Today, I mistakenly thought it was fast Sunday, but I decided to continue my fast once I discovered my error, and I got a lot out of it. Church was particularly good today. Audrey Hansen spoke on using the Atonement as a gift from God to help us through life, and in Elder’s Quorum, I learned more about selfless service.
At home, Lily and I talked a lot about the church, which was both stressful and expanding for me. I love her and her integrity and depth of thought. I also got some rest.
For dinner, I finally got the salmon right :). The last two times I was a bit off in how I cooked it. They key was to not multi-task while grilling.
Over dinner, we discussed Matthew 13 and had an interesting conversation about why Christ taught in parables. On the one hand, it seems he taught in parables so people could use daily life experiences reflected in the parables as a way to access and understand the expansive and at times abstract principles he was trying to teach; principles that would otherwise be hard to grasp. On the other hand, Jesus explains in Matthew 13 that the reason he taught in parables was to make them hard to understand for certain audiences. My personal conclusion is that Christ taught in parables to both make us have to work to understand them, and to make the message more clear once we have put in the work to understand them. I think when Christ teaches us in a way that forces us to work for the answer, it allows us to better appreciate and remember the insights and knowledge we get, because the struggle creates in us a richer soil for receiving the word. I feel this also applies to the Emily Dickinson’s poem, “To hear an Oriole sing” which we read over dinner yesterday. If Emily Dickinson would have just written, “It is the beauty within you that clothes the sights and sounds you hear with their beauty” I likely would have thought was very insightful and moved on. But because Emily Dickinson put that concept in a parabolic puzzle that we had to sort, de-tangle, and struggle to translate, I was doubly impacted by the meaning. As Thomas Paine said, “we esteem to lightly that which we obtain to cheaply.” By making His disciples work for the meaning of parables, Christ both enabled them to esteem the lessons more highly, and he also made the lessons more accessible (because of their relationship to every day life) once they were uncovered. This theory is one of the few ways I can make sense of Matthew 13:15. Jesus doesn’t want people to understand His word, or even receive His word, unless they are in a position to appreciate it, and esteem it as having great worth. By gating his word and making it available only to those who work for it, he ensures that when His word is received, it is valued, and ideally, implemented.
After dinner, there was a wonderful lesson about the good Samaritan from Georgia and the kids. Here is an adorable video of their performance:
We also played picture sherades
After putting the kids to bed, Carolyn Blosil, the Relief Society President visited with Lily and me. We had a two hour conversation that was so richly nourishing. She was so loving, accepting, wise and enjoyable. Lily and I were both richly blessed by her visit. Then I played guitar while Lily massaged her mom’s feet and chatted with her.
***Sunday Testimony***
When I was in Rome on a Europe trip with my friends and brother, I brought with me a church book to help prepare me for my mission. In that book, there was a section that discussed the doctrine from my church that I have a mother in Heaven, who is my God, just as my Father in Heaven is. In that section, I read the words from the song “O My Father” “In the heav’ns are parents single? No, the thought makes reason stare! Truth is reason; truth eternal Tells me I’ve a mother there.” When I read that phrase, right there in the center of Rome, I had the spirit witness to me powerfully that I do indeed have a Mother in Heaven. I don’t know much about her, or how to incorporate Her into my life. I really need and want to go deeper into that relationship. But for the time being, I at least want to testify, that I KNOW SHE IS THERE!