|
The Gods of the Copybook Headings |
| AS I PASS through my incarnations in every age and race,
I make my proper prostrations to the Gods of the Market Place. Peering through reverent fingers I watch them flourish and fall, And the Gods of the Copybook Headings, I notice, outlast them all. We were living in trees when they met us. They showed us each in turn That Water would certainly wet us, as Fire would certainly burn: But we found them lacking in Uplift, Vision and Breadth of Mind, So we left them to teach the Gorillas while we followed the March of Mankind. We moved as the Spirit listed. They never altered their pace, Being neither cloud nor wind-borne like the Gods of the Market Place, But they always caught up with our progress, and presently word would come That a tribe had been wiped off its icefield, or the lights had gone out in Rome. With the Hopes that our World is built on they were utterly out of touch, They denied that the Moon was Stilton; they denied she was even Dutch; They denied that Wishes were Horses; they denied that a Pig had Wings; So we worshipped the Gods of the Market Who promised these beautiful things. When the Cambrian measures were forming, They promised perpetual peace. They swore, if we gave them our weapons, that the wars of the tribes would cease. But when we disarmed They sold us and delivered us bound to our foe, And the Gods of the Copybook Headings said: "Stick to the Devil you know." On the first Feminian Sandstones we were promised the Fuller Life (Which started by loving our neighbour and ended by loving his wife) Till our women had no more children and the men lost reason and faith, And the Gods of the Copybook Headings said: "The Wages of Sin is Death." In the Carboniferous Epoch we were promised abundance for all, By robbing selected Peter to pay for collective Paul; But, though we had plenty of money, there was nothing our money could buy, And the Gods of the Copybook Headings said: "If you don't work you die." Then the Gods of the Market tumbled, and their smooth-tongued wizards withdrew And the hearts of the meanest were humbled and began to believe it was true That All is not Gold that Glitters, and Two and Two make Four And the Gods of the Copybook Headings limped up to explain it once more. As it will be in the future, it was at the birth of Man There are only four things certain since Social Progress began. That the Dog returns to his Vomit and the Sow returns to her Mire, And the burnt Fool's bandaged finger goes wabbling back to the Fire; And that after this is accomplished, and the brave new world begins When all men are paid for existing and no man must pay for his sins, As surely as Water will wet us, as surely as Fire will burn, The Gods of the Copybook Headings with terror and slaughter return! (Bolded words and italics added for emphasis). The idea is held by most of the world that the human race has continually progressed in civility and technology since it first made it's appearance on the earth. But any serious student of history will see that mankind's movements are cyclic occurrences and do not progress continually upward. This poem does well to illustrate mankind's tendency to repeat the mistakes that proved the down fall of the generation before. May we be more wise and learn from the Gods of the Copybook Headings. |
Thursday, August 25, 2011
Great Truths From a Poet
Of recent date I have become very fond of reading poetry. Many years ago I purchased a book called "101 Famous Poems" compiled by Roy J. Cook and have just recently resurrected if from my modest library. I have found many of the principled poets are quite prophetic. This one written by Rudyard Kipling had a particular unique effect on me. It is called, "The Gods of the Copybook Headings." (It may be helpful to the reader to know that a copybook was used in grade schools before textbooks. They contained moral sayings and principles that the children would have to copy down in the space provided in the book).
Thursday, May 7, 2009
Saturday, May 2, 2009
Wednesday, April 22, 2009
Mission Addresses
I know this post is not inspirational or anything but I could not think of a better place to put this information. Here are the addresses that I will be able to be contacted at over the next two years as I serve in Armenia:
MTC Address:
Elder A. Ross Garner
Armenia Yerevan Mission
Provo Missionary Training Center
2005 N 900 E
Provo, UT 84604
Armenia Pouch System Address:
Elder A. Ross Garner
Armenia Yerevan Mission POUCH
P.O. Box 30150
Salt Lake City, UT 84130-0150
(Letters sent through the pouch system must be single sheet, folded into three-pannels and taped at the top only, no envelopes, placing the address, return address and stamp on the front of the letter itself. International stamps are not necessary for letters sent through the pouch system.)
