the sun. He has had many pre-cancerous melanoma's removed. Last January he had one burned off. He went back a couple of weeks ago to have it looked at again. The doctor took a biopsy this time. Last Friday the doctor tried to get hold of him but had to leave a message. He was on a trip so couldn't return the call. The doctor called again yesterday. "Must be pretty concerned" I thought. When he was finally able to call the doctor today the doctor told him it was melanoma and he had set up an appointment for him to see an oncologist tomorrow. He can't go as he has yet another trip. First available appointment is in two weeks. "Bring your wife with you" they told him.
I have known lots of people with melanoma. One friend had her toe removed because of one. Another had a big chunk of her leg cut out and a bunch of lymph nodes and then it wouldn't heal. I have yet to know of any who had a melanoma metastasize. But just the mere fact that it could....!

Sunday our High Councilor spoke. I had an amazing experience. It had been a really painful week. My husband had said something to me that really hurt and caused me to question what on earth to do with such information. Talking to him is of no use. He simply will not talk about feelings including mine. As usual I just had to deal with my feelings and forgive.
So at church the speaker talked about this scripture:

Alma 56:15-17 15 "And these are the cities which they possessed when I arrived at the city of Judea; and I found Antipus and his men toiling with their might to fortify the city.

16 Yea, and they were depressed in body as well as in spirit, for they had fought valiantly by day and toiled by night to maintain their cities; and thus they had suffered great afflictions of every kind.

17 And now they were determined to conquer in this place or die; therefore you may well suppose that this little force which I brought with me, yea, those sons of mine, gave them great hopes and much joy."

My immediate thought was "I need someone to fortify me...to reach out and strengthen me. I hurt." But even as I thought it another thought replaced it "you know that's not how it works. You are healed as you reach out to others." I know but sometimes you just have to imagine what it would be like.

The speaker then went on to quote from the baptismal covenant in Mosiah 18:

8 "And it came to pass that he said unto them: Behold, here are the waters of Mormon (for thus were they called) and now, as ye are desirous to come into the fold of God, and to be called his people, and are willing to bear one another’s burdens, that they may be light;

9 Yea, and are willing to mourn with those that mourn; yea, and comfort those that stand in need of comfort, and to stand as witnesses of God at all times and in all things, and in all places that ye may be in, even until death, that ye may be redeemed of God, and be numbered with those of the first resurrection, that ye may have eternal life— "

Yes, I thought, that is the covenant I made and that is how I want to be. Sometimes it's just a little harder than other times.

Next he spoke of the new commandment our Savior gave to his disciples found in John. Our Savior knew that what they would miss most when He was gone was His love. That is what we all miss but rarely recognize it.

John 13:33 Little children, yet a little while I am with you. Ye shall seek me: and as I said unto the Jews, Whither I go, ye cannot come; so now I say to you.

34 A new commandment I give unto you, That ye love one another; as I have loved you, that ye also love one another.

35 By this shall all men know that ye are my disciples, if ye have love one to another.

We feel His love for us as we share His love with His children.

He went on to quote from Matthew which I have quoted here before:

Matthew 11:28 “Come unto me, all ye that labour and are heavy laden, and I will give you ^crest.

29 Take my yoke upon you, and learn of me; for I am meek and lowly in heart: and ye shall find rest unto your souls.

30 For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light.”

Ah...there's the key. We can be comforted and find strength to be healed even in the midst of great adversity if we "come unto" Him. And as Neal Maxwell taught "Empathy during agony is a portion of divinity."

As I was contemplating all of this a little boy, about 2 years old, left his family on the other side of the chapel from where I was sitting and came over to me. He handed me a half stick of gum and walked back to his family. I sat and marveled. A minute later he walked back over and shyly stood at the end of the bench where I was sitting. I motioned to him several times to come over but he continued to stand there. Finally he walked to me and whispered "do you need more gum?" "No" I said. " I am fine. But thank you!" and he walked away.

The speaker ended his talk with a quote from Elder Holland's conference talk of October 2008. I love this:

“My beloved brothers and sisters, I testify of angels, both the heavenly and the mortal kind. In doing so I am testifying that God never leaves us alone, never leaves us unaided in the challenges that we face. “[N]or will he, so long as time shall last, or the earth shall stand, or there shall be one man [or woman or child] upon the face thereof to be saved.” On occasions, global or personal, we may feel we are distanced from God, shut out from heaven, lost, alone in dark and dreary places. Often enough that distress can be of our own making, but even then the Father of us all is watching and assisting. And always there are those angels who come and go all around us, seen and unseen, known and unknown, mortal and immortal.
“May we all believe more readily in, and have more gratitude for, the Lord’s promise as contained in one of President Monson’s favorite scriptures: “I will go before your face. I will be on your right hand and on your left, . . . my Spirit shall be in your [heart], and mine angels round about you, to bear you up.” In the process of praying for those angels to attend us, may we all try to be a little more angelic ourselves—with a kind word, a strong arm, a declaration of faith and “the covenant wherewith [we] have covenanted.” Perhaps then we can be emissaries sent from God when someone… is crying,.. .” 


