This weekend was very packed. Here's the run down on what I did.

Friday, after work, I went straight to the cannery where I got 16 boxes (six cans per box) of food storage. This time we got beans, sugar, rice, flour, carrots, onions, and probably some other stuff I can't remember. Hopefully that is enough to keep us stalked for awhile. I didn't get home until after 10 p.m.

On Saturday I got up at 4:15 a.m. to go to the 6:30 a.m. temple session. When I got home I mowed and trimmed the lawn while the rest of the family washed the cars. When that was done we went to Bellevue for our niece's birthday party at Chucky Cheese. After the party we brought the kids home and Bridget and I went back to Bellevue (for my third time that day) for an art auction. We didn't buy anything, but it was fun going...mostly because of the free steak dinner they gave us.

Today I went to church, came home and immediately went out home teaching. After coming home, eating lunch, and taking a nap, I went back to the church to work on membership record stuff. It should be nice going back to work tomorrow so I can get a rest.

I'll post pics later when Bridget can tell me where the camara is :o)

The Truth Shall Make You Free

I have been listening to a lot of talk radio lately and, of course, the 2008 elections are always being talked about. The thought occured to me that if everybody knew the truth that there wouldn't be nearly as much contention. For example, if people knew that using corn for ethanol would drive the price of food up or that it was an inefficient use of land then they would be less likely to advocate its use. If everybody knew all the pros and cons of government actions then I think the public opinion would be much less divisive. This thought process got me to thinking that that is probably why people outside of the church often think of the members as not being free thinkers or not having our own opinions. Of course we do have our own opinions, it's just that we also have the truth, which leads most of us to want the same things and behave in similar ways. And what a blessing it is that we can trust our leaders to want the same things as us and not have to worry about poor decisions being made.

On another note, I went to the cannery yesterday to stock up on wheat for our food storage. There is a world shortage of wheat and the church is keeping the prices down (much less than market value) for awhile. It is expected that the price will probably raise in August, or thereabouts. The church buys a large portion of its wheat from an LDS farmer so either that farmer is selling below market or the church is eating part of the cost. Either way, it is cheap...for now. Brigham Young once said, "The time will come that gold will hold no comparison in value to a
bushel of wheat." (Brigham Young, in Journal of Discourses, vol. 1, p.
250, 1943 ed., p. 298.) It seems like more and more lately I have been hearing about the urgency to gather up food storage and to be prepared. Hopefully we are doing enough as a family and as members of the church to fulfill this obligation.

Mar 23, 2008

Happy Easter everybody. I was listening to Glenn Beck Friday on the radio (for those of you who don't know, he is an LDS political talk show guy http://www.glennbeck.com/) and he was telling the story of the cruxifiction of Jesus overlayed with a Pink Floyd song (don't worry, it was tastefully done). Glenn made a comment about how hard it must have been to describe the scene of His crucifixtion as noted in the four gospels of the New Testament that write only, "and they crucified him." The thought of trying to write about that event brought a sudden, and unexpected, burst of tears to my eyes. I can't imagine being responsible for the task of recording such a terrible event. Anyway, I just wanted to copy some of Glenn's transcript that day since it's Easter and I think it was a powerful message.

"I can't get into detail because it's personal in my family, but this has been one of the hardest years for me. This has been a very difficult year for me and my family and many nights in the last two months have not ended until 2:00 in the morning with my family around the kitchen table. And just this week one of my children said something, as all teenagers do, that was hurtful and I said, you know what, this stops, this stops and this stops right here until you figure out what to do with what just happened.

Well, it took her a few days but she came to me and in about 20 minutes she hemmed and hawed and I didn't say a word. I just let her talk. And she did everything but say 'I'm sorry,' but I knew she wanted to and I knew if I just shut up long enough, she would say it, and she did. Took 20 minutes. She finally stopped and she said, 'I'm really sorry, Dad.' I got up and hugged her and she immediately burst out into tears. And what was so shocking to me was her response. As she was crying, she said, 'It can't be this easy.' I said, 'Honey, you've made it so hard. It hasn't been easy, but it is this easy.' In all of life, all it requires is recognizing the problem, recognizing the pain, recognizing the frustration, working through it. And as you make mistakes along the way just stopping and honestly saying, 'I'm sorry.' And that's really what Easter is all about, much more important than Christmas. That's about the birth. But if it didn't happen, what happened this weekend, if that didn't happen, the birth would just be another baby. It's about the death and about the resurrection and about what that means, and what that means is, oh, my gosh, it's so easy. We make it so tough. We make it so hard. We wallow in our pain or we ignore our pain when all we have to really do is just sincerely say, 'I'm sorry,' really mean it and it all goes away."

Here is an interview where Glenn tells his conversion story: