I work at Home Depot in Mission, Texas from 4:00 a.m. to 9:00 a.m. Monday through Friday. They play different types of music in the store on different days. Sometimes they play Country and Western, sometimes Rock and Roll. I recently heard a Country song that I thought was interesting, titled Sounds Like Life. I found the words on the Internet and have pasted them below:
Got a call last night from an old friend’s wife
Said I hate to bother you
Johnny Ray fell off the wagon
He’s been gone all afternoon
I know my buddy, so I drove to Skully’s
And found him at the bar
I say hey man, what’s going on
He said, I don’t know where to start
Sarah’s old car’s about to fall apart
And the washer quit last week
We had to put momma in the nursing home
And the baby’s cutting teeth
I didn’t get much work this week
And I got bills to pay
I said I know this ain’t what you wanna hear
But it’s what I’m gonna say
(Chorus)
Sounds like life to me, it ain’t no fantasy
It’s just a common case of everyday reality
Man I know it’s tough, but you gotta suck it up
To hear you talk you’re caught up in some tragedy
It sounds like life to me
Well his face turned red and he shook his head
He said you don’t understand
Three kids and a wife depend on me
And I’m just one man
To top it off I just found out
That Sarah’s 2 months late
I said hey bartender set us up a round
We need to celebrate
(Chorus)
Sounds like life to me, plain old destiny
Yeah the only thing for certain is uncertainty
You gotta hold on tight, just enjoy the ride
Get used to all this unpredictability
Sounds like life
Man I know its tough but you gotta suck it up
To hear you talk you’re caught up in some tragedy
Sounds like life to me
Sounds like life (End of Song)
Life is not always easy. Very few of us get through this life without some difficulty or even some tragedy. Much of the difficulty that we face is the result of choices that we have made, but a great amount of our problems are the result of other people’s choices and decisions or circumstances that we cannot control.
Sometimes we think that we are experiencing hard times because we have offended God in some way. This may sometimes be the case, but even the most righteous people have gone through great suffering. Prior to becoming President of the Church, Spencer W. Kimball contracted throat cancer, necessitating the removal of his larynx. He spent his entire term as President speaking through a hole cut into his windpipe. Moses spent forty years in the wilderness, looking after 600,000 of the children of Israel, who, for the most part, behaved like children.
From the morning of the First Vision, Joseph Smith’s life was filled with difficulty. Numerous times he was tarred and feathered. At least one of his children died from exposure during a tarring and feathering. Some of his closest associates deserted him and called him a fallen prophet. Numerous times he was illegally imprisoned.
While in the Liberty, Missouri jail he became so discouraged that he called upon God for relief. The answer he received was this:
5If thou art called to pass through tribulation; if thou art in perils among false brethren; if thou art in perils among robbers; if thou art in perils by land or by sea;
6If thou art accused with all manner of false accusations; if thine enemies fall upon thee; if they tear thee from the society of thy father and mother and brethren and sisters; and if with a drawn sword thine enemies tear thee from the bosom of thy wife, and of thine offspring, and thine elder son, although but six years of age, shall cling to thy garments, and shall say, My father, my father, why can’t you stay with us? O, my father, what are the men going to do with you? and if then he shall be thrust from thee by the sword, and thou be dragged to prison, and thine enemies prowl around thee like wolves for the blood of the lamb;
7And if thou shouldst be cast into the pit, or into the hands of murderers, and the sentence of death passed upon thee; if thou be cast into the deep; if the billowing surge conspire against thee; if fierce winds become thine enemy; if the heavens gather blackness, and all the elements combine to hedge up the way; and above all, if the very jaws of hell shall gape open the mouth wide after thee, know thou, my son, that all these things shall give thee experience, and shall be for thy good.
8The Son of Man hath descended below them all. Art thou greater than he?
9Therefore, hold on thy way, and the priesthood shall remain with thee; for their bounds are set, they cannot pass. Thy days are known, and thy years shall not be numbered less; therefore, fear not what man can do, for God shall be with you forever and ever. (D & C 122:5-9)
I don’t know why some people have to struggle everyday of their lives while others seem to live in relative ease. I do believe that if we strive to obey the commandments and follow the promptings of the Holy Ghost that we will be provided with the opportunities for the experiences that will be the most beneficial to us and that will lead us back to the presence of our Heavenly Father.
At this point in my life, life is a struggle. My body is beginning to feel the effects of its age; I can’t always do the things I would like to do. Our nation’s economy is such that I am not able to earn as good of a living as I have been used to in the past. My wife and I have had to sacrifice and do without things we would like to have in order to meet our daily needs. Gasoline is about $3.50 per gallon, and we cannot always afford to go to places we would like to go. Life is a struggle.
