When
our children were very small, I started to write down a few things
about what happened every day. Let me tell you how that got started. I
came home late from a Church assignment. It was after dark. My
father-in-law, who lived near us, surprised me as I walked toward the
front door of my house. He was carrying a load of pipes over his
shoulder, walking very fast and dressed in his work clothes. I knew that
he had been building a system to pump water from a stream below us up
to our property.
He
smiled, spoke softly, and then rushed past me into the darkness to go
on with his work. I took a few steps toward the house, thinking of what
he was doing for us, and just as I got to the door, I heard in my
mind—not in my own voice—these words: “I’m not giving you these
experiences for yourself. Write them down.”
I
went inside. I didn’t go to bed. Although I was tired, I took out some
paper and began to write. And as I did, I understood the message I had
heard in my mind. I was supposed to record for my children to read,
someday in the future, how I had seen the hand of God blessing our family.
Grandpa didn’t have to do what he was doing for us. He could have had
someone else do it or not have done it at all. But he was serving us,
his family, in the way covenant disciples of Jesus Christ
always do. I knew that was true. And so I wrote it down, so that my
children could have the memory someday when they would need it.
I
wrote down a few lines every day for years. I never missed a day no
matter how tired I was or how early I would have to start the next day.
Before I would write, I would ponder this question: “Have I seen the
hand of God reaching out to touch us or our children or our family
today?” As I kept at it, something began to happen. As I would cast my
mind over the day, I would see evidence of what God had done for one of
us that I had not recognized in the busy moments of the day. As that
happened, and it happened often, I realized that trying to remember had
allowed God to show me what He had done.
More than gratitude
began to grow in my heart. Testimony grew. I became ever more certain
that our Heavenly Father hears and answers prayers. I felt more
gratitude for the softening and refining that come because of the
Atonement of the Savior Jesus Christ. And I grew more confident that the
Holy Ghost can bring all things to our remembrance—even things we did not notice or pay attention to when they happened.
And
the challenge to remember has always been the hardest for those who are
blessed abundantly. Those who are faithful to God are protected and
prospered. That comes as the result of serving God and keeping His
commandments. But with those blessings comes the temptation to forget
their source. It is easy to begin to feel the blessings were granted not
by a loving God on whom we depend but by our own powers. The prophets
have repeated this lament over and over:
“And
thus we can behold how false, and also the unsteadiness of the hearts
of the children of men; yea, we can see that the Lord in his great
infinite goodness doth bless and prosper those who put their trust in
him.
“Yea,
and we may see at the very time when he doth prosper his people, yea,
in the increase of their fields, their flocks and their herds, and in
gold, and in silver, and in all manner of precious things of every kind
and art; sparing their lives, and delivering them out of the hands of
their enemies; softening the hearts of their enemies that they should
not declare wars against them; yea, and in fine, doing all things for
the welfare and happiness of his people; yea, then is the time that they
do harden their hearts, and do forget the Lord their God, and do
trample under their feet the Holy One—yea, and this because of their
ease, and their exceedingly great prosperity.”
And
the prophet goes on to say: “Yea, how quick to be lifted up in pride;
yea, how quick to boast, and do all manner of that which is iniquity;
and how slow are they to remember the Lord their God, and to give ear
unto his counsels, yea, how slow to walk in wisdom’s paths!”4
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