Metamorphosis

In 2006, I made hundreds of calls trying to gather my 1986 graduating class for a 20-year reunion. (Just for fun, I'm tossing in a graduation photo.)  I can't even tell you how many times I heard this, "High school?  No thanks. I am sooooo over that."  And I thought, "Well, so am I.  We have all moved on."

It seemed obvious to me that during the years that my peers and I have been separated, ALL of us have changed. Of course, we are not the same people that walked the halls of Taylorsville High School decades ago.  Plus, I don't think that we were too bad back then for kids who were just 15 or 16 or 17 years old. Maybe some would say that we were squirrel-y teens with half-connected neurons, but we were trying to grow up good.  And with the benefit of years and years, probably (hopefully), we were all even better and improved.

As promised, THS Class of 1986 reunion was a great study of human growth and development over a long period of time.  That is, if you are into a kind of scientific anthropology beyond just drinking punch with old friends.  ha!

That brings me to today's big thought--

(Cue the confetti canons and fiery sparklers.)

!!!!!  People change  !!!!!

When you are talking about children of God, yesterday is not today, and today is not tomorrow. We grow.  We improve.  We develop.  We are tutored.  We are molded.  We are refined.

To quote The Bard, "Twas I, but 'Tis not I" (1), because God is remodeling the human race, one by one and moment to moment.

The central purpose of mortality is the opportunity to grow and reach a greater potential. (2)  The changes are gradual and occur over time. Our progress is more a process than an event.  (3)

The central figure in that "process" is Jesus Christ, whose divine mission was, in part, to suffer beyond the capacity of a mere mortal and then give His life to save us from our sins. His purpose was to reclaim us through repentance from the inevitable missteps of our probationary time, and then to advocate with the Father on our behalf.  To offer us an escape from the condemnation that we earn through acts of independence and agency, and allow us to benefit from the gradual growth and development that failure and/or experience brings.

His purpose is to accomplish in us, a complete metamorphosis-- "The gospel of Jesus Christ...takes...men and women of the earth and refines (them) into men and women for the eternities." (4)

As Paul said, "We look for the Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ: Who shall change our vile body, that it may be fashioned like unto his glorious body, according to the working whereby he is able even to subdue all things unto himself." (5)

Whew!  That is beautiful doctrine and with it in mind--

I am very concerned about a real societal problem that I see popping up all over the place.  It is this sweeping ideology that once a person has fallen short, that there is never a way to rid oneself of shortcomings or mistakes, rebellion or agency, weakness or transgression.  That they stick like glue.  Impossible to shed.  And they follow you in perpetuity.  (The Information Age makes this more and more possible.)

What a desperate and grim state to believe that our accumulation of daily blemish is with us irrevocably!  This is an outright denial of The Atonement of Jesus Christ.

It is a modern-day proliferation of the philosophy of ancient, awful anti-christs.

Sherem "(preached) among the people, ...(declaring) unto them that there should be no Christ." (6)

And Korihor screamed, "...ye cannot know that there shall be a Christ. Ye look forward and say that (you) see a remission of your sins. But behold, it is the effect of a frenzied mind; and this derangement of your minds comes because of the traditions of your fathers, which lead you away into a belief of things which are not so." (7)

We live in a society that denies Heavenly Father's plan to help us grow through line upon line development over a lifetime and more.  We live with a collective people who deny that Christ came to offer us an escape from condemnation.

This is my anthem today-- allow others to change!

It is such a bad thing when we deny each another the possibility of the Savior's power to transform us over time. It is especially disconcerting when we appreciate and depend on the liberal mercy of Christ for ourselves, but are restrictive with His grace when we view others.(8)  We are all prodigals.  We are NOT finished, yet.  And we all need Christ.

Here is THE true, hopeful doctrine that allows us to embrace our arduous path and move onward through our mistakes-- Elder Packer taught, “The Atonement leaves no tracks, no traces. What it fixes is fixed. … It just heals, and what it heals stays healed....The Atonement, which can reclaim each one of us, bears no scars. That means that no matter what we have done or where we have been or how something happened, if we truly repent, [the Savior] has promised that He would atone. And when He atoned, that settled that!” (9)

It is my hope that we can apply Elder Packer's declaration to ourselves, but also, liberally to others.  Remembering that Heavenly Father started us here on earth as babies in mother's arms needing to learn every single thing new.  And believing that every day is an essential opportunity to be building on yesterday, growing and stretching, and recreating ourselves. Christ making that possible.

