Growing Through Sacrifice

Weston and I gave talks in church today.  I hadn't been asked to give a talk in almost 5 years.  Jiles was a newborn the last time I spoke.  Here is my talk from today, with a few Instagram photos sprinkled in:

Sacrifice:

An Opportunity for Growth;

An Investment in Eternity

Sacrifice : the act of giving up something valued for the sake of something else more important or worthy; giving up something for the gaining of something better.  

Sacrifice is a principle of the gospel.

The Prophet Joseph Smith told us, "Let us here observe, that a religion that does not require the sacrifice of all things never has power sufficient to produce the faith necessary unto life and salvation."

The Lord said in September 1831, "Now it is called today until the coming of the Son of Man, and verily it is a day of sacrifice…of my people."

In his talk titled "This Is a Day of Sacrifice", Ezra Taft Benson contemplates the legacy of faith and sacrifice left by our forefathers.  He says,

"I see father Abraham offering his son Isaac in sacrifice.

I see his great-grandson Joseph, though tempted severely in his youth, sacrificing the enticements of the world.

I see father Lehi, who left everything to come to this land of promise. 

I see the founders of this republic, who pledged life, fortune, and sacred honor - some paying the pelage in full.

I see a modern Joseph sacrificing character, reputation, honor, applause, his good name, his home, lands, family, and finally his own life for the truth's sake.

I see the early pioneers who left lands, possessions, and community, to come to these mountain valleys.

I see the Son of God, who made the infinite, eternal sacrifice that we might, through our worthiness, live again with our Eternal Father."  

I think of these examples and I ask myself, "What have I known of sacrifice in my own life?"  I haven't had to leave my belongings, or my family, or cross plains.  I look back on my life a little and try to think of situations that could be an example of sacrifice.  

I think back to when I was in high school.  I went to early-morning seminary.  It started at 5:55 every morning of the school year, which meant I had to leave my house at 5:35.  If I didn't go, then I could sleep longer and not have to leave my house until 7.  It was a sacrifice to go.  Sleep is good.  I didn't love waking up early, and i'd heard that teenagers sleep best in those last few hours of sleep.  But edifying myself through seminary every morning was far better than sleeping a little longer.  I didn't see it as a sacrifice then.  It was just something that we did.  I never even considered NOT going.  I remember that I missed at least one day.  I know that I missed at least one day because that day sticks out in my mind as a day that I felt incomplete and uneasy at school because I did sleep in and miss seminary.  I think I gained a testimony of seminary and scripture study that day and began to see seminary for the rest of my high school career as metaphorical armor or tonic needed everyday to survive high school.    

Later in high school, in my senior year, I remember having a conversation with my field hockey coach.  She brought up scholarships and about my playing in college.  I loved field hockey, and would've loved to have played on a collegiate level, but I knew it wasn't right.  I knew that I needed to be in a place where I could grow spiritually, and be surrounded by those with my same values.  I remember telling my coach, "I want to go to a church college out in Idaho, and they probably don't even now what field hockey is."  She thought I was crazy.  I was teased a little about going so far away to school.  Maybe 10 people out of the 2000some people in my high school had even heard of Ricks College.  Some of my friends would get confused and call it Bob's College and one of my very best friends thought that I was in Ohio the 2 years I was at Ricks.  To my high school friends, I was giving up playing field hockey at a university near home to go to Bob's College in Ohio.  

The morning I left for Ricks College, at 18 years old, I grabbed my pillow, shoved a blanket and sheet inside the pillow case, grabbed my 2 crammed-packed suitcases, and my sister drove me to the train station.  On the train from Richmond to Baltimore, alone, I sat by the window and watched the scenery: lush countryside; bright greens and dark browns saturated from a fresh rain shower.  I started crying (something I never really did in those days).  The reality of leaving home for the first time hit me.  I ADORED my life in Virginia, where I was born and raised and had hardly ever left; it was my world, and I was leaving it behind.  But no matter how hard it was to leave my comfortable little world, there was no turning back.  I knew I needed to leave it, even just for a little while.  I knew it was right.  I needed to grow.  And plus, I thought, it would only be for a little while, not forever.  

