The Gift of Frankincense



Frankincense

We don’t actually know how many Wise Men came to worship the baby Jesus. Tradition maintains that there were three but that is because there were three gifts: gold, frankincense, and myrrh. All three are significant in that they are gifts befitting a king. But in addition, all three have symbolic significance.

Frankincense is found in the scraggly, but hardy, Boswellia tree, and is harvested by slashing the bark and allowing the resins to bleed out and harden. The hardened resins are called tears. Frankincense trees grow in very difficult environments where most plant life could never exist such as out of solid rock. How it attaches to the stone is unknown, but a bulbous disk-like swelling of the trunk at the base of the tree allows it to adhere and grow. This growth prevents it from being ripped from the rock during violent storms that frequent the places the trees grow in. The bulbous swelling is slight or absent in trees grown in rocky soil or gravel.

Frankincense is used as a perfume, but more significantly it was used as incense and burned on the altar of the Jewish temple. Think about the last time you saw smoke rising and how it forms a “ribbon,” that connects heaven to earth. This is why incense became a symbol of prayers which when uttered rise to God.

Frankincense is also a symbol of another connection between heaven and earth, priesthood, which is the power of God shared with mankind.

What a fitting gift, then, frankincense was for the King of Kings, the great High Priest, who is our mediator, connection to heaven.

Take the Gift

I don't know where this summer has gone. Wasn't yesterday Christmas? But here we are with school starting and Fall in the air. Ready or not, life moves on. And another of the advantages of Living in Truth is that life moving on doesn't stress or worry us. We plan for the future, learn from the past, but live in the present.

Because we aren't focused on the past or the future, we see and discover many wonderful delights offered to us in the present. I like to think of these as gifts from God. I know that when I give a gift and it isn't acknowledged or accepted, I feel bad. So by living in the present and recognizing the many gifts given to me in a day, I hope I'm making God happy. I know I am. I can feel it.

Have a wonderful, gift filled day!

So Thankful . . .

November is the month of Thanksgiving and so I’ve been taking a few moments each day to think about some the things I have to be thankful for. Yesterday I was thinking about how thankful I am for the Holy Ghost and I found this list of just a few of the things He does for me. The list made me even more grateful, and so I thought I’d share it with you so you can ponder on these things too.

 Helps us recall and recognize truth (John 14:26)

 Conveys spiritual gifts (1 Cor. 12: 1-11)

 Guides our prayers (D&C 46: 30)

 Teaches us eternal truths (Moroni 10: 5)

 Brings peace and joy to the soul (Gal 5: 22)

 Opens our minds to revelation (Alma 5: 46, 1 Ne 10: 19)

 Shows and tells us all things that we should do (2 Ne 32:3, 5)

 Strengthens the body, mind, and spirit (Romans 8: 26)

 Remits sin (JST Matt 26: 24-25)

 Sanctifies us (3 Ne 27: 20)

I am so blessed, but this list also made me realize that when I make wrong choices and sin, I am giving all this up. It helps motivate me to do what is right.

Today's thoughts of gratitude are easy. A new grandson arrived last night giving us a total of 27 grandsons and 7 grand daughters! My heart is full to the brim and overflowing! How grateful I am!

Gifts For A Bad Day

Last night just over Cascade Mountain I saw the most beautiful rainbow I’ve ever seen. It made a full 180 degree arch and in front of it was a paler replica—a double rainbow! Besides being a full rainbow that arched from earth up and around and back down to touch the earth again, this rainbow had a full spectrum of bright colors blending from one to the other—seven of them! It was amazing.

It was also an incredible gift before a day when everything has gone wrong. You’ve all had those days—a $600 unexpected car repair job, my computer wouldn’t work and I spent all day talking with computer support people trying to get it fixed when I should have been working on the seven lectures I need to have ready for Education Week next week. I have a houseful of company coming Monday to stay for education week, and my husband’s office party is here tomorrow night.

BUT. . .all day long as I’d start to feel stressed, I’d think about that beautiful rainbow and be grateful I’d seen it. I’d close my eyes and see it again. The computer still isn’t fixed. The house isn’t ready for the party or guests, but I’ve got a rainbow in my head and I’m feeling good. I wish I'd learned not to stress about things like this years ago. It never did any good.And besides that my stressing caused me to miss something important. It absolutely amazes me how the Lord takes care of us—even before we know there is something that needs to be taken care of!

