I saw Little Women at the Hale Center Theater this weekend. It was a wonderful musical production of one of my all-time favorite novels, and unbidden, it unlocked a wistful, aching weeping through much of the production. Somehow, immersing myself in the world of the March sisters transported me back to the autumn of 1995, to one of the most important private lessons of my life. I was a mostly overwhelmed mother with a busy 5-yr-old boy and a differently busy 5th grade girl. My daughter was coming home from school nearly every day with a different book from the Goosebumps series - a series of “horror” novels for teens and pre-teens by R.L. Stine. Writing that in retrospect I can hear my brain saying, “Excuse me???” At the time, they seemed fairly harmless. Megan was borrowing a new novel from a classmate as quickly as she could read the last one. This lasted for a couple of weeks and about a half-dozen novels, and the first inkling of real concern about this new reading penchant came as a quick, specific thought, clearly formed in my head, in this sentence: “If you don’t intervene, she will never love Jane Eyre.” Specific much? And don’t you love that the Spirit chose maybe my favorite novel of all time to make the point? I’ve learned to recognize the Source of specific thoughts like this; I knew it was a loving nudge from a loving Father in Heaven, and I spent a couple days pondering it. My daughter’s voracious reading habits mirrored mine as a child; she was in the 2nd grade when she would sheepishly admit she’d finished a book we’d started together on her own. I assumed she had outgrown being read to aloud, and continued to read aloud to her younger brother. But then this strong impression - almost an assignment - to intervene - to make a renewed effort to influence and educate her tastes and desires. I recalled my 8th and 9th grade students fifteen years earlier, thrilled when we got enough work done for me to read a novel to them on Fridays. Perhaps you didn’t outgrow the love of being read aloud to - and Audible has certainly proved that to be true, eh? After sitting with this prompting and praying about it for a few days, I randomly - or so I thought - chose Little Women as my intervention project. I simply announced to Megan that we were going to read this book together. It was long enough where her 10-yr-old reading abilities, advanced as they were, needed a docent into such a book. I knew Father wanted me to gently teach this important lesson to the daughter of my heart: “You’re higher than this.” Then began one of the most sacred experiences I shared with her, as God revealed some of my biggest weaknesses to start to work on. We read about Jo - and the impetuous decisions she nearly instantly regretted, and I would find myself praying more intentionally about my own impetuous decisions, nearly instantly regretted. We read about Marmee mastering a terrible temper - WHAT??? We were as surprised as Jo to learn this, and as filled with wonder as Jo to watch her mother after years of practice at it. I found myself praying more earnestly to master my own temper, and needing to practice the same thing over and over again. Watching the March family with their struggles often mirrored our own, and in the arena of our struggling, often broken little covenant family, I was grateful for the call of my own to stretch past my weaknesses and practice mastering them: “You’re higher than this.” Reading Little Women together was a seminal event in my children’s childhood. Megan and I went on to read Little Men, Treasure Island, and The Hobbit - eventually joined by Grant. Somewhere in either Narnia or Watership Down, Megan peeled off again. Having experienced an important course correction, she was a different reader as she forged on ahead without us, leaving Grant and me to forge the same kind of connection with reading higher books together. Friday afternoon, the weeping started as I watched the story of a young girl, desperate to tell a story of her own, be gently prodded on in her own journey. While the play missed the finer point of the novel, my own experience with the novel rushed in to fill in the blank. Jo’s character was forged and refined in large part by the good friend who would become her husband - who had the courage to be frank with her about her sensational, Goosebumps-of-the-day writing - telling her, “You’re higher than this.” Reading to my children is one of my sweetest memories of their childhood. Thanks to a heavenly intervention of my own, I was able to intervene in forming the tastes of my children, and I’m equally convinced that doing so helped in forging their character as well. All this flooded back to me Friday afternoon as I watched the story that was key to the process. It was a poignant reminder of how important it is to climb - out of bad habits as well as bad books. Daunting as it often is, great literature beckons us on climbs worth taking, and develops more than our character; it develops climbing muscles for the next mountains. Great literature is always whispering to us: “You’re higher than this.” “There’s something higher… than this.”

Come Follow Me - 1 Nephi 7-10 It seems hard to imagine that a few days could go by, and you could forget you’d seen an angel who kind of chewed you out. Or that you could forget a miraculous intervention in protecting you against a Gadianton-type big wig. Maybe, after days of heading out of town, only to head back into town and have such an adventure - only to head back out of town, and being told to head back into town makes you cross. 1 Nephi chapter 7 is a fascinating display of human nature at its worst. It had to be stunning to Laman and Lemuel that Nephi was able to convince another good man to bring his entire family on the insane odyssey of their father. So off they go, back out of town for the third time, and I guess something just snapped. In verses 9-12, Nephi lays out some important things Laman and Lemuel seem to have forgotten - spiritual things they once knew: Verse 9 - they haven’t been obedient to the things they have already received from God through the Spirit. Verse 10 - because of disobedience, spiritual experiences they’ve had - in this case, seeing an angel! - are forgotten. Verse 11 - because of disobedience, blessings from the Lord are either discounted, dismissed, and eventually, completely forgotten. Verse 12 - because of disobedience, former knowledge and evidence of God’s power is also discounted, dismissed, and eventually, completely forgotten. So, basically disobedience is like a big ol’ obliviating spell. But not entirely. Henry B. Eyring taught: “There is another reason why it is not easy for the proud to build on a foundation of truth. It is because the enemy of righteousness also works in little steps - steps so small that they are hard to notice if you are thinking only about yourself and how great you are. Just as truth is given to us line upon line and the light brightens slowly as we obey, even so, as we disobey, our testimony of truth lessens almost imperceptibly, little by little, and darkness descends so slowly that the proud may easily deny that anything is changing. “I heard the boast of a man who walked away from the Church slowly. At first he just stopped teaching his Sunday School class, then he stayed away from Church, and then he forgot to pay tithing now and then. Along the way he would say to me: ‘I feel just as spiritual as I did before I stopped those things and just as much at peace. Besides, I enjoy Sundays more than I did. It’s more a day of rest.’ Or, ‘I think I’ve been blessed temporally as much or more as I was when I was paying tithing.’ He could not sense the difference, but I could. The light in his eyes and even the shine in his countenance was dimming. He could not tell, since one of the effects of disobeying God seems to be the creation of just enough spiritual anesthetic to block any sensation as the ties to God are being cut. Not only did the testimony of the truth slowly erode, but even the memories of what it was like to be in the light began to seem to him like a delusion.” (Henry B. Eyring - “A Light Founded in Light and Truth,” BYU Devotional, August 15, 2000) https://speeches.byu.edu/talks/henry-b-eyring/life-founded-light-truth/ But I have a theory. Maybe - just maybe - there are remnants of memory associated with disobedience. To the extent that when confronted with the Hagrid notion - "I should not ha' done that" - we wince a little. Maybe squirm some. Feel. Uncomfortable. And rightly so. People too often forget that guilt is a feeling of discomfort to remind you to do it differently. Its purpose is solely to provide an impetus to repent. THAT'S. IT. When we have those feelings of discomfort, the solution isn't to remove them or any reminder of them. The solution is to pay attention. Exhibit A from chapter 7: In verse 15 Nephi basically tells Laman and Lemuel to go ahead and go back to Jerusalem, pretty much saying, no one is holding a gun to your head. "...if ye have choice, go up to the land, and remember the words which I speak unto you, that if ye go ye will also perish..." And that's when they really lose it. That uncomfortable feeling in their gut - what if Nephi is right? - was strong enough to just tick them off. It just seems like people who deep down...know. They just don't WANT to know. And there it is - the difference between a person who wishes they were obedient (see "What if Ya Just Don't Wanna?) - and a person who doesn't wish they were, but worries about the consequences anyway. Or worse, decides to have a temper tantrum and challenge reality and the inevitability of those consequences. The crucial difference between someone who says - "I don't want to, but I wish I wanted to" - and someone who says "I don't want to, I don't want to want to, and I'm ready to fight anyone who tells me why I should want to." This certainly explains the apoplectic conversations about good and evil these days, don't you think?