But I testify to you that despite these struggles (or maybe because of these struggles) I have never felt closer to the Spirit than I do right now. Everyday I have to call upon the Lord to get me through the day. Everyday I ask the Lord to bless me that my old blue truck will get me to work and back and the other places I need to go. Everyday I have to put my trust in the Lord that my needs and the needs of my family will be met for that day. He has always blessed me with what I have asked.
Maybe one of these days the washing machine will break down or my old blue truck will stop running. That’s life. When those things happen, we’ll just have to find ways to deal with them. But they’re just things. What’s important is that my wife and I love one another and that we are working to have an eternal marriage. What's important is that our daughters and their husbands and children and grandchildren are healthy and live happy and productive lives. What’s important is that our son serves an honorable mission in Peru then comes home and devotes his life to his family and the building up of the Lord’s kingdom. What’s important is that we experience the things that Heavenly Father wants us to experience so that we can someday become like Him. That’s life. That’s Eternal Life.
Monday, July 11, 2011
Sunday, July 3, 2011
Independence Day
(The following blog entry is a repeat [with a few minor changes] of my posting on July 16, 2007. I felt it needed to be repeated.)
Tomorrow we celebrate the Fourth of July, known in the United States as Independence Day. History tells us that this is somewhat of a misnomer as independence did not actually come to the American colonies on July 4, 1776. That was merely the day that the Declaration of Independence was adopted by the colonies as their statement of the reasons they felt it necessary to sever their political ties with Great Britain. Independence did not actually come until after countless soldiers and civilians had died in a bloody, sometimes unpopular war. Despite the fact that we Americans celebrate July 4, 1776 as the birth date of our country, our beginning as a nation did not truly begin until after the ratification of the Constitution.
Still, this document, The Declaration of Independence, was the beginning of the process that created the United States. This document declared to the entire world that they who were seeking independence were not doing so without due consideration of all the ramifications of their actions. The writers and signers of the declaration fully realized the large-scale consequences of their actions, namely, war. They also understood, on a personal level, that as soon as they put pen to paper to sign their names, they would be forever branded as traitors to their mother country and subject to death by the crown. Still, they signed.
The Declaration of Independence is not a long document, but its significance as a political statement cannot be overestimated. This document set in motion the events that would lead to the founding of the greatest republic in the history of the world. Because of this document, a nation was created wherein the “…unalienable rights...” of mankind are not only recognized, but guaranteed and protected. This document led to the acceptance of the belief that all people should be free to speak as they please, believe as they please, as well as have all the other basic freedoms that would later be enumerated in the Constitution.
The importance of The Declaration of Independence to Latter-day Saints also cannot be overestimated. This document was necessary in order to develop a climate of religious freedom that would allow The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints to be established. Indeed, the signing of The Declaration of Independence could be called the first significant event in the Restoration of the Gospel of Jesus Christ.
I have attached a copy of The Declaration of Independence at the end of this essay. I would hope that all who have read this far would take the few minutes necessary to read and ponder its message.
The Declaration of Independence of the Thirteen Colonies In CONGRESS, July 4, 1776
The unanimous Declaration of the thirteen united States of America,
When in the Course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another, and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature's God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.
We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. --That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, --That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness.
Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shewn, that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security. —Such has been the patient sufferance of these Colonies; and such is now the necessity which constrains them to alter their former Systems of Government. The history of the present King of Great Britain [George III] is a history of repeated injuries and usurpations, all having in direct object the establishment of an absolute Tyranny over these States. To prove this, let Facts be submitted to a candid world.
He has refused his Assent to Laws, the most wholesome and necessary for the public good.
He has forbidden his Governors to pass Laws of immediate and pressing importance, unless suspended in their operation till his Assent should be obtained; and when so suspended, he has utterly neglected to attend to them.
He has refused to pass other Laws for the accommodation of large districts of people, unless those people would relinquish the right of Representation in the Legislature, a right inestimable to them and formidable to tyrants only.
He has called together legislative bodies at places unusual, uncomfortable, and distant from the depository of their public Records, for the sole purpose of fatiguing them into compliance with his measures.
He has dissolved Representative Houses repeatedly, for opposing with manly firmness his invasions on the rights of the people.
He has refused for a long time, after such dissolutions, to cause others to be elected; whereby the Legislative powers, incapable of Annihilation, have returned to the People at large for their exercise; the State remaining in the mean time exposed to all the dangers of invasion from without, and convulsions within.