Armenia Mission Home Address:
Elder A. Ross Garner
Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints
Vratskan #5
0051 Yerevan, Armenia
(International stamp needed.)
It would be best to send letters through the pouch system.
I am so excited to serve a mission.
Ross (soon to be Elder Garner :o)
MTC Address:
Elder A. Ross Garner
Armenia Yerevan Mission
Provo Missionary Training Center
2005 N 900 E
Provo, UT 84604
Armenia Pouch System Address:
Elder A. Ross Garner
Armenia Yerevan Mission POUCH
P.O. Box 30150
Salt Lake City, UT 84130-0150
(Letters sent through the pouch system must be single sheet, folded into three-pannels and taped at the top only, no envelopes, placing the address, return address and stamp on the front of the letter itself. International stamps are not necessary for letters sent through the pouch system.)
Armenia Mission Home Address:
Elder A. Ross Garner
Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints
Vratskan #5
0051 Yerevan, Armenia
(International stamp needed.)
It would be best to send letters through the pouch system.
I am so excited to serve a mission.
Ross (soon to be Elder Garner :o)
Thursday, April 16, 2009
Of Love
“Master, which is the great commandment in the law? Jesus said unto him, Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind. This is the first and great commandment. And the second is like unto it, Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself. On these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets.” Matthew 22:36-40
The subject matter of the work is love. Love of God, love of neighbor and love of self. I wish to stress the importance of the subject and reiterate what has been stated in the excerpt from Matthew. Love is the great commandment and upon it hangs all the law and the prophets.
Love, as defined by the 1828 Webster’s Dictionary, means “to regard with affection, on account of some qualities which excite pleasing sensations or desire of gratification. It is also described as “an affection of the mind excited by beauty and worth of any kind, or by the qualities of an object which communicate pleasure, sensual or intellectual.”
According to Mr. Webster love is essentially conditional; being extended only to those things which excite pleasing sensations that appeal to our sensual or intellectual passions. Thus it means that I will love you on condition that you gratify my desire for pleasure in some way.
This form of love is not the love we should be striving for as Christians. Christ said in Luke 6:32 that “if ye love them which love you, what thank have ye? for sinners also love those that love them.” This form of love, as stated by Christ, is shallow love. What exceptional goodness is there in man who is nice only to those who are nice to him?
We Christians should be striving for a better love. A love that Paul describes in his teachings to the Corinthians as one that “never faileth.” This love has no pre-conditions, no personal agendas or other limitations. It has no special pre-requisite requirements to worthy of it. This love is completely self-less and unconditional. It is deep and devoted without any sign of hypocrisy. This love is Charity, the pure love of Christ.
The Greatest Commandment
When I was seventeen I decided that I was going to make something of my life. I had grown up in a very active Christian home where I had been taught that God had bigger plans for His children than they could ever imagine and if they would simply turn their lives over to Him, He would do more through them than they could ever do on their own.
I thought on this a lot and I actively sought after the will of God for me through a study of the scriptures and much prayer.
One day when I read the verses in Matthew that were quoted at the beginning of this work I stopped and thought about what I had read. I asked myself what it would mean to me to love God with all my heart and with all my soul and with all my mind. What would I do? How would my actions and behavior change? (What is to follow is the answer I found for myself through further study and contemplation. I realize that it is my answer and so I am not going to assume that it is yours as well. But consider what is to be stated and feel free to take what you like and discard what you will).
“With all thy heart”
When I hear the word heart in this context I think of all the emotional aspects of love. This is rather hard to describe and the best way I think I can portray this is through another personal experience.
During the summer of my eighteenth year I worked as a grounds keeper for a large company along with three other laborers. We developed a very strong friendship over the summer with a sense of unity and comradery that I have never before experienced.
