Climbing the Family Tree

Family Tree here

I've been reading some family histories my mother gave me for Christmas and marveling at the ancestors that made me. I've heard most of the stories before; I grew up on them. But reading them now when I've experienced so much more of life, I appreciate what the stories mean more than I ever did before. For example, my great-grandmother Christina Marie Sorensen Anderson (Steena for short) was widowed when she was just forty-seven years old. She'd given birth to eleven children and also raised two other neighbor boys whose extended family refused to take them in when their parents died. She only had a few weeks of education and so when she was left to care for the family, she did the only thing she could, she farmed to keep them all alive and in her spare time was midwife to most of the women in the area. She lived a widow for forty-nine years, and I remember her making the most delicious cinnamon rolls I've ever tasted in her big, black, coal burning stove.

Her seven daughters have been my idols all my life. They were strong women--all of them either nurses or school teachers who each faced incredible adversity and tribulation with courage and strength. It makes me proud and has inspired me knowing that I am an "Anderson Woman." One of these Anderson Women was my grandmother, the oldest of the sisters and a school teacher who served a mission in Hawaii, who died when my mother was sixteen so I never knew her, but her influence has been with me every day of my life.

Reading these histories has warmed me, and it can warm you. It seems that sometimes we feel so alone in life. Discouragement sets in, dull winter days erode the joy, and life feels empty. At those times one of the best things you can do is remember the stories of those who have gone before you. Everyone has someone a generation or two back who inspires courage and motivates to be better. If you haven't found that person or persons on your family tree, start searching. I guarantee you they are there, and when you find their story and savor it, you will feel of their spirit walking beside you every day bouying you up and urging you on through the cold Januaries of life.

Love What's Coming

With the dark, overcast sky this morning it is tempting to be discouraged. But sun or no sun, today is a new day and that means new opportunities and new options. It means that I have new hours to write my life upon. I can let the weather discourage me, or I can go through the day looking for surprises and new opportunities. The rain doesn’t change any of that. 

Who knows? Maybe the dusky, dreary, drizzle is the very thing that will bring today’s surprises. I’ll wait and see, but while I wait I'll anticipating the good. 

Elder Wirthlin said, “Come what may, and love it.” But I think we should also anticipate with joy what’s coming. Sure, what comes may not be all that you wanted, but if you waited with joy, the wait was a lot more fun than it would have been. So I say, “Love what’s coming, and it may.”

Disappointment

All of us face disappointments at one time or another. I know I do, but I have learned something important about disappointment: disappointment serves a purpose—as a matter of fact, many purposes.

(1) Disappointment can spur us on to bigger and better things.

(2) Disappointment can humble us and bring us closer to God.

(3) Disappointment can teach us things we will need to know later.

Nature reinforces this in many ways. The failing of the caterpillar indicates a butterfly is about to fly forth. The failing bud turns into a beautiful rose. The tiny seed disappears but grows into a food providing plant. Plants grow the most in the darkest hours just before the dawn. In other words, nature seems to be trying to teach us that some of our darkest times of failure and disappointment are merely steps of evolution to our happiest and brightest successes.

I had a friend who summarized this idea when he told me, “I’ve gotten to the point that I get excited when bad things happen because I know something good is waiting for me on the other side of the bad experience.”

So if right now you are experiencing good days—rejoice and enjoy!

If you are experiencing bad days—rejoice knowing that there is something good waiting for you!

Sun's Out

This morning when I went out to exercise the world was dark and dreary. Snow floated from the sky to add to an already white world. Roads were slick and treacherous and the cold chill nipped into the bones. But here I sit a few hours later and the sun shining in a clear blue sky twinkles on the fast melting snow. It is warm enough that I just ran errands without a coat. It is amazing how fast things can change and not just the weather.

No matter how bad things are, it is important to realize that the only thing that is constant in this life is change. Nothing stays the same and no matter how bleak something appears at the moment, the next moment it could all change.

So here’s to sun shining in your heart now and if it isn’t—it will be soon! You can count on change!

Lift Up Your Eyes And See!

In the Bible we read of how discouraged the Children of Israel became because life was difficult. Over and over they let this discouragement overtake them, and over and over the Lord tried to teach them they didn’t need to be discouraged. From our vantage point it is easy to see that their discouragement made their trek longer and harder. But they couldn’t see that. They only saw the events immediately facing them. On one of those numerous discouraged occasions (Numbers 21:4-9), the people claimed God was leading them to death and angrily complained about the food they had been given. In response, God showed them that things could be worse. He sent a plague of “fiery serpents” among the people. When bitten by a serpent, the people experienced high fevers and many died. This jolted the people into a realization of what they had done. Remembering God now, they asked Moses to pray for a solution. In answer to Moses’ prayer God instructed Moses to place a brass pole in the center of the camp with a brass fiery serpent on top of the pole. Moses did so and then told his people that if they were bitten, they should look to the pole and they would be healed.
This story is referred to four times in the Book of Mormon and each time we learn a little more about it. Nephi tells us that after the pole was erected many who were bitten would not look “because of the simpleness of the way, or the easiness of it” (1 Nephi 17:41) and therefore they died. Alma tells us that “few understood the meaning of those things, and this because of the hardness of their hearts. But there were many who were so hardened that they would not look, therefore they perished. Now the reason they would not look is because they did not believe that it would heal them” (Alma 33:20). Another Nephi also retold this story and explained that the fiery serpent was a symbol of Christ (see Helaman 8:14-15) and that all who look upon Christ will live.
Discouragement is part of life. We all feel it from time to time and if we let it dwell in us, we like the Children of Israel will wander in life without obtaining our Promised Land. But if in times of discouragement we look to Christ, trusting, hoping, believing, patiently expecting the best, the discouragement will fade and we will feel ourselves lifted and healed. Christ’s power is not just enough to save us at the day of judgement. Christ’s power is enough to save us every day–if we, when "bitten" by the negative feelings of life, will just look to Him.