8-3-11 “He did deliver me from bondage” p. 44, Day 6

8-3-11                         “He did deliver me from bondage” p. 44, Day 6

Patience in suffering

Mosiah 24:14

“And I will also ease the burdens which are put upon your shoulders, that even you cannot feel them upon your backs even while you are in bondage; and this will I do that ye may stand as witnesses for me hereafter, and that ye may know of a surety that I, the Lord God, go visit my people in their afflictions.” 

I think the Lord has done much to ease my burdens by studying this book, not to mention it is helping me with my mission to see how I can create a learning journal for others.  I think having patience for myself and accepting my best- whatever ‘widow’s mite’ it is, is beginning to help me let go of the need to become angry.  The other day when the kids were fighting I felt released from the obligation to ‘make them stop’ fighting.  I know they fight and yell because that is how I have shown them how to solve their problems.  I am changing from the inside out.  As I continue to try my best each day, one more marble of good goes into the hose.  Deliverance is on the way, it is an eventuality if I continue to change, they will change.  Then I will not “[need to]” suffer that my children fight and quarrel. 

I guess I should explain the hose thing.  In my process of learning in the garden, and learning about delayed gratification, the Lord planted an idea in my mind of an analogy.  Change is like a garden hose and marbles: As you sew, so shall ye reap; Work now, reward later.  This process helps us learn faith and patience to be able to bring about the promises the Lord has promised us.  If I have a garden hose that is full of all black marbles and I want it full of white marbles, the only thing I can do is put one marble in the hose at a time.  We are creatures who learn slowly.  Plants only grow one day at a time.  Why should we expect more of ourselves?  Everyday I read my scriptures I am effecting change from the inside out: the slow way.  I seek to change my heart, and change myself.  My actions through out the day are a result of who I ‘am’ in today.  It is as if every day when I keep my promise to study my scriptures that I am putting a marble into the hose, one each day.  Depending on how long the hose it, then it will take that much work before I see the results come out of the other end.  There is a period of faith that a seed must germinate under the soil unseen and in the dark before it can emerge from the ground.  Both conditions are necessary in order to create the environment for the seed to grow.  We must plant with hope, work with patience, and then we will see the fruits of our labors.  By imagining this hose in my process of change, it helps me to have faith in the eventuality (not just a possibility) of the harvest.  If I do what the Lord asks, His blessings will be mine eventually, not maybe. 

So that takes me back to Leslie’s Jackrabbit factor.  This is where we are grateful in today and trust the process, imagining that those blessing are already ours. 

 

Epiphany from “When you least expect it” song by Hilary Weeks:

We all have cycles of up and down times.  If we join together in synergy, then we can lift each other up in those moments of doubt; and the work collectively will never have to be hindered by a momentary doubt individually because synergistically we our strengths will cover our weaknesses.  We will constantly progress toward the promises of the Lord: which are a sure eventuality if we are faithful.  Together we will be stronger.