ABUNDANT LIFE

 

(Rimma Smirnova ArtAI)

“There are nine requisites for contended living:

1.      Health enough to make work a pleasure;

2.      Wealth enough to support your needs;

3.      Strength enough to battle with difficulties and overcome them;

4.      Patience enough to toil until some good is accomplished;

5.      Charity enough to see some good in your neighbour;

6.      Love enough to move you to be useful and helpful to others;

7.      Faith enough to make real the things of God;

8.      Hope enough to remove all anxious fears concerning the future;

9.      Grace enough to confess your sins and forsake them.

 

-          Johann Wolfgang Von Goethe  (1749-1832)

A MAN CALLED DANIEL

 

(Art: Daniel by Briton Riviere (1840-1920)

This man’s life is the epitome of success against all odds. His is a formula for making lemonade when life hands you lemons.

Imagine if the Saviour appeared to you and greeted you like He greeted a man called Daniel who as a youth was taken to Babylon during the first siege of Jerusalem in 605 B.C.: “O Daniel, a man greatly beloved” (Daniel 10:11). And not only Christ but also Michael who greeted him: “Oh man greatly beloved” (Daniel 10:19 and Gabriel who came to teach him and who told him: “I am come…for thou art greatly beloved” (Daniel 9:23).

This is why this man earned such highly honoured greetings. Daniel, with his three friends, Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego, was amongst the more skilled and educated of the Kingdom of Judah which fell into Babylonian captivity and was therefore trained for service in King’s court. Because of his purity of faith in the God of Israel, he rose to the status of incredible power becoming an Advisor to five kings and the Governor of all the Jews in Babylonia’s exile.

To understand Daniel’s stature of righteousness, it is important to also understand the Babylon he survived so well. King Nebuchadnezzar was the beginning of Babylon’s greatness and glory. Using slaves from various areas of the empire, he inaugurated a massive building program to make Babylon the greatest city in the world.

From raising an artificial mountain and constructing hanging gardens with terraces, to walls surrounding the city that were so massive that one story houses were built on top of the walls on either side and even then there was space enough between the rows of houses that could permit four chariots to drive abreast (Samuel Fallows, ed., The Popular and Critical Bible Encyclopedia and Scriptural Dictionary, s.v. “Babylon”, pp 208-9; 204-5)

The grandeur of Babylon was incredibly impressive but with such opulence and wealth also came moral decay, wickedness and iniquity. Will Durant, a secular historian wrote that “even Alexander [the Great], who was not above dying of drinking was shocked by the morals of Babylon (Our Oriental Heritage, p 244).

All the corruption and decadence of Babylon was very obvious to Daniel from the start and so he decided he would not ‘defile himself ‘with any of it, starting with ‘king’s meat’ which did not comply with the Mosaic law. Not only that but often the meat given to the populace of the court happened to be  remnants of sacrifices to heathen gods (for dietary instructions of the Mosaic law see Leviticus 3:17; 11; Deuteronomy 14). Consuming such foods would have been akin to condoning the worship of false gods. Daniel knew this and this I believe was the very decisive point of coming into favour with God who punished the kingdom of Judah with captivity due to idolatry.

The abstaining from defilement of idolatry was impressive for Daniel and his three friends for “God gave them knowledge and skill in all learning and wisdom: and Daniel had understanding in all visions and dreams” (Daniel 1:17). This led to King Nebuchadnezzar’s recognition of their superiority over “the magicians and astrologers that were in all his realm” (Daniel 1:20).

“The gospel was Daniel’s life….In the king’s court, he could be little criticized, but even for a ruler he would not drink the king’s wine nor gorge himself with meat and rich foods. His moderation and his purity of faith brought him health and wisdom and knowledge and skill and understanding, and his faith linked him closely to his Father in heaven, and revelations came to him as often as required. His revealing of the dreams of the king and the interpretations thereof brought him honour and acclaim and gifts and high position such as many men would sell their souls to get.” (President Spencer W. Kimball, in CR, Mexico and Central America Area Conference 1972, p 31)

I am in awe of such commitment because it affords such amazing example to others and leads them to recognise the God of heaven as was the case with Daniel’s influence over King Darius who called him 'servant of the living God' (Daniel 6:20). To be a youth surrounded by heathen foreign people in a foreign country, living in the lap of luxury, where excuses to abandon your religion were so easily accessible and yet to adhere to the principles and values you were brought up with warrants genuine admiration and worthiness of all the blessings you are given. Such was the reality for Daniel who rose to be an example of righteousness and devotion to the God of his fathers for his exiled people in a strange land….

