It's Good To Be Alive

Do What You Can with What You Have, Where You Are

2012-01-23T11:29:00.000-08:00

Last week, one of my good friends, Tom Judson, a 40 year teacher of government and world history at Orange high school, knowing of my love for reading biographies of great people, suggested that I read the book, "Unbroken." It is the biography of Louie Zamperini, from Torrance, California, who ran in the 1936 Olympics in Berlin as a 19-year-old, became involved in World War II, was captured by the Japanese and suffered incredible hardships without giving up or giving in. I have only read the first three chapters, but have already been impressed by the young Louie. I can hardly wait to read the remainder of the book, and i am grateful that Tom recommended it to me.
A few years ago I was watching BYU TV and listened to President Gordon B. Hinckley speak to the BYU student body at their weekly devotional. It was one of the last talks he gave before passing away. I was impressed that at age 96 he was still able to speak with such intelligence and clarity. It was his opening remarks that caught my attention. He said that on one occasion, Ralph Waldo Emerson, was asked what books he had read that had influenced him the most. Emerson replied that he could no more remember all the books he had read than the meals he had eaten, but they had made him what he was.
As I reflected on what Emerson said, as quoted by President Hinckley, it struck a chord within me as being a true statement. I suppose all of us are shaped, not only by the meals we eat, but by the books we read, or maybe don't read.
I have been blessed in my lifetime to have been exposed to some of the greatest books ever written which certainly have shaped my thinking and even my behavior I believe. As I look back over my life, it is the Scriptures that have impacted my life the most. My favorite reading these days is in the Scriptures – especially the Book of Mormon. I gain vital daily spiritual strength from my reading this Book. I could hardly get through a day without this Book of Books.
My mother introduced me to many great books as a young boy, and then I met Dr. Nan Grass while attending BYU, who for an entire two semesters, five days a week, taught me to love the great literature of the English language in her marvelous course, "Major British Authors". Through her guidance I began to love the writings of Shakespeare, Alfred Lord Tennyson, Browning, Lord Byron, Matthew Arnold, John Milton, John Donne, Chaucer, and a host of others.
And then, still a young man, I came to Southern California in 1970 to be the institute director at the Institute of Religion at California State University at Los Angeles. I was able to determine what I would teach and one of the first classes I chose to teach at the Institute level was entitled "Presidents of the Church". At that time there was a very meager lesson manual for that course which was a great blessing because it forced me to read a biography on each one of the presidents we would be discussing. This began a passion that I still have to read biographies of great people. I would read the biography of one of the Church Presidents and then around the dinner table each evening I would tell my little children stories from the lives of the prophets. They were a very receptive audience and came to know a great deal about the presidents of the Church. Little did they know how much they were helping me to teach my Institute class by trying out stories from the lives of the prophets on them.
The lives of these great men, along with the great literature I had been reading, shaped my thinking and inspired me to always want to be a better person. I am always looking for good biographies to read. How blessed I have been to not only read the biographies of great Church leaders, but also of men like George Washington, John Adams, Alexander Hamilton, Abraham Lincoln, Ulysses S. Grant, Theodore Roosevelt, Winston Churchill, Harry S. Truman, Douglas MacArthur, Dwight D. Eisenhower, and many others as well.
Since my accident and loss of physical mobility I have also come to love history, and through my reading have witnessed the building of the Panama Canal, the Brooklyn Bridge, the Transcontinental Railroad, been on the Lewis and Clarke expedition, circumnavigated the globe with Magellan, experienced the incredible year of 1776 and Washington's crossing of the Delaware, seen World War II through the eyes of a "Band of Brothers", and on and on it goes. How dull and boring my life could be if it were not for the magic of reading.
Through my reading, one of my favorite historical characters has become Theodore Roosevelt. I am just amazed at this man. I think my subconscious self would like to be like Theodore Roosevelt. I have read a number of books on his life.
Some time ago. I came across a not so well known book about Theodore Roosevelt written by a lady by the name of Candice Millard and is entitled "The River of Doubt". Not being elected president in 1912, he accepted an invitation to go to South America to do some speaking, on the condition that he could also do some exploring as well. He was 55 years old at the time. This book about his adventures and adversity in traveling down a river ("The River of Doubt") in Brazil that no one had explored and was not even on a map is exciting and reveals so much about the character of this great man.
He suffered greatly in the vast Amazon rain forest -- 1913-14 -- and died a few years later, much younger than he would have had he not taken this trip.
Theodore Roosevelt had traveled extensively in his lifetime. He led his Roughriders up San Juan Hill in Cuba, had fought grizzly bears, had a big cattle ranch in the Dakotas, and was tough as nails. I think his trip to Brazil tempered him somewhat and taught him a great lesson about life, as evidenced by a statement he made near the end of his life. "Do what you can, with what you have, where you are." [Theodore Roosevelt, 26th president of the United States, 1858-1919]
Having studied his life, this statement appears to me to be so untypical of this adventurous and vital man. However, I believe any human being who learns to do what he can, with what he has, where he is, has discovered one of the great keys to a happy and fulfilling life.
I believe I have tried to adopt Roosevelt's philosophy into my own life since my accident. I haven't always been successful in doing so, but those days that I do all I can, with what I have, where I am, are rewarding and fulfilling days.
Although my body is mobility impaired, through the magic of reading, my mind knows no limits. Through reading I have become acquainted with some of the greatest people with the best minds that have ever lived, and have vicariously experienced many of the world's most important events in history. Isn't it incredible what 26 little letters in our alphabet can do?

Dad/Grandpa/Jack

Grandpas miracle

2012-01-06T17:09:00.000-08:00

This short essay was written by my 12-year-old granddaughter, Annie Rushton. She wrote it for one of her classes in school. I think you will enjoy her take on my near death experience, last May. Dad/Grandpa/Jack
Grandpa`s Miracle
In 1989, my grandfather, Jack Rushton, was body surfing at Laguna Beach and broke his neck. He has been a quadriplegic for the last twenty-two years. Despite being paralyzed, my grandfather, along with my grandmother, has been very supportive of me and my three siblings. For example, they come from Orange County to my family`s soccer games, choir events, birthday parties, or just to visit. My grandparents have been very involved in my life. I know they love me and are proud of me. I love them with all my heart.
Four months ago, I found myself sitting on my colorful be will d doing homework. My grandfather had been in the hospital for two weeks at the time, not able to talk or interact. The phone rang loudly to be heard by all. A couple of minutes after being answered, I walked into my mom`s room to see her crying.
“What`s wrong?” I asked concerned.
“That was Dad on the phone,” Mom said while wiping a tear off her cheek.
“What`d he say? Did he call from the hospital?” I asked curiously.
“Yes, and he said that the doctors did a lot of tests on Grandpa and they just found out that he has brain damage. They said he won`t ever be the same. He won`t talk. He won`t wake up and they said we should just let him die.”
I just sat there. I was in too much shock to truly believe what my mother was saying. I did not want to just stand by and wait for my grandfather`s death to pass. I wished there was something we could do. I did not want to say good bye to him. Not now. Not ever. I then cried along with my mother in disbelief.
My entire family on my dad`s side agreed we would wait a few weeks before letting my grandpa die to make sure the unthinkable was true. Since my family took shifts to care for my grandfather, my mom and I decided we should go watch him for a couple of hours. I had a soccer game all the way in Orange County, so afterwards we would go visit him in the hospital.
At 10:00a.m., we parked next to the dozens of cars already at the hospital. I could not help notice how many windows the blue and white building had. Much more than fifteen rectangular holes were neatly carved out of the boring hospital. On the front of the structure all I could see were big letters spelling out the words, “Kaiser Permanente, Irvine”. As I walked inside the building through revolving doors, in the corner I saw a tan woman with oval glasses sitting behind a desk typing on the computer in front of her. The walls were painted yellow and there were square pieces of tile implanted as the floor. My mom and I stepped inside the elevator across the room. My mom pressed the button with a three on it, the doors closed, and the elevator lifted us to the third floor. We exited the contraption and strolled to the room which my grandpa was staying in. The room was a perfect square with walls and a ceiling attached. It had a bed which my grandpa was laying in, at least five chairs, a T.V. attached to the wall, a refrigerator, and a cot on the other side of Grandpa. My uncle, John, and his girlfriend, Jessica, were both occupying two of the chairs. Grandpa was laying on the bed with many wires attached to his body, nose, and his bed. My mom and I greeted them both and then I hopped on top of the cot. My mom sat across from John and Jessica on a chair.
“How is he?” My mom questioned John.
“He`s been sleeping all morning.” He replied.
“I’m going to try to wake him up.” My mom stated. She walked toward his bed. “Hi Dad, it’s me, Kim. Annie is here with me. We just came from her soccer game in Tustin.” My grandpa opened his blue eyes like a baby opening its eyes for the very first time.
“Let`s feed him some ice chips. He`ll like that more than the I.V,” John said while pulling up a clear and small plastic bowl full of crushed ice chips. He grabbed a spoon and held up a scoop to Grandpa`s lips. His mouth quivered at the coldness. The ice chips disappeared in his mouth. He was actually eating. I`m sure he loved having the taste in his mouth.
An hour after that, John and Jessica left to go grab something to eat. I was very bored. I was not having the most fun playing on John`s lap top so I started playing around. When my mom was feeding Grandpa some ice chips, I was making silly faces, dancing and jumping behind her. Grandpa`s eyes slowly turned towards me. My mom noticed where his eyes were going and she looked behind her and saw me making a pig face. She gave me a look as if I were an alien from space. I looked back at her and sat down. Then she proceeded to feed grandpa. I couldn`t help but act silly again, but when she looked back I sat down before she noticed a second time. I stood on a chair so I could see Grandpa and so he could see me. My mom glanced back at me.
“Sing him a song.” My mom requested. Okay, I thought, I could do that. So, I sang three beautiful songs that I learned and memorized from my choir class at school to my grandpa. I could tell that he loved my performance. Before I could sing a fourth song, Grandpa started making very funny noises. He grunted and yelled the strangest sounds I have ever heard. He was trying to talk! My grandma had just arrived and entered the room during the musical performance. She was overjoyed to hear her husband make sounds and eat ice chips.
“Annie, sing some more! I want to hear you too,” my grandma exclaimed. So, I repeated a few more songs, hovering above my grandparents on the chair, which had become my stage. Again, my grandfather let out a loud garbled sound.
“I think he is trying to talk!” my mom and Grandma both said at once. “He really likes your singing, Annie.” My mom immediately called my Dad, and all of my aunts and uncles, yelling, “You won’t believe what’s happening! Dad is trying to talk! Annie was standing on a chair singing to Dad and he started making sounds. It’s a miracle!”
The nurse came in and took care of grandpa. Everyone was so happy. At about 4:00p.m Mom and I left to our home in Murrieta. The next day, the entire family returned to the hospital. My grandpa was awake and talking in full sentences. It truly was a miracle. The doctors said they have never been so happy to be wrong. They could not believe it. All the tests pointed to my grandpa’s brain being damaged. My dad even saw all the tests being done and he believed what the doctors had said. Now, my grandpa was talking and seemed to be back to himself.
Two weeks later, my grandpa was let out of the hospital. He is now alive today in Orange County in his wheel chair moving around, talking, and being the exact same person he was before the brain damage, maybe even better. It seems his brain has been rebooted like a computer and he is as sharp as a tack.
I love my grandparents so much. I am glad to say I`m seeing him once a month or more for special occasions. I know my grandpa loves me and I love him. Everyone in our family is so thankful that we wanted to wait, to pray and to have faith that God could make a miracle happen. We do not k now how exactly, but we do know that something special happened to bring my grandfather back from a brain damaged state to being my wonderful grandfather again. I am proud to be his granddaughter and I am so happy he is here today.

I May Never Pass This Way Again

2012-01-06T17:03:00.000-08:00

I have a number of friends still alive, I am happy to report, who were born approximately when I was. When I write them and wish them a happy birthday, I always tell them that I am one person they will never hear complaining about getting older. I believe getting older is better than the alternative! I always say it's better to be "seen" than to be "viewed."
I definitely feel, not in a morbid way, that I am quickly and inevitably rolling down the home stretch of life approaching the finish line of mortality. It causes me to reflect on my life and what good I may or may not have done.
Many years ago, when I was the Institute director at the Cerritos, California, Institute of Religion, part of my duties included being the general manager of a patriotic singing group, sponsored by the Institute, called "The Grand Land Singers." They performed all over the United States, and I truly enjoyed the four years I spent with them. I left that assignment in the late 70s, but I can still remember several of the songs the group sang at almost every performance. One that I think a great deal about as I grow older is: "I May Never Pass This Way Again." It was written by Murray Wizel and Irving Melcher. The artist who made it famous was Perry Como. Some of you old guys may remember it. The lyrics are as follows:

"I'll give my hand to those who cannot see the sunshine or the fallin' rain.
I'll sing my song to cheer the weary along,
For I may never pass this way again!
I'll share my faith with every troubled heart, so I shall not have lived in vain.
I'll give my hand, I'll sing my song,
I'll share my faith, because I know, that the time is now to fulfill each vow,
For I may never pass this way again!"

Those beautiful lyrics, to me anyway, penetrate my heart as I ponder what I have done with these precious years I have spent on this earth. I know that as we finally cross the finish line of mortality and enter the Spirit World, all of the worldly possessions, high profile positions in the world and the Church, degrees, and the honors of men, won't amount to anything!
The Savior passed "this way" of mortality but once, and demonstrated to us what our priorities should be. I believe Christ's mission was twofold: (1) to fulfill the Law of Moses, to work out the infinite atonement, and to teach his Gospel. (2) But also to bless the lives of his brothers and sisters during the brief time he was with them by healing their souls – body and spirit. [D&C 88:15].
In my study of the four Gospels, I have discovered, as many others have as well, I am sure, that much of Christ's ministry was not spent just in teaching but in healing the sick and afflicted. I have discovered there are 53 references which use the word heal, or a derivative thereof such as healing or healed when referring to the Savior's blessing the sick. There are also an additional three references using the words cure or cured. These references do not include the times he raised the dead, or gave sight to the blind. I am sure what we have recorded in the Gospels is but the tip of the iceberg, with regard the healing part of his ministry.
In reading these accounts, I have been impressed by two things: (1) what a large part of the Savior's ministry was spent in healing the souls of his brothers and sisters; and (2) the great compassion he had for them.
I love Dr. Elaine Marshall’s (former Dean of the BYU College of Nursing) summary from the scriptures of this aspect of the Savior’s ministry.
“As Jesus healed, the scriptures say, "All the people were amazed" (Matthew 12:23). They brought their sick, their "blind, and dumb" (Matthew 12:22), those that were "possessed with a devil" (Matthew 12:22; also Mark 1:32), and their dead. They sought Him every day and into the evening. So great was His reputation and His healing power that they sought to "only touch the hem of his garment; and as many as touched were made perfectly whole" (Matthew 14:36). "And Jesus went about all the cities and villages, teaching . . . and preaching the gospel . . . , and healing every sickness and every disease among the people" (Matthew9:35).”(April, 2004 Ensign, 57.)
It is a daunting task to seek to follow Christ's example of love and compassion to those with special needs who are all about us. Knowing "we will never pass this way again," however, what better way can we, or should we, use these few fleeting and fragile hours of mortality than to try to emulate the example of the Master Healer?
Believe it or not this is a Christmas letter. Truly celebrating the birth of Christ and his subsequent mortal mission, it seems to me can best be done by committing ourselves to follow His example of compassion, love, and desire to bless even "the least of these our brethren" who surround us on every side.
At the final judgment day, when the sheep are gathered together by the Good Shepherd on His right hand, He will say to them, "…Come, ye blessed of my Father, inherit the Kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world: For I was an hungered, and ye gave me meat: I was thirsty, and ye gave me drink: I was a stranger, and ye took me in: Naked, and ye clothed me: I was sick, and ye visited me: I was in prison ,and ye came unto me… Verily I say unto you, Inasmuch as ye have done it unto one of the least of these my brethren, ye have done it unto me." [Matthew 25:31-46 – Emphasis added]
Merry Christmas! Dad/Grandpa/Jack

What Lack I yet?

2012-01-06T16:58:00.000-08:00

We are very fortunate indeed if we, in our lifetimes, have a good friend or family member, who will be perfectly honest with us when we solicit their feedback. My dear wife, Joanne, is one of those people. I can always count on her to tell me the truth when I ask her opinion regarding a talk I have prepared, or something I have written, or a lesson I have given. Many times over the years, I have had to swallow my male ego and pride as I have asked for her opinion – and have received it!
For example, one Christmas I was asked to speak at a Ward in our stake. I prepared what I thought was a wonderful talk, and had felt great inspiration as I did so. I then had Joanne read what I had prepared and asked her what she thought of it. She was silent for some time, which is always a bad sign, and then said, "Do you really want to know?" I gulped and said, "Go ahead." She then proceeded to tell me that my talk was a very good Education Week talk at BYU, but was just not going to cut it in a sacrament meeting. She told me that I would lose the children and teenagers who would be attending, in about one minute. My first human and male response to such feedback is to get defensive and almost angry. How could anyone find fault with my inspired and well-crafted message? Thankfully, I had the good sense to swallow my pride, and told her I would think about what she had said. As I thought about it, I realized that she was right – and that is what is so infuriating – she always seems to be right. It reminded me of the little pink T-shirt she bought for our daughter Rachel when she was in about the third or fourth grade that had emblazoned on the front in silvery script letters, "Girls Are Smarter!" I have lived long enough to sadly come to realize the truthfulness of that statement.
Well, I went to work and spent hours preparing an acceptable talk. I finally presented it to Joanne, who quickly read through it and said, "This is better, but you are not quite there yet." I began to defend myself and my precious work, but fortunately thought better of it and humbly went back to the drawing board. Finally, because of Joanne's reaction to my work, I did a lot of pondering and praying about what would be more appropriate than I had already prepared. New ideas came flooding into my mind, and writing another draft that I felt good about, and with great trepidation I might add, asked Joanne to read it once again. With me holding my breath while she silently perused the document, finally, and with a smile on her face, she said, "I think you have really got it!" That statement made me happier than when I passed my oral examination defending my doctoral dissertation before a group of learned professors at USC.
I have told Joanne that Adams, Jefferson, and Lincoln's Declaration of Independence, the Preamble to the Constitution, and Gettysburg Address, would have been so much better if they could have passed them by her before going public. Truthfully, however, she is a very gifted editor and has a finely tuned sense of what is good or bad in the written word or a talk.
This time of the year, the beginning of January, I often think of the incident in the Savior's ministry, recorded by Matthew, when the rich young man came to Him and asked Him a searching question – he wanted Jesus' feedback. Matthew recorded: "And, behold, one came and said unto him, Good Master, what good thing shall I do, that I may have eternal life? And he said unto him…if thou wilt enter into life, keep the Commandments. He saith unto him, Which? [Jesus then told the young man to keep the 10 Commandments] The young man saith unto him, All these things have I kept from my youth up: WHAT LACK I YET? Jesus said unto him, If thou wilt be perfect, go and sell that thou hast, and give to the poor, and thou shalt have treasure in heaven: and come and follow me. But when the young man heard that saying, he went away sorrowful: for he had great possessions." [Matthew 19:16-22]
I believe the young man's question, "What lack I yet?" is a question for the ages, and one we could all benefit from asking ourselves, a trusted spouse or friend, but especially to ask it of our Heavenly Father frequently. I am convinced if we ask that question of the Lord, and then take the time to listen, through the whisperings of the Spirit to our minds and the feelings that come into our hearts, we will receive an answer to our prayer and question. It of course, may take more than just one prayer.
There is a danger in asking that question, because we may not like the answer, as was the case with the rich young man. I don't know that the Savior would give all of us the same answer he gave to this young man. We are all lacking in different ways, I believe. The rich young man was more attached to his material things than he should have been which kept him from becoming a true disciple of Jesus. All of us, however, are lacking in something which is keeping us from following the Savior with more devotion, putting Him first in our lives, and being his true disciple.
Growth will only come to us as we recognize and honestly admit to ourselves, however hard it may be, what we lack and take the steps to overcome and deal with that weakness.
As Moroni so truthfully and beautifully wrote: "… And if men come unto me I will show unto them their weakness. I give unto men weakness that they may be humble; and my grace is sufficient for all men that humble themselves before me; for if they humble themselves before me, and have faith in me, then will I make week things become strong unto them." [Ether 1 phase out 2:27]
The keywords in this teaching of Moroni, I believe, are (1) ",Come unto me," (2) "Humble themselves before me," and (3) "have faith in me." The promise to those who do so is that weak things will become strong unto them.
As I reflect back on my life, as I am sure is the case with all of you as you do likewise, you will see how this true principle has been operative in all our lives.
Especially at the beginning of this new year, I can't think of a more worthwhile question to ask the Lord than, "What lack I yet?"
Dad/Grandpa/Jack

