Thoughts I want to remember

I read a lot.  There's no way to possibly remember everything I read. But when I read a good book I try to write a review on Goodreads to help me remember what I liked or what I learned.  And ocassionally when I read something good elsewhere I try to document it somehow.  Here's a couple of thoughts I've really liked lately:

In a podcast with Robert Millet about the Holy Ghost, Brother Millet shared this: 

"Well, I think what I what I tried to do with the book was to have people come away when they laid it down, after reading it, saying, "Wow, I had no idea He was this involved." I came away with this impression.   You have your work cut out for your finding any facet of the Christian life, in which the Holy Ghost is not inextricably linked. Name one for me. I can't think of anything we do in the church that the Spirit isn't a part of, you know? I mentioned in the book, suppose we had full church organization, apostolic authority, 75,000 missionaries, and books of scripture. But there was no gift of the Holy Ghost, then what? None of that would matter very much. What good does it do to have the keys of the priesthood, the sealing power, if in fact, there's no Holy Spirit of promise to seal that marriage? And so I came away with the realization that the Spirit has a monumental role in the plan of salvation. The Prophet Joseph Smith said everlasting covenant was entered into by three personages before the foundations of the world and it pertains to their dispensation of things on the earth. They are God, the first the Creator God, the second Redeemer, God the third the witness or testator, and what I became aware of is how intimately connected all three are in the work of salvation. We often think of God and obviously we think of Christ as the key to salvation. But try getting saved without the Holy Ghost. In other words, the overwhelming thing when I had finished the book was "My gosh, He's involved in everything." And consequently, one of my dear friends, Joseph McConkie, at a time when he and his wife were called to preside over a mission in Scotland. They were going to leave and we were good friends. And so my wife Shauna and I went to dinner with him one night, and Joseph and I were chatting. And I said, Well, have you been through all the material you were sent? No, listen to all the tapes you're supposed to listen to. He said, "Yeah, I have," he said but "You know, I've been trying to distill, somehow distill it all into a neater package, so that we take that white missionary handbook and we say, yeah, that's the Book of rules, but can we distill it?" And here's what he came up with and he said it almost became a mission motto and it was this, "I would never do anything that would cost me the influence of the Spirit of the Lord." Can you imagine what the Latter-day Saints would be like in terms of spiritual power if that were our motto, and our way of life? I would never do anything that would cost me the influence of the Spirit. That's the other thing. I came away from the book saying, "I don't want to do anything to lose this. It's too precious."

I especially love that ending...I don't want to do anything to lose the Holy Ghost. It is too precious.

I also really love in these "All In" podcasts from LDS Living, they always end by asking the person what it means to them to live "all in."  I love Brother Millet's answer:

"You know, to me, it means I'm in for the long haul. Sadly, and unfortunately, I've met too many people in the last five to seven years who've left the church. They didn't like this or they didn't like that, or this bothers me or this bothers me. I had never appreciated what the phrase meant when Heber C. Kimball years ago said, be careful because there will come a time, a day of sifting. I didn't know what sifting was, I was a city boy. I didn't know what you did with grain to sift it. But I know now because I've watched people, dear, dear friends and loved ones be sifted. And so for me, John Taylor and Brigham Young had a phrase they would say "It's the kingdom of God or nothing." And I've even said in comical moments, you know, what, if Jeffrey Holland and Dallin Oaks and Henry Eyring and Russell Ballard are going to go down, I'm going down with them because they're not bad people to hang out with. Okay? And in other words, my wife and I, we have one greatest desire, it's to live and die firm in the faith. And if I were ever asked by a leader of the Church or the Lord, where do you stand? I want to be able to say, I've been loyal to church leadership. And I've tried to be loyal to the Lord. I don't think you can do that if you're only two thirds of the way there. And all in for me means you buy the whole package. You buy the whole package, and that comes...the Church with its members and their flaws. As Elder Holland put it beautifully God working with people who are flawed, "It must be terribly discouraging for him," he said, "but he deals with it. And so much we," and so with me it's the kingdom of God or nothing. It means I don't have anything that I'm not willing to do to build up the kingdom of God if I'm called on to do it, that's what it means to me. ...When I wrote the book, "Whatever Happened to Faith?" One of the thoughts that bore down on me was this. I began thinking about the singing of hymns. And there are certain hymns I just have trouble getting through, okay, they just moved me too deeply. They just get to me. One of them, interestingly enough, is "Firm As The Mountains Around Us." Every time I sing that and I come to the words of the chorus, "And we hear the desert singing, Carry on, carry on." In my case, I don't see the desert. I see my grandfather who joined the Church in the 1930s saying to me, "Robert, carry on." I see my dad who gave everything for the Church saying, "You Carry on, carry on." I don't want to face them hereafter, and have slipped up somewhere in a serious way. So it's the kingdom or nothing."

Emily Freeman shared this on Facebook/Instagram: 

"I BELIEVE GOD.  It was several years ago and I was talking on the phone with a good friend. I am religious by nature. He is taking a break from religion. Our conversations are generally filled with the passion that comes from sitting on those two sides of the fence. 