If we could think of life as "a process" then maybe we could stand back and glory in the cumulative nature of development. Then we would not be in such a dogged hurry with each other's progress.  And I don't think that we would hold each other hostage to our pasts either.  But instead we would stand in awe, armed with mercy, as we witnessed and even admired God's longitudinal, drip by drip, long-term program of transforming each of us into something more divine.


(1) Shakespeare, "As You Like It"
(2) Mormon.org, What is the Purpose of Life? https://www.mormon.org/beliefs/purpose-of-life
(3) "Born Again" Elder D. Todd Christofferson April 2008 GC
(4) CR Nov 2007 The Great Commandment Elder Joseph B. Wirthlin
(5) Philippians 3:20-21
(6) Jacob 7:1-2
(7) Alma 30:15-16
(8) ideas came from reading Elder Renlund's April 2015 GC talk, "Latter-day Saints Keep on Trying"
(9) Boyd K Packer, “The Plan of Happiness,” Ensign or Liahona, May 2015, 28.

A Nation of God's Children

This is a little throwback to September of 2011.  It is a photo of corporate-Greg as he was leaving for the airport for his first American Airlines flight post 9-11.  He left without fear.

Me? Skiddish. That's why there is a picture.  I wanted some kind of "last memory" if things went eschew.  Sweet Jamison is the baby.

That was quite a season in the history of our country and I felt affected even from our innocent little world of Frisco, Texas.  By affected, I mean, vulnerable.

I was grateful for leaders who jumped into action to protect me.  It reminds me that last week I heard Brett Kavanaugh (presently of the DC Court of Appeals) remembering his five and a half years in the George Bush White House.  He said that for President Bush, every day post 9-11 was September 12th and he was consummately determined to keep America safe.  At the time, I felt secure in that. I sensed that for the next 2686 days, Bush had my back.

I also had profound feelings of patriotism for this great nation that I love.  After 9-11 we embraced in the great biggest National hug ever.

I remember watching the broadcast of the September 14th Prayer Service in the DC National Cathedral and I felt like America was all gathered for comfort and strength from The Heavens.  It was beautiful. The Nation, collectively, needed a Supreme Being during that season to make sense of the senseless.  They needed to put their faith in someone loving and powerful and omnipotent.

In that meeting, President Bush said this:
"It is said that adversity introduces us to ourselves. This is true of a nation as well. In this trial, we have been reminded, and the world has seen, that our fellow Americans are generous and kind, resourceful and brave...Today we feel what Franklin Roosevelt called 'the warm courage of national unity'. This is a unity of every faith and every background."

And that was the week that Congress shook off their differences, squished together, and with "heart eyes" for each other, sang "God Bless America" on the United States Capital steps" while we all watched. What an amazing scene.

It would be nice if that was the climate of our nation today, but we have been so casual with the unity that we found in tragedy.

Last week, I was obsessively interested in the Senate's public confirmation process of the above mentioned Supreme Court nominee, Judge Kavanaugh.  I watched a lot of the two days of questioning and came away confident that the Judge was beyond qualified. This is a good man. This is a man committed to the rules of the Judiciary.  He respects precedent. He is principled.  He is a willing servant.  His twelve years on the bench has shown intelligence, lack of bias, respect for the Constitution, and for those in his courtroom.  Like Senator Lindsay Graham said, he should be confirmed with 96 or 97 or 98 votes.  But that is just not the way things work in Washington these days.

I'm not sure whether our politicians set the tone for us as Americans, or if they go to DC to represent us in our bias. But chicken or egg, cooperation and courtesy is not the way we play.  Those Senate hearings last week were a peek into the ugly and the wedges and the cliques and the selfish and the destructive and the bitter.

And that's why it isn't all bad to have 9-11 come around the corner again.  It is a day of remembering the victims and their loved ones, yes.  But we would be obliged if it was more than that.  If the day was also an opportunity to remember when love combined against hate.  When solidarity reigned and, as a nation, we were one.

If we all remembered those feelings then maybe we would require benevolence of ourselves, and of our public servants again.  And if we could hold it close, I bet we would sigh at how glorious it felt to be joined and connected again-- all of us God's children, placed here together in this brilliant and beautiful land of liberty and love.