Dale is the rabid BYU fan in our house. I am the more cautious, mostly guilty-by-association BYU fan in this house. Yet I'm the one who predicted BYU would make it to the Sweet 16 this year, confident they could win at least two games in the playoffs before they characteristically dashed my heart out, which is why I have kept myself aloof from cheering for them wholeheartedly for lo, these many years. Dale predicted BYU would lose to Wisconsin, yet they beat them in an upset Saturday night 91-89 - number 6 seed took out number 3 seed. Ironic on two fronts: the rankings, and little Miss Sports Rookie - who still picks teams by completely irrelevant characteristics - pickin' 'em to win. So we're watching the game, and I'm stitching, and at some point in the first half, I notice this kid on BYU with a headband. He instantly arrested my attention. He had a big grin on his face; maybe that was it. But the grin looked like a full-body grin, if you know what I mean. This kid knows how to grin with all of him. "Who's that?" I wondered. As the game continued, I found myself watching Headband if he was playing. I couldn't tell you why he fascinated me, but fascinate me, he did. He played with what looked like an effortless, indefatigable energy, but that wasn't all. There was something about this kid... Headband is out for a while, but when he's back in, he's all in. Like... All. In. It's more than the boundless energy with a seemingly inexhaustible source - it's an intensity I can't quite put my finger on. He's a catalyst. He executes well; rarely makes mistakes; in fact, he often fixes mistakes. It's more than intensity - there's an intention to his playing as well. The thing I learned when I couldn't move at all - Be. Here. Now. - this kid has it - in spades. He is 100% in this game. And then the grin. In all this energy and intensity and intention and ignition - there's this... what am I seeing? Near the end of the game, when Headband is still making things happen, the sports commentators start talking about him: number 15 - Richie Saunders - grandfather is the inventor of tater tots. Hysterical detail much? They start talking about some of what I'm seeing - what a great athlete he is - what a great human he is. Then they talk about his dad taking him to the church at 5:00 every morning to shoot baskets, because as early as age 12, he knew he wanted to play basketball for BYU some day. And, dweeb that I am, it was at that point my eyes started to leak, just a bit. Because that's the other thing I see when I watch Richie Saunders play basketball that I couldn't quite put my finger on - joy. Richie Saunders plays basketball with unapologetic, full-throated joy. He is literally living his dream - and the way he's living it is different - because he knows it. I was overjoyed to see BYU win, which is uncharacteristic of me, the cautious girl being courted by the unreliable suitor that is BYU. Of course, I was delighted in part because I got points in my brackets for the win. But I'm mostly excited I get to watch Richie Saunders play some more. I'm glad I know who he is, and have seen what he brings to the table. Seeing someone do something they're good at - that they love - that they’ve earned with hard work - with that level of authenticity and commitment - is a beautiful thing. It's what passion looks like - and we need more of that in this world. Though I am torn. If BYU continues to win, I will lose points going forward.

I made this bread from a sourdough start given to me in September 2024. I have yet to learn the finer points of carving leaves or embellishments to beautify the top, as you can clearly see. Perhaps you've seen such loaves in your social media feeds; everyone and their Aunt Lillian seem to be making sourdough bread these days. You really can't swing a dead cat without finding another post on sourdough. I was astonished to even see posts on Marketplace - lotsa bread going around these days. And seriously - homemade bread? I GET IT. I'm generally not a huge fan of bandwagons of this sort. I wouldn't watch Dallas . I refused to read The Work and the Glory , though I'm rethinking that one. If everybody's doing it, I have this perverse need to... NOT. But bread... Also, there's the wheat I've stored for apocalyptic winter. If I can't turn it into bread, then what was the point? Also, my mother used to tell me about this book she'd read about two old women in an Eskimo tribe who were left behind because they could no longer contribute to the collective survival of the tribe. As they learned to keep themselves alive on their own, their paths eventually crossed with the tribe that had exiled them - and ended up saving the very community which had shunned them. I've thought about that story a lot - particularly as one of the least practical-skilled people I know. Do I bring anything to the table that would make it worth a community keeping me alive? I seriously doubted it. Learning to make bread had become about more than making use of all that wheat. It was about more than jumping on an abhorrent bandwagon. It was about beating the odds of my own impractical skill set. Learning to make bread had become about mastering something I didn't think I could do. It had become about having a skill of self reliance. Suddenly, I could tell why people jokingly said sourdough was the gateway drug to chickens and bees. It's about the question: am I capable of doing anything to keep myself alive? My first attempt at sourdough was many years ago. A dear friend, RaeLynne, gave me two starts: one made with white flour, and one made with wheat flour. That way I could make bread whether I had freshly milled wheat on hand or not. Because she knew my ADHD could seriously endanger the mission, we grimly named these two starts. The white start, being slightly more domesticated, we named Peta. The wheat start, slightly less tamed, we named Katniss. These seemed the perfect names, as we both recognized: the odds may not be in their favor. Having two starts was waaaaaaaay too much for my brain at that time. Peta didn't make it. I tried to tell myself Katniss was heartier, and would be fed almost exclusively by the wheat in my basement, so maybe it was just as well. I could not get a decent loaf out of Katniss to save. My. Life. It was tasty and flavorful, and this is how I know this, besides tasting it. When RaeLynne moved to Texas, another friend who is a sourdough guru - Rhonda - came to see whether Katniss was worth saving, and try to figure out what I was doing wrong. She carefully tasted the start itself and pronounced: "Oh, this start has personality." Though few think of Katniss as Miss Congeniality, in spite of her "personality," I could not get those loaves to raise. Could. Not. I finally settled for pulling Katniss out of the freezer periodically, and feeding her when I wanted to make waffles. Fast forward to last fall. Yet another stout-hearted friend, Kari, drew me into her beautiful kitchen and taught me - AGAIN - the finer points of sourdough. I'm not sure if it was the pretty kitchen, or the fact it was the magically correct number of multiple repetitions that did it, but I think even I saw the lightbulb over my head that day. I GOT IT. I finally understood when the start was happy enough to make a great loaf of bread. I took a new white flour start home that day with a lump of dough from my friend's start. I named this new start Peta in honor of the fallen tribute of yesteryear. I haven't bought bread since. I even got a little brazen and pulled Katniss from her happy, cryogenic state to attempt what I thought was the impossible. With a little coaching from Kari, Katniss has produced actual raised loaves made with freshly milled wheat from my basement. For the record, I concur with Rhonda; Katniss does have personality. She also makes a heck of a cracker (thank you, Courtney and Alisha). I have to wonder if my ability to juggle keeping two starts alive and productive has had anything to do with my keeping kefir grains alive for the last nearly two and a half years. And I don't just pull that one out periodically, no, no. I feed the kefir grains almost every single day. Oddly, I haven't felt the need to name this little gal. Guy? Oh, wait. Milk in French is 'le lait.' It's a guy. I'll get back to you. For those of you keeping score at home, this surprise addition to our story brings our total of Living Organisms Laureen is Keeping Alive in Her Home to three. Dale largely keeps himself alive and has for lo, these many years. Heck, he kept me alive when I couldn't move. But these three fermented entities depend solely upon me for their survival. And against all odds, all three are thriving. I think I might be ready for children.