From the Baltimore train station, to the shuttle to the airport, the airplane to Salt Lake City, and then the Greyhound Bus to Rexburg, Idaho, where the only person I knew was my newly married sister who would just be there for a couple of weeks.  It was hard for me.  I was shy, it was baron and desert-y, it was cold (it was the end of April - Spring Term - and it snowed!), I guess I did cross the plains, but on a cushy airplane seat.  As weird as this may sound, I wasn't used to being around so many LDS people, and it was sort of a culture shock.  I remember being in the grocery store and overhearing someone talk about Relief Society.  I wanted to go over to them and tell them that I was LDS too, but then I remembered that I was in Rexburg and talking about Relief Society in the grocery store was probably normal.  My roommates were all from the west and would always ask me, "What?"  whenever I would say something because they couldn't understand my Virginia/mumbly accent.  (Meanwhile, my friends back home in Virginia thought I was starting to sound like a northerner.) 

But my years there were good for me, even if I did call home and cry that I wanted to go home once or twice.  I made good friends, my testimony grew, as did my self confidence and my intelligence.  My field hockey void was filled with soccer and all sorts of intramural activities.   I was having experiences that I needed to grow and that I just couldn't get back home.  I had given up my comfort zone at home to grow in the way the Lord wanted me to grow.

We are told in section 4 of the Doctrine and Covenants that we must have "faith, hope, charity and love, with an eye single to the glory of God" to qualify for the work of the Lord.  Having an eye single to the glory of God must require some sacrifice.  This means that we must give up always doing what we want to do in order to do what the Lord wants us to do.  We sacrifice to show him that we love him and our willing to obey his commandments and his plan for each of us.

In a conference talk back in 1971 titled "Sacrifice Still Brings Forth Blessings", Hartman Rector Jr. says, "Jesus, our Lord and Master, was the greatest example of all in following in obedience to his Father's commandments.  His great agony in the Garden I presume has never been approached and cannot be matched by human man.  He in Gethsemane prayed, saying, "O my Father, if it be possible, let this cup pass from me: nevertheless not as I will, but as thou wilt."  (Matt. 26:39) The Master did not want to endure what was before him even though he knew this was the major purpose of his coming to earth - but he did what his Father had asked, and because he did, he holds "all power… in heaven and in earth" (Matt. 28:18) and has, as Paul records, become "the author and finisher of our faith" (Heb. 12:2), and as many as receive him become his sons and daughters."

Hartman Rector Jr. continues by asking, "And how was it done?  It was possible only through sacrifice.  Truly sacrifice does "bring forth the blessings of heaven."

Yes it does.  Sacrifice does bring forth the blessings of heaven.

President Harold B. Lee said, "I am persuaded of one great truth: Whenever the Lord has a great blessing for one of his children, he puts that son or daughter in the way to make a great sacrifice."

This quote by President Lee makes me think of my own life and something else that I have considered a sacrifice.  Mostly just for the first few years, but still sometimes now.  And that is moving to the ranch.  I have talked about this before, probably too much, but it is, obviously, a huge part of my life story right now.  I guess it is my life story right now.  I'm not going to lie and say that moving to and living on the ranch, what I used to consider kind of in the middle of western nowhere, has been easy for me.  BUT…it has, as President Lee said, put me in a position to receive great blessings from the Lord.  He knows me.  He looks out for me and for my family.  He wants me to be happy and wants me to have my dreams come true.  He provides.  And He puts us in positions to grow and positions for us to be molded by Him.  

President Benson taught that "to sacrifice, we need to deny ourselves of all ungodliness.  We need to come unto Christ and repent of any sins which prevent the spirit of the Lord from taking precedence in our lives.  To deny oneself of all ungodliness is to "offer a sacrifice unto the Lord they…, even that of a broken heart and a contrite spirit" (D&C 59:8)."   

President Benson also says we must be willing to serve a mission, be married in the house of the Lord, and serve with our time and means to build the kingdom of God.

I am grateful for my parents and my in-laws for being examples to me in sacrificing to serve missions.  It must be hard to leave children, grandchildren, miss weddings and funerals, baptisms, and other events.  I am grateful also that I was able to marry a return missionary in the temple, and that we are raising our children together in the gospel.  I am grateful for my calling of mother.