Being You

I hope each of you awakes each morning thinking, “It is so great to be me!”

God made you to be you. He put you where you are in order to serve the people that surround you and to learn from those people. Of all the situations in life, the situation you are in is the very best situation for you.

The problem is that we look around at other people and begin to doubt God. Surely He made a mistake! We should be as energetic as a friend down the street or as pretty as the lady in the grocery store or able to sing like the next door neighbor. We think life would be so much better for us if our children behaved like our sister’s children or that our husband was as considerate as our best friend’s husband. We think we aren’t as capable as the friend who owns the boutique or as the cousin with the Master’s degree. We cower and hide the talents God has given us because we deem them not as good as what everyone else has. What a mistake. Just thinking those thoughts keeps us from discovering what we are supposed to be doing. But more than that thinking that way chokes the joy right out of life!

In 1 Peter 4:10 the King James Bible reads, “As every man hath received the gift, even so minister the same one to another, as good stewards of the manifold grace of God.” That same verse in the NRSV Bible reads, “Like good stewards of the manifold grace of God, serve one another with whatever gift each of you has received.” And the NIV reads, “”Each one should use whatever gift he has received to serve others, faithfully administering God's grace in its various forms."

Between these three translations, you can’t miss the message. Whatever God has given YOU, use it to bless the lives of others. Don’t fret about whether you have more or less or would be better off with something different. The truth is that you have all you need to do what you were sent here to do. So USE it. If you are a good listener, listen. If you have a sense of humor, laugh. If you have a beautiful smile, share it. If you see these wonderful things in others instead of coveting write a note and thank them for making your life better by sharing. If you are healthy, serve others who aren’t. If you struggle with relationships, ask God what you are to learn from it. The list goes on and on. There is a reason and a purpose for everything. Don’t waste time fretting about it. Learn from it. Grow from it. Use it to bless others!It really is great to be you!

A Gift

We’ve all heard of the rich people of the world making endowments to universities or charities. These endowments add wings to hospitals or fund research projects or many other valuable things. Thus we all know that the word endowment is synonymous with the word gift. An endowment is a gift.

The prefix en means to put into or onto. The root of the word is endow which means “to equip or supply with a talent or quality.” The suffix ment means process of. Therefore the word literally means the process of putting a talent or quality into someone or something. But what is the most interesting thing about the word is its history or etymology. Endow comes from the Old French word douer which means to provide with a dowry. Therefore the gift the groom presented to the bride could be called an endowment.

When we put this together with the fact that throughout the scriptures Jesus Christ is symbolically the groom and his people are symbolically the bride, we gain a whole new feel for the word endowment.

Heritage

I’ll never forget the day several years ago when I was working in the kitchen doing all the normal things you do like wiping down the cupboards and cleaning out the microwave when suddenly while wringing out the dishcloth in the sink a shock went through me. The hands wringing water out of the cloth weren’t mine! They were my mother’s. How had her hands become attached to the end of my arms? It was a strange moment of discovery that I was aging, but more than that it was a moment of realization that I was becoming my mother. Genetically I had been programmed to have her hands.

Since that day I can’t look at my hands without thinking about my mother which means that I think about her about a hundred times a day. (Try to count how many times a day you see your hands!)And whenever I see her hands, I know what mine will be like in 20 years.

It is easy for most of us to look in a mirror and see the things about us that we inherited from our parents. But what isn’t as easy is identifying what we inherited from our Heavenly Parents. For some reason we let a false sense of humility keep us from acknowledging traits we inherited from Them. But that isn’t humility at all.
As Christmas approaches, I challenge you to identify at least two characteristics you inherited from your Heavenly Father and then to concentrate on those two things throughout the month. Of course, they won't be perfected like His traits are, but you will have those traits in a lesser form. Make it your Christmas gift to God to enhance them and to be grateful for them.

I’m in the middle of parents and children now, and I also know how delightful it is to notice myself in my children—especially my good qualities. Seeing your good characteristics in them is a true source of joy, and I’m sure that our Father in Heaven also experiences joy when we recognize and acknowledge ways we are like Him. After all He gave us those traits and as He said, “What doth it profit a man if a gift is bestowed upon him, and he receive [acknowledges] not the gift? Behold, he rejoices not in that which is given unto him, neither rejoices in him who is the giver of the gift” (D&C 88:33).