He Really Likes Me

2011-11-30T14:14:00.000-08:00

A couple of nights ago I was watching one of my favorite Broadway musicals on Turner Classic Movies, "Man of La Mancha."
The next day, I was telling Joanne how much I had enjoyed watching "Man of the Mancha" once again. She reminded me of the day, 23 years ago, when I was able to come home from the rehabilitation Hospital, where I had spent the last six months of my life. Our street was lined with friends and family cheering me on, and welcoming me home. Through my tears I could see my good friend, Murl Nelson, playing his drums on my front lawn – he had played the drums for some of the major big bands, including Elvis Presley, during the 50s – with my mother-in-law, Evelyn Stuart, singing at the top of her lungs, "To Dream the Impossible Dream," the most well-known and popular number from " Man of La Mancha." My mother-in-law loved life and loved to sing. She even enjoyed my repertoire of dumb mother-in-law jokes. I was grateful. Joanne had brought this memory back into my mind.
In case you are not familiar with the musical, it was written by Dale Wasserman, with music by Mitch Leigh and lyrics by Joe Danon. The musical was suggested by the classic novel Don Quixote de La Mancha by Miguel de Cervantes.
The main thrust of the play is that Cervantes and his manservant have been imprisoned by the Spanish Inquisition and a manuscript by Cervantes is seized by his fellow inmates, who subject him to a mock trial in order to determine whether the manuscript should be returned. Cervantes' defense is in the form of a play, in which Cervantes takes the role of Alonso Quijana, an old gentleman who has lost his mind and now believes that he should go forth as a knight-errant. Quijana renames himself Don Quixote de La Mancha, and sets out to find adventures with his "squire", Sancho Panza. [Wikipedia]
This time as I watched the movie, one of the lesser-known numbers struck a chord with me. It is a musical exchange between Sancho and Aldonza, a scullery maid with loose morals whom Don Quixote treats as though she is a princess. She has watched in amazement how Sancho has taken care of Don Quixote and catered to his every whim. She wants to know why Sancho does what he does for him, and why he is so kind and loyal to such an obviously crazy man. The following musical conversation takes place between Sancho and Aldonza.
SANCHO
"I like him… I really like him! I don't have a very good reason,
Since I've been with him,
Cuckoo-nuts have been in season... But there's nothing I can do, Chop me up for onion stew, Still I'll yell to the sky
I can't tell you why, That I like him!"
ALDONZA
"It doesn't make any sense! "
SANCHO
"That's because you're not a squire."
ALDONZA
" All right, I'm not a squire. How does a squire, squire?"
SANCHO
"Well, I ride behind him... and he fights. Then I pick him up off the ground, and..."
ALDONZA
"But, what do you get out of it?"
SANCHO
"What do I get? Oh! Why, already I've gotten..."
ALDONZA
"You've got nothing! Why do you do it?"
SANCHO
"I like him, I really like him.
Pluck me naked as a scalded chicken, I like him! Don't ask me for why or wherefore, 'Cause I don't have a single good
" because" or "therefore!"
You can barbecue my nose.
Make a giblet of my toes,
Make me freeze, make me fry.
Make me sigh, make me cry.
Still I'll yell to the sky, I can't tell you why. That I like him!"
Aren't we fortunate, if in our lifetimes, besides our parents who are stuck with us, we find one or two people, like Sancho, who, in spite of our faults, failings, idiosyncrasies, warts, barnacles, and most nauseating characteristics, still really like us, for apparently no good reason.
I have thought about my relationship with Joanne over the past 23 years since my accident. As Sancho said about the time he had spent as the squire of Don Quixote -- "cuckoo nuts have been in season”-- for Joanne all these years as she has acted as my squire. She does, and has done for me, all these years what Sancho did for Don Quixote. She rides behind me, and I fight, then she picks me up off the ground.
I don't think anyone has ever asked Joanne the question Aldonza put to Sancho, "But what do you get out of it?" However, perhaps they have thought it.
You would have to know Joanne's dad, Joe Stuart, to appreciate what I am going to write next. One morning he was helping Joanne get me dressed and into my wheelchair for the day. As he was leaning over me, he looked at Joanne, who was on the other side of the bed, and said, "Boy your life sure went down the tubes when Jack had his accident!" He then got a sickly grin on his face when he realized what he had just said and we all burst out laughing.
Joanne has always made me feel over the years, since my accident, though she, like Sancho, may be hard pressed to say why, that she likes me. At least she always makes me feel like she really likes me. Even I can't figure out why, but it surely does make me feel good.
I am sure there must be times when she, like Sancho, might say to herself, "Don't ask me for why or wherefore, 'cause I don't have a single good " because" or "therefore."
What I write next would probably never make it through church correlation, but here goes. The Savior, the Scriptures teach, [See the numerous references in the topical guide], is our advocate with the Father. For example –"Lift up your hearts and be glad, for I am in your midst, and am your advocate with the Father; and it is his good will to give you the Kingdom. " [D&C 29:5]
I can just picture the Savior pleading our case before the Father. "I know they are "unprofitable servants" and "less than the dust of the earth. They are so very imperfect in many ways, but I like them – I really like them, I like them so much I have given my life for them. Please have mercy on them, Father."
And so when we get discouraged and may think that not even one other mortal being really likes us and can overlook some of our imperfections, we can take comfort in knowing there is ONE who does.
Dad/Grandpa/Jack

As a
will

"I Saw That All I Had Made Was Good."

2011-11-14T16:33:00.000-08:00

My life, like yours, has been an exciting adventure, but especially since my accident 23 years ago. I really have no idea from day to day what new and exciting challenge and opportunity for growth is lurking just around the corner.

For one thing, I have become better acquainted with the medical profession than I ever wanted to. I have been privileged to come to know a wide variety of medical doctors, including a psychiatrist Joanne insisted I visit. I really never could figure out why! I have seen dentists, dermatologists, ER doctors, internists, pulmonologists, urologists, various surgeons, family doctors, doctors of infectious diseases, neurologists, ophthalmologists , cardiologists, and I'm sure some other "… ologists " that I can't think of right now. I appreciate the training and expertise of these doctors who over the years have saved my life and made it possible for me to keep coming back to them for more punishment.
Paid staff will
It stands to reason that someone in my condition would need the expertise and professional training of many doctors to keep them going. I never thought though, that I would have to employ the services of a blacksmith to keep me rolling along down the highway of life.

At a restaurant, anxiously wanting to position my wheelchair under the table so as not to be conspicuous in any way, I was going faster than I should have been, and inadvertently broke my right leg rest on the wheelchair when I rammed it into the table leg.

You would think that a broken leg rest on a wheelchair would not be a big deal. After dinner, though, I found it almost impossible to drive the chair to the van because my foot would drag along in a dangerous way. We finally got me home and figured we could get it easily fixed in the morning.

As a new day dawned, Joanne drove the broken leg rest to our wheelchair repair facility near our home. My chair is very high tech and the technicians are good at diagnosing and repairing electronic computerized problems. They took one dazed and puzzled look at the broken leg rest, however, and told Joanne they couldn't fix something like that. I guess it was too low-tech! They admitted they didn't have the equipment or expertise to do the job. The best they could do they said would be to order a new leg rest for a couple of hundred dollars, and that it would take several weeks for it to come.

There is no way Joanne was going to spend $200 on a broken leg rest without a coupon or some kind of discount. When she returned home with the broken leg rest and bad news, I had her go to the Yellow Pages and look under "Blacksmith." In all of Orange County, with a population of several million people there was only one listing for a blacksmith shop. Believe it or not it was located near our home in old town, Tustin. She copied down the address, got me into the van, and we headed out to find the blacksmith shop.

No more than 2 miles from our home we spotted an old barn that looked like it had been there forever. Sure enough, this was the blacksmith shop, and it had been there forever. With some trepidation Joanne got me out of the van and we somehow were able to cross the street to the open door of the old barn. Standing in the open door an elderly gentleman and his elderly friend – both about my age, I hate to admit – were standing there chatting. This was Andy Griffith's "Mayberry RFD" revisited. We showed them the problem and asked if it could be fixed. The blacksmith took a good hard look at it and said he thought maybe he could do something for us.

The shop was filled with junk metal, other non-discernible debris from a galaxy long ago and far away, welding equipment, discarded oxygen tanks, and a small forge. As we chatted with the blacksmith and his friend we learned that the blacksmith's father had begun the business in that very barn about 1915. The current blacksmith had inherited the business from his father when he passed away. The blacksmith had been taught the trade by his father, came to love it, and never wanted to do anything else. He said that many years ago, his father had taught him how to make customized tools, plows, and etc. that the local farmers needed. In its day, Tustin was quite a farming community. The local high school athletic teams are known as the "Tustin Tillers." He said he wasn't nearly as busy as he used to be but that he still enjoyed working as a blacksmith. About that time a young man came into the barn and took an interest in helping his older friends fix the leg rest. He had come to the blacksmith shop, to work with his friends in the passion and hobby they shared, regardless of the age differential – restoring an old automobile to its pristine state.

It turned out that fixing the leg rest was not so easy after all. It had levers and springs associated with it, but these three wonderful men worked on it as though it were the most important project they had ever tackled. I think there was some pride involved as well. Finally after about two hours, they got it welded together and attached as it should be to the wheelchair. During the procedure I made many helpful and encouraging comments – at least I felt they added an important dimension to the work at hand – a view not shared by all present. Finally, Joanne asked the blacksmith what she owed him, and with an embarrassed look on his face, he said, "Would $20 be too much? Over the years I have never had a doctor ask me a similar question – have you?

Interestingly enough, just the other day Joanne was watching our local PBS TV channel and they were doing a piece on Old town Tustin, California. One of the stops they made was at the blacksmith shop, which included an interview with our friend, the blacksmith. He and his barn truly are the subject matter of a great human interest story.

My recent encounter with the blacksmith and his friends triggered a feeling I have felt many times over the years. I am just in awe of, and appreciate so much people who can create, produce, and repair concrete physical things that bless others. If all we had in the world were lawyers, teachers, computer programmers, and insurance salesmen, for example, we would all be in a "world of hurt."

Some years ago I stumbled on to Rudyard Kipling's poem and tribute to engineers and all men who get things done through hard work, sweat, and getting their hands dirty. Kipling wrote the poem in 1907 and entitled It "The Sons of Martha!" It is based on Luke's account of Jesus' visit to the home of Martha and Mary recorded in Luke 10:38-42.
"The sons of Mary seldom bother, for they have inherited that good part; But the Sons of Martha favour their Mother of the careful soul and the troubled heart… Her Sons must wait upon Mary's Sons worlds without end….It is their care in all the ages to take the buffet and cushion the shock.… It is their care that the gear engages; it is their care that the switches lock.… Tally, transport, and deliver duly the Sons of Mary by land and main.… And the Sons of Mary smile and are blessed – they know the Angels are on their side.… They sit at the Feet - they hear the Word - they see how truly the Promise runs. They have cast their burden upon the Lord, and – the Lord He lays it on Martha's Sons!"

I'm afraid during my lifetime I have been much more a "Son of Mary" than a "Son of Martha." Thankfully, however, over the years I have had many friends who have been "Sons of Martha." They have bailed me out of more difficult and challenging situations than I could ever mention. As the years have gone by my appreciation for blacksmiths, and others our society labels as "blue-collar workers," has increased dramatically.

Ogden Nash, I believe, truthfully and yet sadly said that "People who sit to do their work make a lot more money than people who stand to do their work." I certainly have nothing against people who sit to do their work -- that is my modus operandi for sure -- but we certainly have missed out on something important which is also a great source of joy and fulfillment, if we haven't learned how to create something concrete and of lasting value with our hands.

Our Heavenly Father and His Son, Jehovah rejoice and have joy in the creations of their hands. In speaking to Moses the Lord said: "… I am the Beginning and the End, the Almighty God. By mine only begotten. I created all things; yea, in the beginning I created the heaven, and the earth upon which thou standest… And I God, saw that all things which I had made were good." [Moses 3:1, 10].

Dad/Grandpa/Jack

The Defiant Power of the Human Spirit

2011-10-31T12:59:00.000-07:00

Many years ago, when my oldest son, Mike, was about four or five years old, I came home from work late one afternoon to find Joanne, almost in tears. Mike was sick and the doctor had given her some pills for him to take to make him feel better. She said, "Jack, he just won't swallow the pill." I responded, "He won't will he – well, we shall see about that!" With that, I told him he had to take the pill and that he could and would swallow it with no trouble. However, you could see in his eyes that he didn't believe me and that he was not about to cave in. One thing led to another and I hate to report the outcome, but I finally was sitting on the chest of this five-year-old, holding his nose, shoving the pill in his mouth, and then pouring in the water. Today I'm sure I would have been jailed for child abuse. He gagged and I knew I had won the battle, but as I looked at him in shocked disbelief, with a little smirky smile on his face, he spit the pill out. Joanne and I and Mike began to laugh – he never did take that pill, but he is still alive today, so I guess it was okay. That was our introduction to a boy, a young man, and a man, who has what I call an indomitable spirit which has served him well as a Deputy Dist. Atty. and now as a judge.
Victor Frankl, in his book "Man's Search for Meaning," called this trait that many human beings you all have known or read about seem to possess, "… the defiant power of the human spirit," [page 171]
I have known a number of individuals who are my heroes, because they possess in rich abundance this "defiant power" to not let life's circumstances limit or control their behavior, and keep them from striving to achieve their true potential as sons and daughters of God.
A number of years ago now, I met through the Internet, a young married woman by the name of Jenny Lynn. She lives in Texas and somehow received one of my observations, I think from a friend. She responded to it, and periodically over the years, we have written back and forth.
Jenny Lynn and her husband are the parents of four beautiful children. One night while asleep, she suffered a massive stroke that made it impossible for her to move more than just one finger, and yet, although paralyzed, she has severe pain in one side of her body. While attending BYU, she was part of the dance program – I believe it was the folk dancers, but Jenny will forgive me if I am wrong. I have seen a picture of her, her husband and her children taken prior to the stroke and they are a picture perfect, wholesome, and happy family.
I am sure the last thing they ever could have contemplated is what happened to Jenny. I know when I had my body surfing accident at Laguna Beach, my oldest daughter, Jolene, said to her mother, "Mom, if somebody had told us that something like this would happen to daddy, we never could have imagined it or believed it." I am sure Jenny and her family, undoubtedly felt the same way.
A month or so ago, or maybe longer, I sent out an observation about Job. Some of us who have very visible afflictions to deal with at times, are compared to Job. We who are in these situations would hasten to say that we are not even in the same league with him, because of one important reason that the Lord revealed to Joseph Smith: "Thy friends do stand by thee… Thou art not yet as Job; thy friends do not contend against thee…" [Doctrine & Covenants 121:9-10].
Jenny received this observation and it struck a chord with her. I would like to share with you her e-mail response as it came to me.
"HOW FUNNY! I WAS JUST THINKING (EVER SINCE SUNDAY) EXACTLY ABOUT WHAT U SAID ABOUT JOB, BUT DIDN'T READ YOUR EMAIL UNTIL TODAY!
I CAN'T TELL U HOW WEIRD IT WAS 2 READ YOUR EMAIL! I'M AN AVID JOURNALLER, & SUNDAY I HAD A FLOOD OF THINGS COME INTO MY MIND, & THEY WERE ALL "JOURNAL WORTHY." THE THOUGHT CAME 2 ME, HOW THIS MUST BE PART OF A "MEAN GAME", BECAUSE I TYPE WITH 1 FINGER, & CAN'T SPEAK, SO THERE'S ABSOLUTELY NO WAY I CAN WRITE DOWN ALL THAT THE SPIRIT TEACHES ME! I BRIEFLY WAS FRUSTRATED, WONDERING WHY I LEARNED ALL THESE THINGS THAT I CAN'T SHARE, & THEN MY THOUGHTS TURNED 2 JOB.
I'M OFTEN COMPARED 2 JOB, BUT I THINK THE ONLY SIMILARITY WE HAVE IS: WHEN I HAD MY STROKE, I ACTUALLY FEEL THAT SATAN PLAYED THAT SAME "GAME" WITH GOD, TAKING THINGS AWAY (MAKING MY LEFT SIDE FEEL, BUT BE PARALYZED, GIVING ME DOUBLE VISION, GIVING ME PBA/MY "EMOTIONAL INCONTINANCE", MAKING MY EYES LIGHT SENSITIVE, TAKING AWAY MY SPEECH & MOBILITY, ETC.), BUT THAT'S AS FAR AS OUR SIMILARITIES GO! & I, TOO, FEEL THAT I'M NOT IN THE SAME LEAGUE--NOTHING CAN BE WORSE THAN THE LOSS OF FRIENDS & FAMILY! & WHATEVER I'VE REGAINED IS BECUZ OF HIM! (ISN'T IT INTERESTING THAT I'VE REGAINED JUST ENOUGH SO I CAN TAKE THE SACRAMENT, & ATTEND THE TEMPLE?) I FEEL LIKE WE ALL HAVE OUR OWN UNIQUE MISSIONS, & GOD MAKES THEM POSSIBLE, EACH IN UNIQUE WAYS.
THERE IS NO WAY I CAN WRITE ALL THAT, OR BE AS ELOQUENT AS U WERE! IT'S AS THOUGH U SAID ALL I THOUGHT IN THAT EMAIL (I WAS EVEN SUPPOSED 2 DIE, & I BELIEVE I'M ONLY HERE 4 THE SAME REASONS AS U), SO WOULD U MIND IF I CUT & PASTE YOUR EMAIL, ALONG WITH MY RESPONSE, IN MY JOURNAL?
LOVE,
JENNY"

Jenny then concluded by writing, "Courage does not always roar. Sometimes, it is the quiet voice at the end of the day saying, "I will try again tomorrow".
- Mary Anne Radmacher
I was touched by what Jenny had to say. I am always very humbled when I compare my situation to hers, and am reminded of the great truth I learned 23 years ago now in a rehabilitation hospital by observing my two young roommates who I felt were much worse off than me. That truth – "No matter how bad you think your life is, there is always someone who has it worse than you, and because of that, we should count our many blessings and be content with our lot in life, whatever it may be.
However, I do disagree with Jenny about me being more eloquent than her. I personally have never read anything more eloquent than what she has written, and I'm sure you all would agree.
Thank you, Jenny, for your COURAGE, and your great example of reminding all of us of the "defiant power of the human spirit!"
Dad/Grandpa/Jack

Even If Paul, Not I

2011-09-21T13:20:00.000-07:00

“Et si omnes ego non”
I watch quite a bit of BYU TV early in the morning with my caregivers as they work on me. Though not members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints they seem to enjoy the programming on BYU TV. One caregiver I had for eight years loved to hear President Gordon B Hinckley speak and told me he was his favorite speaker on BYU TV, a sentiment I shared with him. As we watched President Hinckley's funeral service together I saw him wipe away a tear or two.

Several months ago I heard a re-broadcast on BYU TV of a talk Sharon G. Samuelson, the wife of BYU president Cecil O. Samuelson, gave on September 12, 2006 at a student devotional. Her talk seemed so important and relevant, not only to college students in today's society, but to the very young, middle-aged, and old alike.

She told of going with her husband to some friend's home for dinner and inscribed on an archway they had placed some printed words – “Et si omnes ego non.” She was curious about what the Latin words meant and why they had them in such a prominent place in their home.
She was told that their translation was, roughly: “Even if all, not I.” In other words, “Even if everybody does it, I will not.” She was also told the saying was the motto of the Barons von Boeselager, an old German noble family. Two descendants in the family, Philipp and Georg von Boeselager, were members of the resistance group that had planned the failed assassination attempt on Adolph Hitler on July 20, 1944. Their involvement in the operation went undetected, and they were not executed along with the majority of the other conspirators. The saying is carved in a timber beam on the outside of Philipp’s family home in Germany.
She went on to say that her friends explained that they used this quote as a motto for their family and that it was a reminder to them that they are members of a chosen generation and must be different in the world of today. As members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, they should make choices consistent with the teachings of the gospel and shun the negative, misleading, and evil messages of the world that surround them. [BYU Devotional September 12, 2006]

I was very fortunate as a young boy, about age 14, to have the great truth and principle of life, "Even If all, Not I," indelibly burned into my heart and spirit.

The year was 1952, and I was a freshman at White Pine County high school in Ely, Nevada. I had three friends that were excellent trumpet players and they had learned a number entitled "Buglers Holiday." I played the piano accompaniment for them at the annual Christmas high school band concert. The county was so lacking in, and starved for entertainment, that we were asked to perform for the Lion's Club, the Rotary Club, and for the Elks Club. Prior to our performance at the Elks Club, a custodian opened up the hall for us so we could practice for the evening performance. When we finished our rehearsal the custodian was nowhere in sight, and one of the trumpet players reached over the bar, snatched up a fifth of whiskey and hid it under his leather jacket. We all hurried out to the car, piled in, and headed up into the mountains surrounding Ely on an old dirt road. We finally pulled off the road behind some cedar trees and I knew what was coming next.

The driver is the one that had taken the bottle of whiskey and he opened it up and took a big drink and handed it to the kid next to him. I was strategically placed behind the driver and so I knew I would be the last one to be offered a drink of whiskey. I began to sweat bullets! The last thing I wanted to do was to drink the whiskey but at the same time, I didn't want to appear to be a goody two shoes to my friends. What was I to say or to do? I guess I could say, "I don't like whiskey." Or maybe, "My mother would be upset if I were to drink this." Or maybe I would take the bottle and throw it out the window and call my friends to repentance for their wickedness. Quite frankly, I just simply did not know what to say or what I would do when that bottle would inevitably come into my hands.

My good friend sitting next to me was handed the bottle from the boy in the front seat next to the driver. He took a big drink and then turned to hand it to me. I don't know what he saw on my face but he said, "I'm not going to waste this whiskey on Rushton, I know he is a Mormon and doesn't drink." With that he passed the bottle up to the driver. Nothing more was said and no pressure exerted on me to do what in my heart I did not want to do. I felt like I had been pardoned by the governor just before being executed. I gained a reputation that afternoon, for which I take no credit that would follow me all through high school and I was never asked to take a drink by any of my friends who did not share my standards or beliefs. I have often wondered what direction my life might have taken had I taken that drink as a 14-year-old. I vowed that I would never find myself in that kind of a situation again, not knowing what to say or do. Of course, as a 14-year-old I hadn't heard the principle, "Even If All, Not I," but that was in reality how I knew I wanted to live my life.

As a 73-year-old, as I look back on my life, I am so grateful for that experience I had as a 14-year-old. Over the years, like so many of you, I have encountered many situations where I have had to take a stand on certain issues and implement the principle, "Even If All, Not I!"

When we find ourselves outnumbered on issues of morality that obviously are in violation of Article of Faith 13 – "…We believe all things, we hope all things, we have endured many things, and hope to be able to endure all things. If there is anything virtuous, lovely, or of good report or praiseworthy, we seek after these things," hopefully, we will take a stand and be true to our God and to ourselves.

Perhaps, if we are fortunate, there will come into our minds when being tempted to cave-in and give up defending unpopular truths, both by word and by deed, the words of Joseph. As a young 14-year-old boy being persecuted and ridiculed for what he said had occurred in his life, said he felt much like Paul, whose testimony of having seen Christ in vision was rejected and ridiculed as he was examined by King Agrippa.

" So it was with me. I had actually seen a light, and in the midst of that light I saw two personages, and they did in reality speak to me; and though I was hated and persecuted for saying that I had seen a vision, yet it was true; and while they were persecuting me, reviling me, and speaking all manner of evil against me falsely for so saying, I was led to say in my heart: Why persecute me for telling the truth? I have actually seen a vision; and who am I that I can withstand God, or why does the world think to make me deny what I have actually seen? For I had seen a vision; I knew it, and I knew that God knew it, and I could not deny it, neither dared I do it; at least I knew that by so doing I would offend God, and come under condemnation." [Joseph Smith History, 25]

How blessed we would be if we were to truly internalize into our lives and into our hearts as individuals and as families, the motto –“Et si omnes ego non.”
Dad/Grandpa/Jack

26

"Is It I?"

2011-09-11T17:52:00.000-07:00

Several weeks ago I was having some trouble with the battery on my wheelchair that keeps my ventilator going. After making sure it was fully charged, Jo Anne loaded me into the van to go run some errands.

As we pulled into the post office parking lot, the alarm on the ventilator began to sound – a piercing siren like noise. Because the ventilator also has an internal battery, we knew we had about 20 minutes to make it home, realizing we were on borrowed time. Leaving the car running, Jo Anne made a mad dash into the post office. As she did so, I could see that my date with a bean burrito and extra beans at Taco Bell was in jeopardy. She was back in a flash, jumped in behind the wheel, and slamming it into reverse, backed into a yellow cab that had not been there when she came out of the post office. As our back bumper collided with the cab, the driver came exploding out of his beautiful, shiny, and now dinged up yellow vehicle. He was a big man and it was evident from his appearance that he was from somewhere in the Middle East. Looking at the damage inflicted upon his rear fender, he began waving his arms and screaming. Before Jo Anne could even approach him, he was on his cell phone calling everyone he could think of – his boss, the insurance company, and maybe even Al Qaeda.

Knowing we were running short on time, Jo Anne tried to exchange information with him, but he would not get off the phone. She tried to tell him that her husband was on life support that was failing, and she had only minutes to get him home. She said that if he wanted to exchange information he would have to follow her home. He seemed to understand our urgency and moved his cab forward so we could leave. With that she got in the van, screeched out of the parking lot, and zoomed down Newport Avenue toward home. The poor taxicab driver had zero chance of keeping up with Jo Anne, and as we pulled into the driveway she was amazed that the cab was not behind her. However, I was not amazed!

Once safely in our house with my vent plugged into the wall socket, Jo Anne looked at me and with frustration in her voice said "You know, Jack, it is your fault that I backed into that yellow cab! If you hadn't broken your neck at Laguna Beach 22 years ago and been on life support, I wouldn't have been in that situation and smashed into the cab! I was so worried about saving your life that I just didn't see that cab when he pulled up behind me as I was backing out.”

I started to respond and to defend myself but then realized she was probably telling the truth. She can be very convincing.

Several days later just as we were about ready to drive into our housing tract, we saw the flashing red and blue lights of a police motorcycle right behind us. Jo Anne obediently, and I might add, with a sinking heart, pulled over to the side of the street. The police officer sidled up to Jo Anne's side of the van and identified himself, and then asked her if she was Jo Anne Rushton. She said yes and was amazed that he knew her name without even asking for her driver's license. He laughed and said he was actually on the way to our home when he spotted our van. He then asked about the accident that had taken place over a week ago with the cab. Jo Anne explained her version using me as evidence of the truthfulness of her story. However, having been previously convinced by Jo Anne's persuasive argument to me, I blurted out that I was the real culprit even though I couldn't drive, and even if he didn't believe that, he should go easy on my wife – no handcuffs or sirens or lights on the way to the clink. He believed our story after looking at me and that was pretty much the end of it.

Our insurance company did call us the other day, but I don't know what they had to say. I leave those insignificant things up to Jo Anne while I concentrate on more weighty matters like writing observations, reading the Scriptures, sending out e-mails, preparing gospel doctrine lessons and wondering what's for dinner.

Well, what is the point of all of this? Jo Anne has given me permission (isn't she a good sport) to use the tongue-in-cheek experience I have related above and apply it to a very real human character trait all mankind has possessed since the fall of Adam and Eve. I am referring to accepting the consequences of our actions without excuse.

Think back to the Garden of Eden episode and how blame was deflected and directed to others when God confronted Adam and Eve after they had partaken of the forbidden fruit. This was just the beginning of "passing the buck!"

We find it all throughout the Scriptures, in society – ancient and modern – in the workplace, and politics, as well as in society at large and in families.

I hope my son Mike won't mind me relating the following incident that took place when his two boys were very young. Mike was a Deputy Dist. Atty. and was accustomed to cross-examining witnesses and alleged criminals to discover the truth. He was putting his boys to bed one night and when he went into the bathroom he saw toothpaste spread liberally everywhere. The crime scene had become a Ground Zero disaster area. He brought the two boys into the bathroom and said, "Who did this?" Neither boy would confess to the toothpaste crime. Mike was at his cross-examining best but the boys would not cave in. Mike was getting increasingly frustrated with each passing moment and realized he was more successful with hard-core criminals in getting at the truth than with his two little boys. After sending the boys directly to bed with no story time, Mike carefully analyzed the boys' responses with his legally trained mind. He was confident that his namesake, Mike Jr, the oldest of the two, was the perpetrator, or at least the instigator, of the dastardly deed. Hoping to outsmart the guilty one, he entered their bedroom and said in a firm voice, “Spencer, I know you are the one that did it.” And taking the youngest boy from his bed, told him that he was taking him into the other bedroom to spank him. As he did so there was still no response from Mike Jr. As Mike proceeded with his threat, Spencer's eyes got big as saucers while breaking into a cold sweat as he awaited the awful punishment -- having been found guilty of the crime without really having had a legitimate day in court and adequate legal representation. Suddenly from the boys' bedroom came the anguished cry, "Dad, I did it, it wasn't Spencer! Don't hit him!" With that brotherly confession, the rod was spared.

My favorite scriptural example of this "fallen, natural man" character trait is found in Exodus 32. Moses had been up on Mount Sinai for a long time and when he descended with the tablets which contained the 10 Commandments he saw the people worshiping a golden calf. He knew that Aaron and his brother had made the calf for the children of Israel. We can only imagine what Aaron must have felt when he was confronted by his brother Moses. What follows is one of the most classic and lame excuses ever conjured up to cover one's culpability. I like to think that Moses actually laughed out loud at what Aaron told him in an attempt to defend himself. "And Aaron said, Let not the aanger of my lord wax hot: thou knowest the people, that they are bset on cmischief. For they said unto me, aMake us . Bgods, which shall go before us: for as for this Moses, the man that brought us up out of the land of Egypt, we wot not what is become of him. And I said unto them, Whosoever hath any gold, let them break it off. So they gave it me: then I cast it into the fire, and there came out this calf." [Exodus 32:22-24 – Emphasis added]

The only thing that can compare to Aaron's lame excuse is all the finger-pointing in Washington regarding the budget and nobody willing to step up to the plate and admit wrongdoing or at least stupidity.

I believe there is a great lesson to be learned from the original apostles who when the Savior said that one of them would betray him, instead of saying, "I'll bet it's Judas, or Bartholomew," instead said, "Is it I?" [Mark 14:18-19]
I call their response "Apostalic Humility." I believe we can all use a little bit more of that as we exercise our agency and do dumb things every once in a while, because let's face it, "For the anatural bman is an cenemy to God, and has been from the dfall of Adam, and will be, forever and ever, unless he eyields to the enticings of the Holy fSpirit, and gputteth off the hnatural man and becometh a isaint…" [Mosiah 3:19]

Best wishes in your attempt to "yield to the enticings of the Holy Spirit."
Dad/Grandpa/Jack

Lovingkindness

2011-08-01T12:39:00.000-07:00

This past week Jo Anne and I celebrated our 47th wedding anniversary. As we were driving out to Murrieta for a dinner with some of our children and grandchildren she revealed to me what a good life I was having as a quadriplegic on life support. She explained to me how I had no stress in my life – no job to go to or worry about, no house to keep up, no yard or van to maintain, no shopping for outfits to buy and take back, no toilets to clean, no food shopping or wonderful meals to prepare, no Quad to endlessly care for and worry about, and on and on it went. I agreed with her that I really was pretty lucky. She told me that my greatest stress in life was choosing which book to listen to on my special braille Institute audio book player, which TCM movie to watch on TV, or worrying about how pitiful the Dodgers are this year, preparing a good gospel doctrine lesson and being prepared to give a weekly patriarchal blessing. As we drove down the freeway I began to feel sorry for everyone that wasn't paralyzed and on life support! You are all really missing out on something special!

Well, being paralyzed and living on life support certainly does have a big upside as recounted to me by my loving wife. However, the biggest upside is to have been blessed by being married to a woman like Jo Anne, who possesses a character trait in rich abundance that I am striving to incorporate into my own life – and I must admit, not always very successfully.

A couple of weeks ago I was privileged to teach a lesson in Sunday School about the events after the Savior's prayer experience in the Garden of Gethsemane, leading up to, and including the crucifixion. I studied hard, read the scriptural accounts carefully and prayerfully, and even "googled" the words "scourging" and "crucifixion" which led me to many insightful commentaries from a variety of Bible dictionaries regarding these two words. What I read was very graphic and almost too painful for me to contemplate. This Roman form of punishment was degrading and horrific beyond our ability to fully understand I believe. Just think of what Christ went through happening to you or to one of your children and it becomes even more real and painful.

I have been impressed the last couple of weeks, more than at any other time in my life for some reason, with Christ's restraint and desire not to retaliate and just vaporize his antagonists with a blink of the eye which he surely could have done had he chosen to do so.

Just think who the leaders of the Jews, whose hellish desire was to see Jesus crucified, were belittling, mocking, abusing and ultimately exerting sufficient pressure on Pontius Pilate that he succumbed to their evil and unholy desires.

Annas, Caiaphas, arid Herod began the humiliating and degrading procedure that would ultimately climax in HIM being crucified. They slapped HIS face and spit on HIM. They dressed HIM in a purple robe and ridiculed HIM and HE did nothing to retaliate. The Roman soldiers savagely pushed down a crown of thorns on his head, scourged HIM, which often times resulted in death. All of this was but the prelude to the humiliating, degrading, painful and brutal, beyond belief, crucifixion. And who were they doing this to?

HE was Jehovah, the great I Am, the Creator of this world and worlds without number, the Father of heaven and earth, the Messiah, the Redeemer, the Rock, the Lamb of God, the Living Water, Wonderful, Counselor, The Mighty God, the Prince of Peace, and the Only Begotten Son of God the Father in the Flesh!

What kept HIM from striking back? There are undoubtedly many answers to my question but the one that strikes deeply into my heart is from the Book of Mormon. "And the world, because of their iniquity, shall judge him to be a thing of naught; wherefore they scourge him, and he suffereth it; and they smite him, and he suffereth it. Yea, they aspit upon him, and he suffereth it, because of his loving kindness and his long-suffering towards the children of men." [1 Nephi 19:9 (Emphasis added)]

The phrases, "loving kindness," and "long-suffering," are perfect in describing this aspect of Christ's character. I would like to have in greater abundance in my own life the character trait of loving kindness toward others. I am afraid I have a long way to go, but it is one of the desires of my heart to treat others with the same loving kindness Christ showed even toward his enemies. I know it is a lofty goal but as the poet, Robert Browning wrote: "If a man's reach does not exceed his grasp then what is a heaven for?"

I believe it is easy for a person to feel that he has loving kindness for all mankind in general. The true test of our "loving kindness" as well as our "long suffering," it seems to me, is in the relationships we have with our spouses, children, and those with whom we interact in our own little circle of acquaintances on a day to day basis. For me that means Jo Anne, my married daughter Jackie, her husband Nathan,, and their two little girls who currently live with us. It also includes my caregivers, the wheelchair company and its technicians, the company and technicians that service my life support system, various doctors and nurses that I seem to spend more time with than I would like, and a few others as well, like the waiters and waitresses who serve up the gourmet food at Taco Bell, In N Out Burger, Subway, Café Rio, and etc.

Lately when I have been frustrated or irritated and am tempted to think or say something sarcastic, degrading, or mean-spirited because of something some of these "neighbors" (read carefully the parable of the Good Samaritan – Luke 10: 29-37) with whom I interact constantly, have done to me or not done for me, thankfully, of late, there has come into my mind, very vividly, the picture of the Savior being humiliated, degraded, ridiculed, slapped in the face, spit upon, scourged and then crucified, and yet HE did not retaliate in any way.

As I think of HIM and HIS restraint and self-control, I am always embarrassed at my little frustrations and irritations which are like mosquito bites compared to what HE endured. I get embarrassed, bite my tongue and ask the Lord to please forgive me and my "natural man" foolishness.

I believe that Jo Anne possesses the quality of "loving kindness" to a high degree as I have observed the way she treats others including me over almost a half-century now. I hasten to say however, that she is not perfect in this character trait. There have been a few times during 47 years of marriage that her loving kindness has worn thin. She has actually been known to raise her voice when addressing me at times which is hard to understand because I am such a pleasant fellow to be around most of the time. I did kind of understand her little lack of loving kindness a few weeks ago after I had finally been discharged to go home from my extended vacation in the local ICU. I was still hallucinating and having horrible nightmares and I called for Jo Anne's assistance almost every half-hour all through the night. About 5 AM as she came in to help me for what seemed like the umpteenth time, she said, "Is there anything else you don't need done that I can do for you right now?"

It does take a great sense of humor and tons of loving kindness and long-suffering to successfully complete this Telestial Journey to the Promised Land.

Dad/Grandpa/Jack

It's Good to Be Alive Again… And Again

2011-07-16T16:52:00.000-07:00

I hate to admit it but I am a "reject." In fact I must have the word "reject" stamped on my forehead. I have almost lost count of how many times I have been rejected and not allowed to enter the Spirit World. As I carefully consider it, however, I suppose it's not such a bad thing to be rejected from that sphere of existence. I guess I will just have to force myself to patiently wait to take that final step from mortality into eternity.
I believe the essence of my latest brush with death is captured in Charles Dickens' novel, "A Tale of Two Cities. His first sentence in this classic book is, "It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the season of hope, it was the season of despair…"
After being taken to the ER, I was found to be septic (acute infection in the blood), from an inflamed gall bladder. I was then admitted to the ICU. After being there for several days, I became totally unresponsive and remained so for about 10 days.
After a week in this state of unawareness, I was subjected to a series of tests to determine if any damage had been done to my brain due to the severity of my illness. Following brain wave tests and scans, they shot ice water into my ears. Showing no response they then tried to get a gag reflex which was also unsuccessful. That, along with the outcome of my brain tests, showed some damage to the brain stem. For my family, it became a season of despair. At that time, the head doctor of the ICU, made it very clear to the family that she was certain that I would forever remain in the state I was in and recommended that I be taken off life support. If not, then I would have to be admitted to a care center. It truly was the worst of times.
However, it was also became a season of hope because Jo Anne and the children told the doctor that they would rather take me home and wait and see what might happen. There are not words to express how I feel about this act of faith and hope in the face of such a dire prognosis on the part of medical science.
And then wouldn’t you know, while arrangements were being made to take me home in an It's Good to Be Alive Again… And Again… And Again…
I hate to admit it but I am a "reject." In fact I must have the word "reject" stamped on my forehead. I have almost lost count of how many times I have been rejected and not allowed to enter the Spirit World. As I carefully consider it, however, I suppose it's not such a bad thing to be rejected from that sphere of existence. I guess I will just have to force myself to patiently wait to take that final step from mortality into eternity.
I believe the essence of my latest brush with death is captured in Charles Dickens' novel, "A Tale of Two Cities. His first sentence in this classic book is, "It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the season of hope, it was the season of despair…"
After being taken to the ER, I was found to be septic (acute infection in the blood), from an inflamed gall bladder. I was then admitted to the ICU. After being there for several days, I became totally unresponsive and remained so for about 10 days.
After a week in this state of unawareness, I was subjected to a series of tests to determine if any damage had been done to my brain due to the severity of my illness. Following brain wave tests and scans, they shot ice water into my ears. Showing no response they then tried to get a gag reflex which was also unsuccessful. That, along with the outcome of my brain tests, showed some damage to the brain stem. For my family, it became a season of despair. At that time, the head doctor of the ICU, made it very clear to the family that she was certain that I would forever remain in the state I was in and recommended that I be taken off life support. If not, then I would have to be admitted to a care center. It truly was the worst of times.
However, it was also became a season of hope because Jo Anne and the children told the doctor that they would rather take me home and wait and see what might happen. There are not words to express how I feel about this act of faith and hope in the face of such a dire prognosis on the part of medical science.
And then wouldn’t you know, while arrangements were being made to take me home in an ambulance, I just woke up. All the plans for my imminent funeral were thankfully put on hold. Or as WC Fields said, “ Rumors concerning my demise have been greatly exaggerated.”
On Friday afternoon I began tracking with my eyes. On Saturday I began chewing ice and swallowing. Come Sunday afternoon with all my family present, I began to talk. The family, uncertain if there had been any brain damage or not, began asking me tricky questions like who was in the NBA championship series. I immediately responded, “Miami and Dallas.” I could also sadly recall what a dreadful season the Dodgers were having. Sensing I could recall all that really mattered in life, they finally concluded that “Jack was back.”
To say the least the doctors and nurses were pretty amazed. In fact, the doctor who suggested my time had come said she was grateful she had been 100% wrong.
After spending another week in ICU, trying to make a comeback, I was finally safely delivered to my home by ambulance on a gurney – not nearly as dramatic as Lazarus coming forth from the tomb. I basically slept for the first four days only waking to drink and eat small amounts. When I finally woke up from my Rip Van Winkle nap, my communication skills left much to be desired. I barely had the energy to say one or two words at a time like "hungry," "thirsty," and "suction me.”
Beginning the fifth day, however, I was more alert and began speaking in complete sentences asking a lot of questions concerning what had happened. Jo Anne revealed to me how close to entering the Spirit World I had come. It was a very sobering conversation. To think that my visits to Taco Bell and to In N Out Burger had almost come to an end was very traumatic.
In contrast to being the worst of times, my family revealed to me how it was also the best of times. Some of them were always with me 24/7, especially Jo Anne who slept on her semi-comfortable air mattress in the ICU room with me, being relieved occasionally by other family members. All the children, the boys, in particular, spent many hours together visiting, reminiscing, and bonding than they had for some time. There was much laughter as they recalled childhood experiences. Sometimes for Jo Anne it was the worst of times as they revealed things she was totally unaware of. It made me feel good to know of this outpouring of love, faith, concern, and togetherness of my children, their spouses, and my grandchildren while watching over me.
After returning to the land of the living, it was also the best of times for me when my sons, sons-in-law, a grandson -- who is now at the MTC getting prep and ared to serve his mission in the Argentina Buenos Aires South mission -- and other close family members, gave me a special priesthood blessing. I remember Mike, my oldest son, pronouncing the blessing and hearing the inspired promise that I would fully recover and regain my health once again.
I have been told how many wonderful friends were praying for me both in and out of the temple. I do believe it was the faith of family and friends and their many prayers in my behalf that pulled me through. I take no credit for this healing miracle.
Since being home, I have an increased testimony of the importance of prayer and scripture study in bringing the spirit of peace and comfort into our lives. At first, while still recovering from all I had been through, I found it difficult to concentrate enough to pray or study my scriptures on the computer and felt somewhat discouraged by it all. The first day I was able to do so, all of the depression and bad feelings disappeared. I have been so much happier ever since. Prayer and scripture study is the key in bringing light and peace into our lives. The peace I am referring to can only come from the Savior who said, "Peace I leave with you, my peace I give unto you; not as the world giveth give I unto you. Let not your heart be troubled neither let it be afraid." [John 14:27]
I also had come into my mind two other scriptures I recite to myself and ponder daily. They have inspired me to never give up or give in. The first is from a revelation given to young Joseph Smith who was just beginning his work as a prophet, seer, and revelator. "Be patient in afflictions for thou shalt have many, but endure them, for lo I am with thee even unto the end of thy days." [D&C 24:8]
We are told that what the Savior says to one he says to all and so I apply it to my own situation as you can to yours. We can endure anything that comes our way because He is with us even unto the end of our days. He expects us to endure our afflictions well and hopefully come to the realization that we cannot successfully traverse this minefield of mortality without Him. There is just no other way!
The second Scripture that is so important to me is from the writings of Nephi, "Wherefore ye must press forward with a steadfastness in Christ, having a perfect brightness of hope and a love of God and of all men. Wherefore if ye shall press forward feasting upon the word of Christ and endure to the end. Behold thus sayeth the father, ye shall have eternal life." [2 Nephi 31:20]
For me, in my situation, enduring to the end doesn't mean to the end of my life or when the Second Coming transpires. It means to the end of each day. If I do the things Nephi has suggested on a daily basis, I do believe the gift of eternal life, and peace in this life, can be attained. And yes, "It's Good to Be Alive Again!"
Dad/Grandpa/Jack

Broken Bows

2011-05-07T12:11:00.000-07:00

This last week while working on my computer I gave an incorrect command to my voice recognition software and it didn't like it. Maybe it was the tone of my voice; I really don't know but it seems to be extremely sensitive and easily offended. A brief message appeared on my monitor saying "You have made a fatal mistake. You have permanently damaged your user profile and can no longer use it." That message was like a dagger in my heart. At the same time that dreadful message appeared, the computer itself began to act weird and as I write this I am waiting for my son in law Nathan, to come into my office and bail me out. Do you believe in evil spirits? I I feel sometimes that my computer is possessed by some malignant power.

I'm happy to report I was not even tempted to use the "D…" word but at the same time I am very unhappy with myself because I became very frustrated and unhappy and began to wonder what horrible thing I had done to deserve this adversity in my life. I had a gospel doctrine lesson I needed to prepare, was running out of time, and I also had other self-imposed projects and deadlines I felt I needed to complete in a timely manner. I was totally stymied and unable to do what I wanted to do because of a dumb computer and overly sensitive voice recognition software.

Thankfully I remembered a lesson I had learned many years ago from the Book of Mormon regarding "Broken Bows" which enabled me to put my malfunctioning computer in proper perspective and even laugh at myself.

Of course, I am referring to Nephi's account of what happened to him and his family while they were traveling in the wilderness. After he broke his bow and his brother's bows were rendered useless to the extent that no animals could be slain for food, Nephi records:
"And it came to pass that Laman and Lemuel and the sons of Ishmael did begin to murmur exceedingly, because of their sufferings and afflictions in the wilderness; and also my father began to murmur against the Lord his God; yea, and they were all exceedingly sorrowful, even that they did murmur against the Lord." [1 Nephi 16:20 – Emphasis added]

Even righteous Lehi, a prophet of God, let a broken bow make him "exceedingly sorrowful" and obscure his vision for a time as he murmured against the Lord. Only Nephi was able to keep things in perspective and ultimately through his faith and works prevail over the broken bow.

Shortly after my injury if any of my equipment failed which it always seemed to do at the most inopportune times – the ramp in the modified van would fail, the van itself would develop problems that made it impossible to drive, the ventilator or the batteries on the wheelchair it was attached to would quit working, and then the wheelchair itself would do crazy things and make it impossible for me to sit in it and drive, thereby robbing me of what little independence I possessed. When these things would happen my heart would begin to palpitate, I would have an anxiety attack and just be plain miserable. I would become "exceedingly sorrowful," and almost be tempted to "murmur against the Lord." It seemed so unfair.

From Lehi's family's experience I came to understand that most negative things in life that come our way are really just "Broken Bows", are really not that important after all, and ultimately can probably be fixed or replaced. Even severe illnesses of a potential terminal nature – things that can't be repaired or replaced – are simply "Broken Bows," when viewed in the context of eternity.

Years ago I taught seminary at a reform will school in Ogden, Utah. As seminary teachers we developed the following philosophical statement -- "The way out is the way through" -- to encourage the disturbed teenagers we worked with to meet their problems head-on, work through them, and having done so to experience the freedom they desired but didn't know how to achieve. As with many of us, their tendency was to avoid working through their problems, murmuring because of them, and trying to run from them -- a sure way to bring misery, sorrow, and frustration into their lives.

Little did I realize at the time that I would have to apply this same philosophy to my own life in a major way. I discovered it was much easier to teach than to do. During the past years since my accident and subsequent paralysis, I truly have had to work my way through the problem of paralysis in order for my spirit to be free and not held captive by my mobility impaired body. First of all I had to come to grips with the fact that my injury was what the medical world called a "complete" injury. My spinal cord had actually been severed and the neurosurgeons gave us no hope that I would ever get anything back. I just couldn't accept that and for several years I tried all kinds of things to somehow heal my spinal cord. Nothing worked of course and I was very miserable as I tried to run away from the truth and regarding my situation. My family, friends, and I prayed that a healing miracle would take place and that my spinal cord would be made whole so that I could walk and breathe on my own. In retrospect we should have been praying, "Please bless Jack with greater faith and strengthen him spiritually so that his burden of paralysis can be made light and easy to bear and that "he will be able to submit with cheerfulness and patience to all the will of the Lord." [Mosiah 24:15]

The day I was able to say to myself "Jack, you are going to be a quadriplegic and living on life support today, tomorrow, and every other day for the rest of your life." That was a breakthrough day for me as I came to realize that I must do everything in my power to develop all of the talents, abilities, and capacities I still had. When I began to do that and increased the fervency of my prayers the Lord did strengthen me spiritually and life has been very good and I can truthfully say "It's Good to Be Alive!"

I really do believe that most problems and challenges we face in life are really only broken bows. Like Nephi, we must not sit and murmur and weep and wring our hands in despair and frustration, but work 's through our challenges and problems with an attitude of faith and hope, discovering that "the only way out is the way through".

I think it's important that we understand what kind of hope I am talking about. Elder Maxwell once gave this beautiful definition: "Real hope is much more than wishful musing. It stiffens, not slackens, the spiritual spine. It is composed, not giddy, eager, without being naive, and pleasantly steady without being smug. Hope is realistic anticipation taking the form of determination-a determination not merely to survive but to "endure … well" to the end." (Ensign, November 1994, p. 35)

I have a small porcelain statue of Nephi on a shelf just above my computer monitor. I look at it many times each day and it seems to give me strength and courage. There Nephi stands; his bow and arrows strapped to his back, his left hand on his hip and the Liahona in his right hand. He is gazing at the horizon with a look of confidence on his countenance. I feel motivated to go forward with my life as I contemplate Nephi and his great attitude of gratitude toward God, as well as his attitude of faith and hope. It was demonstrated not only in the broken bow incident but constantly throughout his life as recorded in the Book of Mormon. One of my favorite incidents is as the family is crossing the ocean; Laman and Lemuel bound Nephi and only loosed him as the ship was in danger of sinking. Nephi's response to what had happened is so typical of him: "... they came unto me, and loosed the bands which were upon my wrists, and behold they had swollen exceedingly; and also mine ankles were much swollen, and great was the soreness thereof. Nevertheless, I did look unto my God, and I did praise him all the day long; and I did not murmur against the Lord because of mine afflictions." (1 Nephi 18:15-16 – emphasis added)
I have discovered that an attitude of gratitude, along with faith and hope and trying to see the bright side of life like Nephi, is so essential in helping us to deal with life's problems.

We all have been blessed with our own unique broken bows of one kind or another. Our broken bows will never get the best of us or obscure our vision of eternity if we will but believe and implement the Lord's counsel: "Search diligently, pray always, and be believing, and all things shall work together for your good, if you walk up rightly and remember the covenant...." [Doctrine & Covenants 90:24].

Dad/Grandpa/Jack

I

Putting off the Natural Man

2011-04-16T12:12:00.000-07:00

Shortly after my accident I received my first computer along with some voice recognition software. Personal computer technology was not highly developed at the time, nor was voice recognition software. It was very frustrating to try to write or get the computer to respond to the commands the voice recognition software user manual instructed me to use. One embarrassing problem manifested itself almost immediately. To shut down my voice recognition software, the manual instructed me to say the word "close." However, almost every time I said "close" to my computer it would interpret it as "clothes," and immediately the Victoria's Secrets website would pop up on my screen. Somehow the computer was programmed in such a way that it was far easier to access Victoria's Secrets then to get rid of it.
Then there was the unforgettable afternoon that Jo Anne left me home with my youngest daughter Jackie who was a teenager at the time. Because I am on life support I can never be left alone outside of earshot. Jackie was in her bedroom upstairs and I was in my office downstairs working on my computer. We have a good baby monitor system in the house. The transmitter was in my office and Jackie had a receiver in her bedroom. For some reason the afternoon in question found my voice recognition software and computer unwilling to work for me. Whatever command I gave it wouldn't respond and whenever I tried to dictate, the words came out garbled. I had a self-imposed deadline of some kind I was trying to meet and time was slipping by quickly. I don't know how many minutes went by but suddenly I was shouting at the top of my lungs at my computer and using the dreaded "D…" word. Really, I am not in the habit of swearing but somewhere deep down in the dark recesses of my soul the "D…" word surfaced. A second or two later the door to my office burst open and Jackie came marching in. She said, "Dad, did I hear from you what I thought I heard?" I meekly and humbly muttered, "Yes." She responded, "I thought so, and you a patriarch!" With that she turned on her heel shut the door to my office and marched upstairs. I hope President Goodman doesn't read this or our Stake may be getting a new patriarch soon.
I hate to report that the natural man is apparently still well and alive in me. Just when I was thinking I was doing pretty well and maybe was even in line on certain days to be "twinkled," the natural man in me raises up his ugly head. I have a strong testimony and am prime evidence of the truthfulness of what King Benjamin taught his people: "For the natural man is an enemy to God, and has been from the fall of Adam, and will be, forever and ever, unless he yields to the enticings of the Holy Spirit, and putteth off the natural man and becometh a saint through the atonement of Christ the Lord…" [Mosiah 3:19]
I believe that maybe I am not so different from most people however. It will probably take a lifetime and more to completely put off the natural man through the atonement of Christ the Lord and become a saint which can only happen as we continually yield to the enticings of the Holy Spirit each day of our lives.
I do have great faith that through the help of the Lord a purifying and sanctifying process can take place in all our lives. Let me share an analogy with you regarding the purifying and sanctifying process that can take place in all of us as we strive to put off the natural man.
I grew up in a little copper mining company town, Ruth, Nevada. As soon as we were old enough to qualify, if our fathers worked for Kennecott, the company would hire us each summer so that we could earn money to attend college in the fall. My brothers and I all worked many different jobs for Kennecott during the years and the jobs they gave us were always so unpleasant and physically labor intensive that it was one of our primary motivations to return to school full-time each fall. There was no way we could envision spending a lifetime working, for example, on the track gang in the Liberty Pit for Kennecott. I drove truck, worked on a drill, the track gang and various other jobs through the years prior to my mission, usually the graveyard shift (11:30 PM to 7:30 AM) because Kennecott was a 24-hour, seven-day a week operation. Upon returning from my mission however, the only jobs in available were in McGill -- the smelter.
It was from the mining, milling, and smelting process that I began to more fully understand the concept of conversion and putting off the "natural man." I had much experience watching and participating in the digging of ore out of an open pit. The Liberty Pit in Ruth was advertised as the deepest man-made hole in the world which I have always believed to be true. The ore dug from the pit would be hauled by truck, dumped into huge railroad cars, and sent 20 miles from Ruth to the mill and smelter in McGill. Copper ore is gray in color and most of the time tons of waste material holding no ore would have to be removed to get at the true stuff. It arrived in McGill at the mill and the ore cars would dump their loads of raw ore into an enormous machine called the CRUSHER. This machine was aptly named as it began to pulverize rocks and huge boulders into something resembling sand. In the mill a flotation process of some kind was used to skim off much of the impurities (having never worked in the mill I am not sure of all that occurred there). I do know that it eventually left the mill looking like gray damp sand. It was moved on a large conveyor belt to the smelter and dumped into the tops of massive blast furnaces made out of brick.
I won't soon forget the first day I walked into the smelter and felt the heat and noise emanating from those blast furnaces, along with the smoke and what seemed to me total confusion, as groups of men ran back and forth performing their duties. Each furnace had two openings near the bottom, one being a number of feet higher than the other however. These openings were closed with large hunks of clay called dollies. I was assigned to a gang whose job it was to tap out (remove) these dollies (big hunks of clay) several times each shift. This was accomplished by one of us, usually me, holding a long steel bar against the dolly while my friends would take turns hitting the end of the steel bar with a large sledgehammer. Holding the bar sounds dangerous doesn't it? It was and you just had to trust the guy with the sledgehammer that he would always hit what he was aiming at.
When the top dolly was tapped out, molten slag which consisted of the impurities in the ore which had risen to the top under the intense heat of the furnace would flow down a long trough out of the smelter and down the hill to the slag dump. Picture the aftermath of a volcanic eruption with volcanic rock and ash spread out everywhere. There were acres and acres of slag dumps him around McGill and no high-powered PR firm or Chamber of Commerce could ever make you believe that McGill was really picturesque and beautiful.
Eventually the bottom dolly would be tapped out and a more pure substance would run down a large trough dumping itself into vast buckets which a crane, suspended from the top of the smelter, would hook and transport quickly to the other side dumping its contents into a piece of equipment called THE CONVERTER. The converter was a super furnace that was able to apply more heat and pressure to the molten substance it received into its belly than even the blast furnaces. In this final process all impurities would be burned-out and when the converter eventually emptied its contents into special molds for shipping back East it consisted of bars of pure copper laced with gold and silver. Enough gold and silver came out of this process to pay for much of the operating costs to process the ore. I will leave it to you to flesh out the analogy or metaphor as it applies to the conversion process and the putting off of the natural man as you are inspired to do so.
My own take on this entire mining and smelting process is that it applies directly to the conversion that must take place in all our lives. As I watched the process of mining and smelting through the years, and especially while working in the smelter at the side of THE CONVERTER, I came to understand, as I am sure you all do, that true conversion is not just believing or thinking or knowing, it is literally becoming transformed from the raw material called the natural man and into what? I believe that Elder Oaks gave a beautiful answer to that question when he said:
"In teaching the Nephites, the Savior referred to what they must become. He challenged them to repent and be baptized and be sanctified by the reception of the Holy Ghost, “that ye may stand spotless before me at the last day” (3 Ne. 27:20). He concluded: “Therefore, what manner of men ought ye to be? Verily I say unto you, even as I am” (3 Ne. 27:27). Ultimately we want to become like Christ! Elder Oaks went on to say: "Most of us experience some measure of what the scriptures call “the furnace of affliction” (Isa. 48:10; 1 Ne. 20:10). Some are submerged in service to a disadvantaged family member. Others suffer the death of a loved one or the loss or postponement of a righteous goal like marriage or childbearing. Still others struggle with personal impairments or with feelings of rejection, inadequacy, or depression. Through the justice and mercy of a loving Father in Heaven, the refinement and sanctification possible through such experiences can help us achieve what God desires us to become." (Elder Oaks, Ensign, November, 2000, 32).
THE CONVERTER ultimately is life itself and through constant repentance and the sanctifying power of the Holy Ghost we can ultimately be converted from a natural man to a Christlike state.
"Who is righteous? [Who is like Christ?] Anyone who is repenting. No matter how bad he has been, if he is repenting, he is a righteous man. There is hope for him. And no matter how good he has been all his life, if he is not repenting, he is a wicked man. The difference is which way you are facing. The man on the top of the stairs facing down is much worse off than the man on the bottom step who is facing up. The direction we are facing, that is repentance; and that is what determines whether we are good or bad." (Hugh Nibley)
With the help of Christ we can be refined and turned into pure copper, gold and silver. It will be done over a lifetime and will undoubtedly include being thrust eventually into the crucible of affliction or into "THE CRUSHER AND THE CONVERTER."
Dad/Grandpa/Jack

Heap Big Smoke but No Fire

2011-04-11T17:36:00.000-07:00

"Heap Big Smoke but No Fire"
Several years ago I had a stomach ulcer that exploded. The doctors called it Mount St. Helens. A surgeon by the name of Dr. Nakono leaned over me and whispered in my ear, "Jack, if I don't operate right now you will die." I am not very smart but I got her message loud and clear and whispered in return, "Do it!" Dr. Nakono did it! There could have been many disastrous complications that had been mentioned to my family but none of them materialized. I will always believe it was because Dr. Nakono was so well-trained, knew what she was doing, and simply did it, coupled with the intervention of Heavenly Father on my behalf my life was saved. Don't you just love people who know how to do things and then they just do them without a lot of fuss or fanfare?
Jo Anne has been interacting with medical supply companies on my behalf ever since I was injured 21 years ago. For the most part they have done pretty well by us but we have learned that all medical supply companies are not created equal. The company that supplies us with many of the things we need is just the best. Jo Anne can call in an order on Monday let's say, and the next day UPS will deliver it to our home with the exact things we ordered. On the other hand, the company that services our ventilator and all the equipment I need to keep my life support system functioning the way it should, is absolutely and irrevocably dysfunctional! Jo Anne can call in an order and it will never come. She calls back and they make excuses and say they will send it right out which they do but it is never the order we requested. They will send half of it or twice as much of it or often not even what we ordered. It is a source of great frustration for both of us. The only thing they never forget is to send the bill which is never accurate – always overcharged. And frequently we get a call from a collection agency asking us if we would like to settle our bill by giving them our credit card number. Well, if you know Jo Anne you can imagine what her response might be to these wonderful people who sound like they are in India or on the North Pole somewhere.
Many years ago I remember watching with my mother on TV the Arthur Godfrey show each day at noon. We only had three channels we could receive at our home in East Ely, Nevada. On Squaw Peak just outside of town there was a receiver of sorts that would pick up the signal from the major stations in Salt Lake City and then reflect them to our home. We were only 250 miles from Salt Lake but 350 from Las Vegas and about the same from Reno. I believe the Arthur Godfrey show was one of my mom's favorite shows on TV. He was a big man with red hair and freckles who loved to sing while playing his ukulele. As a young man I always remember, and still do to this day, the favorite song he used to sing – "Heap Big Smoke but No Fire." It went like this: "Heap big smoke but no fire, heap big smoke but no fire. Him talk a lot but him not so hot. Heap big smoke but no fire!"
A favorite story I read many years ago that is still influencing me is entitled "A message to Garcia." It was written by Eldred Hubbard . It is a wonderful story about initiative, trustworthiness and simply "doing it!" Eldred Hubbard wrote: "...When war broke out between Spain and the United States, it was very necessary to communicate quickly with the leader of the Insurgents. Garcia [leader of the Cuban insurgents against Spain] was somewhere in the mountain fastness of Cuba—no one knew where. No mail or telegraph could reach him. The President [William McKinley] must secure his co-operation, and quickly. What to do! Aid to the President said to him, "There is a fellow by the name of Rowan will find Garcia for you, if anybody can." Rowan was sent for and given a letter to be delivered to Garcia....the fellow by the name of Rowan took the letter, sealed it up in an oil-skin pouch, strapped it over his heart, in four days landed by night off the coast of Cuba from an open boat, disappeared into the jungle, and in three weeks came out on the other side of the Island, having traversed a hostile country on foot, and having delivered his letter to Garcia... The point I wish to make is this: McKinley gave Rowan a letter to be delivered to Garcia; Rowan took the letter and did not ask, "Where is he at?"

"By the Eternal! there is a man whose form should be cast in deathless bronze and the statue placed in every college of the land. It is not book-learning young men need, nor instruction about this or that, but a stiffening of the vertebrae which will cause them to be loyal to a trust, to act promptly, concentrate their energies: do the thing—"Carry a message to Garcia." (Eldred Hubbard)
I believe that Rowan was a prime example of one who was "Heap Big Fire with Little Smoke!" His type of initiative, trustworthiness, and integrity, sadly, is not found in great numbers of people. I know that in the leadership positions I have held over the years I have always tried to surround myself with people that could "carry a message to Garcia." Frequently these men and women have not been great public speakers but they know how to carry the message to Garcia. I have been blessed to find men and women that I could totally trust to use their initiative to accomplish something delegated to them better than I could ever have done it myself. Such individuals are truly priceless.
To do what we say we are going well to do is surely a priceless character trait.
The Savior felt strongly about going and doing, he himself having volunteered in the Pre-mortal life to save mankind by basically saying, "I will go and do it, and the glory be thine." He did it!
Obedient and faithful Nephi when asked to go back to Jerusalem to secure the brass plates from Laban simply said, "… I will go and do what the Lord hath commanded …" [1 Nephi 3:5]
We can learn so much from the Savior, the man Rowan who delivered the "message to Garcia." Nephi, and a host of others. None of these were "Heap big smoke and no fire!" To say what we mean, and mean what we say and then to do it is one of the great character traits we can develop during this trial period we call mortality.
President Kimball's favorite saying I believe consisted of only two words, "DO IT!" For years on my desk were those two words that looked like they were chiseled in stone.. Actually the entire object was made out of some very lightweight synthetic material that resembled stone. However, the message was never synthetic or was the man who lived by those two words! As I looked at each day I was inspired to always try to simply "DO IT!" Not a bad way to try to live our lives.
Dad/Grandpa/Jack

