Work It Out

With Christ on our side, we too can work it out

My little sister and I have a tradition, everytime a new Disney Channel Original Movie comes out we buy some Ben and Jerry's and settle down to watch the premiere on T.V. A few years back this premiere happened to be "High School Musical 2". Its been awhile but it depicts a group of High School friends who get a job at the same country club. Initially they are all excited until a plot is formed by the owner's daughter, Sharpey, to get them all fired. Jealous of their situation, and unhappy herself, she does everything in her power to make them miserable, and, she succeeds. Soon they all want to give up, and in true Disney fashion, rather than just complain or grumble, they begin to sing about it.
Luckily, this group of friends had a courageous and positive leader: Troy Bolton. After hearing their complaints he sings back to them, and, in summation, tells them that "we can work it out". After an epic display of dancing, singing, and other theatrics, the group decides to give it another shot, put their nose to the grind, and not give up.
Sadly, just like the owner's daughter, Sharpey, we too have someone seeking to make us miserable. The Advesary is doing everything in his power to bring us down, to wear us down, and slow us down. Now that is a lot of downs. So often in life we want to give up because of this. He comes from so many angles and is so relentless we feel we can't ever get a break, no matter how hard we try. We may feel we are inadequate, it is too hard, and that it just isn't worth it. I am here to tell you that in those times we too have a leader to lift us up, to catch us up, and to cheer us up. Jesus Christ has experienced all the pain, frustration, and sorrow we will ever face in our lives. He knows exactly what we need to do to overcome these things, and more importantly, He knows what if feels like to overcome these things. Because Christ has "overcome the world" He has made it possible for us to "be of good cheer" (John 16:33). I know that with Him we truly can "work it out", that there is nothing too hard for us to accomplish with Him. No matter how dark it may seem or how pointless it feels, God is stronger than Satan, Satan will lose, and if we rely on the Lord, we too may "overcome the world" and live with Him again in ultimate peace and joy. It will be as hard as we think it will be, but it will also be far more worth it than we can ever imgaine (1 Corinthians 2:9).

The Door of the Sheep 2

A few months back I posted a blog about Christ and His Atonement having the power to make doors through all the walls we face in life. This concept has been on my mind since then and when I was reading some of my brother's favorite versus something new stood out to me. It is found in 1 Nephi 21:14-16:

God gave us walls not to succumb to them,
 but to overcome them through Christ

"But, behold, Zion hath said: The Lord hath forsaken me, and my Lord hath forgotten me-but he will show that he hath not. For can a women forget her sucking child, that she should no have compassion on the son of her womb? Yea, they may forget thee, yet will I not forget thee, O house of Israel. Behold, I have graven thee upon the palms of my hands; thy walls are continually before me."
Christ isn't just mindful of our mistakes and sins, He is perfectly mindful of our walls; those things that hold us back, our natural weaknesses and shortcomings. The Gospel of Jesus Christ isn't just about making us clean, it literally has the power through Christ to make us better-to become new creatures. When my older brother left on his mission he shared this verse with me and since then it has been one of my favorites. It is Ether 12:27:
"And if men come unto me I will show unto them their weakness. I give unto men weakness that they may be humble; and my grace is sufficient for all men that humble themselves before me; for if they humble themselves before me, and have faith in me, then will I make weak things become strong unto them."
We all come with weaknesses and shortcomings, but we have them for a reason. We have them because they help us be mindful of Christ as He is mindful of us, and if we turn to Him in Faith, He will make our weak things become strong. He is not only mindful of walls, He has the power to make them walls of protection rather than walls of damnation-from a weakness to a strength. Weaknesses are one of the best ways we learn to rely and turn to Him. He knows that learning to rely on Him is worth anything we will go through because in His hands we can become far more than we could become of ourselves. He truly has the hands of a master carpenter of souls, and we have the choice to place ourselves in those hands.

