love one another

“Love one another

As I have loved you

Love one another “

This was the theme of my younger son’s mission. He asked his six year- old sister to play this hymn and sing it for his farewell.

This theme can be found in other New Testament scriptures and in the Book of Mormon.

John 13:34  “ A new commandment I give unto you, That ye love one another; as I have loved you, that ye also love one another.”

John 15:12- This is my commandment, That ye love one another, as I have loved you.

Mosiah 4:15 But ye will teach them to walk in the ways of truth and soberness; ye will teach them to love one another, and to serve one another.

We have been encouraged to learn to be better ministers to our families, friends, and others around us this year, and have been learning ways we can do this. I love going out to my front garden when I know my friends are coming over and cut the dead flowers off the rose bushes because, knowing them, they will just start helping. Sunshine, fresh air, good conversation, and the smell of roses; what better way is there to spend a happy hour.

My husband and I just got back from our first real vacation in four years. We went on a river cruise from St Louis Missouri to Nashville Tennessee. The ship, a paddle wheeler, was full of older couples like us. The staff consisted of young adults just out of high school to early twenties.  It was fun to see the interactions between the generations. The young people were learning to care for and about others; and the others, mostly grandparents were enjoying being served and cared for by such happy people. Little things happened like holding doors open; hiding a favorite desert for someone at their table so they wouldn’t run out; learning about families and difficult experiences to give encouragement; helping hands for the unsteady going down the gangplank; pushing a wheelchair for an exhausted traveler; encouraging the youth to hang in there and don’t quit a hard job early though they thought they couldn’t follow through.

On the last day hugs and good byes filled the dining area.

Even the adults were anxious to help each other. Though strangers at the beginning of the trip, there were groups of friends at the end of the week. One woman didn’t know how to send text messages on her new I phone. We took care of that. One man fell in the parking lot. It took twelve people to help him up again, but they accomplished it. One person wanted a picture of a superb quilt but didn’t have a camera. Another took one and emailed it to her. Another found an implement to hold Hor d’oeuvres together that she thought she could use to teach crafts to some the people with dementia that she worked with. Every day, every meal everyone brought theirs to her.

There are hard things you can do like helping towns after a hurricane

There are simple things like when my son-in law makes sandwiches for the homeless in the park he practices in.

There are kind things, like waving to or smiling at neighbors on the street. What can you do today?

Indexing

Last summer, (August ’17) a friend challenged my husband to read the Old Testament straight through, beginning to end. We both took up the challenge, I reading the complete standard works of my church, and he reading the old testament from three different translations. I succeeded in my challenge in August ‘18, but again I was confused by  Malachi 4:6.

“And he shall turn the heart of the fathers to the children and the heart of the children to their fathers, lest I come and smite the earth with a curse”

I know it has to do with family history; but besides wanting to know more about my family, and wishing I had asked my parents before it was too late, was there something I was missing?

This week our church group of women and girls challenged the men and boys to a contest in Indexing for one month. Indexing is an opportunity to transfer government records to computer files so people will be able to access them to do their genealogy.

With dread, I thought, “Okay I can do this for a month”. Anything for the cause.

I started with beginners. The draft records from World War I, “Ho Hum, way before my time.” But, my mind started drifting as I was typing. My husband’s father was in WW I, I wish I’d known him and heard his stories. He use to walk around down town Richmond, VA, and talk to the Civil war vets that still survived. What stories they had! By the third batch, I was thinking of my uncles in WWII. Three of my father’s younger brothers enlisted. Imagine how their mother felt to have nearly half of her living children off to war at the same time, and against the country of her birth! One of them did not survive. 

Today I started a batch of cemetery records. One family had a child die in infancy, another was a still birth, then the father from the flu. It reminded me of my father’s mother. Her first daughter died at two with a heart ailment, her second at birth. Because of the flue Pandemic, my grandmother was in quarantine at home. The midwife outside the bedroom window yelling instructions. Her third daughter had a heart attack at age twelve. How grateful I am for the advances in medicine.

My heart has indeed turned to my fathers. I will stay with the indexing and try to find out more about our families, and extended families. I’m hooked! But really! What does it mean when a one month, four- day old child dies of a “Summer Complaint” in 1915?

What do you know about your great-grand parents?

Help!

