Micro Messages

 Clever Clips

"God cares a lot more about who we are and who we are becoming than about who we once were." —Dale G. Renlund of the Twelve

"It is not right to pray cream and live skim milk." Henry Ward Beecher

"I've heard a lot of good things said, of what the Pilgrim Fathers did. I wonder who fed them and brought them a drink, and kept the children away, when they wanted to think. It must have been strange with so many others, not to have had any Pilgrim mothers." -93 year old Clara Horne Park, Draper, Utah

The Prophet Joseph Smith said: “Happiness is the object and design of our existence and will be the end thereof, if we pursue the path that leads to it and this path is virtue, uprightness, faithfulness, holiness and keeping all the commandments of God.” (History of the Church Vol. 5, 134-135)

"Youth for action, age for wisdom." Author unknown

"Procrastination is a silly thing, it only makes me sorrow. But I can change at any time, I think I will tomorrow." Author Unknown

Man in a flying balloon who lost his maps yells down to a man on the ground, "Where am I?" Man on the ground says, "You're in a balloon." Man in the balloon says, "No, I mean where are you?" Man on the ground says, "I'm on the ground." The man in the balloon says, "You must be a bureaucrat. Your words are true but totally useless." Jacob De Jagger of the Seventy

"A man who has made a mistake and does not correct it, has made two mistakes." Confucius

(When I have a problem) "I want to know the Lord's will and I will carry it out."   Ardith Kapp

"Married couples are tried by temptation, misunderstandings, financial problems, family crises, and illness, and all the while love grows stronger. Mature love has a bliss not even imagined by newlyweds." ...Boyd K. Packer

"You can't teach what you don't know, anymore than you can come back from a place that you've never been." Robert L. Backman

"Adam fell that men might be (mortal) and men are (mortal) that they may have joy." Bruce C. Hafen of the 70 adding to 2nd Nephi 2:25

"God is a father, man is a brother, life is a mission and not a career." Stephen L. Richards

"Selfishness is self destruction in slow motion." Neal A. Maxwell

"The art of being wise is knowing what to overlook." William James

"God put me on this earth to do a number of things. Right now I am so far behind, I will never die!" Bumper Sticker

"My faith is in Jesus Christ & not about outcomes." Dallin H. Oaks

"All the rules of God are fair and there will be wonderful surprises." Marion D. Hanks

"A single Mom pleads with God, while attempting to raise six children on her own...'Can't I come and visit you, just for a day?' She hears God's answer in her mind, 'No you can't, for you would not want to leave, but my Spirit can come & visit you." Gordon B. Hinckley

"When problems arise are you concerned with life today or life forever?" Marvin J. Ashton

"It is easy enough to be pleasant, when life flows by like a song, but the man worthwhile is the one who will smile, when everything goes dead wrong. For the test of the heart is trouble, and it always comes with the years, and the smile that is worth the praises of earth, is the smile that shines through the tears." The poetess Ella Wheeler Wilcox as quoted by Thomas S. Monson

Shifting Sands

Our Moral Environment   (Boyd K. Packer, April 1992 General Conference, emphasis added)

"In the battle of life, the adversary takes enormous numbers of prisoners, and many who know of no way to escape are pressed into his service. Every soul confined to a concentration camp of sin and guilt has a key to the gate. The adversary cannot hold them if they know how to use it. The key is labeled Repentance.

It is a great challenge to raise a family in the darkening mists of our moral environment. The measure of our success as parents, however, will not rest solely on how our children turn out. That judgment would be just only if we could raise our families in a perfectly moral environment, and that now is not possible.

It is not uncommon for responsible parents to lose one of their children, for a time, to influences over which they have no control. They agonize over rebellious sons or daughters. They are puzzled over why they are so helpless when they have tried so hard to do what they should.

If we pollute our fountains of life, there will be penalties “exquisite” and “hard to bear” (see D&C: 19:15), more than all of the physical pleasure ever could be worth. But when the scriptures say “thou shalt not,” we had better pay attention.