There's a story behind the name of this website. I love it so much because it's been an important private lesson - so I thought I'd let you in on it. For many years, I wrote a weekly email to my two children in an optimistic attempt for our family to feel connected and to and remind them of their roots. What it actually did was serve as a weekly journal entry of sorts, recounting life events when I didn't sit and write with a pen in my journal. Which I still love, but rarely do. In my mind, writing with pen and paper looks a lot like this picture. Late in the summer of 2020, as I got ready to click "send" one week, I realized I'd left the subject line blank. I considered the prior weeks filled with more breathless and whirlwind living than usual, and realized this past week had been uncharacteristically calm, with nothing in particular meriting a headline. Imagining that would last all of fifteen minutes, I somewhat wryly typed the subject, nearly as a quip: "Living in the pause", and sent the email. Fast forward a few months to the very end of the year. My darling friend Gale Sears, a prolific writer of historical fiction, called to see if I was interested in contributing to an anthology project she was involved in. If so, she'd have the project's editor contact me, as Gale had recommended me to her. The project was to be a collection of 24 essays - two on each of twelve qualities possessed by the Savior. The book was to be titled Like Him, and was slated to come out the following year in time for Christmas. The one quality she had yet to assign - which would be mine if I wanted to submit something - was temperance. The editor hesitantly told me all the other contributors were turning in their final drafts on Monday. This was the Friday after Christmas. The deadline was in three days. No. Pressure. She hastily assured me I could have more time - THANK YOU - and asked me how much I thought I needed. Funny thing, the minute she said the word temperance, my funny little brain - which lives in a constant state of free association - plucked that random email subject line out of the millions of locked file drawers: living in the pause . I told the editor, "I think I have an idea - can you give me a week?" She agreed. I awoke early two days later on Sunday morning, earlier than usual. I didn't need to get up yet, because it was only 5:30 a.m. I worked on nestling for a little while longer, but my brain wouldn't have it; off it went in different directions about a potential essay on temperance. As I lay there with my body and brain arguing over nestling or writing, the Holy Ghost broke the tie with a whisper: "Why don't we get cracking on that article?" It stuns me as I type this to recount: what ended up being published in that beautiful anthology is very nearly the first draft that spilled out on the sleepy winter morning. I instantly knew it wasn't mine; I was just God's little helper on this one. Mother Teresa wrote: "I am a little pencil in God's hands. He does the thinking. He does the writing. He does everything and sometimes it is really hard because it is a broken pencil and He has to sharpen it a little more." (Mother Teresa, The Joy in Loving: A Guide to Daily Living ) It was like that. I made a few minor edits over the next two days and submitted the essay on Monday with the other writers who'd had their assignments for months. There's a technical word for what happened: miracle. The book came out in late 2021 when I was in a coma on a ventilator. It was months before I could get the rush of going into a bookstore, finding the book, and looking on p. 49 to see my name looking back at me with the title: Living in the Pause . Fast forward again to early 2024. My dear friend who became my web designer, Abe Sloan, asked me what I wanted to call the blog we were about to launch. Again, those four words got plucked from the mess of locked file drawers in my brain, and this website, Living in the Pause, was born. That original phrase - "living in the pause" - was so instinctive and random when it glibly became the subject for an email to my children in 2020. Little did I know God was beginning an incredible private lesson which would take more than three years to get to the punchline. First, God took that original random thought and helped me develop it into an essay on temperance. Viktor Frankl epitomized this kind of pause when he wrote: "Between stimulus and response there is a space. In that space is our power to choose our response. In our response lies our growth and our freedom." (Viktor Frankl, Man's Search for Meaning) Later, God taught me more when President Russell M. Nelson spoke to the young adults of the church in May 2022. He said: "Mortal lifetime is hardly a nanosecond compared with eternity. But my dear brothers and sisters, what a crucial nanosecond it is! During this life we get to choose which laws we are willing to obey - those of the celestial kingdom, or the terrestrial, or the telestial - and, therefore, in which kingdom of glory we will live forever." ( https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/study/broadcasts/worldwide-devotional-for-young-adults/2022/05/12nelson?lang=eng ) Calling mortality a "nanosecond" in this context put profound import on those four glib little words; President Nelson was describing THE pause! The eternal pause where decisions are going to matter SO. MUCH. It was this further learning of the lesson that led to the website having a subtitle: "Living in the Pause: Navigating the Temporary of Now While Living for the Eternal " Learning to live in the pause makes living more intentional. Recognizing mortality as an eternal pause helps me prize the chance to practice and try again every day. We're here to practice preferences, and if I don't prefer the eternal yet, I can educate my desires until, over time, I do. I hope that's what you'll find here - perspective to sift through the temporary, temporal, stuff that in the end, doesn't really matter - and cleave to the stuff that will always matter - the eternal stuff.