ODE TO DANIEL

Your spirit bears me up

On wings of faith;

I stand as a witness of

Thy holy name.

- CATHRYNE ALLEN 

- 

CHRISTMAS BABE

 

Born This Day by Liz Lemon Swindle

A God of splendour;

A babe of mortal birth;

All power surrendered

For the lowly of this earth.

- Cathryne Allen 

A CHRONICLED LIFE

 

Art: The Letter by Abraham Solomon [1860]

I used to chronicle my life, religiously. I have a mountain of filled journals. Each year I would keep a journal and a planner. Writing is my shtick. This year I have not even started a journal. My planner is full of blank pages. There is nothing to plan and only woes to record. I know a journal should be a record of one’s struggles as well as accomplishments but I have this aversion to being weak and recording my weak moments for my posterity is something I avoid, so no journal. In other words, I am full of pride and I want to be seen as a better person than I am.

I have climbed some big mountains in my life:  eleven years of soul crushing marriage and twenty years of guilt ridden and stomach ulcerating single parenthood. I thought I was done but now I am climbing mountains born of small, simple things I used to take for granted: five minute showers testing my endurance of standing, walking without assistance, isolation induced cabin fever, torture of medically compromised digestive system, impossible task of putting socks on, motivation to do anything or even to endure another day.

I have stopped communicating with a lot of my friends, largely because I am sometimes told to count my blessings so my challenges would not seem so insurmountable and even to remember there are people worse off than me. As if either of these sentiments should alleviate my pain. I have thought about it and this is my take on this:

 Living with chronic pain is like being in a domestic violence situation. You have a husband who hits you every day and hurts you physically and mentally but you should feel grateful you have a husband at all who is putting a roof over your head. So what I am hearing instead of those sentiments is this: You have a monster on your back who slaps you around all day and reminds you that you now feel so small you could fit yourself in a match box but you have people around who are willing to wash your dirty underwear and clean your residence so you don’t live in filth and who sacrifice their time to buy you food so you live another day of suffering, so you should be grateful….

The worst of it is your loss of power…..to even live. On days when I no longer want to, I retreat to dark chocolate to get me through, only today that morphed into two whole blocks of Old Gold. The resulting headache and nausea at the end of the day was punishment I would not want to repeat.

I wrote the other day that I am reading The Book Thief once again. A small blessing in my otherwise empty days. I spend half the time reflecting on human suffering and the other half wishing I could write like that. Sometimes it’s the small mercies that outweigh the emptiness. It’s funny this experience we call life. I wonder if I will ever look back and miss it.  

The current goal: To say "Thy will be done".....until then there is grace....

- CATHRYNE ALLEN 

MAGNIFICENT GRACE

 

Receiving Grace by Greg Collins

“The main idea of the word ‘grace’ is divine means of help or strength, given through the bounteous mercy and love of Jesus Christ. It is likewise through the grace of the Lord that individuals, through faith in the Atonement of Jesus Christ and repentance of their sins, receive strength and assistance to do good works that they otherwise would not be able to maintain if left to their own means.

“This grace is an enabling power that allows men and women to lay hold on eternal life and exaltation after they have expended their own best efforts. Thus, the enabling and strengthening aspect of the Atonement helps us to see and to do and to become good in ways that we could never recognize or accomplish with our limited mortal capacity.”

-          Elder David A. Bednar, in CR Oct 2004, Ensign Nov 2004, 76-77

I have always believed in the principle of grace as a means of assistance to help us overcome and rise to higher ground…..to climb higher in our efforts to fulfil our potential than we can climb on our own….until recently I had an opportunity to discover that grace can save us in our darkest moments.

I have been facing the challenge of physical incapacity for over a year now. With it came also the mental oppression of equal intensity….depression, anxiety, loss of self-esteem. I came to the point where I felt I was being lost, that I had lost me and all the personal growth that I had achieved over the years. In the extremity of my anguish I decided that I could not carry on any longer. It frightened me and I pleaded with God to save me. I knew that being in this fallen world I was on the lowest rung of the ladder and He was on the highest and that He could reach down and lift me higher than I could climb on my own.