The only legitimate employment of the power of procreation is between husband and wife, man and woman, who have been legally and lawfully married. Anything else violates the commandments of God. From Alma, “If ye speak against it, it matters not, for the word of God must be fulfilled.” (Alma 5:58)

No idea has been more destructive of happiness, no philosophy has produced more sorrow, more heartbreak and mischief; no idea has done more to destroy the family than the idea that we are not the offspring of God, only advanced animals, compelled to yield to every carnal urge.

Animals are not subject to moral law. Nevertheless, while by and large they are promiscuous in responding to their mating instincts, their mating rituals have set patterns and have rigid limitations. For instance, animals do not pair up with their own gender to satisfy their mating instincts. Nor are these instincts expressed in the molestation of their offspring.

The source of life is now relegated to the level of unwed pleasure, bought and sold and even defiled in satanic rituals. Children of God can willfully surrender to their carnal nature and, without remorse, defy the laws of morality and degrade themselves even below the beasts.

Suppose a law decreed that all children would be taken from their parents and raised by the state. Such a law would be wicked but probably could be enforced. Such things have been done before.

But suppose an article of that law stated, “Within fifteen days the mother will cease all emotional ties to her child.”

That provision is absolutely unenforceable. No matter how severe the penalty or the number of enforcers, it is absolutely unenforceable because it contravenes both natural and moral law…

For instance, do you think a vote to repeal the law of gravity would do any good?

When a moral issue does arise, it is the responsibility of the leaders of the Church to speak out. Gambling, for instance, certainly is a moral issue. Life is a moral issue. When morality is involved, we have both the right & the obligation to raise a warning voice. We do not as a Church speak on political issues unless morality is involved. In thirty years & thousands of interviews, I have never once asked a member of the Church what political party they belonged to.

The phrase “free agency” does not appear in scripture. The only agency spoken of there is moral agency, “which,” the Lord said, “I have given unto him, that every man may be accountable for his own sins in the Day of Judgment (D&C 101: 78) italics added.)

Regardless of how lofty and moral the “pro-choice” argument sounds, it is badly flawed. With that same logic one could argue that all traffic signs and barriers which keep the careless from danger should be pulled down on the theory that each individual must be free to choose how close to the edge he will go.

While we pass laws to reduce pollution of the earth, any proposal to protect the moral and spiritual environment is shouted down and marched against as infringing upon liberty, agency, freedom, the right to choose.

Interesting how one virtue, when given exaggerated or fanatical emphasis, can be used to batter down another, with freedom, a virtue, invoked to protect vice. Those determined to transgress see any regulation of their life-style as interfering with their agency and seek to have their actions condoned by making them legal. People who are otherwise sensible say, “I do not intend to indulge, but I vote for freedom of choice for those who do.”

The adversary is jealous toward all who have the power to beget life. He cannot beget life; he is impotent. He and those who followed him were cast out and forfeited the right to a mortal body. His angels even begged to inhabit the bodies of swine. (See Matt 8:31.) And the revelations tell us that “he seeketh that all men might be miserable like unto himself (2^nd Nephi 2:27).

With ever fewer exceptions, what we see and read and hear have the mating act as a central theme. Censorship is forced offstage as a violation of individual freedom.

That which should be absolutely private is disrobed and acted out center stage. In the shadows backstage are addiction, pornography, perversion, infidelity, abortion, and—the saddest of them all—incest and molestation. In company with them now is a plague of biblical proportion. And all of them are on the increase.

Society excuses itself from responsibility except for teaching the physical process of reproduction to children in school to prevent pregnancy and disease, and providing teenagers with devices which are supposed to protect them from both.

When any effort is made to include values in these courses, basic universal values, not just values of the Church, but of civilization, of society itself, the protest arises, “You are imposing religion upon us, infringing upon our freedom.”

The rapid, sweeping deterioration of values is characterized by a preoccupation—even an obsession—with the procreative act. Abstinence before marriage and fidelity within it are openly scoffed at—marriage and parenthood ridiculed as burdensome, unnecessary. Modesty, a virtue of a refined individual or society, is all but gone.