Wax Strong

The scriptures are full of the term "wax". It can be used in a good way, as in Alma 17:2 speaking of a group of young men that "waxed strong in the knowledge of the truth".  It can also be used in a bad way, as in Alma 8:28, "the people did wax more gross in their iniquities." A good example of both is found in the Old Testament, 2 Samuel 3:1 "but David waxed stronger and stronger, and the house of Saul waxed weaker and weaker.".
I love the term "to wax". I think of Elementary School when we learned about the Pilgrims. For a fun activity our teacher had us dip candles. She handed us a long string and set us up in a line and had us dip that string in the wax and then go to the back of line. Eagerly we began and rushed up to make our first dip and then get back in line, visions of our very own hand made candle dancing in our minds. By the third dip we all began to realize that candles aren't made in seconds. Each dip added a nearly undetectable layer to our candle and soon I began to care less if my candle was too thin to even stand on its own; I was BORED. But, I reminded myself how much I would love to have my own candle and so, I continued to wait my turn in line over and over and over again.
And that is how it works in life. None of us become candles over night; it takes a lot of time and patience. Every action we take either adds a layer of good or bad wax to us. In many cases what may seem to be an overwhelming task is just a task meant to be done over time. When we look at the candle making process dip by dip it is far less overwhelming than thinking about trying to make it a candle all at once. Similarly, when we begin to slack off just a "dip" we know we must be careful where each dip might take us. The Book of Mormon tells us:
"Now ye may suppose that this is foolishness in me; but behold I say unto you, that by small and simple things are great things brought to pass; and small means in many instances doth confound the wise. And the Lord God doth work by means to bring about his great and eternal purposes; and by very small means the Lord doth confound the wise and bringeth about the salvation of many souls."

-Alma 37:6-7

Mosiah tells us to "watch ourselves" that we "perish not" (Mosiah 4:30). It is the little things that matter-nothing is too little to make a big difference. As we watch each "dip" we make we will begin to see just how much the little things shape our lives-that it isn't "foolishness" to believe they do. We will also see that through very small steps God can help us achieve great things and to become great-nothing is too big for Him. Through Him and through careful diligence to His word, we can all "wax strong".

Eggs Over Easy

I happen to love food. Especially breakfast food. I can think a few more beautiful sights than an the blue beacon of an IHOP sign. I remember one day a friend and I treated ourselves to an IHOP breakfast. They were having a special on a large breakfast centered around stuffed french toast. When we placed our orders the waitress tried to talk us out of it, saying it was a LOT of food. I took that as a challenge. Soon I was delighting over a delicious breakfast, and the best part? The eggs.

Eggs are tricky; I either hate or love them. The trick to me is when the yoke is cooked I tend to not like them, when its runny they are delicious. There are few things worse to me than boiled eggs, but there are few things better to me than poached eggs cooked over easy. This reminds me of one of my favorite verses in the New Testament, Matthew 11:28-30 :

"Come unto me, all ye that labour and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. 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. For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light."

As I read that all the times it said "me" and "my" stood out to me. I used to think of this verse as letting Christ into our yoke with us to help strengthen us, and I think that is true. But as I read it this time I thought of it more of taking the yoke we had on us off, and putting on Christ as our yoke. The load we carry is what we choose to think about, dwell on, and put at our center. Rather than carrying the heavy load of our trials and sorrows we can literally take that yoke off and replace that burden with Christ. If the only thing we had to carry was the love of God (Jesus Christ-John 3:16), can you imagine how light that "burden" would be? Of course we will always have difficult times, and sometimes life will feel heavier than we can bare, but during those times we have Christ offering to us a lighter load; Himself. All we have to do is make Christ our focus instead; turn our thoughts, actions, and desires towards Him rather than anything else we are carrying. With Him as our yoke there is literally nothing you and Him can't overcome together, and not only that, there will come into our lives a far greater peace and solace.So like our eggs we have a choice, over easy or over hard-we can continue to carry all that is weighing us down, or we can choose put on the yoke of our Savior.