Spiritual Power Outage!

Growing up I lived in a great farm house in Blackrock Idaho.  It was just big enough to keep our family of 9 comfortable and humble.  With an older home, you get the joys of keeping up on home improvements on a yearly, sometimes, monthly basis.  Now that my parents are "empty-nesters" they have been able to make the home very livable from converting a coal furnace to electric heat, re-shingling the roof, and even re-siding the exterior.  It looks like new!

We were visiting over Valentines day, along with 2 of my siblings and there families, making a full house of 16!  The great old home was being used and worked from every corner.  Lights, space heaters, blow dryers, TVs...if it could be turned on, it was, even if it wasn't needed.  While I was blow drying my hair in one bathroom, and my sister in another, all of the sudden the power shut off.  There was a simultaneous "UH-OH" through out the house.  My mom reassured us that she would flip the breaker and everything would come back on.  She was right.  So, we began blow drying our hair again, and not 2 minutes past when the power shut off again.  Laughing, another simultaneous "UH-OH" echoed through out the house. Again, the breaker was switched.  This time it was about 30 seconds, and for the 3rd time the power shut off.   We were getting frustrated because we were running late.  Why wouldn't the power stay on? 

Never once did we stop to turn off all the gadgets that weren't being used.  We went around the house finding lights, computers, curling irons, and TVs on, serving no purpose to anyone. 
After taking a quick inventory of what was really neccesary to function we had no problem with the power for the remainder of our visit.

How often do we find ouselves TOO BUSY to incorporate the practices of personal and family prayer, scripture study, and temple attendance into our busy daily lives?  Elder M. Russell Ballard of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles said that:

            "Some parents become so expert at filling every physical desire for their children that they begin to
            suppose that all is well in this life and that their eternal stewardship is progressing right on schedule...
            I believe that we must pause and take a careful inventory to determine how well our families are
            doing spiritually.  We could ask how well are we feeding, nurturing, training, and exercising the spirits
            of our children; or how well have we taught, trained, loved, and inspired our children to build their
            spiritual muscles and strength?...Remember, eternity is now, not a vague, distant future. We prepare
            each day, right now, for eternal life.  If we are not preparing for eternal life, we are preparing for
            something else, perhaps something far less." ("Spiritual Development," Ensign, Nov. 1978,66)

I feel that if we overload ourselves and our children with unneccessary activities, that serve no purpose in our eternal progression, eventually we are going to spiritually power down, or shut off.  Just like my parents old overworked home shut off, we can lose our sense of purpose or weaken our testimony if we're not putting in the effort to nurture and feed our spiritual wellbeing on a daily basis. 

In the February issue of the Ensign, "The Power of Early Preparation", it's says,

            "If I were the devil, I don't think I could get to Latter-Day Saints with any of the big sins.  I think I
            would just keep them busy,"

Though we may be necessarily preparing or putting too much emphasis on our short-term goals, we cannot allow those things to distract us from our larger eternal goals.  We need to start to establish regular patterns of gospel living.

Let's remember our eternal priorities when planning our day or week.  "Turn Off" the unneccesary activities that keep you from performing your spiritual priorities, so you can avoid a Spiritual Power Outage!

Follow the Prophet

My children LOVE to sing "Follow the Propet" before they go to bed every night.  This video emulates how I feel about Thomas S. Monson and his Apostles. 
I love the Lord and I am so blessed to have the Gospel in my life.

 

Hanging on by a "Stem"

We just recently moved to Idaho Falls about 2 months ago and we were excited to discover an apple tree in our back yard.  I grew up next to my Grandma's apple orchard and remembered all the apple pie, applesauce, and apple juice produced from the apples on those trees.  I am excited to let my kids be a part of pruning, picking and producing yummy "eats" from our apple tree. 

Well, little did we know that if the apples aren't picked in the fall, they create a mushy-gushy mess on the ground beneath the branches they once called home! YUM!  It was going to snow a lot in the coming days, so I knew we needed to get the apples up quick before they were buried forever. So, the kids and I got to work picking up and throwing away load after load of rotten, bruised apples.  All the while I was thinking, "these could have made so many pies, dumplings, and carmel apples if they would have hung on to their branch just a little bit longer.  I could have saved them from their new worm-infested dwelling."

We cleaned the mess just in time before the first snowfall of the year, and OH BOY was it ever a snowfall.  Over 8 inches in 2 days!  We were welcoming winter at the first of November!  During breakfast one morning we were admiring the wind and snow outside when I glanced over at the apple tree.  There hung a beautiful red apple on one of the lower branches, clinging for dear life as the wind and snow bellowed around it.  

I quickly drew my kids attention to it and tried to teach them a life lesson.  "Look at the strong apple hanging on to the branch in the mean storm.  Sometimes we need to be like the apple, strong and valiant."  I can only go so deep with a 2 yr. old and a 3 yr. old.  The kids went on eating their breakfast, but I kept watching....admiring....and pondering the strength of that apple.  I could immediately feel the spirit testifying to me "hold on in times of trial."  The scripture Helaman 5:12 came rushing to my thoughts:

12 And now, my sons, remember, remember that it is upon the ^arock of our Redeemer, who is Christ, the Son of God, that ye must build your ^bfoundation; that when the devil shall send forth his mighty winds, yea, his shafts in the whirlwind, yea, when all his hail and his mighty ^cstorm 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.

In a world full of Satan's "mighty winds", we can hold fast to the gospel.  I pray everyday that my family and I can be strong, with firm testimonies, so when adversity comes bellowing around us, it shall have no power over us.  We can be strong like the apple. We can hold on in times of trial.  The Lord has great things in store for us if we can hang on long enough and endure it well.  

The "FIRST" Post

I never felt like I would be a "BLOGGER".  But, I love to journal and I needed a venue where I could document little inspired moments that I may have in my crazy day.  So....here goes.  I hope you fellow BLOGGERS can relate to or give insight to the moments I share...