The Work and the Glory

2011-04-03T15:18:00.000-07:00

After a particularly hard day Jo Anne sat down with me and said, "Jack, we really ought to write a book about our experiences together since your accident." She went on to say, "If we do write such a book I have the perfect title. We will call it "The Work and the Glory!" I looked at her in amazement and responded, "That is truly a wonderful title, but quite a famous author has pretty well used up that particular title." She looked me in the eyes and said, "I know that, but it would still be the perfect title for our book, because for some reason I seem to do all the work and you manage to get all the glory!" Well, it certainly is true about Jo Anne doing all the work but I'm not sure about the glory part of the proposed title.
My mother passed away a few years ago while living with one of my brothers in South Jordan, Utah. The funeral was held in Salt Lake City. Jo Anne and I drove to Provo with our daughter, Jolene, and her youngest child at the time, Tanner. We stayed with Jo Anne's sister, Judy, at her home in the Provo area. The night before the funeral my two older brothers came to visit. About the time Jo Anne was putting me down for the night I said to her in their presence, "Now you know the funeral begins at 10 AM in Salt Lake City and then we are going to have to drive directly to Ely, Nevada for the burial the next day (Ely is 250 miles from Salt Lake City). So do you think you can get me up in the morning, get me dressed and into the wheelchair, feed me some breakfast, load the van and the car top and get us to the funeral by 10 AM and then drive us to Ely after the funeral service?" Jo Anne looked at me without blinking her eyes or grimacing too badly and said, "No problem!" My two brothers looked at each other and one of them said, "Boy, that's what I call a good marriage!"
About now you are probably thinking, "Jack, what do you contribute to this marriage?" That is a very good and legitimate question and the answer is very simple, "Not much!" Really, the only thing I can contribute is to be cheerful, express gratitude for all that is done for me, complement Jo Anne on how nice she looks and how wonderful the outfits are that she puts on me each morning. I also try to be very open and honest in my communication with her and have learned the truthfulness of the significant statement, "Openness brings closeness!"
As Jo Anne takes care of me, makes sure the grass, flowers, and shrubbery are carefully and beautifully maintained, makes sure home repairs are done correctly and by competent individuals (I never did deserve being numbered as part of this elite group), keeping the house spotless, the van serviced properly, battling insurance and medical supply companies, and cooking wonderful meals, and a multitude of other things, what do I do? Good question!
I thought some of you might be interested in a typical day in the life of this quadriplegic on life support. I think it might help you better understand why Jo Anne's proposed title for our book is so apropos.
My day typically begins at about 5 AM each morning. I do however struggle for a few weeks adjusting to daylight savings time each year. When I wake up it is dark but I usually can't sleep anymore at that time of day. I lay there for a few minutes and try to go back to sleep, but once I finally realize that sleep has escaped me for the night, I begin what I call my morning devotional. I begin singing in my mind my favorite hymns. I have approximately 20 that I enjoy singing. I generally sing 10 to 15 of them each morning after I wake up. I will share with you some that I sing. I always start off with "Oh How Lovely Was the Morning" – all four verses. Next I sing "Praise to the Man," followed by "I Stand All Amazed." And then I sing the following: "Have I Done Any Good in the World Today," "Put Your Shoulder to the Wheel," "There Is Sunshine in My Soul Today," (I especially love the verse – "there is music in my soul today, a Carol to my King, and Jesus listening can hear the songs I cannot sing) "High on a Mountaintop," Redeemer of Israel," "Hope of Israel," "Let Us All Press On," "Ere You Left Your Room This Morning," "I Need Thee Every Hour," "Oh My Father," "We Thank Thee Oh God for a Prophet ," and I won't bore you with any more. I always end by singing "How Firm a Foundation." I especially love the third verse, "Fear not, Jack, I am with thee, oh be not dismayed, for I am thy God and will still give thee aid. I'll strengthen thee, bless thee and cause thee to stand [I especially like that phrase] upheld by my righteous omnipotent hand, upheld by my righteous omnipotent hand!"
By the end of my hymn singing I am feeling very happy and peaceful inside and am prepared to offer my morning prayer. I am in no hurry and enjoy this part of my morning devotional the best. If I know I have overslept I will eliminate the hymn singing but never the prayer. I simply could not make it without the prayer. The third part of my devotional is to meditate or ponder. I prepare lessons and talks in my mind, receive ideas for observations I would like to write and have had some very special experiences during that pondering time. I can never go to the computer saying to myself that I am now going to write an observation. I will think for several weeks about an experience or an idea I think might be worth writing about and when I finally go to the computer it generally flows for me, although at times it ends up going a completely different direction once I start writing.
About 7 AM my son-in-law, Nathan Brown, (I really like this boy) comes into my bedroom on his way to work, gives me a drink of water, does some other things to make me more comfortable, and then puts my earphones on me so that I can listen to a book on tape. Because my eyesight has gone south on me making it impossible for me to read the printed page any longer, and because I don't have the use of my limbs I qualify to be a member of the braille Institute who through the Los Angeles County public library system supplies me with a special tape recorder and a wide variety of books I can request to read. I always have on my shelf 9 or 10 books I can hardly wait to listen to.
Between 8 and 8:30 AM my caregiver comes to start getting me ready for the day. He performs some necessary procedures on me, washes my face, shaves me, brushes my teeth, and exercises my body, stretching my limbs to keep my muscles from atrophying and my limbs from becoming frozen in place and distorted. About this time he calls for Jo Anne to come down to make the most important decision of the day. My caregiver and I would not dare to choose the outfit for the day. To do so would be way beyond our intelligence and abilities. Jo Anne selects the outfit and she and my caregiver get me completely dressed. The caregiver, a wonderful man from the Philippines, does all of the tugging and pulling and finally I am hooked up to the hydraulic patient lifter, transported from the bed to the wheelchair which is always an adventure because I am without air during the transfer, and I truly do love to breath. Jo Anne reluctantly lets my caregiver comb my hair. It has taken many years for her to delegate that awesome responsibility to anyone but herself. Finally my caregiver feeds me some yogurt with fruit in it, gives me some water to wash down a variety of pills (I am one of the great "pillars" in the Church) and then I am ready for the day.
I roll out of my bedroom across the dining room and into my office. Either Jo Anne or my caregiver sets me up on my computer, positions my microphone headset properly, boots up the computer and I am finally ready to go to work.
I am usually on the computer by 10 AM and study the Scriptures, prepare lessons, write observations, research on the web, read and send e-mails, and thoroughly enjoy what I am able to do. My voice recognition software is incredibly good and I can accomplish by voice what normal able-bodied people can do with their hands and fingers. I work until about 12:30 PM when I take a 10 minute break, drink some tomato juice to wash down another series of pills, maybe eat a handful of nuts and then get back on the computer. Between 2 and 3 PM Jo Anne takes me out in the van to run errands and to go to lunch. Our errands generally consist of returning purchased items to the major mercantile establishments in the greater Orange County Area. I can generally persuade her to get lunch before 3 PM. We go to Taco Bell, subway, Baja fresh, Café Rio on Taco Tuesday where we get a good deal on their wonderful tacos, Saturday afternoon we have a tradition of going to "In N Out Burger" which to me is always the highlight of our gourmet dining during the week. Sometimes Jo Anne talks me into going to a healthy organic pizza place. I really don't enjoy it and prefer the greasy, cheesy pizzas at Pizza Hut. I know my lunch diet is not really good for me but I don't care. I remember Tommy Lasorda, the former Hall of Fame manager of the Dodgers, was talked into going on a diet one time. He finally gave it up and said "I did lose lots of weight and was looking good, but the thought came to me that all the misery I was going through would culminate at my viewing before my burial where people would come by and say,' My, doesn't he look great' ! I just decided the misery wasn't worth it."
On a typical day we will be home before 5 PM and I will spend a couple of more hours on the computer. I'm usually in my bedroom by 6:30 PM watching the news on TV. We eat dinner between 7 PM and 8 PM most days. My caregiver comes at 8 PM to put me down for the night. I am in bed on my left side so I can watch the TV by 8:30 PM. I will be watching the Lakers or the Dodgers or BYU sports in season or a Turner classic movie. I have sworn off network TV not finding anything virtuous, lovely, praiseworthy, or of good report in most of the programming. Jo Anne and Nathan come in about 11 PM, reposition the bed, get me on my back, give me another bunch of pills with a big drink of water and I am ready for a good night's sleep until 5 AM in the morning.
We also try to go to the Temple once each week, an occasional movie if we can find one worth watching, out to dinner with friends, and we love Sundays being with our good friends, teaching gospel doctrine, and usually giving a patriarchal blessing or doing some home teaching Sunday afternoons. We especially enjoy visiting with our children and grandchildren who fortunately live within an hour of our home.
Now, I'm afraid I have painted such a rosy picture of the life of a quadriplegic on life support that some of you may feel cheated that you haven't been blessed with this great opportunity. I must admit it has a downside as well however, which I won't dwell on and really never think much about.
A while back in our Gospel doctrine class we were discussing the Savior and Peter walking on the water during the storm on the Sea of Galilee. I once heard a minister on a radio program saying that he thought Peter was like a cheap suit. Every time the going got tough he folded. On the Sea of Galilee he sank like a rock and that night in Caiaphas' Palace he denied knowing Jesus. I beg to differ with him. How many of us have ever walked on water? Peter was a man of great faith but it was not fully developed yet. He was momentarily distracted and became very self-conscious I believe when he realized he was actually walking on water. The moment he lost his focus on the Savior his walking on the water was over. Matthew recorded the following: "But when he [Peter] saw the wind boisterous, he was afraid; and beginning to sink, he cried, saying, Lord, save me. And immediately Jesus stretched forth his hand, and caught him…"[Matthew 14:30-31]
I am convinced that Peter, though his faith faltered in that instance and he was afraid he, never lost faith in Christ. And as he was sinking to his death he cried out, "Lord, save me," and Jesus stretched forth his hand and saved him.
I can identify with Peter. For the better part of 21 years now I have felt I have been "rolling" on water. The burden of paralysis has been made light and because of the Savior and his great , the fix out one thing out of the bottle, neither just one chapter love I have been strengthened spiritually so I have been able to lift up the burden of paralysis with ease and submit cheerfully and with patience to all the will of the Lord. [Mosiah 24:15]
However, there are those moments when I lose focus like Peter did and reflect on what I am doing and what I have been doing for the last 21 years and I begin to sink like a rock and feel for just a second or two that what I have done and am doing, and what Jo Anne has done and said is doing is absolutely impossible. In those rare moments, like Peter, I cry out, "Lord save me," and he does and will continue to do so I believe, as long as I do my part.
And the truth of the matter is that Jo Anne is both "The Work and the Glory," and to me "A Marvelous Work and a Wonder!"
Dad/Grandpa/Jack

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If We Don't Try We Don't Do

2011-02-11T15:03:00.000-08:00

Sometime ago, in fact a few weeks before Christmas, my son-in-law, Nathan, was telling me he was going to upgrade his computer. That sounded like something I should do to my computer since it was six years old and I had been told that it was woefully outdated. The more we talked about it I came to the brilliant conclusion that instead of doing an upgrade it probably made more sense to just buy a new computer. The word got out to my children that this is what I wanted to do and for Christmas they gave me some money to help defray the cost. At Christmas a good friend of mine also gave me the latest and greatest new edition of Dragon NaturallySpeaking voice recognition software. I had been using for some time the 10.1 version which worked really well but I was told the 11.0 edition was far superior.
Well, about a week after Christmas Joanne, Nathan, and I went out one evening to shop for a new laptop computer. We first of all went to Micro Center which is just a few blocks from our home. They carry every computer ever made it seems and every other electronic gadget man has invented. As I rolled into this mecca of electronic wizardry I became dizzy with all of the choices of computers that were available. Thankfully I had done some homework and the experts I knew told me that the Toshiba laptop worked better with Dragon NaturallySpeaking than any other computer. We finally found a Toshiba laptop that seemed to have everything I wanted or needed, but Joanne – the great shopper that she is – insisted that we leave Micro Center and truck on down to Best Buy. Again I was dazzled by both the incredible array of computers available as well as other electronic inventions. What met my gaze rivaled the Liahona the Lord had given to Lehi to guide him through the wilderness. I was secretly wishing I had a Liahona to guide me in making the momentous decision as to what computer to buy.
We again found a Toshiba at a better price than at Micro Center which brought peace to Joanne's soul who will hardly buy anything unless she thinks it is a real "deal." I asked the salesman what he thought were the two best laptops available on the market and he said the Hewlett-Packard or the Toshiba. On further interrogation he said that if he had to choose between the two he would choose the Toshiba. He said it was a little more stable and reliable than the Hewlett-Packard. Toshiba isn't giving me a kickback to promote their product by the way.
I discovered that my new computer had a 500 gig hard drive. I was impressed! My old computer only had a 60 gig hard drive. I don't know what a gig is – the only Gigs I ever knew were the old movie star, Gig Young and a young man by the name of Gig Griffith. Please don't write and tell me what a gig is – I wouldn't understand it anyway and it would only confuse me more than I already am. To my mind 500 gigs seemed a lot better than just 60. Then I discovered I now had four gigs of RAM memory. My old computer only had one gig of RAM memory and so it seemed to me that to have three more RAMS must be pretty good. Abraham only needed one RAM to satisfy Jehovah in the incident involving his son Isaac, so having four RAMS in my computer made me feel quite secure.
I had been using Microsoft Windows XP for many years which worked really well for me but now I had Microsoft Windows 7 operating system that came with my new computer. I had also been using Microsoft Word 2003 as my word processor but now had installed the new Microsoft Word 2010 version. So armed with more gigs and Rams than I ever thought possible, a new voice recognition upgrade along with new word processing software, and a new e-mail system I was ready to get back to work once again with high hopes and expectations.
Nathan set everything up for me and then turned me loose. The next two days were two of the most frustrating of my life. Nothing seemed to work. I contemplated suicide! The new Microsoft Word 2010 was so different from the 2003 version that it looked like Chinese to me. The updated NaturallySpeaking voice recognition software didn't use many of the old commands I had mastered in using the older version. The e-mail was very confusing and I just couldn't seem to make anything work. By the end of the second day I was thinking I had made a fatal mistake in upgrading everything and that why didn't I just stay with what I had been using and leave well enough alone? The old adage, "If it ain't broke don't fix it" seemed to make a whole lot of sense. I thought of the waste of money and that all the gigs and Rams I now possessed didn't seem to be helping me that much. Nathan would help me every night after work but still I was very frustrated.
I think it was on the third day that I finally came to grips with myself. I said "Jack, you can either look at this new computer with all of its gigs and Rams and new voice-recognition software and word processor as an insurmountable problem and stumbling block to your creativity, productivity and happiness, or you can look at it as a great opportunity to learn something new." Thankfully in that moment I chose to look at it as an intriguing challenge and an opportunity to learn and grow. I began to try to learn to do two new things every day and then I would have Nathan help me to gain some new insights into not more than one or two things each time I called on him for help. A few days later I had an incredible breakthrough and everything began to work and to exceed my greatest expectations. It was exhilarating!
My new computer and all the new programs have catapulted me forward and upward into a higher stratosphere of computing. With my new system I am light years ahead of where I was using the old comfortable computer and programs. My word processing is almost 100% accurate now. I am able to use the Internet and edit Word documents much more efficiently than ever before. I shudder to think what I would have missed out on had I not kicked myself out of my comfort zone and tried to master something difficult and challenging.
President Monson loves to quote from poetry, music, and movies in his talks. In two consecutive general conferences he quoted the following line from the old Civil War movie "Shenandoah." The words are spoken by Jimmy Stewart as follows, "If we don't try we don't do and if we don't do then why are we here? To me those are words to live by. I believe there are times in all of our lives when we are tempted to give up or give in because things that confront us are just too difficult to deal with. Of course if we quit trying we quit doing and the "why are we here" question becomes very relevant in our lives.
On those occasions when I have been tempted to give up and feel that all is lost and quit trying and doing I remember my Grandmother Halley Wilkin Young. Her example gives me courage to keep trying and doing. She faced an unbelievable challenge as a young mother in her 30s that almost got the best of her. The following is taken from a journal entry she wrote on June 3, 1951.
"A week before Christmas Allen (her husband), Wallace and Herb Taylor went to Cherry Creek for wood and a cedar Christmas tree. (They were living in Abraham, Utah just outside of Delta at the time) They were caught in a big snow storm, It took them four days to make the trip. When they arrived home Allen was sick with a bad cold and pain in the side.
Doctor Broaddus, the only doctor in the community was away on a vacation, Christmas morning we were informed about a woman doctor visiting in Woodrow, We called her on the telephone and described his case, She said he has appendicitis, get him to Salt Lake City as soon as possible. There was a terrible snow storm and blizzard raging. The first train out of Delta was 10 o'clock that night, Grandpa Young advised me not to go to Salt Lake city with Allen because I was three months pregnant; He would ask brother Oscar Fullmer to go. Brother Fullmer was a good religious man and knew just what to do. Mr., Cooper from Delta came in his car to take [Allen ] to the train. the train was three hours late on account of the Storm. The ambulance met the train in Salt lake City and took [Allen] to the LDS. hospital. There he was operated on as soon as possible. When the doctor made the incision the pus shot to the ceiling. Bro. Fullmer telephoned me about his condition I left for S.LC, on the train that night, Allen was very glad to see me. He had two drains in his side, he had peritonitis. I stayed with him all day at the hospital .
At night I stayed with my cousin, Ellen Blondell. The second week Allen’s condition improved so much I came home for my family needed me. I was home a week when I received a telegram to come at once Allen has pneumonia. When I arrived he wanted me to stay with him all the time. Annie Chaffin Allen’s sister came from Provo to be with me The third morning after I arrived, Allen took my hand arid said 'Halley" the Devil has won. I have had a hard fight and lost. I said don’t talk that way Allen, what can I do with out you, he said I have been trying to figure that out. I can see the sad look he gave me yet. In the afternoon he tried to get out of bed, “I am going to walk now or never,” it took two nurses and an orderly to hold him in bed. He sank into unconsciousness and passed away at 12:30 A.M. Jan. 12, 1917.

After the funeral I was left with a bitter feeling that was terrible. I couldn’t cry. It seemed the world died for me the day Allen left. The two great things I had fasted and prayed for with all earnestness had been denied me. “To spare the life of my mother and my husband.” In my weakness the devil was alert and beckoning me. I stopped praying and resigned all my religious activities.
I told the children they could continue to pray and go to church. If there was a God, he wasn’t a just God… The children continued to pray and to attend church; the older ones helped the younger ones. Ten days before my baby was born I was bitten by a deer fly. I was very sick and under care of Doctor Broaddus. He told my folks he was afraid the baby would not survive, and did not give them hopes for my recovery. I heard them talking in the kitchen. My baby boy was born 2:00 A.M. June 23rd 1917
When I heard my baby’s cry it put new life and new hope in me. I began to pray earnestly to the Lord to spare my life and the life of my baby that I might live to raise my family, four sons and four daughters, and teach them to live the gospel of Jesus Christ. To be true Latter Day Saints."
Grandma successfully raised her eight children, kept the farm going, became a midwife and the post mistress of the little post office in Abraham, and has bequeathed to her posterity a legacy of faith, endurance, and courage.
During some of my dark days I have thought to myself, "If Grandma Halley could keep trying and doing, faced with her seemingly insurmountable challenges, I can certainly follow her example and never give up or give in as well."
One of my heroes is Nephi. I have a small porcelain statue of Nephi that sits above my computer monitor. With the Liahona in his left hand and with a bow in his right hand and a visionary look on his countenance is very inspiring to me. I look at it every day and am reminded of the words that to me describe the essence of the man, "I will go and do…!" Not a bad example to follow.
Dad/Grandpa/Jack

"If We Don't Try We Don't Do!"
Sometime ago, in fact a few weeks before Christmas, my son-in-law, Nathan, was telling me he was going to upgrade his computer. That sounded like something I should do to my computer since it was six years old and I had been told that it was woefully outdated. The more we talked about it I came to the brilliant conclusion that instead of doing an upgrade it probably made more sense to just buy a new computer. The word got out to my children that this is what I wanted to do and for Christmas they gave me some money to help defray the cost. At Christmas a good friend of mine also gave me the latest and greatest new edition of Dragon NaturallySpeaking voice recognition software. I had been using for some time the 10.1 version which worked really well but I was told the 11.0 edition was far superior.
Well, about a week after Christmas Joanne, Nathan, and I went out one evening to shop for a new laptop computer. We first of all went to Micro Center which is just a few blocks from our home. They carry every computer ever made it seems and every other electronic gadget man has invented. As I rolled into this mecca of electronic wizardry I became dizzy with all of the choices of computers that were available. Thankfully I had done some homework and the experts I knew told me that the Toshiba laptop worked better with Dragon NaturallySpeaking than any other computer. We finally found a Toshiba laptop that seemed to have everything I wanted or needed, but Joanne – the great shopper that she is – insisted that we leave Micro Center and truck on down to Best Buy. Again I was dazzled by both the incredible array of computers available as well as other electronic inventions. What met my gaze rivaled the Liahona the Lord had given to Lehi to guide him through the wilderness. I was secretly wishing I had a Liahona to guide me in making the momentous decision as to what computer to buy.
We again found a Toshiba at a better price than at Micro Center which brought peace to Joanne's soul who will hardly buy anything unless she thinks it is a real "deal." I asked the salesman what he thought were the two best laptops available on the market and he said the Hewlett-Packard or the Toshiba. On further interrogation he said that if he had to choose between the two he would choose the Toshiba. He said it was a little more stable and reliable than the Hewlett-Packard. Toshiba isn't giving me a kickback to promote their product by the way.
I discovered that my new computer had a 500 gig hard drive. I was impressed! My old computer only had a 60 gig hard drive. I don't know what a gig is – the only Gigs I ever knew were the old movie star, Gig Young and a young man by the name of Gig Griffith. Please don't write and tell me what a gig is – I wouldn't understand it anyway and it would only confuse me more than I already am. To my mind 500 gigs seemed a lot better than just 60. Then I discovered I now had four gigs of RAM memory. My old computer only had one gig of RAM memory and so it seemed to me that to have three more RAMS must be pretty good. Abraham only needed one RAM to satisfy Jehovah in the incident involving his son Isaac, so having four RAMS in my computer made me feel quite secure.
I had been using Microsoft Windows XP for many years which worked really well for me but now I had Microsoft Windows 7 operating system that came with my new computer. I had also been using Microsoft Word 2003 as my word processor but now had installed the new Microsoft Word 2010 version. So armed with more gigs and Rams than I ever thought possible, a new voice recognition upgrade along with new word processing software, and a new e-mail system I was ready to get back to work once again with high hopes and expectations.
Nathan set everything up for me and then turned me loose. The next two days were two of the most frustrating of my life. Nothing seemed to work. I contemplated suicide! The new Microsoft Word 2010 was so different from the 2003 version that it looked like Chinese to me. The updated NaturallySpeaking voice recognition software didn't use many of the old commands I had mastered in using the older version. The e-mail was very confusing and I just couldn't seem to make anything work. By the end of the second day I was thinking I had made a fatal mistake in upgrading everything and that why didn't I just stay with what I had been using and leave well enough alone? The old adage, "If it ain't broke don't fix it" seemed to make a whole lot of sense. I thought of the waste of money and that all the gigs and Rams I now possessed didn't seem to be helping me that much. Nathan would help me every night after work but still I was very frustrated.
I think it was on the third day that I finally came to grips with myself. I said "Jack, you can either look at this new computer with all of its gigs and Rams and new voice-recognition software and word processor as an insurmountable problem and stumbling block to your creativity, productivity and happiness, or you can look at it as a great opportunity to learn something new." Thankfully in that moment I chose to look at it as an intriguing challenge and an opportunity to learn and grow. I began to try to learn to do two new things every day and then I would have Nathan help me to gain some new insights into not more than one or two things each time I called on him for help. A few days later I had an incredible breakthrough and everything began to work and to exceed my greatest expectations. It was exhilarating!
My new computer and all the new programs have catapulted me forward and upward into a higher stratosphere of computing. With my new system I am light years ahead of where I was using the old comfortable computer and programs. My word processing is almost 100% accurate now. I am able to use the Internet and edit Word documents much more efficiently than ever before. I shudder to think what I would have missed out on had I not kicked myself out of my comfort zone and tried to master something difficult and challenging.
President Monson loves to quote from poetry, music, and movies in his talks. In two consecutive general conferences he quoted the following line from the old Civil War movie "Shenandoah." The words are spoken by Jimmy Stewart as follows, "If we don't try we don't do and if we don't do then why are we here? To me those are words to live by. I believe there are times in all of our lives when we are tempted to give up or give in because things that confront us are just too difficult to deal with. Of course if we quit trying we quit doing and the "why are we here" question becomes very relevant in our lives.
On those occasions when I have been tempted to give up and feel that all is lost and quit trying and doing I remember my Grandmother Halley Wilkin Young. Her example gives me courage to keep trying and doing. She faced an unbelievable challenge as a young mother in her 30s that almost got the best of her. The following is taken from a journal entry she wrote on June 3, 1951.
"A week before Christmas Allen (her husband), Wallace and Herb Taylor went to Cherry Creek for wood and a cedar Christmas tree. (They were living in Abraham, Utah just outside of Delta at the time) They were caught in a big snow storm, It took them four days to make the trip. When they arrived home Allen was sick with a bad cold and pain in the side.
Doctor Broaddus, the only doctor in the community was away on a vacation, Christmas morning we were informed about a woman doctor visiting in Woodrow, We called her on the telephone and described his case, She said he has appendicitis, get him to Salt Lake City as soon as possible. There was a terrible snow storm and blizzard raging. The first train out of Delta was 10 o'clock that night, Grandpa Young advised me not to go to Salt Lake city with Allen because I was three months pregnant; He would ask brother Oscar Fullmer to go. Brother Fullmer was a good religious man and knew just what to do. Mr., Cooper from Delta came in his car to take [Allen ] to the train. the train was three hours late on account of the Storm. The ambulance met the train in Salt lake City and took [Allen] to the LDS. hospital. There he was operated on as soon as possible. When the doctor made the incision the pus shot to the ceiling. Bro. Fullmer telephoned me about his condition I left for S.LC, on the train that night, Allen was very glad to see me. He had two drains in his side, he had peritonitis. I stayed with him all day at the hospital .
At night I stayed with my cousin, Ellen Blondell. The second week Allen’s condition improved so much I came home for my family needed me. I was home a week when I received a telegram to come at once Allen has pneumonia. When I arrived he wanted me to stay with him all the time. Annie Chaffin Allen’s sister came from Provo to be with me The third morning after I arrived, Allen took my hand arid said 'Halley" the Devil has won. I have had a hard fight and lost. I said don’t talk that way Allen, what can I do with out you, he said I have been trying to figure that out. I can see the sad look he gave me yet. In the afternoon he tried to get out of bed, “I am going to walk now or never,” it took two nurses and an orderly to hold him in bed. He sank into unconsciousness and passed away at 12:30 A.M. Jan. 12, 1917.

