This blog is a serious attempt to create something of everlasting value to my children and my grandchildren and so on down the generations as they come to pass. I have been known to speak out, informed or uninformed, listener beware, about and on many varied topics and occasionally with some eccentric points of view.
Setting that aside for now as another separate piece of work it is important for each of you to know and understand that I am in fact full of faith and commitment to obtaining all of the promised blessings of the covenants I have entered into with God the Father and His son Jesus Christ.
If you read in the book of Mormon in the 1st chapter of Jacob you will find something of which I am speaking when Jacob is instructed of what types of things to record on the small plates which his older brother Nephi had entrusted to him (Jacob 1:2-4). Therefore, this record that it might fulfill my most important responsibility to you as your Father, your Grandfather, and so on.
After many attempts to arrive at the best forum and medium for conveying the most precious and valuable thoughts and feelings of my heart and soul. I have concluded that this blog might just be the place to compile and memorialize such things for the benefit of my personal posterity. I would like to direct your individual and collective desires and actions to follow the path that will bless your life now and through the eternity to come.
Remember this from Matthew 22:
34 ¶But when the Pharisees had heard that he had put the Sadducees to silence, they were gathered together.
37 Jesus said unto him, Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind.
Regarding the first.
Trying the best I could and not doing so perfectly I want you to know that while I do love God with all of my heart, my heart seems to have many, many facets with edges that have needed to be smoothed out over my life's experiences. These facets and my heart will and can only become perfect through the atonement of Christ and my repentent efforts to improve and change, sometimes one facet at a time, sometimes this comes only when the spirit really helps me recognize the need and helps me achieve the true desire to improve.
When one attempts to change their heart I have heard and I have learned that it is true both physically, as in the case of a heart transplant, and spiritually, as in the case of myself and most of us, that when we attempt to change our heart, maybe call it repent, there is a natural force of rejection that begins to take place. Physically, there are drugs and medicine to assist with this. Spiritually, there is faith and perserverance and the strength that God bless us with as we continue to try. Always continue to try! Never give up on repenting of what you need to, please!
Regarding the second.
Only when I became more aware of the unconditional love of God and Christ for me did I become able to love myself as a divine son of God. This is a challenge as well because I had to accept my imperfections and weaknesses along with the true knowledge and belief that again Christ could help me become clean and pure and unspotted from the trials and tribulations of this world.
Then, knowing this I have tried as best I could to love others as I love myself. I regard others, all others, as equally important and valuable in the sight of God and worthy of my efforts to love and serve them whenever and wherever I find myself able to do so. And, when I find myself moved upon by the Spirit to recognize and understand the promptings to do so.
This has taken shape primarily and principally in the form of love and service to my dear companion Melanie, our children, our grandchildren, then our extended families, then our friends and those we associate with at work, church, etc. and finally to love and serve those that God simply puts in my path day by day.
Now then, proceeding on, I have no other desire nor ambition in mind other than to reunite with all of you at the proper time in such a state of proper preparation, obedience, and performance as to truly be worthy of the infinite atoning sacrifice of Jesus Christ and a glorious celestial resurrection.
This way we might obtain and enjoy the covenant blessings we have been promised that we might be blessed together with our family relationships intact and together returning to our Heavenly Father's presence to be blessed with exaltation and eternal life, the greatest of all the gifts of God (D&C 14:7).
May God bless you as you read these things with a witness of the spirit by the power of the Holy Ghost (Moroni 10:5) that you might be true to the faith that our parents have cherished and true to the faith for which martyrs have perished. Be true to this faith that in my weakness I have tried to uphold and turn into marvelous and glorious hope for joy and happiness.
This work will now commence with a direct reference to my faith as my reflection, testimony, and commentary on the 'Articles of Faith' of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints.
I memorized them as a child, then lost the word for word only remembering the concepts. Later on I've come to use an acronym to assist me in my recollection of which one was which and then on our mission to South Africa, Melanie and I recited them every third day to each other, a pattern we shall continue as long as we are coherent and together!
Here's the Acronym: GTAP HOGB RTWK 13
Here's the interpretation set in key words:
- Godhead
- Transgressions
- Atonement
- Principles
- Hands
- Organization
- Gifts
- Bible
- Revelation
- Ten Tribes
- Worship
- Kings
- 13, the long one.
Here's the Acronym in my silly talk way of remembering:
- GTAP - Gitty up
- HOGB - Hog back
- RTWK - Return to work
- 13 - the long one at the end