He has endeavoured to prevent the population of these States; for that purpose obstructing the Laws for Naturalization of Foreigners; refusing to pass others to encourage their migrations hither, and raising the conditions of new Appropriations of Lands.
He has obstructed the Administration of Justice, by refusing his Assent to Laws for establishing Judiciary powers.
He has made Judges dependent on his Will alone, for the tenure of their offices, and the amount and payment of their salaries.
He has erected a multitude of New Offices, and sent hither swarms of Officers to harass our people, and eat out their substance.
He has kept among us, in times of peace, Standing Armies without the consent of our legislatures.
He has affected to render the Military independent of and superior to the Civil power.
He has combined with others to subject us to a jurisdiction foreign to our constitution and unacknowledged by our laws; giving his Assent to their Acts of pretended Legislation:
For Quartering large bodies of armed troops among us:
For protecting them, by a mock Trial, from punishment for any Murders which they should commit on the Inhabitants of these States:
For cutting off our Trade with all parts of the world:
For imposing Taxes on us without our Consent:
For depriving us, in many cases, of the benefits of Trial by Jury:
For transporting us beyond Seas to be tried for pretended offences:
For abolishing the free System of English Laws in a neighbouring Province, establishing therein an Arbitrary government, and enlarging its Boundaries so as to render it at once an example and fit instrument for introducing the same absolute rule into these Colonies:
For taking away our Charters, abolishing our most valuable Laws, and altering fundamentally the Forms of our Governments:
For suspending our own Legislatures, and declaring themselves invested with power to legislate for us in all cases whatsoever.
He has abdicated Government here, by declaring us out of his Protection and waging War against us.
He has plundered our seas, ravaged our Coasts, burnt our towns, and destroyed the lives of our people.
He is at this time transporting large Armies of foreign Mercenaries to compleat the works of death, desolation and tyranny, already begun with circumstances of Cruelty and perfidy scarcely paralleled in the most barbarous ages, and totally unworthy the Head of a civilized nation.
He has constrained our fellow Citizens taken Captive on the high Seas to bear Arms against their Country, to become the executioners of their friends and Brethren, or to fall themselves by their Hands.
He has excited domestic insurrections amongst us, and has endeavoured to bring on the inhabitants of our frontiers, the merciless Indian Savages, whose known rule of warfare, is an undistinguished destruction of all ages, sexes and conditions.
In every stage of these Oppressions We have Petitioned for Redress in the most humble terms: Our repeated Petitions have been answered only by repeated injury. A Prince whose character is thus marked by every act which may define a Tyrant, is unfit to be the ruler of a free people.
Nor have We been wanting in attentions to our British brethren. We have warned them from time to time of attempts by their legislature to extend an unwarrantable jurisdiction over us. We have reminded them of the circumstances of our emigration and settlement here. We have appealed to their native justice and magnanimity, and we have conjured them by the ties of our common kindred to disavow these usurpations, which, would inevitably interrupt our connections and correspondence. They too have been deaf to the voice of justice and of consanguinity. We must, therefore, acquiesce in the necessity, which denounces our Separation, and hold them, as we hold the rest of mankind, Enemies in War, in Peace Friends.
We, therefore, the Representatives of the united States of America, in General Congress, Assembled, appealing to the Supreme Judge of the world for the rectitude of our intentions, do, in the Name, and by the Authority of the good People of these Colonies, solemnly publish and declare, That these United Colonies are, and of Right ought to be Free and Independent States; that they are Absolved from all Allegiance to the British Crown, and that all political connection between them and the State of Great Britain, is and ought to be totally dissolved; and that as Free and Independent States, they have full Power to levy War, conclude Peace, contract Alliances, establish Commerce, and to do all other Acts and Things which Independent States may of right do. And for the support of this Declaration, with a firm reliance on the protection of divine Providence, we mutually pledge to each other our Lives, our Fortunes and our sacred Honor.