After the funeral I was left with a bitter feeling that was terrible. I couldn’t cry. It seemed the world died for me the day Allen left. The two great things I had fasted and prayed for with all earnestness had been denied me. “To spare the life of my mother and my husband.” In my weakness the devil was alert and beckoning me. I stopped praying and resigned all my religious activities.
I told the children they could continue to pray and go to church. If there was a God, he wasn’t a just God… The children continued to pray and to attend church; the older ones helped the younger ones. Ten days before my baby was born I was bitten by a deer fly. I was very sick and under care of Doctor Broaddus. He told my folks he was afraid the baby would not survive, and did not give them hopes for my recovery. I heard them talking in the kitchen. My baby boy was born 2:00 A.M. June 23rd 1917
When I heard my baby’s cry it put new life and new hope in me. I began to pray earnestly to the Lord to spare my life and the life of my baby that I might live to raise my family, four sons and four daughters, and teach them to live the gospel of Jesus Christ. To be true Latter Day Saints."
Grandma successfully raised her eight children, kept the farm going, became a midwife and the post mistress of the little post office in Abraham, and has bequeathed to her posterity a legacy of faith, endurance, and courage.
During some of my dark days I have thought to myself, "If Grandma Halley could keep trying and doing, faced with her seemingly insurmountable challenges, I can certainly follow her example and never give up or give in as well."
One of my heroes is Nephi. I have a small porcelain statue of Nephi that sits above my computer monitor. With the Liahona in his left hand and with a bow in his right hand and a visionary look on his countenance is very inspiring to me. I look at it every day and am reminded of the words that to me describe the essence of the man, "I will go and do…!" Not a bad example to follow.
Dad/Grandpa/Jack

"If We Don't Try We Don't Do!"
Sometime ago, in fact a few weeks before Christmas, my son-in-law, Nathan, was telling me he was going to upgrade his computer. That sounded like something I should do to my computer since it was six years old and I had been told that it was woefully outdated. The more we talked about it I came to the brilliant conclusion that instead of doing an upgrade it probably made more sense to just buy a new computer. The word got out to my children that this is what I wanted to do and for Christmas they gave me some money to help defray the cost. At Christmas a good friend of mine also gave me the latest and greatest new edition of Dragon NaturallySpeaking voice recognition software. I had been using for some time the 10.1 version which worked really well but I was told the 11.0 edition was far superior.
Well, about a week after Christmas Joanne, Nathan, and I went out one evening to shop for a new laptop computer. We first of all went to Micro Center which is just a few blocks from our home. They carry every computer ever made it seems and every other electronic gadget man has invented. As I rolled into this mecca of electronic wizardry I became dizzy with all of the choices of computers that were available. Thankfully I had done some homework and the experts I knew told me that the Toshiba laptop worked better with Dragon NaturallySpeaking than any other computer. We finally found a Toshiba laptop that seemed to have everything I wanted or needed, but Joanne – the great shopper that she is – insisted that we leave Micro Center and truck on down to Best Buy. Again I was dazzled by both the incredible array of computers available as well as other electronic inventions. What met my gaze rivaled the Liahona the Lord had given to Lehi to guide him through the wilderness. I was secretly wishing I had a Liahona to guide me in making the momentous decision as to what computer to buy.
We again found a Toshiba at a better price than at Micro Center which brought peace to Joanne's soul who will hardly buy anything unless she thinks it is a real "deal." I asked the salesman what he thought were the two best laptops available on the market and he said the Hewlett-Packard or the Toshiba. On further interrogation he said that if he had to choose between the two he would choose the Toshiba. He said it was a little more stable and reliable than the Hewlett-Packard. Toshiba isn't giving me a kickback to promote their product by the way.
I discovered that my new computer had a 500 gig hard drive. I was impressed! My old computer only had a 60 gig hard drive. I don't know what a gig is – the only Gigs I ever knew were the old movie star, Gig Young and a young man by the name of Gig Griffith. Please don't write and tell me what a gig is – I wouldn't understand it anyway and it would only confuse me more than I already am. To my mind 500 gigs seemed a lot better than just 60. Then I discovered I now had four gigs of RAM memory. My old computer only had one gig of RAM memory and so it seemed to me that to have three more RAMS must be pretty good. Abraham only needed one RAM to satisfy Jehovah in the incident involving his son Isaac, so having four RAMS in my computer made me feel quite secure.
I had been using Microsoft Windows XP for many years which worked really well for me but now I had Microsoft Windows 7 operating system that came with my new computer. I had also been using Microsoft Word 2003 as my word processor but now had installed the new Microsoft Word 2010 version. So armed with more gigs and Rams than I ever thought possible, a new voice recognition upgrade along with new word processing software, and a new e-mail system I was ready to get back to work once again with high hopes and expectations.
Nathan set everything up for me and then turned me loose. The next two days were two of the most frustrating of my life. Nothing seemed to work. I contemplated suicide! The new Microsoft Word 2010 was so different from the 2003 version that it looked like Chinese to me. The updated NaturallySpeaking voice recognition software didn't use many of the old commands I had mastered in using the older version. The e-mail was very confusing and I just couldn't seem to make anything work. By the end of the second day I was thinking I had made a fatal mistake in upgrading everything and that why didn't I just stay with what I had been using and leave well enough alone? The old adage, "If it ain't broke don't fix it" seemed to make a whole lot of sense. I thought of the waste of money and that all the gigs and Rams I now possessed didn't seem to be helping me that much. Nathan would help me every night after work but still I was very frustrated.
I think it was on the third day that I finally came to grips with myself. I said "Jack, you can either look at this new computer with all of its gigs and Rams and new voice-recognition software and word processor as an insurmountable problem and stumbling block to your creativity, productivity and happiness, or you can look at it as a great opportunity to learn something new." Thankfully in that moment I chose to look at it as an intriguing challenge and an opportunity to learn and grow. I began to try to learn to do two new things every day and then I would have Nathan help me to gain some new insights into not more than one or two things each time I called on him for help. A few days later I had an incredible breakthrough and everything began to work and to exceed my greatest expectations. It was exhilarating!
My new computer and all the new programs have catapulted me forward and upward into a higher stratosphere of computing. With my new system I am light years ahead of where I was using the old comfortable computer and programs. My word processing is almost 100% accurate now. I am able to use the Internet and edit Word documents much more efficiently than ever before. I shudder to think what I would have missed out on had I not kicked myself out of my comfort zone and tried to master something difficult and challenging.
President Monson loves to quote from poetry, music, and movies in his talks. In two consecutive general conferences he quoted the following line from the old Civil War movie "Shenandoah." The words are spoken by Jimmy Stewart as follows, "If we don't try we don't do and if we don't do then why are we here? To me those are words to live by. I believe there are times in all of our lives when we are tempted to give up or give in because things that confront us are just too difficult to deal with. Of course if we quit trying we quit doing and the "why are we here" question becomes very relevant in our lives.
On those occasions when I have been tempted to give up and feel that all is lost and quit trying and doing I remember my Grandmother Halley Wilkin Young. Her example gives me courage to keep trying and doing. She faced an unbelievable challenge as a young mother in her 30s that almost got the best of her. The following is taken from a journal entry she wrote on June 3, 1951.
"A week before Christmas Allen (her husband), Wallace and Herb Taylor went to Cherry Creek for wood and a cedar Christmas tree. (They were living in Abraham, Utah just outside of Delta at the time) They were caught in a big snow storm, It took them four days to make the trip. When they arrived home Allen was sick with a bad cold and pain in the side.
Doctor Broaddus, the only doctor in the community was away on a vacation, Christmas morning we were informed about a woman doctor visiting in Woodrow, We called her on the telephone and described his case, She said he has appendicitis, get him to Salt Lake City as soon as possible. There was a terrible snow storm and blizzard raging. The first train out of Delta was 10 o'clock that night, Grandpa Young advised me not to go to Salt Lake city with Allen because I was three months pregnant; He would ask brother Oscar Fullmer to go. Brother Fullmer was a good religious man and knew just what to do. Mr., Cooper from Delta came in his car to take [Allen ] to the train. the train was three hours late on account of the Storm. The ambulance met the train in Salt lake City and took [Allen] to the LDS. hospital. There he was operated on as soon as possible. When the doctor made the incision the pus shot to the ceiling. Bro. Fullmer telephoned me about his condition I left for S.LC, on the train that night, Allen was very glad to see me. He had two drains in his side, he had peritonitis. I stayed with him all day at the hospital .
At night I stayed with my cousin, Ellen Blondell. The second week Allen’s condition improved so much I came home for my family needed me. I was home a week when I received a telegram to come at once Allen has pneumonia. When I arrived he wanted me to stay with him all the time. Annie Chaffin Allen’s sister came from Provo to be with me The third morning after I arrived, Allen took my hand arid said 'Halley" the Devil has won. I have had a hard fight and lost. I said don’t talk that way Allen, what can I do with out you, he said I have been trying to figure that out. I can see the sad look he gave me yet. In the afternoon he tried to get out of bed, “I am going to walk now or never,” it took two nurses and an orderly to hold him in bed. He sank into unconsciousness and passed away at 12:30 A.M. Jan. 12, 1917.

After the funeral I was left with a bitter feeling that was terrible. I couldn’t cry. It seemed the world died for me the day Allen left. The two great things I had fasted and prayed for with all earnestness had been denied me. “To spare the life of my mother and my husband.” In my weakness the devil was alert and beckoning me. I stopped praying and resigned all my religious activities.
I told the children they could continue to pray and go to church. If there was a God, he wasn’t a just God… The children continued to pray and to attend church; the older ones helped the younger ones. Ten days before my baby was born I was bitten by a deer fly. I was very sick and under care of Doctor Broaddus. He told my folks he was afraid the baby would not survive, and did not give them hopes for my recovery. I heard them talking in the kitchen. My baby boy was born 2:00 A.M. June 23rd 1917
When I heard my baby’s cry it put new life and new hope in me. I began to pray earnestly to the Lord to spare my life and the life of my baby that I might live to raise my family, four sons and four daughters, and teach them to live the gospel of Jesus Christ. To be true Latter Day Saints."
Grandma successfully raised her eight children, kept the farm going, became a midwife and the post mistress of the little post office in Abraham, and has bequeathed to her posterity a legacy of faith, endurance, and courage.
During some of my dark days I have thought to myself, "If Grandma Halley could keep trying and doing, faced with her seemingly insurmountable challenges, I can certainly follow her example and never give up or give in as well."
One of my heroes is Nephi. I have a small porcelain statue of Nephi that sits above my computer monitor. With the Liahona in his left hand and with a bow in his right hand and a visionary look on his countenance is very inspiring to me. I look at it every day and am reminded of the words that to me describe the essence of the man, "I will go and do…!" Not a bad example to follow.
Dad/Grandpa/Jack

"If We Don't Try We Don't Do!"
Sometime ago, in fact a few weeks before Christmas, my son-in-law, Nathan, was telling me he was going to upgrade his computer. That sounded like something I should do to my computer since it was six years old and I had been told that it was woefully outdated. The more we talked about it I came to the brilliant conclusion that instead of doing an upgrade it probably made more sense to just buy a new computer. The word got out to my children that this is what I wanted to do and for Christmas they gave me some money to help defray the cost. At Christmas a good friend of mine also gave me the latest and greatest new edition of Dragon NaturallySpeaking voice recognition software. I had been using for some time the 10.1 version which worked really well but I was told the 11.0 edition was far superior.
Well, about a week after Christmas Joanne, Nathan, and I went out one evening to shop for a new laptop computer. We first of all went to Micro Center which is just a few blocks from our home. They carry every computer ever made it seems and every other electronic gadget man has invented. As I rolled into this mecca of electronic wizardry I became dizzy with all of the choices of computers that were available. Thankfully I had done some homework and the experts I knew told me that the Toshiba laptop worked better with Dragon NaturallySpeaking than any other computer. We finally found a Toshiba laptop that seemed to have everything I wanted or needed, but Joanne – the great shopper that she is – insisted that we leave Micro Center and truck on down to Best Buy. Again I was dazzled by both the incredible array of computers available as well as other electronic inventions. What met my gaze rivaled the Liahona the Lord had given to Lehi to guide him through the wilderness. I was secretly wishing I had a Liahona to guide me in making the momentous decision as to what computer to buy.
We again found a Toshiba at a better price than at Micro Center which brought peace to Joanne's soul who will hardly buy anything unless she thinks it is a real "deal." I asked the salesman what he thought were the two best laptops available on the market and he said the Hewlett-Packard or the Toshiba. On further interrogation he said that if he had to choose between the two he would choose the Toshiba. He said it was a little more stable and reliable than the Hewlett-Packard. Toshiba isn't giving me a kickback to promote their product by the way.
I discovered that my new computer had a 500 gig hard drive. I was impressed! My old computer only had a 60 gig hard drive. I don't know what a gig is – the only Gigs I ever knew were the old movie star, Gig Young and a young man by the name of Gig Griffith. Please don't write and tell me what a gig is – I wouldn't understand it anyway and it would only confuse me more than I already am. To my mind 500 gigs seemed a lot better than just 60. Then I discovered I now had four gigs of RAM memory. My old computer only had one gig of RAM memory and so it seemed to me that to have three more RAMS must be pretty good. Abraham only needed one RAM to satisfy Jehovah in the incident involving his son Isaac, so having four RAMS in my computer made me feel quite secure.
I had been using Microsoft Windows XP for many years which worked really well for me but now I had Microsoft Windows 7 operating system that came with my new computer. I had also been using Microsoft Word 2003 as my word processor but now had installed the new Microsoft Word 2010 version. So armed with more gigs and Rams than I ever thought possible, a new voice recognition upgrade along with new word processing software, and a new e-mail system I was ready to get back to work once again with high hopes and expectations.
Nathan set everything up for me and then turned me loose. The next two days were two of the most frustrating of my life. Nothing seemed to work. I contemplated suicide! The new Microsoft Word 2010 was so different from the 2003 version that it looked like Chinese to me. The updated NaturallySpeaking voice recognition software didn't use many of the old commands I had mastered in using the older version. The e-mail was very confusing and I just couldn't seem to make anything work. By the end of the second day I was thinking I had made a fatal mistake in upgrading everything and that why didn't I just stay with what I had been using and leave well enough alone? The old adage, "If it ain't broke don't fix it" seemed to make a whole lot of sense. I thought of the waste of money and that all the gigs and Rams I now possessed didn't seem to be helping me that much. Nathan would help me every night after work but still I was very frustrated.
I think it was on the third day that I finally came to grips with myself. I said "Jack, you can either look at this new computer with all of its gigs and Rams and new voice-recognition software and word processor as an insurmountable problem and stumbling block to your creativity, productivity and happiness, or you can look at it as a great opportunity to learn something new." Thankfully in that moment I chose to look at it as an intriguing challenge and an opportunity to learn and grow. I began to try to learn to do two new things every day and then I would have Nathan help me to gain some new insights into not more than one or two things each time I called on him for help. A few days later I had an incredible breakthrough and everything began to work and to exceed my greatest expectations. It was exhilarating!
My new computer and all the new programs have catapulted me forward and upward into a higher stratosphere of computing. With my new system I am light years ahead of where I was using the old comfortable computer and programs. My word processing is almost 100% accurate now. I am able to use the Internet and edit Word documents much more efficiently than ever before. I shudder to think what I would have missed out on had I not kicked myself out of my comfort zone and tried to master something difficult and challenging.
President Monson loves to quote from poetry, music, and movies in his talks. In two consecutive general conferences he quoted the following line from the old Civil War movie "Shenandoah." The words are spoken by Jimmy Stewart as follows, "If we don't try we don't do and if we don't do then why are we here? To me those are words to live by. I believe there are times in all of our lives when we are tempted to give up or give in because things that confront us are just too difficult to deal with. Of course if we quit trying we quit doing and the "why are we here" question becomes very relevant in our lives.
On those occasions when I have been tempted to give up and feel that all is lost and quit trying and doing I remember my Grandmother Halley Wilkin Young. Her example gives me courage to keep trying and doing. She faced an unbelievable challenge as a young mother in her 30s that almost got the best of her. The following is taken from a journal entry she wrote on June 3, 1951.
"A week before Christmas Allen (her husband), Wallace and Herb Taylor went to Cherry Creek for wood and a cedar Christmas tree. (They were living in Abraham, Utah just outside of Delta at the time) They were caught in a big snow storm, It took them four days to make the trip. When they arrived home Allen was sick with a bad cold and pain in the side.
Doctor Broaddus, the only doctor in the community was away on a vacation, Christmas morning we were informed about a woman doctor visiting in Woodrow, We called her on the telephone and described his case, She said he has appendicitis, get him to Salt Lake City as soon as possible. There was a terrible snow storm and blizzard raging. The first train out of Delta was 10 o'clock that night, Grandpa Young advised me not to go to Salt Lake city with Allen because I was three months pregnant; He would ask brother Oscar Fullmer to go. Brother Fullmer was a good religious man and knew just what to do. Mr., Cooper from Delta came in his car to take [Allen ] to the train. the train was three hours late on account of the Storm. The ambulance met the train in Salt lake City and took [Allen] to the LDS. hospital. There he was operated on as soon as possible. When the doctor made the incision the pus shot to the ceiling. Bro. Fullmer telephoned me about his condition I left for S.LC, on the train that night, Allen was very glad to see me. He had two drains in his side, he had peritonitis. I stayed with him all day at the hospital .
At night I stayed with my cousin, Ellen Blondell. The second week Allen’s condition improved so much I came home for my family needed me. I was home a week when I received a telegram to come at once Allen has pneumonia. When I arrived he wanted me to stay with him all the time. Annie Chaffin Allen’s sister came from Provo to be with me The third morning after I arrived, Allen took my hand arid said 'Halley" the Devil has won. I have had a hard fight and lost. I said don’t talk that way Allen, what can I do with out you, he said I have been trying to figure that out. I can see the sad look he gave me yet. In the afternoon he tried to get out of bed, “I am going to walk now or never,” it took two nurses and an orderly to hold him in bed. He sank into unconsciousness and passed away at 12:30 A.M. Jan. 12, 1917.

