Please Don't Turn Thanksgiving Black

This year Thanksgiving was probably one of our most memorable. We, as a family joined with several others of our extended family including my mother, and the Bengtzen Family in runing/walking The Human Race, to benefit the Utah food bank. It was a blast, my sister Stacie, my brother Ryan, and I all ran the 10k while the rest ran/walked the 5k. It was neat to feel the spirit of fun that was there. DeeAnn and Matt ran from start to finish. It was DeeAnn's first start to finish running the whole way. The first of many to come, I would suspect. Spence and Matt haven't wanted to take their shirts off since the race. Obviously we had to put the kibosh on that one. My brother and I finished in a record time for us at just over 58 minutes. For years, we had talked about wanting to do more than just have the Thanksgiving feast and sit around and watch T.V. So this was a great change and will definitely be repeated.

Following the race we came home and got ready for the Thanksgiving feast. Once we got our food prepared and taken to my mother's home, DeeAnn and Lauree sat down with all the ads and started looking for the deals that they wanted to take advantage of on the morrow. While they were busy with the ads I visited and relaxed. It was one of the most memorable Thanksgivings I can remember. I really enjoyed it.
However, one thing that really bothered me was the creeping up of the Black Friday. Some stores decided that they would not wait until the day after Thanksgiving. They decided that they would open the evening of Thanksgiving. I understand the importance of Black Friday. The day when stores finally break even and begin to make a profit. I wonder if the Occupy Wall Street group realized that for 11 months many of these stores are praying for a final month to stay in business. They pay their employees 11 months without a guarantee of profits.  Anyways, so I get the whole importance of the day after Thanksgiving and getting a leg up on the competition, but I am not ready to give up my day of thanks for the madness that is Black Friday.
I decided that I would go with my wife on Black Friday shopping a couple of years ago. That was the last time for me. I can see the potential fun it could be, but the spirit of the season is not found in the stores and many forget to fill themselves up with the spirit before they leave their homes. It has become more about the things than it is about the feeling of gratitude and love that should be apart of the season.
For this reason I plead that we leave Black Friday for Friday. Let us get our fill of the Spirit of Gratitude before we enter those stores, maybe then the spirit of Christmas will find its way back into the Season. In any case it is our responsibility to spread the spirit of Gratitude and Love, whether anyone else does or not. So, keep smiling and wishing all a Merry Christmas and enjoy the Holiday Season. 

When I Reach My Autumn

Live, Love, and Give until you have nothing left to give.

The Power Of The Marriage Covenant

The Covenant of Marriage is a three way covenant. As a member of the Church of Jesus Christ this is very significant, not that it is not for others, but as a Latter Day Saint when we are married in the Temple it is for time and all eternity. Depending on your relationship this can bring comfort or it can be a little scary.

The nature of an Eternal marriage is that it is an agreement entered into by you, your spouse, and God. This is a binding covenant and so long as the covenant is not broken then your marriage is eternal and all that are born or adopted into that covenant belong to God. This covenant can not be broken without the Lords permission. We may not act within the covenant, but when that covenant is bound by the power of God, ultimately it is only by His power than that covenant can be dissolved.

From time to time in the course of our marriage feelings are hurt, and sometimes our relations are banged up. Trust is challenged and sometimes we may feel like jumping ship. There is a temptation for some to begin looking for the back door at the first sign of trouble. Sadly many bail out before they can realize the power of the atonement in that covenant.

Your part in this covenant is to do your best and learn to perfect your relationship through Christ. An imperfect relationship is not the same as a broken covenant and is not a reason to bail out. All covenants are imperfect unless the atonement is apart of the terms.

Still some will claim that their spouse has broken the covenant and therefore they feel justified in ending the marriage. God has declared that certain actions justify the end of a marriage, but he does not say that it must end a marriage. I believe short of abuse, and or endangerment, you should do everything in your power to maintain your covenant. Your spouse can not remove you from the covenant anymore than you have power to remove them from the covenant. So, it is better to learn to work within the covenant making your relationships within covenant your greatest priority. Those relationships must be balanced between your spouse and the Lord.

A personal experience that I had has taught me that many of the things that happen here in this mortal experience will not matter in the eternal scheme of things, and when we get to the other side of the veil we will have wished we had been quicker to forgive even the most serious of offenses against us.

Let no man tear apart that which the Lord has sealed together. Make it your priority.

The Truth Always Brings Hope

Truth is not always pretty. Truth is, sometimes the truth is quite ugly, but until we learn to embrace the truth we will have no hope for peace. Hope comes by embracing the truth and dealing with it. The ugly truth tells us that hard times are going to happen. The battle between Good and Evil will have many casualties. Many will die, many will be wounded physically, emotionally, and spiritually. We will see family members seduced by the darkness. There will be times when we feel alone in our battle.
I imagine a great mist of darkness, made up of the filth and vulgar images and sounds that will blind us and make the truth hard to hear. I imagine that many of us will face our own demons in the darkness and will be tempted to shrink away, but if we understand the truth we will not. The beauty of truth is that we know who wins.

In Star Wars Anakin was a gifted child who served as a Jedi knight, but his ambitions to be the best led him to hope for more power, which the Sith Lord used to seduce him. Anakin lost everything he sought power to save. And while he gained great power, he lost all hope when in his final act as a Jedi he killed a Jedi master. Luke, the son of Anakin, on the other hand, carried inside of him the power of hope, and in the end the power of hope defeated the hope for power.

Lord of the Rings plays out a similar story of hoping against all hope, fighting a power that seems unbeatable relying upon the most unlikely of creatures to deliver that final blow to the Evil which ruled over the land without mercy. And again in the end the light purged the land of all evil.

It is easy to see who was right and who was wrong in the movies, but in real life we have feelings that are easily manipulated by those who are masters of manipulation. It becomes our responsibility to trust no one. Put not your trust in the arm of flesh, but trust in God, and in the end the light will prevail...

Gratitude Is Essential To Happiness In Hard Times

One of the problems that I have noticed in my existence is that when I am ungrateful I tend to attract things that I should be ungrateful for. When I am ungrateful I tend to want more, not that wanting more is bad, but I tend to forget to be grateful for what I do have. I tend to see everything I don't have as a punishment that is being inflicted upon me by God. This goes against everything I know to be true, but sometimes it creeps into my thoughts.

I have also noticed that gratitude begets things that I can be grateful for. When I am grateful I tend to notice the many miracles that are happening all around me. I look back on my life and I see why things have happened the way they did. When I have gratitude in my heart I see that God is giving me all he can  give me according to my own faith. Funny thing is the more gratitude I have the greater my faith becomes. The greater my faith the less I see the hard times.

Be grateful for you you are. Be grateful for what you have. Be grateful for who God has brought into your life. Hard times are coming, let your gratitude guide you through.