One day as we were working together, not speaking a word, I looked at one of my companions and was suddenly filled with a sense of love for him that I have rarely felt before. Neither he nor I had done or thought or said anything, I simply felt love for him and for my other two companions. That feeling caused me to want to serve them and show them how I loved them. It was an overwhelming, completely consuming feeling that welled up inside me and seriously threatened to pour out through every faculty of my body.
This I believe was the love of God. The energy that came from it was quite astonishing and very powerful. This is what we are asked to give to God. All of our emotional energy God wants devoted to Him.
“With all thy soul”
My personal definition of “soul” is the combination of both body and spirit, thus the commandment becomes loving the Lord with all thy physical and spiritual abilities. I love the Lord with all of my fingers and toes, with all of my skin and my organs, with all of my senses. With all my physical possessions do I love Him with and all of them I would willingly devote to Him.
A good example of loving God with all thy physical ability is given in the film “Chariots of Fire.” In this film we are introduced to a young Irishman by the name of Eric Liddell who is completely devoted to serving his God. His plans were to potentially be a missionary to China, but Eric was also given a pair of legs with which he ran faster than any man he raced.
In 1924 he was given the opportunity to run in the summer Olympics representing the nation of Great Britain. This opportunity he took, but as he got more and more involved in his training his sister, an individual equally devoted to serving her God, became worried that her brother was getting carried away; that his god-given ability to run was running him away from his God.
She expressed her concern to him and in response he said, “I believe God made me for a purpose. For China. But He also made me fast. And when I run, I feel His pleasure. To give it up would be to hold Him in contempt. You were right. It’s not just fun. To win is to honor Him.”
Eric went on to win a gold medal in the Olympics and later fulfilled his call to China to serve as a Christian missionary.
This man loved God. He ran for God. It does not matter what your physical abilities may be, do them for God.
Joseph B. Wirthlin, a great religious and moral leader once said, “Do you love the lord? Spend time with Him.” This quote is at the center of loving God with all of our spiritual ability.
Spend time with God by praying, by reading His words, by fasting, by being in nature and apart of nature, by listening to inspired music, by listening to and being with God. When we spend time, quality time with God, we come to know Him which increases our ability to love Him. For how can a person truly and deeply love somebody he does not know?
“Do you love the Lord? Spend time with Him.”
“With all thy mind”
This, of course, is our intellectual abilities and we are supposed to love God with all of them as well. When in love with someone we usually think about that person a lot. He or she is probably the main subject of our thoughts. We think of them when we are away and we do not want to leave when we are with them. God wants us to give Him that same consideration, but it is also more than this.
The mind is a marvelous, awe inspiring creation. It is one of the things that sets man apart from the common beast. The ability to think and reason to come to great new discoveries has led the human race to the prosperous and advanced state which it now enjoys. And yet the capacity of the brain is still largely untapped. All of this God wants to be given to Him. That does not mean the only thought we should ever have is about God, but that we should essentially think everything for Him.
(It is understood that I have just attempted to separate things that are very interdependent, and so it may be hard identify them separately. My purpose in doing so was simply to illustrate that God wants us to love Him with everything we posses.)
These four areas we have defined basically cover all that man is composed of. He is emotional, physical, spiritual and intellectual and all of it man is suppose to give to God. One might think that to do so may seem faulty, extreme and risky. Why would anyone ever make him or herself so vulnerable? Experience seems to tell us that to do so would be inviting pain, sorrow and heart ache. Why would anyone choose to be so exposed?
What must be understood in this case is you are not opening yourself up to a flawed mortal but to a perfect being. He will not trample over you like so many thoughtless people do, but He will cherish that great gift which you have given Him and He will return the favor, in the form of blessings and in personal revelation that shows the extent of His eternal and perfect love for you.