On this particular day he had asked me why I do all the things I do. My answer was simple, “because Jesus.”

“Your life isn’t easier,” he told me. It’s true. Our life hasn’t been easy. 

“Believing is a dangerous way to live.” He said. 

Maybe.
But God has promised peace in times of trouble. Grace when I need strength. Healing when life hurts. Comfort through loneliness. Hope when hope is gone. Light in my wilderness places. A haven in my storms. Refuge and respite and relief. He promised to be there no matter what life brings. 

I believe God. 

And that belief has carried me through every day of this mortal experience, and just like Paul, I plan to cling to it until the day I leave. 

“Wherefore, sirs, be of good cheer: for I believe God, that it shall be even as it was told me.” Acts 27:25

I, too, believe God. I believe His promises are sure because I have seen many fulfilled in my life and I have faith and hope that I will see others fulfilled in the future. It is worth any sacrifice, any effort, any challenge on our part to follow Him.

At girls camp at the end of July, and in testimony meeting on August 4, I shared a few words of Paul. "I have all, and abound. I am full..." (Philippians 4:18). Paul had so many trials and so many hard things happen...yet he found cause to rejoice even in the midst of hard. I've seen in my life that there is lots of hard. But there are also glorious vistas, moments of breathtaking joy, echoes of truth that we learned long ago swelling in our hearts and moments when through tears we can exclaim, "I have all and abound. I am full" because we believe God. Because we know Christ lives. Because we have seen the joy and peace that envelop us even in the midst of hard when we do our best to follow Him.

In a children's book I read on August 13 (You Are Never Alone by Elin Kelsey), the author's note mentioned being "within the blast radius of love." I love that description!

A blast radius is the distance from the source that will be affected by an explosion.

So a blast radius of love...in my mind, at least...would be how far a ripple of kindness or love can travel. How far we can make our love felt.

A friend was telling me about that week's (August 13) episode of Don't Miss This before I watched it.  I ended up loving the ending where Emily Freeman and David Butler talk about how in Romans 16 Paul lists all these people he loves and what he admires about them. I think our blast radius of love is probably bigger than we think. President Kimball said our influence "can be tenfold what it would be in more tranquil times." In the video, David Butler and Emily Freeman encourage each of us to find a way to let people know that they have influenced your life. Send a text or a note or tell them in person. Send out ripples of love and extend your blast radius of love.  I actually started an additional Instagram page that is my attempt to document all of the people that have influenced my life for good.  It's called eachlifethattouchesours and I write about people that I love and the Christlike attributes they possess or the way that they have blessed my life.  Then I send each person a note letting them know that they have blessed my life.  I just started it about a month ago so I only have written about 10 or so people...but I have so many more planned...just limited time in which to accomplish it.  But it makes my heart so full to realize how many people I have been blessed to have in my life!

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In a different "All In" podcast, I loved these thoughts from a woman/writer named Melissa Inouye:

"Love is the power that allows us to be useful to others."

"MI: That's right, because everyone has the beliefs that they do, and wants to act on those beliefs out of this desire to follow Christ. And I think if we recognize the goodwill, within our fellowship and the covenants we've actually made to each other at baptism, then then that can get us pretty far.

MJ: Yeah, I love how you said the covenants that we made to each other.

MI: Yeah. If you look at Messiah where Alma's talking at the waters of Mormon. He says, if you're willing, you know, to be baptized, this is what it entails. It entails taking on the name of Christ and it entails, this covenant entails bearing each other's burdens, mourning with those that mourn. So there's a kind of vertical aspect in which we covenant to God. And there's also a horizontal aspect in which we covenant to each other. "

"MJ: I love another thing...I'm sorry to pull so many quotes from the book, but there were so many things. I was like, I want to talk to her about these. I love how you say "The miracle of Zion's one heart and one mind was not that all members of the community had been born identical, but that they had chosen to love and serve each other despite, or perhaps because of, their diversity." What can we do, Melissa, do you think on an individual level to create that kind of unity in the Church?

MI: I think one thing we can do is try to actively seek out people who are struggling for various reasons. It's obvious to see people who have kind of, you know, physical difficulties, who've you know have been in a car accident, people who need to move house, people who have just had a baby, who need meals, these kinds of things we're really good at noticing. I think we could be a little better at noticing where people are feeling spiritually fragile or feeling fragile in their faith, or feeling like they don't belong. We could do more to reach out to people and make it clear that we're there to support them, even if that support may be a bit...may stretch us or make us feel a bit uncomfortable. It's, you know, it's a lot of work to help someone move. I've participated in many Latter-day Saint moves, and it's, you know, you're like schlepping their massive bed and their flat screen TV, and their super heavy, you know, chest of drawers like, why is this wood so heavy, this is a really heavy chest of drawers. But like that is that's a no brainer for us. Right? It's really easy.

MJ: We show up.

MI: Right. But we can also show up in those other ways. And in the book, I have an essay called conversations are like casseroles. You know, it's like a no brainer again, just like throw together a casserole and then send that off to someone. But often it takes much less time to try to engage with someone on a slightly uncomfortable topic. But we should do that too. That's also a form of work and we shouldn't shirk, as the hymn says."