Now it's true that our mission is to know the Savior so well that we can reach out to His children in love and compassion like Him...for Him but He loves us and will send angels to strengthen us when we really need them. They may come in the form of a loved one calling to chat, a co-worker telling us we are doing a great job, a friend who waves as they drive by our house, a speaker in sacrament meeting who listens to the spirit and speaks to our heart. Or they may come as a little child offering a half stick of gum.

Experience the total effect.

If you are new to this blog really don't start here. To understand what it is all about you must go to the beginning and read a few entries. If it's not what you are looking for then go ahead and move on. But it just might be for you! So give it a try before clicking off.
Thanks a whole bunch.

Happy Mother's Day!

Being a mom is hard, is wonderful, is frightening, is awesome. I love my kids and miss them so much. Did I mention they live FAR away? He is out of town so I am alone today. But never really alone. He left me a nice card and called me from poolside in Phoenix. I'm OK though there are days I absolutely get so frustrated. I am frustrated that he can't see the truth--doesn't want to know the truth. I am frustrated that I am home alone most of the time when I could be enjoying my children and grandchildren. I am frustrated with my inability to function at a higher level. BUT gratefully these moments of deep discouragement are fleeting. I know I can have joy in the midst of the most difficult trial and these are not that difficult in the big scheme of things. After all, that's what this blog has been all about. Finding joy in the journey.
I felt a moment of that joy today. Actually twice...OK probably more than that as I think about it. But let me share two. At the end of our Sacrament meeting our Bishop spoke about a Primary teacher he remembered. She was definitely flawed in many ways but he remembers how much she loved him. He wasn't the best behaved boy in class (hard to imagine since he is so calm) but still she loved him. He said something at the end of relating this story that pierced my soul as if it had been said to me as a message from my Heavenly Father. He said "She loved us with all our imperfections...and we loved her with all of hers." I could hear Father saying to me "I love you! Yes, even with all your imperfections." It felt good. And it reminded me that He loves even those in my life who I allow to cause me grief. And with His help I can love them too. I know my husband drinks coffee and beer, but I like to live in denial that he does. Today he mentioned it and it was frustrating to be reminded. But I had that moment that Stephen Covey talks about between stimulus and response we have a space in which we can choose. I chose to not make it into an exchange that would end badly. He knows how I feel about it. I don't need to harp. I chose to love him.
The second experience came as I was listening to Music and the Spoken Word. The Tabernacle Choir was singing God So Loved the World. It was beautiful and as I sat alone I felt myself reaching for my Savior...almost literally but really only figuratively---and I felt (figuratively but almost felt literal) Him reaching toward me touching my arm. How grateful I was in that moment to be reminded yet again that He loves me and wants to bless me.
He loves you! And in His strength we can bless the people in our lives.

1 John 4: 9-11 In this was manifested the love of God toward us, because that God sent his only begotten Son into the world, that we might live through him.

Herein is love, not that we loved God, but that he loved us, and sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins.

Beloved, if God so loved us, we ought also to love one another.

Eternal Marriage

“In an eternal marriage, the thought of ending what began with a covenant between God and each other simply has little place. When challenges come and our individual weaknesses are revealed, the remedy is to repent, improve, and apologize, not to separate or divorce. When we make covenants with the Lord and our eternal companion, we should do everything in our power to honor the terms” (Marlin K. Jensen, Ensign, October 1994).

"My dear brothers and sisters, there will be days and nights when you feel overwhelmed, when your hearts are heavy and your heads hang down. Then, please remember, Jesus Christ, the Redeemer, is the Head of this Church. It is His gospel. He wants you to succeed. He gave His life for just this purpose. He is the Son of the living God. He has promised:
“Come unto me, all ye that labour and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest” (Matthew 11:28).
“For the mountains shall depart and the hills be removed, but my kindness shall not depart from thee” (3 Nephi 22:10). Elder Uchtdorf