It is as if I am an investor and my stock I am investing is love. The market is full of commodities I could invest in such as material goods, education, relationships, etc., each one promises a certain yield and each has its own risks. But there is only one investment option that has a guaranteed return with huge profits. God is that option and as an investor I am going to hold true to that old adage and put all of my eggs into one basket, investing all of myself in God.
The subject matter of the work is love. Love of God, love of neighbor and love of self. I wish to stress the importance of the subject and reiterate what has been stated in the excerpt from Matthew. Love is the great commandment and upon it hangs all the law and the prophets.
Love, as defined by the 1828 Webster’s Dictionary, means “to regard with affection, on account of some qualities which excite pleasing sensations or desire of gratification. It is also described as “an affection of the mind excited by beauty and worth of any kind, or by the qualities of an object which communicate pleasure, sensual or intellectual.”
According to Mr. Webster love is essentially conditional; being extended only to those things which excite pleasing sensations that appeal to our sensual or intellectual passions. Thus it means that I will love you on condition that you gratify my desire for pleasure in some way.
This form of love is not the love we should be striving for as Christians. Christ said in Luke 6:32 that “if ye love them which love you, what thank have ye? for sinners also love those that love them.” This form of love, as stated by Christ, is shallow love. What exceptional goodness is there in man who is nice only to those who are nice to him?
We Christians should be striving for a better love. A love that Paul describes in his teachings to the Corinthians as one that “never faileth.” This love has no pre-conditions, no personal agendas or other limitations. It has no special pre-requisite requirements to worthy of it. This love is completely self-less and unconditional. It is deep and devoted without any sign of hypocrisy. This love is Charity, the pure love of Christ.
The Greatest Commandment
When I was seventeen I decided that I was going to make something of my life. I had grown up in a very active Christian home where I had been taught that God had bigger plans for His children than they could ever imagine and if they would simply turn their lives over to Him, He would do more through them than they could ever do on their own.
I thought on this a lot and I actively sought after the will of God for me through a study of the scriptures and much prayer.
One day when I read the verses in Matthew that were quoted at the beginning of this work I stopped and thought about what I had read. I asked myself what it would mean to me to love God with all my heart and with all my soul and with all my mind. What would I do? How would my actions and behavior change? (What is to follow is the answer I found for myself through further study and contemplation. I realize that it is my answer and so I am not going to assume that it is yours as well. But consider what is to be stated and feel free to take what you like and discard what you will).
“With all thy heart”
When I hear the word heart in this context I think of all the emotional aspects of love. This is rather hard to describe and the best way I think I can portray this is through another personal experience.
During the summer of my eighteenth year I worked as a grounds keeper for a large company along with three other laborers. We developed a very strong friendship over the summer with a sense of unity and comradery that I have never before experienced.
One day as we were working together, not speaking a word, I looked at one of my companions and was suddenly filled with a sense of love for him that I have rarely felt before. Neither he nor I had done or thought or said anything, I simply felt love for him and for my other two companions. That feeling caused me to want to serve them and show them how I loved them. It was an overwhelming, completely consuming feeling that welled up inside me and seriously threatened to pour out through every faculty of my body.
This I believe was the love of God. The energy that came from it was quite astonishing and very powerful. This is what we are asked to give to God. All of our emotional energy God wants devoted to Him.
“With all thy soul”
My personal definition of “soul” is the combination of both body and spirit, thus the commandment becomes loving the Lord with all thy physical and spiritual abilities. I love the Lord with all of my fingers and toes, with all of my skin and my organs, with all of my senses. With all my physical possessions do I love Him with and all of them I would willingly devote to Him.
A good example of loving God with all thy physical ability is given in the film “Chariots of Fire.” In this film we are introduced to a young Irishman by the name of Eric Liddell who is completely devoted to serving his God. His plans were to potentially be a missionary to China, but Eric was also given a pair of legs with which he ran faster than any man he raced.
