Growing

Truth be told, I have been meaning to write about some thoughts and feelings I've had about being called to be a seminary teacher, but life keeps getting in the way.  Insecurity gets in the way as well.  I doubt myself all the time when I write stuff here.  Will it be taken the way I intended?  Do people think that I am full of myself?  Do I share too much and I'm making light of sacred things?  Does what I say have any value?  All that stuff gets in my way sometimes.  

Other things that get in my way.  Stuff that is happening in the world.  Right now, believe me when I say, It's all been said.  My opinion doesn't need to be added to this mess.  Without going into detail, there are 4 main issues that are tearing our families apart.  

1.  Are you owed anything?  How does charity and personal responsibility co-exist?
2.  "love is love"  Is marriage between a man and a woman and does the government get to decide?  How does this effect membership within the church?
3.  Should woman who feel they are being treated unfairly by not being able to hold the priesthood get to actively demonstrate and proselyte contrary to church doctrine and not get excommunicated?
4.  Should we care about the thousands of illegal children who are in shelters on the boarder?  Should they be left in those conditions because their parents broke the law?  How do we reconcile law with compassion?

All these things weigh heavily on my mind and I am the least qualified person to comment on any of them....beside, it's all been said.  What I do is focus on is my growth as a disciple of Jesus Christ and hope that anything that you want to take away as applicable to what is happening will help you reconcile those same questions I struggle with.  

The last couple of days I have been praying fervently for wisdom, compassion and true knowledge.  Eyes that see and ears that hear.  How to love while not condoning actions.  I had no idea when just before the reelection of our current president when I was feeling a big test coming on, how right I was and that scares me.  I could feel the test coming of our ability to love each other and to have the attitude the savior had while hanging on the cross "father forgive them, for they know not what they do."  That "know not what they do" is the key.  The general YW president felt the need to put out a 1 minute video on compassion.  It is heated right now.  Brother is being pitted against brother all in the name of love and compassion and the almighty "tolerance".  It scares me for our future if we can't figure this out.  I believe it will be a major part of the sifting of the wheat and the tares - this ability to love our brothers and sisters no matter what they don't know or do and how that effects us.  

A friend of mine made a comment on the video from the general yw president that I shared on my fb, that got me pondering more.  She said "thank you for sharing this... I was commenting about (I removed her name) today and called her a moron and immediately had to reword what I said, because really I know she just doesn't get it... and how often have I just not "gotten it"?! 

That "just not gotten it" put me right back to "they know not what they do."  It also reminded me of Mormon.  He was the greatest example we have of being surrounded by people who just didn't get it, yet he still exemplified love and compassion.  He knows what it feels like to be the last man standing.  To look around and wonder how many could just not get it.  To be stricken with grief because of the choices of those around you.  But, he knew the plan and he never faltered from it.  He knew that the best hope his people had of exaltation was to stand by them to the end.

My favorite blogger and the only blog I read posted something about this being all prophecy which is being fulfilled.  All I can say is, yep.  Now to figure out how to live thru it and not loose your own soul.  To remain stedfast and unmovable.  To exemplify charity - which is the pure love of Christ -towards our fellow men so that they have their best chance at being exalted right along with us.  How else could Mormon have stood with his people if he hadn't loved them by serving them and most importantly never giving up on them - even though he would have been completely justified in doing so.  OK, he did walk away for a small moment, but then he returned -which is why I love him even more!

I have also had an interesting experience while taking on the challenge of reading the BOM with the intent of marking everything that has to do with pride.  I took this challenge because of my favorite apostle and teacher who I won't name to save from eye rolling.  When we started our pilgrimage to Nauvoo, I started this challenge.

In the front of my missionary copy of the BOM I wrote: "...looking for evidence of pride -what is it- what to do about it - what it does.  Finished the BOM on my iPad 2 days ago and haven't started this yet because we are in an RV on a church history tour.  We are in Kansas heading home.  It is April 17, 20014."

It is now June 27th.  Before I took on this challenge I was reading 2 chapters a day.  Now that I have a hard copy that I've got to cart around and a green (the color of pride and envy) pencil to mark that I've got to keep track of, I'm getting nowhere fast.  I just finished Omni this morning.  Something about wanting to understand pride is slow going.  This isn't an exercise where you just look up all the scriptures that contain the word "pride" because pride is much more complicated than that.  You should see how much green there is in my book so far because I have also been marking the lack of pride -when credit was given to the Lord.  This little experiment is probably also why I am having a hard time wanting to write here.  