 

Today

My soul

Feels full of holes

My life seems incomplete

I cannot say that I’ve fulfilled

The goals I planned to meet

I begged

My God

To answer me

Why is my life so torn?

I’m here. He said to bring you light

--My reason to be born

Hope Flickers

Run

Run

Run

Run

Like a bunny having fun

 Run

Take a breath

Deep breath

Breathe

Hyicynths

Spruce

Orange Blossoms

Cows?

Get outdoors. Do it now!

Be one with nature

Feel the sun

Feel the Son

Listen to the beauty of His Music

Be a seed

A God in Embryo

Ready to emerge

A diamond

Reaching

Longings

Having a particularly stressful morning on my birthday, (I woke up to an Email that the last leg of our vacation was being cancelled; and my computer had been invaded): I cried out in frustration. My husband, ready to fight off dragons, said “What can I do?”

“Chocolate I yelled! Bring me chocolate!”

Do you ever have cravings? I do! When I’m frustrated, when I’m sad, when I’m lonely, when I’m mad, I crave chocolate! I read this year that it has some of the same properties as an opioid!

I found a chapter of one of the books that I am currently reading, interesting. The author, Nichole Johnson says,

“You were made for more than this world has to offer you. Our yearning, longings , cravings, and hopes are telling us something: there is not enough love, peace, hope, friendship and intimacy on this earth to satisfy us. We will always want more.”

“Longings-- Coming face to face with the fact that there are empty places in our lives that haven’t been filled.

Yearning—wanting more than we have.

Cravings—The hope of finding something That will satisfy the rumblings in the stomach of our soul”

“It’s true, what we don’t have shapes us more than what we have. We are like Swiss cheese, and the holes in us are actually supposed to be there. The holes are the things that make us who we are. The holes are the places God has reserved in us for Himself! The longings identify our real hunger. A hunger that drives us to Him to be satisfied. If…big If… we listen….”

Fresh Brewed Life Nichole Johnson

Thomas Nelson Publishers Nashville TN 1999

My daughter and her husband long to buy a house. I asked, “What are you willing to give up to meet that goal?

I want to have a grandchild. If that is not possible, what can I do to compensate for that craving? Volunteer with youth groups? Teach classes? Find ways to serve mothers with children? Become an advocate for children who need help?

Many in our country today are afraid. They fear strangers; they fear the economy failing;

They fear they won’t get theirs. They fear the government. They fear God. What can we do to bring back hope into our world? What can we do to get out of the depression we seem to be sinking into—to achieve our longings? Prayer is the only answer. Whether we believe or not, we must let God fill the holes in our souls. He has longings too. He wants us back.

I love you. 

Think about it!

And The Wheels Keep Turning

And the wheels keep turning

I love the beauty of morning rides;

The sunshine rising over the mountains,

Creeks trickeling and babbeling  as

I ride the trail.

Sometimes

Friends and family join me.

Their joy in nature brings happiness to

My soul.

Their uprightness and integrity

Lighten my dreary burdens

As we struggle towards the sunset,

And the atonement.

Even God’s mighty eagles head home

To rest.

And I will ride on

Till the wheels stop turning

National Day of?

Did you know that there is a calendar with National Day of’s for every day of the year?

I think it’s fun to check every once in a while, to see what people are celebrating. Today is National Sewing Machine day. I think I’ll go sew a quilt top after I weed my garden of course. It’s also National Weed your Garden Day.

Today is also my sister’s birthday. Life would not have been as much fun or meaningful without her.

We have shared many experiences together—like the time we were riding our bikes down town and my tire popped. I had filled it too full. Or the time we were roller skating down the hill and my skate wheel fell off! Or the time we were sledding on the same sled. I was steering and ran her into the guardrail on the edge of the street. I think I’m a klutz. By the way it’s also National Klutz in the Kitchen Day. I’m staying out.

I love my little sister and wish we could see each other more often. Technology improvements in our lifetime has made communication opportunities easier, but it’s more fun to be with her than texting.  We also have “sisters” in our communities, neighborhoods, and churches that we can love and share memories with. I’ve met the new neighbors who are building their house next door to mine. They are fun and brought along another neighbor down the street to meet. We felt an instant closeness, just like sisters. Reach out this week and find a “sister of the heart”, and spend some time with them. It’s a beautiful summer day.

Tomorrow, June 14,is National Pop Goes the Weasel Day. How are you going to celebrate?