Motherhood is one of my favorite topics.  Motherhood is wonderful, and glorious, and fulfilling in so many ways, but it is, by no means, short on sacrifice.  Every part of it requires sacrifice. 

The world tells us that we should not be mothers, but do our "own thing".  The world says, "Indulge yourself.  Make YOU happy.  Serve yourself.  Have a career over children.  Have nice things.  Look beautiful no matter what the cost.  Spend your time doing what YOU want to do.  Don't have children."

He does have a right arm, I promise.  He just blurred it off from moving so fast.  My phone couldn't keep up with his excitement over the yellow flower.

The Lord's way is MUCH better.  He wants us to fulfill our divine role as mother and wants to help us.  Motherhood is hard.  It does require sacrifice.  But it is well worth it.  After all, sacrifice is the act of giving up something valued for the sake of something else more important or worthy.  Even as i write this talk, thinking about sacrifice, it is bedtime and i have 3 children laying on the soft carpeted floor beside me.  One is crying out of sheer exhaustion, one fussing because my arm is in the wrong place, and one is just content to be laying on the floor beside me.  Motherhood is fun, and frustrating, and rewarding, and… so on.  

I love my calling as a mother.  I love that the Lord inspires us in how to be, and gives us strength when sometimes we feel like the sacrifice is too great - like at 5:00 when you are trying to get dinner on the table, with a baby in one arm, someone else hanging on your leg crying because they are tired and hungry and melting down, someone else just hit somebody else with something, the phone's ringing, and …..it's great.

Julie B. Beck's general conference talk "Mothers Who Know" is one of my favorite conference talks ever.  Sister Beck gives great wisdom and inspiration and direction of how to raise our children unto the Lord.  She also teaches ways of how to sacrifice in our calling of mother.  She says, "Mothers who know do less.  They permit less of what will not bear good fruit eternally.  They allow less media in their homes, less distraction, less activity that draws their children away from their home.  Mothers who know are willing to live on less and consume less of the world's goods in order to spend more time with their children - more time eating together, more time working together, more time reading together, more time talking, laughing , singing, and exemplifying.  These mothers choose carefully and do not try to choose it all.  Their goal is to prepare a rising generation of children who will take the gospel of Jesus Christ into the entire world.  Their goal is to prepare future fathers and mothers who will be builders of the Lord's kingdom for the next 50 years.  That is influence; that is power. " 

President Ezra Taft Benson told us that the opportunities for sacrifice are ever present.

What would constitute as sacrifice today?

Such things as:

Raising our children unto the Lord

Paying our tithing

Observing the word of wisdom

filling a mission

holding family home evening every week

scripture study

family prayers

gathering together as a family every day for dinner

shutting the computer down when a family member needs you

turning off the television when you should be having an eye to eye conversation

serving those around you

giving a broken heart to the Lord

offering a contrite spirit

President Gordon B. Hinckley defined sacrifice so beautifully when he said: “Without sacrifice there is no true worship of God.   ‘The Father gave his Son, and the Son gave his life,’ and we do not worship unless we give—give of our substance, … our time, … strength, … talent, … faith, … [and] testimonies” (Teachings of Gordon B. Hinckley [1997], 565).

Carol B. Thomas, 1st counselor in the YW General Presidency in 2001 stated, "Sacrifice is an amazing principle. As we willingly give our time and talents and all that we possess, it becomes one of our truest forms of worship. It can develop within us a profound love for each other and our Savior, Jesus Christ. Through sacrifice our hearts can be changed; we live closer to the Spirit and have less of an appetite for things of the world."

President Hinckley taught a grand truth when he said: “It is not a sacrifice to live the gospel of Jesus Christ. It is never a sacrifice when you get back more than you give. It is an investment, … a greater investment than any. … Its dividends are eternal and everlasting” (Teachings of Gordon B. Hinckley, 567–68).

We know sacrifice is the giving up of something for the gaining of something better, but let us add to our definition that it is the opportunity to grow and become better, and as an investment in eternity.  

I bear testimony that if we choose to sacrifice, especially with a willing heart, we will be immensely blessed in this life and in eternity by our great Creator who loves us and wants to bless us.