In 1924 he was given the opportunity to run in the summer Olympics representing the nation of Great Britain. This opportunity he took, but as he got more and more involved in his training his sister, an individual equally devoted to serving her God, became worried that her brother was getting carried away; that his god-given ability to run was running him away from his God.
She expressed her concern to him and in response he said, “I believe God made me for a purpose. For China. But He also made me fast. And when I run, I feel His pleasure. To give it up would be to hold Him in contempt. You were right. It’s not just fun. To win is to honor Him.”
Eric went on to win a gold medal in the Olympics and later fulfilled his call to China to serve as a Christian missionary.
This man loved God. He ran for God. It does not matter what your physical abilities may be, do them for God.
Joseph B. Wirthlin, a great religious and moral leader once said, “Do you love the lord? Spend time with Him.” This quote is at the center of loving God with all of our spiritual ability.
Spend time with God by praying, by reading His words, by fasting, by being in nature and apart of nature, by listening to inspired music, by listening to and being with God. When we spend time, quality time with God, we come to know Him which increases our ability to love Him. For how can a person truly and deeply love somebody he does not know?
“Do you love the Lord? Spend time with Him.”
“With all thy mind”
This, of course, is our intellectual abilities and we are supposed to love God with all of them as well. When in love with someone we usually think about that person a lot. He or she is probably the main subject of our thoughts. We think of them when we are away and we do not want to leave when we are with them. God wants us to give Him that same consideration, but it is also more than this.
The mind is a marvelous, awe inspiring creation. It is one of the things that sets man apart from the common beast. The ability to think and reason to come to great new discoveries has led the human race to the prosperous and advanced state which it now enjoys. And yet the capacity of the brain is still largely untapped. All of this God wants to be given to Him. That does not mean the only thought we should ever have is about God, but that we should essentially think everything for Him.
(It is understood that I have just attempted to separate things that are very interdependent, and so it may be hard identify them separately. My purpose in doing so was simply to illustrate that God wants us to love Him with everything we posses.)
These four areas we have defined basically cover all that man is composed of. He is emotional, physical, spiritual and intellectual and all of it man is suppose to give to God. One might think that to do so may seem faulty, extreme and risky. Why would anyone ever make him or herself so vulnerable? Experience seems to tell us that to do so would be inviting pain, sorrow and heart ache. Why would anyone choose to be so exposed?
What must be understood in this case is you are not opening yourself up to a flawed mortal but to a perfect being. He will not trample over you like so many thoughtless people do, but He will cherish that great gift which you have given Him and He will return the favor, in the form of blessings and in personal revelation that shows the extent of His eternal and perfect love for you.
It is as if I am an investor and my stock I am investing is love. The market is full of commodities I could invest in such as material goods, education, relationships, etc., each one promises a certain yield and each has its own risks. But there is only one investment option that has a guaranteed return with huge profits. God is that option and as an investor I am going to hold true to that old adage and put all of my eggs into one basket, investing all of myself in God.
Wednesday, March 25, 2009
Live for God
(This is a talk I once gave in sacrament meeting. Because it is a talk it does not flow the same as writing and it is directed to a very specific audience. But I think it is appropriate to post it here.)
How will you be remembered when you die?
How do you want to be remembered?
How will you choose to be remembered?
Winston Churchill once said, “History will be kind to me for I intend to write it.” I believe he was true to that statement and I challenge you to do the same. A blank sheet of paper is before you, the future is yours to author, what will it say?
Be sure that it says what you want it to because the world will remember it and even write it for you if you do not. The best way to prevent this is to decide what you want, but in this is where most people make their first fatal mistake of mortality. They choose to live for that which has no worth. Their sights are set on the things of this world which are good and for our use, but they are only rays of light, they are not the source. The joys that they bring to our lives are as the light of a candle when compared to the light of the sun the gospel gives us. Our sights must be set higher than the things of this mortal world. If we live for clothes our sights are too low. If we live for iPods our sights are too low. If we live for cell phones, TV shows and computers games our sights are too low. Even if we live for our education and careers our sights are too low. The challenge that I want to make to all of you here today is to live for God. Only then will all things be added unto you.
