Wow, do I relate to this! So many times I just want to walk away from life and all its promise problems. I'm not saying that that is what Nephi did - no one knows and it's useless to speculate. But not knowing, I still feel envious. it is all too easy to feel burdened by life and its problems.
My husband's memory continues to fail and it affects his desire to do things that he won't remember anyway.
Tamu Smith (Sistas in Zion) was he yelled at by a white guy in a truck with an American flag and a blue life matters flag and who said to her, We're taking our country back, n*****!"
A large refugee camp in Greece, home to 13,000, burned to the ground yesterday. Now they have nothing.
The political divide continues with its nasty rhetoric.
There is a movement to end our public schools and to go to private charger for profit schools.
"For profit" seems to be the bottom line in america. "For the common good" is out of style.
I just watched a good Disney movie only to afterwards find out it was filmed in western China in an area known for human rights violations against its Muslim residents and that the young woman who played Mulan spoke out in favor of the Chinese police who affronted protesters wanting democracy in Hong Kong.
There is no end to the confusion. It is so easy to just want to walk away.
No one knew what this felt like more than did the prophet Mormon. He saw his whole nation destroyed. He writes in Mormon 5:16&18:
For behold, the spirit of the Lord has already ceased to strive with their fathers; and they are without Christ in God in the world . . . Driven before the wind, or as a vessel is tossed about upon the water or without anything wherewith to steer . . .
And yet it is from the same man that we have Moroni chapter 7 -one of the most beautiful of all chapters in scripture. Mormon calls us back to the Savior with his beautiful words:
42 Wherefore, if a man have faith he must needs have hope; for without faith there cannot be any hope.
43 And again, behold I say unto you that he cannot have faith and hope, save he shall be meek, and lowly of heart.
44 If so, his faith and hope is vain, for none is acceptable before God, save the meek and lowly in heart; and if a man be meek and lowly in heart, and confesses by the power of the Holy Ghost that Jesus is the Christ, he must needs have charity; for if he have not charity he is nothing; wherefore he must needs have charity.
45 And charity suffereth long, and is kind, and envieth not, and is not puffed up, seeketh not her own, is not easily provoked, thinketh no evil, and rejoiceth not in iniquity but rejoiceth in the truth, beareth all things, believeth all things, hopeth all things, endureth all things.
46 Wherefore, my beloved brethren, if ye have not charity, ye are nothing, for charity never faileth. Wherefore, cleave unto charity, which is the greatest of all, for all things must fail—
47 But charity is the pure love of Christ, and it endureth forever; and whoso is found possessed of it at the last day, it shall be well with him.
48 Wherefore, my beloved brethren, pray unto the Father with all the energy of heart, that ye may be filled with this love, which he hath bestowed upon all who are true followers of his Son, Jesus Christ; that ye may become the sons of God; that when he shall appear we shall be like him, for we shall see him as he is; that we may have this hope; that we may be purified even as he is pure. Amen.
I find myself pulled back to these words, to the 23rd psalm, to the Sermon on the Mount, to the Lord's Prayer. I am starving and cannot eat enough. I am empty and seek to be filled.
This is a hard time to be alive. I find my strength in my savior.
Jesus Savior Pilot Me
1. Jesus, Savior, pilot me
Over life’s tempestuous sea;
Unknown waves before me roll,
Hiding rock and treach’rous shoal.
Chart and compass came from thee;
Jesus, Savior, pilot me.
2. As a mother stills her child,
Thou canst hush the ocean wild;
Boist’rous waves obey thy will
When thou say’st to them, “Be still!”
Wondrous Sov’reign of the sea,
Jesus, Savior, pilot me.
3. When at last I near the shore,
And the fearful breakers roar
’Twixt me and the peaceful rest,
Then, while leaning on thy breast,
May I hear thee say to me,
“Fear not; I will pilot thee.”
Text: Edward Hopper, 1818–1888
Music: John Edgar Gould, 1822–1875
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Where Can I Turn for Peace?
1. Where can I turn for peace?
Where is my solace
When other sources cease to make me whole?
When with a wounded heart, anger, or malice,
I draw myself apart,
Searching my soul?
2. Where, when my aching grows,
Where, when I languish,
Where, in my need to know, where can I run?
Where is the quiet hand to calm my anguish?
Who, who can understand?
He, only One.
3. He answers privately,
Reaches my reaching
In my Gethsemane, Savior and Friend.
Gentle the peace he finds for my beseeching.
Constant he is and kind,
Love without end.
Text: Emma Lou Thayne, 1924–2014. © 1973 IRI
Music: Joleen G. Meredith, b. 1935. © 1973 IRI
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