Coming to a Knowledge of Christ

The Lord has said: 

Behold, I stand at the door and knock: if any man hear my voice, and open the door, I will come in to him, and will sup with him, and he with me. Rev. 3:20

Recently, someone came to visit my family. It was an unexpected visit and the person who visited us said they would like to help and explained why they felt they were able to do so by sharing a very personal aspect of their life. We were overwhelmed at the selfless generosity demonstrated for our family and the great courage this person demonstrated by taking us into their confidence.

Tithing and My Broken Down Car...

When I turned twenty one I was just starting school at BYU (Brigham Young University). My plan was to live at home and spare the expense of living away. This, I thought, would allow me to put the money I would have spent on rent toward a car. To me this sounded logical and reasonable, but this way of thinking went contrary to the way my dad thought about things. He was very old-school and counseled me to stay out of debt for anything other than a home. I considered what he said and then decided to buy the car anyway.

A Letter To My Daughter Upon Starting Her First Year of College...

Dear Daughter,

I know you have heard this before, but here is a link to the story about my first week away from home when I went to Rick's College (now known as BYU Idaho). Read it some time, if you want, when you are absolutely bored (My First Week of College).

I won't lie to you. What you are doing is really hard and will test both your resolve and your abilities. May I share with you some of the things I learned as I blundered my way through college?

I Am a Child of God...

The fact that we are children of God is so fundamental to our religion and has been so often repeated to us since the time when we were just small children that I believe in many instances we take this fact for granted and rarely think about what this amazing doctrine implies. To really understand even the simple things of  god takes a little effort on our part, but that effort soon leads those who try god’s word to an understanding that simply believing and rehearsing His doctrines fails to reveal.

Choluteca and the Threat of War...

I've already talked about the contentious geopolitical climate of Honduras at the time of my mission in another post (see The Military Roundups of San Miguel...), so I won't belabor this subject too greatly here. But I do want to elaborate a bit more on the time I spent in Choluteca which is a Honduran city which lies just a few miles north of the Nicaraguan border.

The Military and the Roundups of San Miguel...

When I arrived in Honduras, it was a time of great upheavals and political strife. Honduras was literally surrounded by countries on all sides which were entangled in civil wars and rebellions. The armed conflicts were raging on all fronts when I arrived there in the early 1980s.

Fist Fights In Paradise, and God's Strange Ways...

One of the areas I served in during my mission was a very small island named Utila just off the northern coast of Honduras. Although small, it was one of the most beautiful places I have ever been. When I was there it was picture post card perfect. We used to walk out on the pier which went out into the ocean for hundreds of feet and would dangle our feet in the ocean as we ate our lunch. And there was this bridge which crossed a little finger of water that stretched inward into the interior of the island where we could watch sharks and rays as they glided past under foot. We even saw a school of flying fish which must have made a wrong turn somewhere because they no sooner entered the bay than they turned themselves about and headed back out into open waters.