The deliberate pollution of the fountain of life now clouds our moral environment. The gift of mortal life and the capacity to kindle other lives is a supernal blessing. It’s worth is incalculable!

God grant that we will come to our senses and protect our moral environment from this mist of darkness which deepens day by day. The fate of all humanity hangs precariously in the balance."

What is in Our Future?

The Second Coming, Great or Dreadful?  by Curtis Jacobs (Taken from part of a 2010 audio presentation produced by Covenant Recordings.  Bro. Jacobs is a Bishop, Institute Teacher & Lecturer. Some comments have been paraphrased).

(First the great things)…”On an average day, 840 people join the Church, throughout the world.  That does not include all the babies born to the Latter-day Saints in that same time frame.  About every 3 and one half days enough people join the Church to create a new stake.  We are adding about a million members every three years…

Some stories illustrate the miracles behind our growth. One is from West Africa told by Elder Alexander B. Morrison, of the 70.  One day a tall black man knocks on the door of the mission president and asks, “Where is the book?”  President Palmer opens the door and says, “I don’t even know who you are.  What are you talking about?” 

The young man says, “I don’t know you either, but I want the book!”  President Palmer says, “Can you give me an idea of what you’re talking about?”  “Sure, the young man answers, “I had a dream last night & I was shown this road and this house and I was told to ask for a book.  I was told that I was to read that book and that book would change my life.” Of course the book was the Book of Mormon and President Palmer gave him one.

On another occasion, two missionaries were walking down the street and a stranger approached them and said, “Give me the book.”  “What? The missionaries exclaimed.  “My grandma that’s been dead for awhile told me in a dream to get a book from those missionaries that have white shirts and name tags.”  The missionaries gave him the Book of Mormon.  That happened repeatedly to the missionaries by the request of other strangers.

Still another example, the missionaries were knocking on the doors of those living in an apartment complex in Russia.  No one answered in a particular door but some people in an apartment nearby heard the knocking and said, “Are you Mormon Missionaries?”  “Yes,” the missionaries answered, “Why do you ask?”

They replied, “We just got back from Poland an hour ago and some friends of ours told us about your Church and that you would contact us shortly after we returned.”

The point is that missionary work goes forward and miracles abound.  There are many more miracles we could share that would fill volumes, however, Satan also must have his day and there are dreadful things as well. 

 I’m sure you’ve heard that Salt Lake City will one day be one of the most wicked cities in the world.  This was spoken by Heber C. Kimball of the first presidency years ago, during the time of Brigham Young.

Today, less than 50% of the population of Salt Lake City is LDS.  The FBI has a crime statistic index, wherein they record certain types of violent crimes to form the crime index of a city.  The higher the number the worse you are.  Salt Lake City now has a higher crime index than Las Vegas, Los Angeles, Dallas or New York City.

Recent statistics show that in the United States, one third of every birth is to an unwed mother, certainly an indication of immorality.  90% of those in U.S. prisons come from a family of a teenage mother.  There are more abortions than there are live births in the U.S.  One third of the abortions are performed on teenage girls.

“Never before have the sources of good and the sources of evil been so well organized,” Pres. Benson said…The Lord will get the world’s attention by sending missionaries or disasters.  Hailstorms will destroy the crops of the earth, in the last days.  Revelation 16: 21 says that hailstones will weigh a talent. A talent weighs about 75 pounds.

 It is estimated that hail falls at about 100 to 200 mph according to our weather man & meteorologist Mark Eubank.  Some physics majors feel that to weigh that much, the hail stones would need to be about 18 inches in diameter.  Can you imagine that falling from the sky?  Bowling balls only weigh about 10 to 15 pounds.  What would 75 pounds do to your car, falling at 100 miles an hour?

That would not only go thru your car but thru your house!  If you’re looking to be wicked, that’s something that could happen to you. 

The story of the ten virgins that wait for the bridegroom is not about five faithful latter-day saints and five foolish non members.  Instead it’s about five faithful members of the Church and five foolish members of the Church.  The oil in their lamps is spiritual preparation.  Are we going to endure to the end in righteousness or get distracted by worldly ways and give in to the temptations of Satan?  It’s our choice.