You're probably wondering what happened last week. Nothing to report. The man is just plain happy in his current status! No divine discontent there! And I did have that moment of let down. but I am fine. Back on track and holding fast to hope. He was in town today and we did go to church together.
I have quoted from Stephen R. Covey before. His book "The Divine Center" was extremely helpful to me during those dark, difficult days and still is.
"...anytime we are too vulnerable we feel the need to protect ourselves from further wounds. Often the best defense is a good offense, and sometimes this manifests itself in cynicism, the defense of the mind, for when we expect nothing we will never be disappointed. So the attack frequently manifests itself in sarcasm, in cutting humor, in sharpness of tongue, in critcalness, and in anything that will keep from exposing the soft, vulnerable, tenderness within. Each partner then will tend to wait upon the initiative of the other for love, only again to be disappointed but also be confirmed as to the rightness of his or her own past accusations...
"I remember speaking at an Education Week in Phoenix when a lady came up to talk to me about the speech I had given the previous year at an Education Week in California on the subject of being a light and not a judge. she related to me her story of the intervening year.
She began by identifying how depressed she had been the year previous because of the lack of valiance in her husband's life-style. He had never caught fire in the gospel or the Church and was just barely getting along. She however had been illuminated with the gospel light and wanted the full blessings of the Lord on her entire family. She had tried every method she had heard of in an effort to influence her husband, all without success; and she had eventually succumbed to depression and cynicism.
"Hearing my previous presentation, she was temporarily stimulated by the idea that her calling was to be a light, not a judge---in other words, a constant producer of good attitudes and behavior. (After all, where in all the scriptures are we commanded to confess another's sins?) She decided to try it. She did so, and for several weeks she had a very difficult time in maintaining this new course.
As an example, she recounted that one time when she was preparing to go to church with the children, none of whom was very enthusiastic to go, she asked her husband in the middle of the TV program if he would join her in going to church and would help her with the children. He said he didn't want to go, that he wanted to finish watching his television program, and added, 'you should let the kids stay and watch it and not force them to go to church." She swallowed hard and remembered she was striving to be a light, not a judge; a model, not a critic. Normally she would snip at him at the end of the encounter by saying something like, 'well, if these kids don't turn out right, you know whose fault it is'---then she would immediately leave, giving him no opportunity for a rejoinder. She always tried to get in the last word and couch it in the language of the scriptures. It was her way of getting some kind of justice.
This time, however, she said nothing as she left, but merely took the children along with her and drove to church. While driving, she condemned herself for not performing her traditional judgment act on her husband for his lack of valiance, and the withdrawal pains she experienced were severe. She was breaking a deeply impacted habit that was addicting to her---the habit of getting back, of justifying, of having the last word, of putting down. She persisted with this changed behavior, even though she experienced great internal emotional turmoil for several weeks. At one point she was about to abandon the entire project, but fortunately she counseled with her bishop. He encouraged her to keep it up, and she did.
"At the Arizona Education Week she now pointed out her husband, who was across the hall, and said, 'There's my husband. he is not a member of the bishopric.' I asked her if she would mind if I talked with her husband regarding what had happened. She felt good about it and so did he, and he described the process.
"He said he had felt completely justified in his relative lack of commitment to the gospel, because apparently there were no real, powerful fruits of it in her life. She wasn't really changed because of the gospel and the Church. Further, she would punish him from time to time in various ways, and that made him feel justified in his minor rebellions. She paid him off, and this gave him the 'right' to do it some more. He even sensed her new method---be a light, not a judge--- and her striving not to answer back or fight or yell or criticize. But he knew what she was really thinking and feeling inside, and to some degree he enjoyed her being punished, as she had been punishing him for such a long time.
"At this point in his account he said something that struck me forcibly. 'But she persisted until this new behavior became a habit to her, and I began to sense that she was changing inside also; she wasn't punishing me or manipulating me any longer, and she derived no more satisfaction from the encounters.' He added, 'She became an angel, Brother Covey, and how do you live with an angel?'
"Well, eventually you can't live with an angel unless you change to a like condition. You eventually shape up or ship out. Whatever good there is in one person is appealed to by the angelic nature of the other. Most people have a great deal of good within them, and if only others would perceive it and treat them accordingly, this would tend to bring it out. There is no guarantee of this, however, for it will take great time and patience, ...
"It takes two to fight, and if one partner does not fight back, soon the other's angry surliness spends itself.
"The Lord is not only our advocate with the Father; He is our advocate with all of our Father's other children..." (The Divine Center pg. 24-28)

The scriptures bear this out (note--this is in no way meant to imply that anyone should allow themselves to be abused!):

Alma 24:20 And it came to pass that their brethren, the Lamanites, made preparations for war, and came up to the land of Nephi for the purpose of destroying the king, and to place another in his stead, and also of destroying the people of Anti-Nephi-Lehi out of the land.

21 Now when the people saw that they were coming against them they went out to meet them, and prostrated themselves before them to the earth, and began to call on the name of the Lord; and thus they were in this attitude when the Lamanites began to fall upon them, and began to slay them with the sword.

22 And thus without meeting any resistance, they did slay a thousand and five of them; and we know that they are blessed, for they have gone to dwell with their God.

23 Now when the Lamanites saw that their brethren would not flee from the sword, neither would they turn aside to the right hand or to the left, but that they would lie down and perish, and praised God even in the very act of perishing under the sword—

24 Now when the Lamanites saw this they did forbear from slaying them; and there were many whose hearts had swollen in them for those of their brethren who had fallen under the sword, for they repented of the things which they had done.

25 And it came to pass that they threw down their weapons of war, and they would not take them again, for they were stung for the murders which they had committed; and they came down even as their brethren, relying upon the mercies of those whose arms were lifted to slay them.

26 And it came to pass that the people of God were joined that day by more than the number who had been slain; and those who had been slain were righteous people, therefore we have no reason to doubt but what they were saved.

27 And there was not a wicked man slain among them; but there were more than a thousand brought to the knowledge of the truth; thus we see that the Lord worketh in many ways to the salvation of his people.

How grateful I am for hope. So grateful for my Savior's incredible love and strength. This is a long, arduous road but He makes it light and worthwhile. I love Him. And I love that He wants me to love my husband and helps me when it's hard. After all, that poor man loves me too! Bless his heart :)