In my extremity and in His mercy, His grace reached to the pit of my misery and enabled me to climb to higher ground. Sometimes it is not trophy worthy achievements but plain endurance that needs the grace of someone bigger than ourselves to prevent the rubber band from snapping, to stretch us further than we can go on our own…..because in that endurance we might just find an answer to our suffering, an understanding we needed, a piece of growth we have been missing….and only He knows…and so the grace, always the grace and His love and His mercy.

How vast You are that

You can fill the immensity of space

Yet so small You can fit

Into my heart with eternal grace.

 

How small and insignificant am I

Among the countless children

Of this earth’s dust and fleeting pace

But of what importance

To Your saving grace!

 

-      Cathryne Allen

THE MILLENIAL DAY

 

He Shall Reign by Susan Edwards

“What does it mean to bind Satan? How is he bound? Our revelation says: “And in that day Satan shall not have power to tempt any man” (D&C 101:28). Does this mean that power is withdrawn from Satan so he can no longer entice men to do evil? Or does it mean that men no longer succumb to his enticements because their hearts are so set on righteousness that they refuse to forsake that which is good to follow him who is evil?

“Clearly it means the latter. Satan was not bound in heaven, in the very presence of God, in the sense that he was denied the right and power to preach false doctrine and to invite men to walk away from that God whose children they were; nay, in this sense, he could not have been bound in heaven, for even he must have his agency. How then will Satan be bound during the Millenium? It will be by the righteousness of the people.”

-          Bruce R. McConkie, The Millenial Messiah [1982], p 668

The day that is spoken here is the Millenial Day when Christ shall come to subdue all enemies under His feet (D&C 49:6). The preceding scripture in this chapter of Doctrine and Covenants convinces me of the truth that our righteousness will bind Satan and his attempts to draw us away. This scripture states: “And in that day whatsoever any man shall ask, it shall be given him” (D&C 101:27).

The only way it can happen that God will give us whatever we ask for is if our petitions are founded in righteousness and we ask for the right thing that is expedient for us. There are many warnings in the scriptures that tell us not to ask for anything out of weakness, such as:  if we ask and don’t receive it, it means we asked for the wrong thing (James 4:3); if you ask for anything that you shouldn’t have, it will be for your detriment (D&C 88:65); we should only ask for that which is right (3 Nephi 18:20); we should not use ‘vain repetitions’ or pray like God doesn’t know our needs (Matthew 6:7-8).

And my favourite which proves my point here rather well….the Lord told Nephi that because he has declared the word with ‘unwearyingness’ all things shall be done ‘according to his word’ because he will not ask for that which is contrary to God’s will’ (Helaman 10:5). In other words, ask for what you will and it shall be given you because I know you will not ask for anything you shouldn’t ask or want…..because of your righteousness. This is the point we will arrive at during the Millenium. This is the point when Satan will have no power over us. No temptation will be greater than our faithfulness.

The only way we can become so aligned with God that we will bind Satan with righteousness is to come out of the spiritual Babylon we are presently in. We are about to study Daniel who survived ancient Babylon and its grandeur and its corruption. I wondered how it was possible for a stalwart Israelite to live in such an environment and stay true to one’s faith. This is what Daniel taught me…..it is possible to survive Babylon…..and to even rise above it, if you have a connection with the God of Heaven. Consider just a few words of his worshipful prayer that testifies of this: “I thank thee, and praise thee, O thou God of my fathers, who hast given me wisdom and might……blessed be the name of God for ever and ever: for wisdom and might are his….he giveth wisdom unto the wise, and knowledge to them that know understanding……” (Daniel 2:20-23).

The time is running out and the enemy is at our feet….

- CATHRYNE ALLEN 

YOUR LIVING WORD

 

Jesus of Nazareth by Greg Collins

I stand in awe of Your sacrifice

And Your soul’s pain;

The body freely given

For nothing of You to remain.

 

I ache, I ache,

Knowing the cost;

Then I read Your living word

And I am comforted

Knowing nothing is lost.

- CATHRYNE ALLEN