After the funeral I was left with a bitter feeling that was terrible. I couldn’t cry. It seemed the world died for me the day Allen left. The two great things I had fasted and prayed for with all earnestness had been denied me. “To spare the life of my mother and my husband.” In my weakness the devil was alert and beckoning me. I stopped praying and resigned all my religious activities.
I told the children they could continue to pray and go to church. If there was a God, he wasn’t a just God… The children continued to pray and to attend church; the older ones helped the younger ones. Ten days before my baby was born I was bitten by a deer fly. I was very sick and under care of Doctor Broaddus. He told my folks he was afraid the baby would not survive, and did not give them hopes for my recovery. I heard them talking in the kitchen. My baby boy was born 2:00 A.M. June 23rd 1917
When I heard my baby’s cry it put new life and new hope in me. I began to pray earnestly to the Lord to spare my life and the life of my baby that I might live to raise my family, four sons and four daughters, and teach them to live the gospel of Jesus Christ. To be true Latter Day Saints."
Grandma successfully raised her eight children, kept the farm going, became a midwife and the post mistress of the little post office in Abraham, and has bequeathed to her posterity a legacy of faith, endurance, and courage.
During some of my dark days I have thought to myself, "If Grandma Halley could keep trying and doing, faced with her seemingly insurmountable challenges, I can certainly follow her example and never give up or give in as well."
One of my heroes is Nephi. I have a small porcelain statue of Nephi that sits above my computer monitor. With the Liahona in his left hand and with a bow in his right hand and a visionary look on his countenance is very inspiring to me. I look at it every day and am reminded of the words that to me describe the essence of the man, "I will go and do…!" Not a bad example to follow.
Dad/Grandpa/Jack

Hope – Adrenaline for the Soul

2011-01-31T13:52:00.000-08:00

continue resume is A couple of weeks ago Jo Anne was coming down the stairs from her bedroom early in the morning to turn up the heat.. Being a little groggy she failed to notice the step down to the heat register by the entryway. She said on a scale from 1 to 10 in terms of a graceful fall hers was a one. She landed on her right shoulder and because of the intense pain she thought she had broken it. She was able to drive herself with her good left arm to the urgent care facility near our home. In my helpful way I encouraged her to go for it but to be careful!

After a thorough examination it was determined she only had a severe sprain. Her arm was placed in a sling and she was given some
pain medication. I told her she was a wimp and that if I sprained my shoulder I wouldn't ask for pain medication – I would just tough it out. The doctor said it would be several weeks before she would have the full range of motion in her shoulder once again.

Well, what a pathetic couple we looked like for a few days with me totally paralyzed and in a mega power wheelchair and unable to move, and Jo Anne with her arm in a sling. Thankfully our daughter Jackie and her husband Nathan who are living with us for the time being have made it possible for us to get through this little ordeal.

Several days ago my caregiver was getting me ready for the day and I passed out. He and Jo Anne were able to revive me and we thought it was just a random episode but just as Jo Anne left the room I passed out again, my lips turned blue, and it was with great difficulty that they brought me back. The life-support system had not failed as it has a number of times in the past. This time I apparently was the one that failed. I had no premonition of what would happen, it was like a light switch being turned off. Jo Anne called the paramedics and as usual they came roaring up to our home with a fire truck, paramedic unit, and an ambulance. At least it provided some entertainment for the neighborhood which all turned out to see what was happening with Jack this time. Six big paramedics came rushing into my bedroom to lend assistance. Some of these men had been to our home several times before. My blood pressure was way low and my heartbeat was not doing very well either. We convinced them that Jo Anne would drive me to the ER and that we would be okay until then. They hesitantly agreed and about a half hour later we made the drive to the ER.

To make a long story short I spent three nights in the hospital with Jo Anne sleeping on an air mattress by my side. Do you think I love her? Past experience has taught us that hospitals are ill equipped and prepared to safely take care of someone in my condition. It was discovered I was severely dehydrated which was causing my kidneys, and heart to begin to shut down. They fixed me up thankfully and I am home once again! As my good friend John Nelson often says when these kinds of things happen to us, "If it's not one thing it's your mother!"

Are we discouraged and think our lot is hard? I don't think so! We have hope that things will get better and that we can endure this temporary inconvenience of paralysis, passing out, and a sprained shoulder without giving up or giving in or getting discouraged. We feel like the Apostle Paul when he wrote: "We are troubled on every side, yet not distressed; we are perplexed, but not in despair…" [2 Corinthians 4:8]

Watching Sports Center on ESPN (my third favorite channel only superseded by BYU TV and Turner Classic Movies), one of the hosts of the show in quoting a famous coach, and I can't remember which one, said "Hope is adrenaline for the soul!" Now, Sports Center is not exactly the Scriptures or the home of great thinkers and philosophers but when I heard that statement I realized, based on my own life's experience, how true a statement it was.

How many times have we seen a team seemingly outplayed and being defeated, but because of hope that they can still turn the tide and win, miraculously come back and snatch victory from the jaws of defeat? I am convinced that it is hope that keeps us going forward in spite of the challenges and seeming tragedies that can come into all our lives.

I believe there are at least two different levels of hope that are operative in our lives. There is the hope that no matter what the problem is that there is a way out and that things can get better. And then there is a higher level of hope which the Scriptures call "A perfect brightness of hope." This perfect brightness of hope is faith and hope in the atonement of Christ and in the great plan of happiness. Fortunate is the man or woman who has both levels of faith/hope alive and well in their lives.

I believe we all have within us a God-given desire to live as long as we can regardless of how strong our faith and hope is in life after death.. I know the seven or eight times my life-support system has failed and I have almost left mortality and taken that step into eternity I have not been saying to myself "Oh boy, I get to die and go to the spirit world!" On the contrary, during those desperate circumstances I have been fighting with every molecule and atom of my being and crying out to the Lord in my mind and heart to let me have just one breath of precious life-giving air and oxygen. Knowing that help is not likely to come in time there is still an element of hope that somehow my life will be preserved.

I have had many friends who have suffered from cancer and instead of dying have opted to undergo surgery, chemotherapy and radiation which has made them sick and miserable for extended periods of time. Why haven't they just turned their faces to the wall, accepted the perhaps inevitable, assumed the fetal position and let nature take its course? It is because of hope – hope they can be cured and remain upon this earth with their loved ones as long as they can. I am sure this kind of hope is pleasing to our Heavenly Father.

We all know however, that in spite of our hope for a cure, sometimes the cure doesn't come. That's when the next level of hope sustains us– the "perfect brightness of hope" that life is eternal, that there will be a glorious resurrection, and that families are forever. This is the hope that sustains us when we realize there is no cure in spite of our hope that there would be one.

Two hours after my accident at the beach while in the ER room of the Laguna hospital two dear friends convinced the neurosurgeons to let them give me a blessing. I had just come out of a two-hour coma and my mind was very foggy. I knew one thing though, and that was that I was paralyzed and couldn't breathe on my own and that the condition might possibly be permanent. The only part of my body the neurosurgeons would permit my friends to touch was a portion of my foot. Laying their hands on that part of my body a special blessing was given. 21 years later I still remember the promise made in that first blessing following my accident. I was promised the following, "You will be able to continue to be a husband to your wife and a father to your children!" Those words sank deep into my heart and although I could not see at the time how such a promise could ever be fulfilled in my physical condition, I was filled with hope that such would be the case.

I came to learn that a cure of my physical condition was not to be and that the promise made by the Lord through my friends would have to be miraculously fulfilled in some other way. It has been! Through some desperate and depressing times those words have continued to fill me with hope and to want to never give up.

We just can't make it through this minefield of mortality without both levels of hope. I know so many wonderful people with health challenges much more severe than mine who are great examples to me of how hope truly is adrenaline for the soul. My nephew, John Michael Stuart, born with severe cerebral palsy has gone on to receive a BA degree and a Master of social work degree, has become an author and powerful motivational speaker and has blessed the lives of many. I think of Rob Hadlock who lives in our neighborhood and was rendered a quadriplegic while in high school by diving into a shallow swimming pool. He graduated from high school, BYU, Hastings law school in San Francisco, and is now a practicing attorney in Southern California. He married and he and his wife have adopted a beautiful little baby girl. I do not have words to express how proud I am of these kinds of individuals who with hope – both levels – teach us all so much.

I contrast them with the doctor from Texas who had a snow skiing accident in Colorado about the same time I had my accident, and ended up in a condition similar to mine. When he realized his condition and the prognosis for the future he made three requests. He wanted to drink a margarita, watch a Dallas Cowboys football game, and then have somebody pull the plug. All three wishes were granted.

Faith hope and charity are inextricably intertwined and form a powerful and strong lifeline that anchors us to the love and power of Christ that we all need so badly in our lives.

No one said it more beautifully than Nephi of old: "Wherefore ye must press forward with a steadfastness in Christ [this is faith] having a perfect brightness of hope [this is hope] and a love of God and of all men [this is charity] wherefore if you shall press forward [not looking back on the supposedly good old days] feasting upon the word of Christ and endure to the end, behold thus saith the father, ye shall have eternal life." [2 Nephi 31:20 – commentary added]

Dad/Grandpa/Jack

All people make me happy

2010-12-01T12:52:00.000-08:00

As Joanne and I, almost daily, travel about Orange County to return things to our favorite stores, and to eat some tacos or a bean burrito with extra onions at our favorite gourmet restaurant, "Taco Bell," we listen to books on CD that we obtain from our local public library.

We just finished listening to one that I feel compelled to tell you about. Let me preface it with a statement shared with me by a good friend, Randy Smith that has a ring of truth to it. "All people bring happiness into our lives -- some by coming and others by going." [Anonymous] During our life times hopefully the people that bring us happiness by coming into our lives will far outweigh those who bring us happiness by going. Fortunately that has been the case during my lifetime.

The book I am referring to has introduced Joanne and me to a person that has brought us happiness and enriched our lives. We are only sorry we did not have him come into our lives sooner. His name is William Wilberforce and the book is entitled, AMAZING GRACE: William Wilberforce and the Heroic Campaign to End Slavery by Eric Metaxas.

Through our own ignorance over the years somehow we had not come to know William Wilberforce. The movie, "Amazing Grace," which we saw several years ago, was taken from this book but does not do justice in portraying the kind of man William Wilberforce was. The book does so in depth in a beautiful way. We were enthralled, edified, and also somewhat embarrassed we didn't know anything about him. Maybe some of you are like Joanne and me. The following was taken from the book jacket. "Amazing Grace tells the story of the remarkable life of the British abolitionist William Wilberforce (1759-1833). This accessible biography chronicles Wilberforce’s extraordinary role as a human rights activist, cultural reformer, and member of Parliament. At the center of this heroic life was a passionate twenty-year fight to abolish the British slave trade, a battle Wilberforce won in 1807, as well as efforts to abolish slavery itself in the British colonies, a victory achieved just three days before his death in 1833.
Metaxas discovers in this unsung hero a man of whom it can truly be said: he changed the world. Before Wilberforce, few thought slavery was wrong. After Wilberforce, most societies in the world came to see it as a great moral wrong... This account of Wilberforce’s life will help many become acquainted with an exceptional man who was a hero to Abraham Lincoln and an inspiration to the anti-slavery movement in America."

We were very touched by this multifaceted, "born-again, evangelical" Christian who after a young life of debauchery and self-centeredness found Christ and devoted his considerable talents and fortune not only in seeing slavery abolished, but also helping to raise the quality of life of the poor and downtrodden in England. After reading this book I think I would have liked to have had William Wilberforce as a friend. I could say much more about William Wilberforce but would rather leave it up to you to let him "come" into your life through reading this wonderful book.
The relationship we have with those who come into our lives is the source of much of our happiness both in mortality and in eternity. I learned how true this is while lying in a hospital bed with a neurosurgeon looking down at me and giving me his prognosis about my life from that time forward. I knew in that moment that the only thing that mattered at all in my life up to that moment were the relationships I had with people who had "come into my life" and brought me much happiness because of it.

I think the reason that death is so anguishing and frightening to many is because they may feel that a priceless relationship is being severed for good. That thought is almost more than any of us can bear. Without the "Great Plan of Happiness" life truly would be senseless and death a black abyss waiting to eventually swallow every human being into a state of nothingness.

There are some people that come into our lives that we never want to go away. I feel that way about my wife and children and grandchildren as you do about yours. My father passed away while undergoing open-heart surgery as a 62-year-old. I walked by the gurney talking to him as he was wheeled down the corridor of the St. Mark's Hospital in Salt Lake City to the operating room. Little did I know I would never see him again or talk to him again in this life. He passed away in April, 1970. I still miss him and wished he hadn't gone away. He was the first person that was really close to me that died. I thought my heart would break when I realized he was gone for good. However, within days of his passing I had confirmed within my soul by the Spirit that life is eternal and that one day I would be reunited with my dad once again. Hopefully we all know this about ourselves and our loved ones; otherwise life would truly be empty, scary, and meaningless.

One of my favorite scenes from the Book of Mormon is when the Savior is leaving those to whom he had appeared and taught as a resurrected being. He spent many hours with them. They had touched the nail prints in his hands and feet and the wound in his side and they knew it was He of "whom the prophets had testified should come into the world," even the Christ, the Messiah. As he was about to leave them Mormon recorded the following which I think we can all identify with: "And it came to pass that when Jesus had thus spoken, he cast his eyes round about again on the multitude, and beheld they were in tears, and did look steadfastly upon him as if they would ask him to tarry a little longer with them." [3 Nephi 17:5, emphasis added]. Had we been there that day I'm sure we too would have been in tears with the thought of him leaving us. I never want to forget what happened next. Sensing how he was loved by these faithful and trusting souls and how they never wanted him to leave them, he "... said unto them: Behold, my bowels are filled with compassion towards you." [3 Nephi 17:6] He then had them bring forth their lame, paralyzed, blind, leprous, deaf, or withered family members and friends. "... and he did heal them every one as they were brought forth unto him... And... [He] wept, and the multitude bare record of it, and he took their little children, one by one, and when he had done this he wept again..." [3 Nephi 17:21-22, emphasis added]

Of all the friends we have or of all the people that have come into our lives, none has brought us the happiness Christ has. How grateful we are for Mormon's account of the Savior's love for all of us and of his great tenderness and compassion.

Though temporarily separated from him, we have the same promise he gave to his beloved apostles that Thursday night before going from them. Sensing their sorrow at his parting, much as the Nephites had, he said to them (and to us), "I will not leave you comfortless I will come to you." [John 14:18] There is an important footnote to the word "comfortless." Apparently a better translation from the original Greek text would have been "orphans." Though gone for a while he would never leave us "orphans." He has not nor would he ever abandon us Until he comes to us again the Holy Ghost has been given as a supernal gift to comfort us and constantly remind us of his great and eternal love for each one of us.
Of all the people we invite to come into our lives lets make sure that Christ is the first.
Dad/Grandpa/Jack
www.observationsbyjack.blogspot.com

Hands

2010-11-19T13:03:00.000-08:00

Even in Southern California it is possible to discern that in November, summer is finally over. When fall turns into winter I start having myself covered at night with my favorite quilt. It is covered with the tiny red and blue handprints of little primary children who under the direction of our good friend, Sue Anthony who was primary president at the time, dipped their little hands in blue or red paint and then pressed them on to the quilt. My "Hands-On" quilt is 21 years old and those little hands are now big and most of their owners have served missions and are married now with children of their own.

It is my favorite quilt because I like to imagine those little hands keeping me warm and comfortable through the long cold nights of winter. Those little hands represent to me the love of Christ manifest through these pure, precious, and innocent children.

Since my injury I am fascinated by hands. I am convinced that only God could create something so marvelous. Not having the use of my hands anymore I am just in awe of what hands can do. I see the masterful artwork done by my good friend Ron Wilson, and our daughter's mother-in-law, Rhonda Reilly. What a gift to take a blank computer screen or canvas and create something beautiful, inspiring and enduring. I listen to my granddaughter, Allora Stratford, play the piano and watch her fingers literally fly over the keys. Having played the piano for many years before my accident I know what a gift she has been given to be able to translate from her mind to her hands given to her by God, the edifying music she is able to interpret and perform. I have had a trained surgeon literally save my life because of her trained and skillful hands.

Each day as I sit in my office and look at the beautiful workmanship I am reminded of the gifted hands of Gary Anderson and Paul Colby to build something beautiful out of wood -- a skill I have never possessed.

As impressive as these gifted and trained hands are however, hands can also be used to bless and comfort in many other ways as the little hands of our former primary children do for me through my "Hands-On" quilt.

President Dieter F. Uchdorft in the April, 2010 general conference related the following story: "... during the bombing of a city in World War II, a large statue of Jesus Christ was severely damaged. When the townspeople found the statue among the rubble, they mourned because it had been a beloved symbol of their faith and of God’s presence in their lives.
Experts were able to repair most of the statue, but its hands had been damaged so severely that they could not be restored. Some suggested that they hire a sculptor to make new hands, but others wanted to leave it as it was—a permanent reminder of the tragedy of war. Ultimately, the statue remained without hands. However, the people of the city added on the base of the statue of Jesus Christ a sign with these words: “You are my hands.”

Not having been able to do one single physical thing for myself for over 20 years now, the "hands of Christ" in the form of my family and friends have literally kept me alive. To me, their hands truly are "The hands of Christ."
All of us can be and should be "the hands of Christ" to those about us. "... we are surrounded by those in need of our attention, our encouragement, our support be they family members, friends, acquaintances, or strangers. We are the Lord’s hands here upon the earth, with the mandate to serve and to lift His children. He is dependent upon each one of us." [Thomas S. Monson, Ensign, November, 2009]

In its humanitarian outreach to the world, disaster victims have witnessed young and old dressed in yellow T-shirts or vests with the words "Mormon Helping Hands," printed on them. These "hands of Christ" have blessed countless disaster victims and will continue to do so as the years go by.

If our hands are truly to be the hands of Christ however, we must make sure that not only are they clean but that our hearts are pure as well.

The psalmist wrote: "Who shall ascend into the hill of the Lord? or who shall stand in his holy place? “He that hath clean hands, and a pure heart; who hath not lifted up his soul unto vanity, nor sworn deceitfully” (Psalm 24:3–4).
Elder Bednar, in commenting on these verses said: "... it is possible for us to have clean hands but not have a pure heart ... Let me suggest that hands are made clean through the process of putting off the natural man and by overcoming sin and the evil influences in our lives through the Savior’s Atonement. Hearts are purified as we receive His strengthening power to do good and become better..." [Ensign, November, 2007]

And so the challenge we all have in becoming the hands of Christ is through our faith and trust in the power of the atonement to truly have the same clean hands and pure heart He has. It is a daunting task but as Robert Browning wrote, "If a man's reach does not exceed his grasp, then what is a heaven for?"

"Hands are one of the symbolically expressive parts of the body. In Hebrew, yad, the most common word for “hand,” is also used metaphorically to mean power, strength, might (see William Wilson, Old Testament Word Studies [1978], 205). Thus, hands signify power and strength." [W. Craig Zwick Ensign, November, 2003]
The prophet Mormon said "Know ye not that ye are in the hands of God? Know ye not that he hath all power?” (Mormon 5:23).
"To be in the hands of God would suggest that we are not only under His watchful care but also that we are guarded and protected by His wondrous power.
Throughout the scriptures, reference is made to the hand of the Lord. His divine assistance is evidenced over and over again. His powerful hands created worlds, and yet they were gentle enough to bless the little children.
Consider John’s words describing the resurrected and glorified Savior: “And when I saw him, … he laid his right hand upon me, saying unto me, Fear not; … I am he that liveth, and was dead; and, behold, I am alive for evermore” (Rev. 1:17–18). When He lays His hand upon us, we, like John, can be alive in Him." [Craig W. Zwick, Ensign, November 2003]

Speaking of hands and to end on a lighter note -- hopefully not a light minded note -- the other evening Joanne was feeding me a bacon, lettuce, tomato, and avocado sandwich on grilled sourdough bread -- my favorite. We also happened to be watching a 1942 black-and-white murder mystery on TCM at the same time. We were engrossed in the movie and all of a sudden I heard a scream, Joanne slugged me in the arm and accused me of biting her finger. I have to admit that the bacon did taste a little like finger right about then. Even I however, am not dumb enough to bite the "hand" that feeds me -- or am I?
Dad/Grandpa/Jack

Detours

2010-11-04T13:28:00.000-07:00

During the last 10 years as we have taken trips to Utah we have been confronted with road construction somewhere along the way. To me a new synonym for "eternal" is the Utah freeway and highway system which seems to be "eternally" under construction. I attribute it to maybe two or three things: (1) poorly conceived and overly optimistic plans, (2) feeble minded and poorly run construction companies (3) or -- and this is the one I want to believe -- the population is growing so rapidly there is no way to keep the infrastructure of freeways and highways on pace with the burgeoning population.

I'm not blaming the state of Utah or the wonderful people of Utah for this challenging problem, but when I begin to see unending numbers of orange barrels and the freeway suddenly reduced to one lane I must admit I get a tad anxious, and for good reason.

Outside of St. George one night with orange barrels aglow and yellow hazard lights blinking every few seconds Joanne ran our van into the back of a four-door sedan that was stopped dead still on the on ramp to the freeway. Two young men were confused by all the lights and simply stopped their car without entering the freeway. When I heard and felt the initial gut wrenching crunch I thought it undoubtedly was Joanne's fault given her propensity for close calls while driving, but before I could make any "insightful observations" regarding her driving skills the two young men, running as fast as they could back to our van, confessed that the crash was their fault. I praised Joanne for her superior hand and eye coordination that saved us from severe harm. She seemed to appreciate the compliment and our already happy marriage was strengthened and made even happier. What good timing!

On our last trip we were confronted with a plethora of detour signs, more than I can ever remember on any of our previous trips to Utah. My knee-jerk reaction to a detour sign is "Oh no, think of the time we are going to waste!" We had to take so many detours however, that I began to change my attitude from one of frustration and aggravation to one of anticipation. It was either change my attitude or just be plain miserable.

The dictionary definition for detour is, "A roundabout way or course, especially a road used temporarily instead of a main route." or "A deviation from a direct course of action." (The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language)

It is in my nature, and I think many people are like me, that we don't like to take detours -- a roundabout way -- a deviation from a direct course of action. But as I learned on my last trip to Utah, as I began to anticipate the detours and the new country and things I would see and experience because of them, the trip really became a far richer experience than it would have been without the detours.

As I have pondered the principle of "detours" on freeways, highways, and in our lives, I have concluded that our lives are filled with detours -- unanticipated deviations from the I 15 freeways of life, where there is no traffic, road construction, or potholes and we arrive on time at our pre-determined and desired destination.