Come Follow Me (4 Nephi) The idea of a perfect society has eluded humanity since our first parents left the original Garden. The Fall didn’t just introduce death to this world; it also introduced the fallen nature of mankind - the disinclination to align desires and actions to eternal laws. Basically, it put us at odds with God. If one human can’t pull off anything approaching ideal in an individual life, the chances of an ideal society is going to be pretty slim, what with a society being comprised of individuals and all. Even so, there have been two glimmering short seasons of utopian living - like elusive shooting stars flashing briefly, then disappearing across the night sky of history. The first season was Enoch’s stunning missionary success, which created an ideal society (see Moses 7). It left such an impression on the unwilling and unchanged fallen world that its exit from the planet was followed by the first counterfeit utopian attempt: Babel. The original lie of utopia as peddled by the destroyer always involves offering what God offers - at a discount. Do it your own way - don’t align your will to God’s laws - and still receive the blessings of obedience. It’s almost like Satan convinces humans that if they all agree more vigorously and unanimously natural law will be suspended. The second season was the people of Lehi, following the personal ministry of our resurrected God, Jesus Christ. This society didn’t leave the planet, but rather, enjoyed nearly two generations of ideal living : “there could not be a happier people among all the people who had been created by the hand of God.” (4 Nephi 1:16) How did they do it? How did a community of humans tame their human natures for nearly two hundred years? What helped them create a utopia? “…they had all things common among them; therefore there were not rich and poor, bond and free, but they were all made free, and partakers of the heavenly gift.” (4 Nephi 1:3) Isn’t that interesting? Satan first whispered the lie to Cain that killing his brother would make him free (Moses 5:33). But true freedom only exists when an individual - and by extension, a collection of individuals - freely choose to govern themselves by God's laws. More interesting still: historically, societies which have attempted a utopia have failed miserably, with a significant loss of freedom as a most notable hallmark. Yet here, Mormon records that happiness, peace, and prosperity involved freedom as the citizens of this society became " partakers of the heavenly gift." As humans accept the doctrine of Jesus Christ, they invest in the project of taming human nature - inherent in their bodies composed of "unredeemed earth" (See Melvin J. Ballard, "Struggle for the Soul"). The natural consequence of leaning out of fallen human nature is a leaning into divine nature - inherent in the human spirit with the divine DNA of heavenly Parents. The apostle Peter wrote: "According as [God's] divine power hath given unto us all things that pertain unto life and godliness, through the knowledge of him that hath called us to glory and virtue; "Whereby are given unto us exceeding great and precious promises: that by these ye might be partakers of the divine nature , having escaped corruption that is in the world through lust. "And beside this, giving all diligence, add to your faith virtue; and to virtue knowledge; "And to knowledge temperance; and to temperance patience; and to patience godliness; "And to godliness brotherly kindness; and to brotherly kindness charity, "For if these things be in you, and abound, they make you that ye shall neither be barren nor unfruitful in the knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ." (2 Peter 1:3-8) To invest in the doctrine of Christ is to invest in a program of eternal self-improvement. The power to make such vast changes with mortal limitations is only possible because of the one Human who transcended the limitations. Jesus Christ didn't just execute a perfect mortal life, but suffered the spiritual pain of all humanity to give us power in this project. Self-improvement is only possible because of Jesus. Self-improvement is a key feature of living the doctrine of Jesus. Converted disciples take responsibility for their own lives by investing in the project of self-improvement, aided by Jesus. A collective of converted disciples, invested in self-improvement, create an ideal society. The entire collective of citizens is invested in the results. There is no force in the equation - could it be utopian if anyone were forced against his will to participate? The only way for it to truly be a utopia is for everyone to freely choose to participate - to be invested in taking responsibility for their own self-improvement with Jesus. The world calls it utopia, but disciples of Jesus Christ know such a society by another name: Zion. Zion can only exist in a state of freedom - freely chosen by its citizens. And Zion requires priesthood - so saving and exalting ordinances can be administered, binding those citizens in a covenant relationship to Christ. Then, they can access His redeeming power to continue their project of growth and self-improvement. Mormon records the conditions of the Nephite Zion: "...they did walk after the commandments which they had received from their Lord and their God, "...continuing in fasting and prayer, "...and in meeting together oft both to pray and to hear the word of the Lord." (4 Nephi 1:12) "...there was no contention among all the people in the land..." (4 Nephi 1:13) "...because of the love of God which did dwell in the hearts of the people." (4 Nephi 1:15) "And there were no envyings, nor strifes, nor tumults, nor whoredoms, nor lyings, nor murders, nor any manner of lasciviousness; and surely there could not be a happier people among all the people who had been created by the hand of God." (4 Nephi 1:16) At some point, when you're converted enough, committed enough - you stop worrying about how your neighbor is weeding his garden. You stop worrying if he's weeding at all. You just weed your own garden, because when you signed up with Jesus, you knew it was an eternal investment with eternal dividends. In fact, if you discover your neighbor's weeding isn't going so well, Jesus may enlist the Holy Ghost to tap you on the shoulder, and invite you to pitch in over there for a little minute. When Jesus returns to rule and reign for a thousand years, absolutely no one will be forced to be good. Everyone who gets to stay will have chosen to invest in Zion by investing in repentance. Repentance: the lifetime practice of self-improvement with the aid and power of Jesus Christ through covenant. As President Nelson just reminded us: "It is neither too early nor too late for you to become a devout disciple of Jesus Christ." (Russell M. Nelson, "The Lord Jesus Christ Will Come Again," General Conference, October 2024). Today would be a great day to choose to invest in Zion. If enough people make this choice and this investment, maybe we could get this Millennium thing going already.

Friends in the cybersphere, I'd like to introduce you to a dear friend of many years, Mr. Eric Metaxas. Technically... we've actually never met. Truly, this is a mere technicality. In 2011, a good friend from my book group heard Eric speak at an event, promoting his recently published biography of Dietrich Bonhoeffer, titled Bonhoeffer: Pastor, Martyr, Prophet, Spy. She chose the book for our book group to read the following year. Besides learning about the incredible man whom the book was about, that book also served as my introduction to the mind and faith of Eric Metaxas. I look forward to eventually indulging in Eric's two other lengthy biographies on the lives of William Wilberforce ( Amazing Grace), and Martin Luther ( Martin Luther) . His take on people's approach to living in faith and discipleship is insightful and inspiring. He's an artisan wordsmith - that's my writer's version of "You had me at hello," and has a delightful and winsome sense of humor which can border on the ridiculous. ALWAYS A PLUS. The other of his many books I've read are worthy of mention and recommendation: Miracles - In 2014 Metaxas wrote a fabulous piece for the Wall Street Journal titled "Science Increasingly Makes the Case for God." ( https://www.wsj.com/articles/eric-metaxas-science-increasingly-makes-the-case-for-god-1419544568 )   The article was so wildly popular and so widely viewed and shared, his editor suggested he flesh it out for an entire book. Miracles is the result. The first half of the book is an expansion of the original 2014 WSJ article. The second half are personal witness stories - Eric knows each subject personally - who have experienced what he believes is a true miracle. As he puts it - he didn't want to use mere coincidences which serve miraculously in helping someone, but the miracles where God unmistakably intervened by suspending what we humans recognize as the natural laws of the universe. They are truly phenomenal. 7 Men and the Secret of Their Greatness - an anthology of short biographies on men as diverse as George Washington, Chuck Colson, and Jackie Robinson. 7 Women and the Secret of Their Greatness - an equally enthralling anthology of women including Rosa Parks, Corrie Ten Boom, and Joan of Arc. I was quite taken with both the introductions to these two anthologies. Eric makes the case for what makes a man or woman great in these introductions, but he also lays out his view of the divine roles of men and women as he understands them from his faith as a converted evangelical Christian. As a member of what I believe is the restored church - the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints - I could imagine any of my church leaders, whom I sustain as prophets and apostles, quoting from Eric's introductions in our church's general conferences. His opinions of men and women mesh beautifully with our church's document from 1995, "The Family: A Proclamation to the World." My fandom of Eric's writing became a genuine feeling of friendship as I began to listen to his radio show on podcasts, or listen to his lecture/discussion events called Socrates in the City. As I wrote about in a recent post, "Having a Thing with God" ( https://www.laureensimper.com/post/having-a-thing-with-god ), the best friends are those where we share more things in common - from cooking to quilting, from writing to faith. Those friendships deepen when friends draw you into their world, and you are the Thing, or your friend's friends are the Things. Friendships are sweetest when the Thing you share is mutual love for mutual people. That's what Eric has done for me over our many years of friendship. He's introduced me to: John Zmirak - a brilliant writer at www.stream.org who haunts Eric's podcast regularly, and who frankly needs his own post. Os Guinness - another brilliant writer whose book, A Free People's Suicide: Sustainable Freedom and the American Future, inspired a book from Eric, If You Can Keep It (It's in the stack, I'll get to it). His speeches and/or interviews at Socrates in the City are worth listening to more than once. ( https://socratesinthecity.com/guests/os-guinness/ ) N.T. Wright - Anglican bishop and New Testament scholar who HAS been quoted in general conference! ( https://socratesinthecity.com/guests/n-t-wright/ ) Gabrielle Kuby - author of The Global Sexual Revolution ( https://socratesinthecity.com/guests/gabriele-kuby/ ) Walter Hooper - editor of many of C.S. Lewis' posthumous books. When a dear friend of mine was a little boy, he wrote a letter to C.S. Lewis after his first adventure in Narnia. As this letter was written many years after Mr. Lewis' death, Mr. Hooper actually took the time to reply to my friend's letter. <3 The list is far too long; through Eric I've met so many wonderful people: Naomi Wolf, Andrew Klavan, John Lennox, Armand Nicholi, Beckett Cook, Ryan Bomberger, Baroness Cox, Rosaria Butterfield... it might be too late to add, TO NAME A FEW. But there it is - the great influence of someone I consider a friend - even though we haven't met. Yet. I'll never forget hearing Eric's witness of Jesus Christ in this short YouTube video - from a series of similar witnesses recorded in 2013. It reminded me of Oliver Cowdery being told, through the third person of Joseph Smith, of a personal experience with the Savior - which was only known by Cowdery and the Savior Himself (D&C 6:22-24). https://youtu.be/F_GTMgckqi4?si=5Pw3euYYlGF9GI_c So many reasons I consider Eric Metaxas a dear friend. Discipleship absolutely shortens the divide in the timeline of friendship, don't you think?

