Day Marks

Losing your self is the way to finding your self. And finding out who you are is the way to follow the Lord. But if you are not willing to forgive, why try to follow the Savior? (July 5 2008)

(Rebecca M. Taylor and Vaughn J. Featherstone, “Friend to Friend,” The Friend (Liahona), Aug. 1995, 12). When I was young, my father was often away from home because of a serious alcohol problem. My mother had to work full-time to support us, and I began to do many of the household chores for her. Mother taught me how to scrub floors and how to wash clothes in an old washer. . . . When I was about 11 years old, many of Mother’s relatives came from out of town to have dinner with us one Saturday night. Such visits were rare, so she spent the whole day getting the dinner ready. She prepared a pot roast and all the vegetables to go with it, mashed potatoes and gravy, salads, hot rolls, and dessert. She cooked all day, and soon the dirty dishes started stacking up. After dinner, everyone brought the leftover food to the kitchen, then went into the living room and began to visit. I remember going back to the kitchen, thinking, Mother works all week long, and now she’ll have to do the...

The highway of the upright is to depart from evil: he that keepeth his way preserveth his soul.

6 Then shall the lame man leap as an hart, and the tongue of the dumb sing: for in the wilderness shall waters break out, and streams in the desert. 7 And the parched ground shall become a pool, and the thirsty land springs of water: in the habitation of dragons, where each lay, shall be grass with reeds and rushes. 8 And an highway shall be there, and a way, and it shall be called The way of holiness; the unclean shall not pass over it; but it shall be for those: the wayfaring men, though fools, shall not err therein.

. . . Was it here, Here, that paradise was revealed For one brief moment On a night in midsummer? ( Hammarskjöld, p. 216)

Yes to God; yes to Fate; yes to yourself. This reality can wound the soul, but has the power to heal her . . . (Hammarskjöld, p.155)

I don’t know Who – or what – put the question, I don’t know when it was put. I don’t even remember answering. But at some moment I did answer Yes to Someone – or Something – and from that hour I was certain that existence is meaningful and that, therefore, my life, in self-surrender, had a goal. From that moment I have known what it means “not to look back,” and “to take no thought for the morrow.” Led by Ariadne’s thread of my answer through the labyrinth of Life, I came to a time and place where I realized that the way leads to a triumph which is a catastrophe, and to a catastrophe which is a triumph, that the price for committing one’s life would be reproach, and that the only elevation possible to man lies in the depths of humiliation. After that, the word “courage” lost its meaning, since nothing could be taken from me. As I continued along the Way, I learned, step by step, that behind every saying in the Gospels stands one man and...