Most of us have already accepted this challenge. We did so when we were baptized. It was then that we covenanted to keep all of God’s commandments and that we would always remember Him and in return we are promised that we will always have His spirit to be with us. Every week we renew this covenant, promising that we will live for God and every week, though we fail to keep this promise perfectly, we should progressively be becoming better and better people.
If we turn to the scriptures we find many excellent examples of individuals who have dedicated their lives to serving God. When we think of all the great prophets of history we do not remember them for how talented, rich or good looking they were. In fact, such details are rarely given or are not deemed to be significant. In the Book of Mormon it does say that the prophet Lehi was fairly wealthy having “gold and silver and all manners of riches.” (1 Ne. 3:16) But it does not dwell on how he obtained it. He may have been a merchant, a business man, an educator or a lawyer for all we know. The fact of the matter is that he was not remembered for his riches and worldly positions. He was remembered because he was a true Disciples of Christ. All other things were merely details and a result of his choice to live for God.
Ezra Taft Benson once said,
“Men and women who turn their lives over to God will discover that He can make a lot more out of their lives than they can. He will deepen their joys, expand their vision, quicken their minds, strengthen their muscles, lift their spirits, multiply their blessings, increase their opportunities, comfort their souls, raise up friends, and pour out peace.”
All of this does not mean that we should be spiritual and prophetic all the time. Joseph Smith, the man who “has done more, save Jesus only, for the salvation of men… that any other man.” is a perfect example of this, for even though he was a prophet we know that he had a fun loving, playful personality. Such was probably the case with other prophets like Nephi, Alma and Moroni. 2 Nephi 2:25 explains that “Adam fell that man might be; and men are, that they might have joy.” Our Heavenly Father wants us to find happiness and experience the joys of this mortal life, but we must recognize that the joy that we were meant to live for can only be obtained through obedience to His commandments. And think of this, all the great prophets are remembered for their powerful testimonies of Jesus Christ, not for the great positions they held. They understood the purpose of life and they truly lived it.
There are many great examples of people who truly live life in the world today, but there is one in particular that I want to mention here and he is my father. The many blessing I have personally received because my Father chose to live his life are innumerable and I will be forever grateful to him for his righteous example.
Live your lives and start living today. (Alma 34: 32-34) “The day of this life is the day for men to perform their labors… Therefore I beseech of you that ye do not procrastinate the day of your repentance.”
The time given us on this earth is a great gift from God. We must care for it and not loose any of it. Be jealous of your time, do not spend it on frivolous fancies but invest it in a good cause. For the time will come when we shall all stand before the judgment seat where we will be asked to give an accounting of our lives to our Heavenly Father. What do we want to be able to tell Him?
We must all live our lives right now in a way that we would not be ashamed to tell our Heavenly Father about. We must do it now because later may be too late. The Apostle James said in James 4: 14, “Whereas is your life? It is even a vapor, that appeareth for a little time and then vanisheth.” Life is too fragile to handle carelessly. We must have a firm grasp on it for how well we use it will largely determine the type of life we will have in the eternities. Today is all we have yesterday is gone forever and tomorrow will always be tomorrow. So do not put off till tomorrow what should be done today.
The wicked exist. The apathetic, survive. Only the righteous ever really live. Live your lives brothers and sisters, live for God.
How will you be remembered when you die?
How do you want to be remembered?
How will you choose to be remembered?
Winston Churchill once said, “History will be kind to me for I intend to write it.” I believe he was true to that statement and I challenge you to do the same. A blank sheet of paper is before you, the future is yours to author, what will it say?