I was privileged to speak to the youth of our stake and testify of the prophetic restorative mission of Joseph Smith. I have never had a talk given to me so quickly by the Holy Ghost - as if I had received a heavenly download. Except for looking up a few references, the talk in its entirety was given to me before any study or preparation had taken place. The experience was so singular in its completeness that in the days leading up to presenting the talk, I started to worry about the few thoughts I had jotted down that first night. How could this brief outline refute the massive body of slander which was a mouse click away? How could I defend this man who had nearly become a personal friend - the way any do with whom you spend time - learning their voice by reading their own words? How could I convince the youth that everything this man said happened to him - really happened to him? About three days before the talk, I had a panic-filled prayer. I had gone over the outline so many times, I nearly had it memorized. "Is this seriously all You want me to do to defend Joseph Smith?" I pleaded. The answer came into my mind in a single phrase - instant and complete, the way the talk had come: "Your job isn't to defend him. Your job is to testify. My job is to send the Holy Ghost to bear witness that what you're saying is true." The rest of this post comes from that brief outline, and stands as my witness of what I've learned about Joseph Smith the only way anyone can learn the truth of who and what he is - by the power of God as manifest by the Holy Ghost: (Notes from Standards Night, Murray Utah Little Cottonwood Stake, September 24, 2017) I'm here tonight to leave you with three admonitions, and one statement of fact: Defend the absent Check your sources The statement of fact: Truth has no agenda Catch a wave - shamelessly borrowed from the Beach Boys Defend the Absent Have you ever been in a position where someone has been criticized in your presence - gossiped about, or spoken about in a derogatory way? What did you do? Has it ever been a friend who was talked about? A good friend? I would challenge you to be a person who defends the absent. Even those who talk about others behind their backs will be safe with you if you make the decision to always be the person who defends the absent. But I would particularly challenge you to defend your friends, and tonight, I want to challenge you to use this next school year [or in our adult case - this next year of Come Follow Me] becoming friends with Joseph Smith. Defending Joseph Smith doesn't mean you have to prove anything right or wrong - to anyone. It just means you would say about him what you would say about anyone you know well when they're not present: " You don't know him like I do." I challenge you to become a person who can say that about Joseph Smith. Angel Moroni told Joseph the first night of his visit that his name " should be had for good and evil among all nations, kindreds and tongues, or that it should be both good and evil spoken of among all people." Joseph Smith is absent - for now. Decide to defend the absent. Become someone who can say: "You don't know him like I do." Check Your Sources When you get to know someone, what sources are you going to use? At school - if you wanted to get to know someone you didn't know - whom would you ask to learn something - his friends, or his enemies? Beware of the voices - both inside and outside the church - that debase Joseph Smith by calling into question any aspect of his character. Ezra Taft Benson warned about attempts to bring a humanistic philosophy into our Church history by exposing weaknesses of Church leaders. ( https://video.byui.edu/media/Jayson+Kunzler+%E2%80%9CMillions+Shall+Know+Brother+Joseph+Again%E2%80%9D/0_jun5hvww ) [Parenthetical to the talk and speaking to 2025 readers: This notion of humanizing historical figures isn't to simply point out that they weren't perfect; it is at the heart of the critical method and the cancel culture. A person is dismissed, in spite of his goodness, because of his human flaws - and even sins. It means you can never live past the worst moments of your life. It doesn't just cancel a human soul; it cancels redemption .] The best sources are the words of prophets and those who loved him and knew him best - and the Book of Mormon itself, of course. The more you have a sure witness from the Holy Ghost that the Book of Mormon is the word of God, the more sure your witness will be that a 21-yr-old kid didn't write it on his own in 65 working days - over 85 calendar days! Listen to the words of Brigham Young: "I can truly say, that I invariably found him to be all that any people could require a true prophet to be, and that a better man could not be, though he had his weaknesses; and what man has ever lived upon this earth who had none?" Or John Taylor - who was present at Joseph Smith's murder: Joseph Smith, the Prophet and Seer of the Lord, has done more, save Jesus only, for the salvation of men in this world, than any other man that has ever lived in it. In the short space of twenty years, he has brought forth the Book of Mormon, which he translated by the gift and power of God, and has been the means of publishing it on two continents; has sent the fulness of the everlasting gospel, which it contained, to the four quarters of the earth; has brought forth the revelations and commandments which compose this book of Doctrine and Covenants, and many other wise documents and instructions for the benefit of the children of men; gathered many thousands of the Latter-day Saints, founded a great city, and left a fame and name that cannot be slain. He lived great, and he died great in the eyes of God and his people; and like most of the Lord's anointed in ancient times, has sealed his mission and his works with his own blood. (D&C 135:3). Years after his life, Lorenzo Snow said this: "Joseph Smith, the Prophet, wit whom I was intimately acquainted for years, as well as I was with my brother, I know ... to have been a man of integrity, a man devoted to the interests of humanity and to the requirements of God all the days in which he was permitted to live. There never was a man that possessed a higher degree of integrity and more devotedness to the interest of mankind than the Prophet Joseph Smith. I dan say this from a personal acquaintance with him" (in Conference Report, April 1898, p. 64) A British scholar by the name of Arthur Henry King joined the church because of Joseph Smith's writing style. He studied and taught language stylistics at Cambridge University, and was struck with the sincerity of Joseph Smith's writing. He believed that good men - and bad men - revealed themselves in the way they expressed themselves in writing. Imagine - making a career of studying that! He has written about the genius of Joseph Smith as a writer - this New York farm boy with a 3rd-grade education. Listen to his impressions of reading an account of the First Vision: "When I was first brought to read Joseph Smith's