Our Wisconsin Ward lost no time in putting us to work. Bryan was called to be the Sunday School teacher for the 12-year-olds (and he'll be taking the 13-year-olds for the next few weeks as well) and I'm serving as the Laurel Adviser. The Young Women in this Ward are fantastic and I'm really enjoying the calling.
The boys have been serving as well. Cooper has given a talk in Primary and both boys have shared a time when they chose the right.
And I spoke in church yesterday.
When the Bishop asked if I would speak, I had the briefest moment where I thought "I just spoke in May! And I'm crazy busy! And I'm teaching Young Women!", but I said yes anyway. My topic was the worth of souls and I was the last speaker. I had to do a bit of rewriting as the two speakers before me gave bits and pieces of my talk, but apparently Bryan and I were the only ones that noticed the overlap.
For posterity and because it's tradition, I'm going to include my talk as today's post. It's five-minutes shorter than my last talk, just in case you're on the fence about reading it.
And thanks go to my brother Jordan. He called to talk while I was working on it and helped me brainstorm.
The One
4 What man
of you, having an hundred sheep, if he lose one of them, doth not leave the
ninety and nine in the wilderness, and go after that which is lost, until he
find it?
5 And when he hath found it, he layeth it on
his shoulders, rejoicing.
6 And when he cometh home, he calleth together
his friends and neighbours, saying unto them, Rejoice with me; for I have found
my sheep which was lost.
Have you
ever lost anything? I have. Lots of things. In high school I was notorious for
going to seminary wearing a jacket and coming home without one, having no idea
of course where the coat disappeared to.
Since then
I’ve gotten better about keeping track of my belongings, but I still lose
things. Most recently, the things I’ve lost haven’t been things at all. And
they haven’t had anything to do with my ditziness. No, I’ve recently had a few
experiences where I lost one or two of my children. They don’t know they’re
lost, they think they’re playing a fun run and hide or run and chase game. But
these are not games that I enjoy playing. And during the minutes that I’m
searching for them, I am praying constantly, “Please help me find them. Please
help them to be safe.” As a parent it is truly terrifying knowing that your
children are lost.
Every night
I sing the song I Am a Child of God to my daughter before she goes to sleep.
Think about the words of the second verse, “I am a Child of God and so my needs
are great, help me to understand his words before it grows too late.” While I
am actively concerned for the physical well-being of my children, and I am
equally, if not more-so, concerned for their spiritual well-being. And I know
that I’m not the only one. The first words of this inspired hymn are I am a
Child of God. That means that Heavenly Father as a Heavenly parent is just as
concerned as I am.
President
Dieter F. Uchtdorf spoke of our Father in Heaven’s concern for his children in
last October’s General Conference. His
talk, You Matter to Him, began:
“Moses, one of the greatest prophets the world has ever
known, was raised by Pharaoh’s daughter and spent the first 40 years of his
life in the royal halls of Egypt. He knew firsthand the glory and grandeur of
that ancient kingdom.
Years later, on the top of a distant mountain, far removed
from the splendor and magnificence of mighty Egypt, Moses stood in the presence
of God and spoke to Him face to face as a man speaks with his friend. During
the course of that visitation, God showed Moses the workmanship of His hands,
granting him a glimpse of His work and glory. When the vision ended, Moses fell
to the earth for the space of many hours. When his strength finally returned,
he realized something that, in all his years in Pharaoh’s court, had never
occurred to him before.
“I know,” he said, “that man is nothing.””
President Uchtdorf goes on to say “This is a paradox of man:
compared to God, man is nothing; yet we are everything to God.” He references
Moses chapter 1 verse 39 which reads:
39 For behold, this is my work and my glory—to bring to pass
the immortality and eternal life of man.
That’s our immortality and our eternal life.
I began my
talk by quoting Luke chapter 15. Jesus is teaching his disciples the parable of
the ninety-and-nine. Let’s replace a few words in verse 4.
4 What man of you, having children, if he lose
one of them, doth not leave the others in the wilderness, and go after that which
is lost, until he find it?
Now think of
that verse from Heavenly Father’s perspective. Everyone who has ever lived and
everyone who ever will live is his child. He loves us. He wants us to be safe
and whole. Just as I don’t want to lose my children, He doesn’t want to lose
us.
But
sometimes we wander off. Sometimes we get distracted. Sometimes, like my
children, we take off running after something that looks interesting, ignoring
the calls and pleas to come back. And we don’t realize that we are lost until
we look behind us and see that there are no familiar faces smiling and waving
at us to return.