Be sure that it says what you want it to because the world will remember it and even write it for you if you do not. The best way to prevent this is to decide what you want, but in this is where most people make their first fatal mistake of mortality. They choose to live for that which has no worth. Their sights are set on the things of this world which are good and for our use, but they are only rays of light, they are not the source. The joys that they bring to our lives are as the light of a candle when compared to the light of the sun the gospel gives us. Our sights must be set higher than the things of this mortal world. If we live for clothes our sights are too low. If we live for iPods our sights are too low. If we live for cell phones, TV shows and computers games our sights are too low. Even if we live for our education and careers our sights are too low. The challenge that I want to make to all of you here today is to live for God. Only then will all things be added unto you.
Most of us have already accepted this challenge. We did so when we were baptized. It was then that we covenanted to keep all of God’s commandments and that we would always remember Him and in return we are promised that we will always have His spirit to be with us. Every week we renew this covenant, promising that we will live for God and every week, though we fail to keep this promise perfectly, we should progressively be becoming better and better people.
If we turn to the scriptures we find many excellent examples of individuals who have dedicated their lives to serving God. When we think of all the great prophets of history we do not remember them for how talented, rich or good looking they were. In fact, such details are rarely given or are not deemed to be significant. In the Book of Mormon it does say that the prophet Lehi was fairly wealthy having “gold and silver and all manners of riches.” (1 Ne. 3:16) But it does not dwell on how he obtained it. He may have been a merchant, a business man, an educator or a lawyer for all we know. The fact of the matter is that he was not remembered for his riches and worldly positions. He was remembered because he was a true Disciples of Christ. All other things were merely details and a result of his choice to live for God.
Ezra Taft Benson once said,
“Men and women who turn their lives over to God will discover that He can make a lot more out of their lives than they can. He will deepen their joys, expand their vision, quicken their minds, strengthen their muscles, lift their spirits, multiply their blessings, increase their opportunities, comfort their souls, raise up friends, and pour out peace.”
All of this does not mean that we should be spiritual and prophetic all the time. Joseph Smith, the man who “has done more, save Jesus only, for the salvation of men… that any other man.” is a perfect example of this, for even though he was a prophet we know that he had a fun loving, playful personality. Such was probably the case with other prophets like Nephi, Alma and Moroni. 2 Nephi 2:25 explains that “Adam fell that man might be; and men are, that they might have joy.” Our Heavenly Father wants us to find happiness and experience the joys of this mortal life, but we must recognize that the joy that we were meant to live for can only be obtained through obedience to His commandments. And think of this, all the great prophets are remembered for their powerful testimonies of Jesus Christ, not for the great positions they held. They understood the purpose of life and they truly lived it.
There are many great examples of people who truly live life in the world today, but there is one in particular that I want to mention here and he is my father. The many blessing I have personally received because my Father chose to live his life are innumerable and I will be forever grateful to him for his righteous example.
Live your lives and start living today. (Alma 34: 32-34) “The day of this life is the day for men to perform their labors… Therefore I beseech of you that ye do not procrastinate the day of your repentance.”
The time given us on this earth is a great gift from God. We must care for it and not loose any of it. Be jealous of your time, do not spend it on frivolous fancies but invest it in a good cause. For the time will come when we shall all stand before the judgment seat where we will be asked to give an accounting of our lives to our Heavenly Father. What do we want to be able to tell Him?
We must all live our lives right now in a way that we would not be ashamed to tell our Heavenly Father about. We must do it now because later may be too late. The Apostle James said in James 4: 14, “Whereas is your life? It is even a vapor, that appeareth for a little time and then vanisheth.” Life is too fragile to handle carelessly. We must have a firm grasp on it for how well we use it will largely determine the type of life we will have in the eternities. Today is all we have yesterday is gone forever and tomorrow will always be tomorrow. So do not put off till tomorrow what should be done today.
The wicked exist. The apathetic, survive. Only the righteous ever really live. Live your lives brothers and sisters, live for God.
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