story as recorded in the Pearl of Great Price, I was deeply impressed. I wasn't inclined to be impressed. As a stylistician, I have spent my life being disinclined to be impressed. So when I read his story, I thought to myself, this is an extraordinary thing. This is an astonishingly matter-of-fact and cool account. This man is not trying to persuade me of anything. He doesn't feel the need to. He is stating what happened to him, and he is stating it, not enthusiastically, but in quite a matter-of-fact way. He is not trying to make me cry or feel ecstatic. That struck me, and that began to build my testimony, for I could see that this man was telling the truth." (emphasis added) ( https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/study/ensign/1989/03/a-man-who-speaks-to-our-time-from-eternity?lang=eng ) Truth Has No Agenda To that end - as Joseph Smith wrote not to convince - truth doesn't seek to convince. It just sits there... being true. Truth has no competition. It really can't be argued with - unless you've become untethered from reality. Satan only has one way to effectively attack truth - attack the messenger. Joseph Smith simply said, "... I had seen a vision; I knew it, and I knew that God knew it, and I could not deny it, neither dared I do it..." (Joseph Smith History 1:25) Catch a Wave There are two waves - one is flowing into this church, and one is flowing out. The wave that flows in is focused on doctrine - eternal, unchanging doctrine. It centers on Jesus Christ and focuses on making covenants with Him. It focuses on your individual responsibility to God to be true to what you know. Not your truth; that's absurd. The truth as you know it. The wave that flows out is focused on people - the flawed nature of the human beings running the church, and the rank and file inside the church. And you can't swing a dead cat without hitting an imperfect person in this church. You get to decide which wave you want to be a part of. The wave heading out can't get past mistakes - and believe me - there are mistakes - because this church is FULL of humans who make them every day. But the wave in preaches there's a solution for those mistakes - a cure. A rescue. Jesus Christ came into this world as the only perfect human so He could be the Lamb without blemish - suffer, and die to pay eternal justice for every single mistake every made - if I will accept His gift. I love this doctrine, and I choose it. Everyone can know for himself - and choose it for himself. I invite you to do the spiritual work necessary to know for yourself - and choose the doctrine of Jesus Christ - as it was perfectly restored by an imperfect farm boy from New York.

Come Follow Me (1 Nephi 11-15) I love 1st Nephi chapter 8 - Lehi’s dream of the Tree of Life. There’s so much to study and dissect and ponder. And it would seem Heavenly Father thinks so too, because it’s one of the rare places in the Book of Mormon where not only do you get a retelling from another perspective, you get additional details and interpretation to help you with your pondering. And God bless that Nephi, by the way. I love that when his father shares some powerful spiritual knowledge with his family, Nephi goes straight to the Lord and asks, “Can I know what my dad knows, the way my dad knows it?” And because he’s serious - TRANSLATION: he means to do something with his newfound knowledge by way of obedience - the Lord generously responds. AND A HALF. I’ve always been fascinated with the image of the great and spacious building in Lehi’s dream. Back in chapter 8, we learn that it sits in the air. TRANSLATION: It’s a building without a foundation. We also learn that peer pressure isn’t a modern phenomenon. Some of the people who find their way to the tree are influenced by the mocking of those in the building, an activity which Neal A. Maxwell wryly notes is the chief preoccupation of those who reside there ( Neal A. Maxwell, "`Becometh as a Child,'" Ensign May 1996). People hate to be mocked, so mocking serves very effectively as a worldly tool for compliance. Satan uses shallow vanity to create peer pressure - with images and lifestyles of sophistication and glamor. I dare say peer pressure is at the heart of political correctness: create a culture that is desirable and sought after by the standards of the world, and brand anyone as outcasts who doesn’t have the correct attitudes, values, beliefs, possessions, titles, or education. That would become the first step of sifting into forced compliance: first create this culture which mocks any who don’t clamor after it themselves, and eventually punish those who don’t clamor after it. Mocking is the opposite of charity. And if charity is the pure love of Jesus Christ, the math seems to work out that mocking is an anti-Christ activity. All this is simply prelude to a big AHA that hit me one day while reading 1 Nephi 12:18 - where the angel interprets an image from the dream I’d never caught before: “And the large and spacious building, which thy father saw, is vain imaginations and the pride of the children of men. And a great and a terrible gulf divideth them; yea, even the word of the justice of the Eternal God, and the Messiah…” How did I miss that the gulf separating those at the tree and those in the building was an image to be interpreted? “Even the word of the justice of [God].” What is the justice of God? The principle that we will be judged. We will make an accounting to our Father and Creator for our actions in this life. That’s the ideology of the believer: my behavior must be accounted for. The ideology of the unbeliever: you answer to no one for your actions. Satan has gone to more work to obfuscate the eternal truth of accountability than possibly any other of the implacable laws of the universe. That’s the gulf. A gulf of ideologies. The gulf in the dream represents the gulf of ideologies between the world’s view of life and the actual reality of it. The reality: you will account for your choices. The illusion: you are free to do whatever you want. Satan has even wrested the term free agency by injecting the lie that our choices aren’t affixed to inevitable consequences. There has been propaganda since the first sin recorded in scripture over this concept. What did Cain say after he killed Abel? “I am free” (Moses 5:33). Satan had convinced him he was free to do what he wanted. He just left the fine print out or put it in a teeny tiny font: However - you are not free of the consequences. Cause and effect is a natural law. God must administer these unbending laws of the universe, or as Alma taught, He would “cease to be God” (Alma 42:13). But Father paid an incredibly high price to honor our agency: the life and blood of His only perfectly obedient Son - the Lamb without spot. He will not force us to follow these laws of the universe. He will only invite. Well. And also plead. But He is very clear in His warnings about consequences. He must administer them. Hence - He sent His Son. Especially for the people in the building.