Now that I've gotten all that out of the way, the true reason for this post was to try and express the feeling of my heart regarding the wonderful opportunity of growth I have been given.  The opportunity to help suit up some of the choicest spirits in the armor of the Lord.  A great deal of trust has been placed in me and I don't take it lightly.  

Little known secret and truth be told....I've been wanting to teach seminary for a couple of years.  Now, here's where I may get some misunderstanding.  I feel like I have been preparing for this.  Say it's cheesy.  Say it's prideful.  Say whatever, but we are all here to prepare.  For something.  Whatever that specific path for each of us is, it takes preparation.  When I am finished with the doctrine and covenants I will have studied -with the institute manual - all 4 of the standard works on my own.  I am obsessed with teaching and learning how to become a better teacher.  As a convert and a person that is experiencing a continual conversion, I understand how one becomes converted.  You have to do the work yourself.  Talk about needing your pride stripped away - being a successful teacher requires your pride to be stripped.  It's not about me telling the students everything I know.  It's about me helping them discover things for themselves.  I've got to be willing to work on my weaknesses and let people tell me what they are.  My goal isn't to teach the students the gospel, it is to have them be able to apply it in their lives and be converted to it.  It is to teach them how to be students.  Who cares if they can lay out all the history of the church being founded if they don't know why they need to know it.  

When you know that the stakes are high you (ok, I) can tend to get a little intense.  You can forget to enjoy the journey.  Forget to appreciate that this is a training ground and we are here to work out our salvation.  Work it out.  Fail at it.  Succeed at it.  It's all ok and how it's supposed to be.  

It reminded me of when I was a junior in high school and living with my best friend.  I lived with her and her family for about 1 month and while I was there I attended early morning seminary with her.  It was at the church building and some mornings I would go into the class and some I would just sit in the foyer on the couch and wait for them.  

The only thing I remember is Nate getting the teacher so upset that she threw a wadded up kleenex at him and said "you are so uncouth!"  She was the stake presidents wife and the mother of my friend Tom.  She was the sickly sweet type that always had something positive and pleasant to say.  The fact that she did that was pretty extreme for her.  I don't remember a single lesson or point of doctrine from those days.  In fact nothing from any of the lessons that I sat in on Sundays or on mutual nights.  I do have some from private conversations with those friends and their families.  The only thing I had was a feeling.  A deep yearning for something that I didn't have.  A roadmap that I knew if I used I could be happy.  All of that scared me and I knew that I would have to do something about it if I really took the time to think about anything that I was feeling and I wasn't ready.  I wasn't ready until I finished my first year of college and knew that I needed to do something different.  

What you don't want to do is beat anyone over the head with the gospel.  That's not inviting.  There are real struggles and obstacles to overcome when you decided to change your life no matter the consequences.  Just because the students I am teaching were born into the gospel doesn't mean they don't have those same struggles and challenges.  

Like Elder Anderson said about the students his wife taught in early morning seminary (at a seminary conference) "their hands were warmed by the fire of her testimony."  I just need to show and share my love for the gospel while helping them to gain their own.  

I believe it was also in that conference that he talked about this generation being the most spiritually sensitive.  The kids are so much farther ahead of the game than I was at a much older age.  Can you imagine what kind of miracles are possible if they suit up?  We are talking bible miracles!

So, here's how I announced it on fb, because that's the world we live in.  

"It is now official, I will be teaching early morning seminary in the fall for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints (most specifically, my ward). I am so excited for the challenge, the blessings and the opportunity to share my love of the gospel on a daily basis with the best youth of the chosen generation. To my future students, get yourselves ready for an amazing year!"

My favorite response was from my Dad.  

Their is no doubt in my mind that you will give those Kids the best of what you got and you Mrs. Ivey have got a lot to give. Love is a powerful tool.

Love is a powerful tool.  It's how we are going to survive this mess that we are in.  It's what we are here to learn and figure out.  When we love God's children, we are showing our love to Him and when we love Him we obey Him and when we obey Him we qualify ourselves for all that He has to give....which makes us love Him more and His children more and then we obey more and it goes round and round.  

There's work to do, Let's do it!