The Blessings of Service

Have you ever experienced feeling sad and unsure about what can happen next in your life?  I believe it would be a safe assumption that this condition happens to all of us quite a bit.  The times when you need help the most in your life, how do you get it?  We  want to find what we should do with our lives, but where are we searching?  In the Bible, Christ teaches that, "He that findeth his life shall lose it: and he that loseth his life for my sake shall find it." (Mathew 10:39)  What this scripture is teaching us is that in order to "find" our lives, or in others words receive help in our lives, we must devote ourselves to serving Christ.  There have been many times in my life where I needed help the most, but the greatest help I received was when I helped someone else.  King Benjamin, a beloved king from the Book of Mormon, put it this way: "And behold, I tell you these things that ye may learn wisdom; that ye may learn that when ye are in the service of your fellow beings ye are only in the service of your God." (Mosiah 2:17)  There is a poem that I love, which captures this idea of selfless service:

An old man, going a lone highway,
Came at the evening cold and gray,
To a chasm, vast and deep and wide,
Through which was flowing a sullen tide.

The old man crossed in the twilight dim-
That sullen stream had no fears for him;
But he turned, when he reached the other side,
And built a bridge to span the tide.

"Old man," said a fellow pilgrim near,
"You are wasting strength in building here.
Your journey will end with the ending day;
You never again must pass this way.

You have crossed the chasm, deep and wide,
Why build you the bridge at the eventide?"
The builder lifted his old gray head.
"Good friend, in the path I have come," he said,

"There followeth after me today
A youth whose feet must pass this way.
This chasm that has been naught to me
To that fair-haired youth may a pitfall be.

He, too, must cross in the twilight dim;
Good friend, I am building the bridge for him."

Will Allen Dromgoole  "The Bridge Builder"

There are many ideas and principles we can take from this simple poem.  Whether we be old, young, or in any walk of life, the principle is yet the same.  We can do much for others, and ourselves, as we serve God by serving His children, in whatever capacity we can.  You'll find, as I often have, that you will be helped the most by helping others.  So go out!  Find an opportunity to help someone, and see how God will help you in return.  He loves us all, and is anxious to be there when we need Him the most.

Standing for Something

There is a quote that has been on my mind recently since I saw it a few days ago, and it goes like this:

"You've got to stand for something or you'll fall for everything."

What exactly does that mean?  For me, it reminds me that in order not to be deceived or misled, I must live what I believe in, most importantly of which would be living the gospel of Jesus Christ.  The Savior was a great teacher, among many things, and so when He taught, His teachings gave those who heard them a better way in which to live their lives.  That is why we have His teachings, so that we can live the best way we know, following Christ's example.  This principle reminds me of a few examples from the scriptures that teach the importance of following Christ's teachings.  After delivering the "Sermon on the Mount," the Savior added these verses, recorded in the gospel of Mathew: "Therefore whosoever heareth these sayings of mine, and doeth them, I will liken him unto a wise man, which built his house upon a rock: And the rain descended, and the floods came, and the winds blew, and beat upon that house; and it fell not: for it was founded upon a rock.  And every one that heareth these sayings of mine, and doeth them not, shall be likened unto a foolish man, which built his house upon the sand:  And the rain descended, and the floods came, and the winds blew, and beat upon that house; and it fell: and great was the fall of it." (Mathew 7:24-27)  As is stated clearly in the scripture above, in order to not fall, we have to not only hear what is being taught, but then we also have to do it.  In the Book of Mormon, a prophet named Heleman taught a very similar principle to his sons before his death: "And now, my sons, remember, remember that it is upon the rock of our Redeemer, who is Christ, the Son of God, that ye must build your foundation; that when the devil shall send forth his mighty winds, yea, his shafts in the whirlwind, yea, when all his hail and his mighty storm shall beat upon you, it shall have no power over you to drag you down to the gulf of misery and endless wo, because of the rock upon which ye are built, which is a sure foundation, a foundation whereon if men build they cannot fall." (Heleman 5:12) 

Challenges can and will come into our lives, but if we are built on the teachings of Jesus Christ, then we will have nothing to fear.  When you keep your feet firmly planted on strong moral principles, the most powerful of which were taught by the Savior, then you won't be misled in your life by anyone.  Jesus Christ is the surest way, and He will never mislead us.