Come Follow Me (1 Nephi 11-15 Part 2) The panorama of Nephi’s vision continues in 1 Nephi 13 - amazing prophecy where Nephi is shown many future events that are our history: - Christopher Columbus  - a righteous man (verse 12 - take that, history revisionists) - the settling of the colonies (verse 13-16) - the Revolutionary War (verse 17) - a record of the Jews not as big as the brass plates (verse 23 - and we thought the Old Testament was big) Chapter 13 is the first time the idea of a great and abominable church is introduced. Nephi is told the devil is the founder of this church (verse 6). With every reading of this incredible book, my understanding deepens as to what this church is - and what it isn’t. Interestingly, the people of this church are described in much the same way the people are described who inhabit the great and spacious building.  Expensive fabrics, expensive jewelry, ornate trappings. And then… harlots. Nephi mentions seeing many harlots with this observation: “…the angel spake… Behold the gold, and the silver, and the silks… and the precious clothing, and the harlots, are the desires of this great and abominable church. “And also for the praise of the world do they destroy the saints of god, and bring them down into captivity.”  (verses 8-9) Harlot was a slightly more polite way to describe a prostitute, and is considered - by the world who embraces them - to be an archaic, prudish word. But to have harlots included in the description of well-dressed people with expensive trappings is important because harlots are people who have intimate relations without the benefits of a covenant relationship.  Harlots don’t tie themselves to what they consider the restrictions of a husband. A Bridegroom. The great and abominable church is peopled by those who view covenants as binding, in the sense of no freedom.  Satan has seduced the world to believe that freedom is outside the bounds of covenants with God. The great and abominable church - his church - receives the praise of the world because in destroying God’s church, it destroys the voice of conscience in the world. The church of God is the last holdout voice in a world that has embraced a life of no accountability. If you don’t want accountability a conscience is simply pesky. A church that authentically teaches the word of God has the audacity to teach that there is such a thing as absolute good and absolute evil. If you want to be a law unto yourself (D&C 88:35), the last thing you want is for someone to tell you there are laws which can’t be disobeyed with impunity. Even the existence of other humans believing there is such a thing as sin is going to feel uncomfortable which will also feel like a restriction to such a person who has carefully practiced living a life with “no divine limits on their behavior” (Dallin H. Oaks, “Kingdoms of Glory,” General Conference, October 2023). Those voices which even suggest the idea of the reality of boundaries on behavior must be silenced. Hence - the great and abominable church fights against God by fighting against the agency of man. No wonder this is seen by Nephi as taking plain and precious truths away from the gospel! Forget about leaving only the message of salvation in scripture and deleting the message of exaltation - the whole purpose of the additional testimony from the Book of Mormon. The most plain and precious truth is that there is eternal law which defines good and evil. While in the scriptures of every major religion, this simple eternal truth is glaringly absent from the gospel of Satan and his church.  Why? “And all this have they done that they might pervert the right ways of the Lord, that they might blind the eyes and harden the hearts of the children of men.” (1 Nephi 13:27) Why would men want to blind other men’s eyes and harden their hearts?  To rule over them. When men have correct principles they can govern themselves. Not only can they, but they want to. If men need correct principles to govern themselves, that means they must be taught in correct principles for someone to rule over them.  Talk about fighting the agency of man. The principles that define God’s “church” are unmistakable in their authenticity. God honors agency, which includes accountability for its use. He provided a Savior to provide a way to be clean after the earthly experience of practicing self-government goes so horribly awry, you can’t imagine being able to ever fix it and go home again, reconciled to your beloved Father. The principles that define Satan’s “church” are equally unmistakable in their imitative counterfeit. Satan wants to destroy agency to stunt any growth towards God. He obfuscates accountability by preaching freedom from divine limits and consequences.  And no need for a savior - mankind can elevate itself to utopia - an ordered society of forced compliance rather than chosen obedience and discipline. Only two churches (1 Nephi 14:10). Zion teaches discipline to train chosen obedience. Babylon teaches no restraints which leads to forced compliance. As things continue to shake out in this crazy world,  the time for choosing one or the other feels like it’s looming larger than ever.  It’s impossible to choose both.

Did you know there were two plans? I mean two real plans - not the counterfeit plan of the destroyer - no, no. I'm talking about two plans that involve getting you and me - the fallen humans - back into the presence of God the Father and His Son, Jesus Christ. The first plan is THE plan- what the scriptures refer to as the plan of salvation, the plan of redemption, the great plan of happiness. It's the Big One - the overarching plan of our God to make us clean again after experiencing the filth of the fallen world which is the classroom of our mortality. The Main Plan centers in Jesus Christ - the Lamb of God - Father's perfectly obedient Son who came to pay the price of all our learning experiences - experiences which, ironically, and without Him - impossibly disqualify us from ever entering Father's presence again. Without Jesus Christ, God's glory is simply too much for a fallen human to abide - to tolerate. "For he who is not able to abide the law of a celestial kingdom cannot abide a celestial glory." (D&C 88:22) Without Jesus Christ to sanctify us and help us become holy, God's glory is simply too much. But with Him - we can be clean again. Because of Him, we can change. Even people who have never heard of repentance - anyone who decides to make any changes in their lives to learn and improve and climb... Even if they don't believe in Jesus Christ now, those hardy folk will one day recognize that growth and progress were - and are - and will be only possible because Jesus Christ shed blood to pay for the mortal school of experience for all of us. Faith in Jesus Christ and the Main Plan are talked about a lot at church and in home gospel lessons. While the finer points distinguishing salvation and exaltation are often muddy, most rank-and-file members of the church will tell you that because of Jesus Christ, we will be resurrected as He was, and can potentially live eternally in the presence of God. But the other plan... the other plan is much harder to nail down. The overarching plan is somehow like the blueprints of an exquisite building. Let's call it a mansion. The foundation and framework are all in place. Everything is finished to perfection. Nothing has been left to chance; every detail has been considered and planned for. But the other plan - it's uniquely yours, and yours alone. It's the plan for your life, tailored to your intelligence and spirit, and designed to give you the ideal testing experience for your optimum growth - exaltation. It was the plan roughly sketched with you and Father before this life, thanks to foreordination ( NOT predestination! Let's not go there). This plan is filled out in more detail as the days of your life unfold, choices are made, and mortality does its work in your curriculum to teach you all the things Father sent you here to learn and become. He was - and IS - personally, intimately involved in this plan as surely as He was the Author of the overarching plan that applies to all of us. At the risk of revealing too much, I feel to ask: is it just me, or is your plan super messy, and seems at any time to be completely off the rails? Do you feel like it's a bit of a train wreck on any given day? Do you feel like you're struggling with the same test questions over and over and over again, like a real-life version of the movie Groundhog Day ? Is it ever challenging to see the hand of God in this sketched out plan that's still being written in mortal time for us here - and hard to see any eternal value and purpose in any of it? Sometimes it feels like this beautiful template of the Main Plan doesn't fit over the vague, still-being-written, smudged and tear-splattered blueprints of my life. How is this all going to turn out? The worst of these times is when I'm waiting: for answers, for my own growth, for someone else's - and dang, that means their agency to change as well - for relief, for healing, for different outcomes, for a harvest of any fruit at all after years of planting, digging, and pruning. Waiting means that making sense of my blueprint and reconciling it to the blueprint of the Main Plan often creates a cognitive dissonance that seems completely irreconcilable. If it were a movie, these are the parts where we muttered in the dark theater, "This is never gonna work out." I would humbly submit that having faith in this space is the very most challenging - and crucial - faith to develop. This is faith inside the space of that cognitive dissonance - in the space between our faith in the Main Plan and the uncertainty we feel on any given Tuesday about it all working out and showing up in our plan. I'm learning - slowly, glacially slowly learning - that this space is the most sacred ground I walk. If I can hang on to God when I don't know, when I'm sure I've wrecked everything, when there is no fruit in spite of planting, then I enable God to help me in developing unshakable faith that He can do amazing things with. This is where miracles are born. And sometimes, the miracle isn't... the miracle. Sometimes, the miracle is what God forges in the waiting. Sometimes, it's learning to thank God for the miracle... in advance of the miracle, trusting the Giver of all good things, knowing this is a Father who gives bread and stones - fish and serpents. ( https://www.laureensimper.com/post/let-me-tell-you-about-my-god-how-much-more ) Something is being built while we wait, while we don't know the answer, while we get it wrong, while we weep. If we weep with Jesus, He'll weep with us. He'll stay with us, and quietly creates a bond to lend us His strength to get through all of it. He promised: "In the world ye shall have tribulation: but be of good cheer; I have overcome the world." (John 16:33) The challenge in having faith in both plans is putting into the proper light the purpose of both, and trusting the architect of both. Here is the perspective of two of my favorite writers, thinkers, and disciples in all the wide, wide world. Neal A. Maxwell reminds us of the importance of patience in the waiting: "Patience is a willingness, in a sense, to watch the unfolding purposes of God with a sense of wonder and awe, rather than pacing up and down within the cell of our circumstances." (Neal A. Maxwell, Patience, BYU Devotional, November 27, 1979) ( https://speeches.byu.edu/talks/neal-a-maxwell/patience/ ) C.S. Lewis (who saw that coming??) reminds us of why we wait in the discomfort and sorrow of mortality: "Imagine yourself as a living house. God comes in to rebuild that house. At first, perhaps, you can understand what He is doing. He is getting the drains right and stopping the leaks in the roof and so on; you knew that those jobs needed doing and so you are not surprised. "But presently He starts knocking the house about in a way that hurts abominably and does not seem to make any sense. What on earth is He up to? The explanation is that He is building quite a different house from the one you thought of - throwing out a new wing here, putting on an extra floor there, running up towers, making courtyards. "You thought you were being made into a decent little cottage: but He is building a palace. He intends to come and live in it Himself." (C.S. Lewis, Mere Christianity) God is up to building humans, in covenant partnership with Him. From everything I see of what He's built, I trust He's up to something quite beautiful when He's finished, in spite of the oh-so-raw material He started with. Thanks to Jesus.