The signers of the Declaration represented the new states as follows:
New Hampshire
Josiah Bartlett, William Whipple, Matthew Thornton
Massachusetts
John Hancock, Samuel Adams, John Adams, Robert Treat Paine, Elbridge Gerry
Rhode Island
Stephen Hopkins, William Ellery
Connecticut
Roger Sherman, Samuel Huntington, William Williams, Oliver Wolcott
New York
William Floyd, Philip Livingston, Francis Lewis, Lewis Morris
New Jersey
Richard Stockton, John Witherspoon, Francis Hopkinson, John Hart, Abraham Clark
Pennsylvania
Robert Morris, Benjamin Rush, Benjamin Franklin, John Morton, George Clymer, James Smith, George Taylor, James Wilson, George Ross
Delaware
Caesar Rodney, George Read, Thomas McKean
Maryland
Samuel Chase, William Paca, Thomas Stone, Charles Carroll of Carrollton
Virginia
George Wythe, Richard Henry Lee, Thomas Jefferson, Benjamin Harrison, Thomas Nelson, Jr., Francis Lightfoot Lee, Carter Braxton
North Carolina
William Hooper, Joseph Hewes, John Penn
South Carolina
Edward Rutledge, Thomas Heyward, Jr., Thomas Lynch, Jr., Arthur Middleton
Georgia
Button Gwinnett, Lyman Hall, George Walton
Tomorrow we celebrate the Fourth of July, known in the United States as Independence Day. History tells us that this is somewhat of a misnomer as independence did not actually come to the American colonies on July 4, 1776. That was merely the day that the Declaration of Independence was adopted by the colonies as their statement of the reasons they felt it necessary to sever their political ties with Great Britain. Independence did not actually come until after countless soldiers and civilians had died in a bloody, sometimes unpopular war. Despite the fact that we Americans celebrate July 4, 1776 as the birth date of our country, our beginning as a nation did not truly begin until after the ratification of the Constitution.
Still, this document, The Declaration of Independence, was the beginning of the process that created the United States. This document declared to the entire world that they who were seeking independence were not doing so without due consideration of all the ramifications of their actions. The writers and signers of the declaration fully realized the large-scale consequences of their actions, namely, war. They also understood, on a personal level, that as soon as they put pen to paper to sign their names, they would be forever branded as traitors to their mother country and subject to death by the crown. Still, they signed.
The Declaration of Independence is not a long document, but its significance as a political statement cannot be overestimated. This document set in motion the events that would lead to the founding of the greatest republic in the history of the world. Because of this document, a nation was created wherein the “…unalienable rights...” of mankind are not only recognized, but guaranteed and protected. This document led to the acceptance of the belief that all people should be free to speak as they please, believe as they please, as well as have all the other basic freedoms that would later be enumerated in the Constitution.
The importance of The Declaration of Independence to Latter-day Saints also cannot be overestimated. This document was necessary in order to develop a climate of religious freedom that would allow The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints to be established. Indeed, the signing of The Declaration of Independence could be called the first significant event in the Restoration of the Gospel of Jesus Christ.
I have attached a copy of The Declaration of Independence at the end of this essay. I would hope that all who have read this far would take the few minutes necessary to read and ponder its message.
The Declaration of Independence of the Thirteen Colonies In CONGRESS, July 4, 1776
The unanimous Declaration of the thirteen united States of America,
When in the Course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another, and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature's God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.
We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. --That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, --That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness.
Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shewn, that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security. —Such has been the patient sufferance of these Colonies; and such is now the necessity which constrains them to alter their former Systems of Government. The history of the present King of Great Britain [George III] is a history of repeated injuries and usurpations, all having in direct object the establishment of an absolute Tyranny over these States. To prove this, let Facts be submitted to a candid world.
He has refused his Assent to Laws, the most wholesome and necessary for the public good.
He has forbidden his Governors to pass Laws of immediate and pressing importance, unless suspended in their operation till his Assent should be obtained; and when so suspended, he has utterly neglected to attend to them.
He has refused to pass other Laws for the accommodation of large districts of people, unless those people would relinquish the right of Representation in the Legislature, a right inestimable to them and formidable to tyrants only.
He has called together legislative bodies at places unusual, uncomfortable, and distant from the depository of their public Records, for the sole purpose of fatiguing them into compliance with his measures.
He has dissolved Representative Houses repeatedly, for opposing with manly firmness his invasions on the rights of the people.
He has refused for a long time, after such dissolutions, to cause others to be elected; whereby the Legislative powers, incapable of Annihilation, have returned to the People at large for their exercise; the State remaining in the mean time exposed to all the dangers of invasion from without, and convulsions within.
He has endeavoured to prevent the population of these States; for that purpose obstructing the Laws for Naturalization of Foreigners; refusing to pass others to encourage their migrations hither, and raising the conditions of new Appropriations of Lands.
He has obstructed the Administration of Justice, by refusing his Assent to Laws for establishing Judiciary powers.
He has made Judges dependent on his Will alone, for the tenure of their offices, and the amount and payment of their salaries.
He has erected a multitude of New Offices, and sent hither swarms of Officers to harass our people, and eat out their substance.
He has kept among us, in times of peace, Standing Armies without the consent of our legislatures.
He has affected to render the Military independent of and superior to the Civil power.