Sometimes we
are not the ones who wander at all. We might be holding fast to the gospel,
reading our scriptures daily, attending our meetings, paying our tithing. And
then we look around and we see that the family that used to sit by us in
Sacrament meeting has stopped coming. Or the sister you visit teach has decided
to stay home on Sunday.
Let’s
rewrite Luke 15: 4 again:
4 What man
of you, having an hundred friends and acquaintances, if he lose one of them,
doth not leave the ninety and nine in the wilderness, and go after that which
is lost, until he find it?
We know that
we must go after our children, but do we really need to go after someone we
might only know in passing? Or someone that we don’t know at all?
In the July
2009 Ensign President Monson shared a story that he had heard from Marvin O.
Ashton, a former Presiding Bishop of the church.
"Picture with
me, if you will, a farmer driving a large open-bed truck filled with sugar
beets en route to the sugar refinery. As the farmer drives along a bumpy dirt
road, some of the sugar beets bounce from the truck and are strewn along the
roadside. When he realizes he has lost some of the beets, he instructs his
helpers, “There’s just as much sugar in those which have slipped off. Let’s go
back and get them!” …Those that have fallen out of the truck represent men and
women, youth and children who, for whatever reason, have fallen from the path
of activity. Paraphrasing the farmer’s comments concerning the sugar beets, I
say of these souls, precious to our Father and our Master: “There’s just as
much value in those who have slipped off. Let’s go back and get them!”"
Whether
they’ve slipped off or run off, it is up to us to go find them. President
Monson described the souls of those that are missing from our midst as
“precious.”
Doctrine and
Covenants section 18 verse 10 says:
10 Remember
the worth of souls is great in the sight of God;
So President
Uchtdorf, President Monson and the Doctrine and Covenants have all told us that
the worth of each of us is great to God. And because each of us is important to
Heavenly Father, shouldn’t we be important to each other?
Reading a
few verses down in section 18:
15 And if it
so be that you should labor all your days in crying repentance unto this people,
and bring, save it be one soul unto me, how great shall be your joy with him in
the kingdom of my Father!
One soul.
Remember Luke 15? Jesus taught them to leave then 99 and go after the one. I’ve
done this with my children. We went to a park in Oshkosh during our first week
in Wisconsin. It had been a good day and I was just talking to the kids about
heading home. Suddenly Cooper, my four-year-old, bolted. I grabbed the stroller
and took off after him, calling for my six-year-old to follow. I was running as
fast as I could, but I knew that I’d never catch him while I had the stroller.
I told my oldest to stay with his sister and I ran. I was a few feet away when
Cooper turned and ran into the street. Heart pounding and asthma raging, I
closed the gap and grabbed him before an approaching car reached him. I can
tell you that when I had Cooper in my arms again, my joy was indeed great.
Section 18
verse 16 says
16 And now, if your joy will be great with one
soul that you have brought unto me into the kingdom of my Father, how great
will be your joy if you should bring many souls unto me!
It’s up to
us to bring back those that have wandered. But how?
In an Ensign
article from 1983, Elder Joseph B. Wirthlin gave us some important keys to
bringing our fellow saints back into activity.
- 1. We must prepare ourselves to teach
and have a humble and prayerful attitude and understand the importance of our
work.
- 2. We must build real friendships with
those we want to teach.
- 3. We must understand that our timing
might not be the timing that the Lord has in mind,
- 4. And so we must have patience.
- 5. We must involve them in other ways,
give them a responsibility.
- 6. We must follow the guidance of the
Holy Ghost because each person, each situation is different.
Remember
that the worth of souls is great in the sight of God. I think of the joy I felt
when I pulled Cooper out of the street. And then I try to imagine the joy that
Heavenly Father will feel when we return to him. I wonder if he will hold us in
his arms the way I held my son, thankful that we have come home.
4 What man
of you, having an hundred sheep, if he lose one of them, doth not leave the
ninety and nine in the wilderness, and go after that which is lost, until he
find it?
5 And when he hath found it, he layeth it on
his shoulders, rejoicing.
6 And when he cometh home, he calleth together
his friends and neighbours, saying unto them, Rejoice with me; for I have found
my sheep which was lost.
I leave you
with my testimony that these things are true. We are children of God. He loves
us. He wants us to return to him. I know that it is our responsibility, our
duty to go find those that have wandered, to be their friend, and to invite
them back. As we do this, our joy will be great. I say these things in the name
of Jesus Christ, amen.