This picture is from a few years ago. Until mission season hit, these two cute ladies and I would retreat once a year to a beautiful cabin in the mountains and sew. It's our thing. We take turns fixing meals for each other, sew our guts out, talk our tongues off or watch favorite movies, catch up with each others' lives and solve all the world's problems, and make quilts - quilts which at home, interrupted with that pesky thing we call Life, would take weeks or even months to finish. But give these three women a few uninterrupted days with a sewing machine and shared irons, and LOOK OUT. We are women with sewing machines, hear them roar. If you stop to think about it, don't you love having shared things with certain people? Take my grandson, for instance. He's only been mine a few years, but when I first met him, we bonded over brownies, and now, cooking is our thing. We've swapped recipes ever since and enjoyed cooking or baking together whenever we get the chance, living as far away from each other as we do. My heart turned over last year when I got a text from him - twelve by then, saying, "Lulu, I think I found a recipe better than our brownies." Followed by a screen shot of his hand-written recipe. He was right. This past Thanksgiving, we also discovered that roller coasters is our thing. And what a thing it was, when we actually got to ride one of our favorites two times in a row. I love having shared things with people - books, music, scriptures, following world events, quilting, cooking, sourdough - it doesn't seem to matter what it is, but to have a shared thing bring you together is the perfect spark to start a friendship - a relationship. True Things seem to make the things you don't have in common not seem to matter so much. At least, that's the way true Things should work. You don't even have to have a full-blown relationship with someone to have a thing with them. The way you connect with the grocery store clerk, the mailman, a person in line - anytime you acknowledge you share a Thing with another person, you close the gap of loneliness in this cold ol' dark and dreary world. You're not quite as isolated as you were a minute ago. It's so worth looking for those things - enjoying them, and even celebrating them for a little minute. You'll recognize this in your very best friendships and relationships, too: those you have the very most Things with are those you love the very most and enjoy spending time with more than anyone else. When you think about it, no wonder; you need to spend time together to get to all of the Things. So I ask this not at all rhetorically: do you have a Thing with God? Because if you don't, I would really encourage you to find one. Having even one thing with Him is a complete delight. For instance, if you have a thing for sunsets, let me ask you: where do you think you get that? From the One who does an art project in the sky each and every night, that's who. When your heart drops or wrenches in a gorgeous piece of music, know that the Creator of music feels the same way about the music He inspired. When you feel complete joy and exhilaration at going fast - where do you think you get that? The Creator of the universe and all things speedy. No way He doesn't feel the thrill of fast. When you are moved to tears by something beautiful or tragic - or both - know that you get that from the One who sees the beauty and tragedy - and triumph - of every life. You get that from Him. Ask Enoch. When you create something and feel the deep satisfaction of the creative process as well as the end product, remember: you get that from the Creator who paused after each creative period to pronounce it "good." When no one else appreciates something you find hilarious - know that our Father has the best sense of humor in the universe. He created us , after all! Every single eccentric thing you possess, all the Things which make you certain you are an alien on an exile planet, all of this makes better sense when we know He made us that very way - the way He is. We share His DNA - which is most definitely a Thing. Because He is God - He is ALL of the Things. And because He is all of the Things, He craves having a Thing with each of His precious children - whom He created, nurtured, misses as He's sent them off to school - and craves being with - the way every parent craves being with their children. Father in Heaven is waiting for us to discover the Things we share with Him - the things we both enjoy - so we can have a real relationship. One day when I was having a chat with Heavenly Father (aka praying), I said something that I swear felt like an inside joke about the unique weirdness that is me. I ruefully, wryly chuckled to myself. Right in the prayer. Because that's a Thing Father and I have talked about often - how hard it must be for Him to teach me because of that particular weirdness He baked in right along with my good stuff, I fancy I sort of felt Him chuckle, right along with me. Because we've discussed Him helping me in spite of the weakness, it's kind of like we have a Thing there. I've actually said in prayers, when asking Him to short circuit and send help in spite of me, "You know you You're dealing with, Sir." Because seriously, if He doesn't - the Being who created me - who does? It's our Thing - how is Father going to work around my weaknesses to send me the help He always promises to send when I'm trying? Now that is one of the mysteries. The more joy and beauty I discover - even the more heartache and homesickness I feel - every time I am hard at work processing this strange fallen planet I live on, trying to make sense of it, and what am I even doing here? - I feel the One who created me, sent me, and tailored the private curriculum of my life - encouraged that I'm on the brink of finding yet another Thing in common with Him. He waits and hopes that I've discovered another place where He can enter my story, and be a part of it. Father in Heaven and Jesus Christ are in "relentless pursuit of you" - because Their intent is to bring you home. ( https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/study/general-conference/2024/04/45kearon?lang=eng ) I ask again - and not rhetorically: do you have a Thing with God? Because if you don't, I would really encourage you to find one. As I said, having just one Thing with Him is a complete delight. Having many Things is a relationship. Having all of the Things? That's the most magnificent relationship worth nurturing that you will ever have. My life has been so much richer with Him in it, and the more Things we have, the more I feel His relentless pursuit of me. Feeling Someone so mighty and grand loving you like that changes everything.