He has combined with others to subject us to a jurisdiction foreign to our constitution and unacknowledged by our laws; giving his Assent to their Acts of pretended Legislation:
For Quartering large bodies of armed troops among us:
For protecting them, by a mock Trial, from punishment for any Murders which they should commit on the Inhabitants of these States:
For cutting off our Trade with all parts of the world:
For imposing Taxes on us without our Consent:
For depriving us, in many cases, of the benefits of Trial by Jury:
For transporting us beyond Seas to be tried for pretended offences:
For abolishing the free System of English Laws in a neighbouring Province, establishing therein an Arbitrary government, and enlarging its Boundaries so as to render it at once an example and fit instrument for introducing the same absolute rule into these Colonies:
For taking away our Charters, abolishing our most valuable Laws, and altering fundamentally the Forms of our Governments:
For suspending our own Legislatures, and declaring themselves invested with power to legislate for us in all cases whatsoever.
He has abdicated Government here, by declaring us out of his Protection and waging War against us.
He has plundered our seas, ravaged our Coasts, burnt our towns, and destroyed the lives of our people.
He is at this time transporting large Armies of foreign Mercenaries to compleat the works of death, desolation and tyranny, already begun with circumstances of Cruelty and perfidy scarcely paralleled in the most barbarous ages, and totally unworthy the Head of a civilized nation.
He has constrained our fellow Citizens taken Captive on the high Seas to bear Arms against their Country, to become the executioners of their friends and Brethren, or to fall themselves by their Hands.
He has excited domestic insurrections amongst us, and has endeavoured to bring on the inhabitants of our frontiers, the merciless Indian Savages, whose known rule of warfare, is an undistinguished destruction of all ages, sexes and conditions.
In every stage of these Oppressions We have Petitioned for Redress in the most humble terms: Our repeated Petitions have been answered only by repeated injury. A Prince whose character is thus marked by every act which may define a Tyrant, is unfit to be the ruler of a free people.
Nor have We been wanting in attentions to our British brethren. We have warned them from time to time of attempts by their legislature to extend an unwarrantable jurisdiction over us. We have reminded them of the circumstances of our emigration and settlement here. We have appealed to their native justice and magnanimity, and we have conjured them by the ties of our common kindred to disavow these usurpations, which, would inevitably interrupt our connections and correspondence. They too have been deaf to the voice of justice and of consanguinity. We must, therefore, acquiesce in the necessity, which denounces our Separation, and hold them, as we hold the rest of mankind, Enemies in War, in Peace Friends.
We, therefore, the Representatives of the united States of America, in General Congress, Assembled, appealing to the Supreme Judge of the world for the rectitude of our intentions, do, in the Name, and by the Authority of the good People of these Colonies, solemnly publish and declare, That these United Colonies are, and of Right ought to be Free and Independent States; that they are Absolved from all Allegiance to the British Crown, and that all political connection between them and the State of Great Britain, is and ought to be totally dissolved; and that as Free and Independent States, they have full Power to levy War, conclude Peace, contract Alliances, establish Commerce, and to do all other Acts and Things which Independent States may of right do. And for the support of this Declaration, with a firm reliance on the protection of divine Providence, we mutually pledge to each other our Lives, our Fortunes and our sacred Honor.
The signers of the Declaration represented the new states as follows:
New Hampshire
Josiah Bartlett, William Whipple, Matthew Thornton
Massachusetts
John Hancock, Samuel Adams, John Adams, Robert Treat Paine, Elbridge Gerry
Rhode Island
Stephen Hopkins, William Ellery
Connecticut
Roger Sherman, Samuel Huntington, William Williams, Oliver Wolcott
New York
William Floyd, Philip Livingston, Francis Lewis, Lewis Morris
New Jersey
Richard Stockton, John Witherspoon, Francis Hopkinson, John Hart, Abraham Clark
Pennsylvania
Robert Morris, Benjamin Rush, Benjamin Franklin, John Morton, George Clymer, James Smith, George Taylor, James Wilson, George Ross
Delaware
Caesar Rodney, George Read, Thomas McKean
Maryland
Samuel Chase, William Paca, Thomas Stone, Charles Carroll of Carrollton
Virginia
George Wythe, Richard Henry Lee, Thomas Jefferson, Benjamin Harrison, Thomas Nelson, Jr., Francis Lightfoot Lee, Carter Braxton
North Carolina
William Hooper, Joseph Hewes, John Penn
South Carolina
Edward Rutledge, Thomas Heyward, Jr., Thomas Lynch, Jr., Arthur Middleton
Georgia
Button Gwinnett, Lyman Hall, George Walton
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