Life just isn't that way for most of us is it? Many of our lives are spent on detours which I believe are orchestrated by a loving and kind Heavenly Father. He wants us to see and experience more of life than we could possibly ever see or experience just sailing down the I 15 with our air conditioning keeping us comfortable and our CDs soothing what might otherwise be our jangled nerves.

However, most of the detours that come our way we don't want to take. I was motoring down the I 15 of my life doing just fine and enjoying the ride when the Lord threw a detour in my path. Initially I found no joy in my detour and there were those days I was actually looking for other highway signs that would get me off this detour and out of my misery like "End of Road" or "Dead End."

I wouldn't wish my detour off on to anyone else, but after more than 20 years of taking this unanticipated and roundabout road to the "Promised Land," I wouldn't now trade the experience of this "detour" for anything. Years ago I couldn't have made that statement, but I can truthfully do so now. What I have learned and experienced being paralyzed and on life support for so many years I could have never learned or experienced on the I 15. I am grateful for detours and the special one that has come my way.

I believe "detours" are part of the Lord's plan for all of his children. It takes faith to strike out on an unfamiliar path, but how rich are the rewards in doing so and sticking with the detour as long as is necessary.

I am sure that Abraham was not thrilled with the idea of taking Isaac on a detour to Mount Mariah. The Lord however, knew that this detour was necessary for Abraham, his spiritual development, and the subsequent great mission he was to perform. The Children of Israel had to take a forty-year detour to learn some lessons about life before they could inherit their Promised Land. Lehi and his family spent eight years in the Arabian Desert on a prolonged detour in order to learn some important things about faith, obedience, and trust in God. The Mormon pioneers had many detours and at times even faced circumstances that looked like "Dead Ends." I suppose the great challenge of life is to find "joy in the journey" regardless of the "detours" that come our way.

Many years ago I took a graduate class at USC designed to help us teach college students more effectively. Our teacher loved Robert Frost and had us read a beautiful collection of some of his poetry in a book entitled, "A Swinger of Birches." As we read the book our gifted professor helped us apply much of what Robert Frost wrote to the teaching and learning process.

One of the poems we read then was "The Road Not Taken." I have included it below because I think it captures the essence of what I've been trying to say in this observation.

The Road Not Taken

Two roads diverged in a yellow wood,
And sorry I could not travel both and be one traveler,
Long I stood and looked down one as far as I could
To where it bent in the undergrowth;

Then took the other, as just as fair,
And having perhaps the better claim because it was grassy and wanted wear,
Though as for that the passing there had worn them really about the same,
And both that morning equally lay in leaves no step had trodden black.

Oh, I marked the first for another day!
Yet knowing how way leads on to way I doubted if I should ever come back.
I shall be telling this with a sigh somewhere ages and ages hence:
Two roads diverged in a wood, and I, I took the one less traveled by,
And that has made all the difference.

Robert Frost

I too have been blessed to take the road less traveled by, "and that has made all the difference."

Dad/Grandpa/Jack

What Happened to Your Face? Page

2010-10-15T14:16:00.000-07:00

Most of you have heard me tell the incident when I was surrounded by a group of five-year-olds on the playground of an elementary school. After they had fired numerous questions at me a little boy got up really close and looking into my eyes said, "Hey Mr., what happened to your face?" I looked at him and said, "My face -- give me a break." I thought it was the only part of my body that was halfway normal and working! I tried to run over the little kid!

I have been thinking recently that what the five-year-old said could be taken two different ways. I took it as an insult (a truly funny insult coming from a five-year-old which of course did not offend me), but he could have meant it as a complement. Maybe he thought my face looked pretty fine compared to the rest of me. I don't really believe that but it is a nice thought. What I do believe is that after many years of living what we truly are becomes etched on our countenances.

Last week I had the unexpected pleasure of attending the second missionary reunion for Central American missionaries who served in Central America from the late 50s into the 60s. We had never thought to travel to Utah again, but our book publisher had arranged a promotional tour to publicize my new book, "It's Good to Be Alive-observations from a wheelchair," throughout the Salt Lake City/Provo area. The highlight of the trip for me, besides being able to visit with wonderful family and old friends, was being able to attend the missionary reunion. Most of us have been home from our missions for about 50 years. I have never been around so many old guys with no hair or white hair. I had the special privilege and joy of visiting with many former companions and many others I knew in the mission field. In my condition I surely did feel like the "voice from the dust." Though not able to see very well, as I peered into the faces of those former young men now grown old, I felt radiating from their faces a light which testified that their love of the gospel and their service to others did not end when they were 22 years old. The day Elder Uchtdorf was sustained as an Apostle he told the Saints:
"I have seen the face of Christ in your faces, in your deeds, and in your exemplary lives." [Elder Dieter F Uchtdorf, Ensign, November, 2004]
I echo that statement made by President Uchtdorf. I do believe that those who serve others and live exemplary lives truly have the face of Christ in their countenances.

Alma asked the people of Zarahemla the searching question: "... Have ye received his image in your countenances?" [Alma 5:14] Certainly this is an important question we could all ask ourselves frequently.

In my lifetime I have known many who I believe have received the image of Christ in their countenances. Sitting in the celestial room during the dedication of the Newport Beach, California Temple a number of years ago, not more than 5 feet from President Hinckley and President Faust, I could not help but staring at them throughout the session. I could tell that through their many years of service to others, as well as their exemplary lives, accompanied by the sanctifying influence of the Spirit they had received Christ's image in their countenances.

Of literally hundreds of experiences I have had in seeing the face of Christ in the faces of others, and most recently in our trip to Utah to visit family and friends and then the missionary reunion, there are two that stand out in my mind.

Allen Rosza, former president of the Los Angeles Temple, and I had become good friends over the years. I had taught his football playing triplet sons in Institute in Santa Ana, California and had watched the boys play a few games. After my injury, President Rosza would come to the rehabilitation Hospital several times each week to encourage me to never give up.

One weekday evening Jo Anne had left the hospital after spending the day with me, to drive from Downey to our home in Tustin. The distance is only maybe 40 miles but on a Southern California Freeway it can be harrowing and especially dangerous at night for a single woman. The six months I was at the hospital she made this drive at least five days each week. Jo Anne was depressed and wondering how things were going to ever turn out and just could not see the light at the end of the tunnel that particular evening. She even shed a few tears driving down the freeway and when she pulled off the off ramp near our home noticed that she was nearly out of gas. She pulled into a gas station near the off ramp and got out of the van to begin pumping gas. She had barely opened the door when Allen and Donna Rozsa pulled up beside her. Allen jumped out of his car and could see Jo Anne's distress and the evidence of tears. He filled the van with gas, not letting her pay for it, and then he and Donna took her to get something to eat. They lifted Jo Anne's spirits in a remarkable way in just a few minutes. He told Jo Anne that he never used that gas station but felt prompted to get off the freeway at that particular exit which he did. That evening Jo Anne saw the face of Christ in the faces of Allen and Donna Rozsa as I had previously seen in the face of Allen so many times in the hospital.

Several months after coming home from the hospital we were having a bad day. It was a Saturday and we had planned on going to hear the Know Your Religion speaker at our Stake Center that evening but were depressed and despondent and just didn't feel like going out. Jo Anne was fixing us something to eat when we heard the doorbell ring. She went to the door and standing there was Ken Anderson, an administrator for continuing education for BYU. We had known him when he lived here in Southern California and his brother and his family had lived in our Ward when I served as bishop. If you know Ken you know that he has the most wonderful smile and spirit emanating from him that you will probably ever see or experience in any other individual. The minute he walked into our home the atmosphere changed from one of depression and darkness to one of joy and light. He was supposed to be at the Know Your Religion program but felt impressed to come to our home instead. We visited for some time and then he left. When he had gone Jo Anne said that we had just seen the face of Christ in our home. She was right!

Although I have only chosen to use these few experiences, I could multiply them by the hundreds, and am so grateful to be able to say to my family and many friends, as Elder Uchtdorf said: "I have seen the face of Christ in your faces, in your deeds, and in your exemplary lives."

And so I do believe that from time to time it is not so bad to look into the mirror and say, "Hey Mr., what is happening to your face?"

Dad/Grandpa/Jack

Jo Anne

2010-09-18T11:29:00.000-07:00

The fall of 1963 I was just beginning my senior year at BYU. The first Sunday of the fall semester I attended our student ward, the BYU 32nd Ward. As I sat down in the back of the room with my three roommates we all noticed a beautiful red haired girl sitting up toward the front. None of us had seen her before and all expressed a desire to remedy that situation.
Jo Anne doesn't believe this, but from that moment I just knew that she was meant to be my wife. As the semester progressed we became better acquainted with each other in an informal way. I was the Elder's Quorum president and Jo Anne was the magazine Rep. in our ward. Hers was the responsibility of making sure that all the members of our ward had subscriptions to the Church magazines. Weekly she would call in her report to my roommate who was the ward clerk, and who was not home most of the time. I would therefore take her report and we would visit and joke around while talking on the telephone.
Not only was I taken with her beauty, vivacious and fun personality, and obvious goodness, but I was also impressed with her because of her work ethic and independent nature. I sensed a great strength in her. Without any real support from any source she was really at BYU on her own. She would borrow the money she needed for tuition at the beginning of each semester and then working at Olson's Bakery near campus she would pay off her loan before the semester was over as well as supporting herself with the necessities of life. She would then borrow her tuition for the next semester and repeat the process. She drove the bakery truck, and was able to take home all of the day old pies and other pastries which made her the most popular girl with all of the boys in the 32nd Ward.
The truth is that I was much more interested in her than she in me. From the very beginning it was a delight for me to be with her. Then and now, I would rather be with Jo Anne than any other person I have ever known. It's just good to be with her. We used to regularly be ejected from the BYU library because we would start laughing and then get the uncontrollable giggles. I must admit I got very little studying done when we were together. I have always felt that Jo Anne is one of the friendliest people I have ever known. She is very open and will talk to anybody.
She is a good person. I have never known anyone with a more finely tuned sense of what is right and wrong than she. She has never made any compromise with evil. Her children know that. It is not in her nature to do evil. I'm not saying that she is perfect and I am sure that she will take me to task for writing this observation, but I have never met a better person. She has always had incredible integrity. She has been blessed with a high energy level. She has waged a war against dirt in its many forms all of her life -- moral dirt and physical dirt. She cannot tolerate disorganization and a lack of cleanliness in her home. She can work harder and longer than almost anyone I have ever known.
While serving as Bishop or stake president and also working full-time as well, I always knew in my heart that Jo Anne was doing as much or more in keeping the family and home together. She gave me the freedom to work and to serve with complete peace of mind knowing that all was well at home. I believe that
love is based upon respect and I have always had complete respect for her.
Over the 39 years we have been acquainted I have seen her grow spiritually. She has a great love for the Scriptures. Some of the best insights I have received into the Scriptures have come from Jo Anne. Her approach is always so fresh and insightful. Seldom does a day go by without her studying the Scriptures. Last year she read every word of the Old Testament. I
love to hear her pray - it's always right from the heart. She has great faith. Never will I forget fasting with her for several days while our two year old son John's life hung in the balance. She would not eat or drink until the crisis was passed. Though I gave the priesthood blessings it was Jo Anne's faith, manifested through her fasting and prayer that I will always believe was the catalyst in John's recovery. What is more powerful than a mother's love? More times than I could ever mention has she prompted me to fast and pray with her for the children or some other acquaintance in need. She has faith. She believes.

She has been blessed with a tender heart and the gift and quality of charity. Nobody knows that more than me. Nobody but me is totally aware of the tender and loving care I have received these many years since my accident. Nobody is more aware than I of the constant care that someone in my condition needs. Every doctor that ever sees me is so impressed at how good I look. That is because of Jo Anne. Her love literally has sustained me over the years. In many ways
her role in life has been more difficult than had she been a widow. She has become a one woman army - caregiver, financial planner, housekeeper, cook, advocate in fighting insurance companies, gardener, chauffeur and automobile mechanic, mother and grandmother. In all of this never once have I felt that she has felt that life has been a burden. She has true grit and determination. To me she is an Elect Lady in every sense of the word.
Well, I didn't want this to turn into a eulogy. Obviously there are so many more things that could be said about Jo Anne. I just wanted to make these few observations about her before I pass on into the happy hunting ground and have left unsaid what should have been said about Jo Anne.
Dad/Grandpa/Jack

Spiritual Integrity

2010-09-13T12:29:00.000-07:00

The other day I overheard Jo Anne talking to one of her friends on the phone. Her friend had asked how I was doing and Jo Anne said, "Well, he can only see out of one eye and not very well; his hearing is going bad, and he can't breathe or move his body, but other than that he is doing really well."

As I heard her describe me I actually began to feel a little sorry for myself and also for Jo Anne who has worked so hard in trying to keep me alive these many years. That feeling of self-pity lasted for only a second however, and was immediately replaced by the feelings of happiness, hope, peace, and a great sense of well-being I constantly experience. I almost feel guilty feeling as good as I do, given the circumstances. Being around Jo Anne every day I get the feeling she feels much as I do.

My son Mike is the gospel doctrine teacher in his ward and frequently we teach the same lesson on the same Sunday. We often discuss what we have taught after-the-fact, and I invariably gain some important insights from my son. As a former district attorney and now a judge, he has an uncanny ability to cut to the heart of things.

We both had just recently taught the Book of Job in our Sunday school classes. In talking to him he said, "Dad, in spite of what many people think, I don't believe the Book of Job answers the question of why bad things happen to good people." I agreed with Mike having just read through the 42 chapters of Job. Job never does know why so much adversity came into his life so unexpectedly.

I have often heard over the years, people asking the question "Why do bad things happen to good people?" To really address that question we ought to be asking as well, "Why do good things happen to bad people or why do good things happen to good people, or why do bad things happen to bad people?"

Because we have mortal bodies and live in a world governed by natural Law we are all subject to having both good and bad things come into our lives. God has the power to protect us from every bad thing but in doing so would take away from us the priceless gift of agency. Often overlooked in the Savior's parable of the houses built on the rock or the sand is the fact that the full fury of the storm came to both houses. The point is that the house built on Christ weathered the storm. Our "goodness," won't necessarily protect us from the storms of life but will give us the strength to weather them.

Mike and I concluded that the Book of Job was all about a good man, whose life was solidly built upon the rock, who never lost his "spiritual integrity," through good times and bad.

He was described as follows: "Job... was an upright man and one that feared God, [and turned his back on evil]..." [Job 1:1] He was also so wealthy that the author of Job said of him, "... this man was the greatest of all the men of the east." [Job 1:3].

Job was prospering, he was good, and it appears from the text we have been given he was not letting his wealth be a stumbling block in his relationship with his God. He was maintaining his "spiritual integrity" during his prosperous times without being lifted up in his pride.

Then, talk about having a bad day, in one day Job lost all of his wealth, his worldly possessions, and his posterity to death. His wife thought it was such a bad day she told him he ought to curse God and die. You have to love Job for his response: "... naked came I out of my mother’s womb, and naked shall I return thither: the LORD gave, and the LORD hath taken away; blessed be the name of the LORD." [Job 1:21]

In making that statement Job maintained his "spiritual integrity" and was unwavering in his love for, and trust in God.

Having lost his wealth and posterity, and subsequently his health and the love and support of his family and friends, he didn't give up or give in. Even though his "friends" tried to sow the seeds of doubt in his mind that it was because of his unrepentant wickedness that he was being punished by God, Job knew better than that.

Job will forever be my personal hero and role model with regard to enduring well the adversities of life because of the following two statements he made after losing everything except his life: "Though he slay me, yet will I trust in him..." [Job 13:15] "For I know that my redeemer liveth, and that he shall stand at the latter day upon the earth. And though after my skin worms destroy this body, yet in my flesh shall I see God..." [Job 19:25-26]

I do believe the only way we can maintain our "spiritual integrity" like Job, is through coming to know the Savior and trusting in his love and goodness during both the good times and bad times that come into all of our lives.

There are at least two other important principles that manifest themselves in the life of Job. The Lord loves us as he loved Job and though difficult to comprehend in the midst of our individual and customized adversity, ultimately as we are faithful he has assured us that all things will ultimately be for our good. "And we know that all things work together for good to them that love God..." [Romance 8:28-- emphasis added]

I believe the key phrase in the Scripture is that all things work together for our good as we truly love the Lord. The Lord told Joseph, "... all these things shall give thee experience and shall be for thy good." [D&C 122:7]

I have come to understand however, as many as you have, that bad things are only good for us as they humble us, drive us to our knees, and draw us closer to the Savior.

21 years ago when neurosurgeons told me I would never breathe on my own again, move my body, speak, eat normal food, and never live outside a care facility for as long as I would live, I could not understand how this could possibly be good for me. Years later I can see what a blessing it has been in my life and how it has helped me to more fully know the Savior and to know for myself, independent of any other person, that he loves me and that this "tragic" accident at the beach has been for my good.

Finally, as Job endured faithfully and well his many afflictions, never doubting the love God had for him, "... the LORD gave Job twice as much as he had before him." [Job 42:10]

I believe the Lord will do the same thing for each one of us as we endure faithfully and well to the end. I believe the blessings we will receive won't necessarily be of a material nature, but far more significant than anything the world has to offer.

The Scriptures teach: "But he knoweth the way that I take: when he hath tried me, I shall come forth as gold. [Job 23:10, emphasis added]

Enduring well and trusting in a loving and kind Heavenly Father, will not position us to necessarily receive great worldly wealth, but as we are tried in the refiner's fire we will eventually become what the Lord sent us here to become.

He will also give the faithful the greatest gift that only God can bestow upon his children: "Behold, I am the law, and the light. Look unto me, and endure to the end, and ye shall live; for unto him that endureth to the end will I give eternal life." [3 Nephi 15:9, [emphasis added]

Dad/Grandpa/Jack

Sacrifice of a Hang Glider

2010-09-08T14:03:00.000-07:00

"A religion that does not require the sacrifice of all things never has power sufficient to produce the faith necessary unto life and salvation." (Joseph Smith)

While serving as a new Bishop, our stake undertook the project of raising $one million to build the Irvine, California stake center. That was the 30 percent we were required to raise before the Church would make available the additional 70 percent necessary to build that huge stake center. The projected building was to be an acre under roof, which included two full-size chapels, two cultural halls, really two of everything, and enough office space, literally to house an entire stake.

As bishops we committed our wards to raise our portion of the $one million within three years. None of us knew how we could possibly do this and ultimately we just went forward with faith. That three-year period was one of the most spiritual in my life. I saw many people and families make incredible sacrifices to raise the money necessary to build the stake center. We never held any "building fund projects" but simply asked for commitments from the Saints for the necessary funds.

Each December during tithing settlement I would make sure that I met with as many families as would come to my office. I would then tell them what amount we needed to raise for the building fund that year and ask them what commitment they thought they could make. If I remember correctly the commitments ran anywhere from 2 to $4000 per family for the year. The thing that touched me so much was how faithful each family was in fulfilling their commitment to me as their bishop. Homes were not painted, cars were not purchased, carpeting endured a few more years of wear, and we just gave all we could to build the building, in addition to paying our tithing.

Of the many stories I could tell of sacrifice at this time I will just share a couple. Many members of our ward during this time period lived in government subsidized housing -- the Nissan Garden Apartments. This is indicative of the lack of affluence in our ward while we were trying to raise money for the building fund. One young couple with several small children that were living in government subsidized housing came to me and told me they wanted to commit, what I considered to be an amount unrealistic considering their circumstances, but which they insisted on doing. They felt they needed all the blessings they could receive and that this was a good way to go about receiving them. They told me that if I would give them one food order from the bishop's storehouse that they had figured out a plan whereby they then could make a monthly payment to the building fund. I finally agreed to their plan and then watched each month as their payment came in to fulfill their commitment. I knew how little they had and my heart was touched with their willingness to literally give all to the Lord.

Another wonderful young couple living in the Nissan Garden Apartments made a commitment to me of $2000 for the year. Again I wondered how they would ever be able to fulfill this commitment. During the months that followed they never paid anything to the building fund and I began to be concerned that they wouldn't fulfill their commitment and how badly it would make them feel. This went on until December of that year. It was near Christmas as I remember that this young man walked into my office and handed me a check for $2000. He told me that all through the year he had expectations of making the money necessary to pay his commitment to the building fund but that it just hadn't happened. His passion in life was hang gliding -- he had done it for years and was an expert at the sport. He told me that the day before he had gone out and sold his hang glider and all of the equipment he had accumulated through the years for $2000. He didn't do it grudgingly but was happy and relieved that he could fulfill his commitment to the Lord. I am sure it was not in the same ballpark with Abraham's willingness to sacrifice Isaac, but to me it was as pure a sacrifice as I have ever witnessed.

The day the Irvine stake center was dedicated the bishops blessed the sacrament while the high council and counselors in the bishoprics passed the sacred emblems to those attending the dedication. As I sat at the sacrament table I had one of the most powerful and touching experiences I have ever had. I knew the Lord had accepted of our sacrifice and was pleased with what we had done.

That same kind of sacrifice is not being required at this time, but whenever we give time and resources to the Lord with a willing heart, the faith necessary to our obtaining salvation deepens and grows.

Dad/Grandpa/Jack

A plumber with integrity

2010-09-04T11:56:00.000-07:00

Being paralyzed and living on life support it is so important to me to be able to trust my caregivers and medical equipment providers who maintain my wheelchair and life support system, to not be careless and to do what they are supposed to do. I have been blessed with caregivers with integrity who have kept me alive for so many years in my fragile condition. I wish I could say the same thing for my medical suppliers and support people. We have one dysfunctional company that just never gets things right. We submit an urgent order which they misplace, and after many phone calls they end up sending us what we didn't need and didn't want. On the other hand, we have a company who upon receiving a request for needed medical items will have it on our doorstep the next day. I am afraid that people are very similar to these two companies.

While serving as Bishop it became necessary to call a new young men's president. A young man and his wife and two little children had just moved into the ward and I felt inspired that he was the man for the job. He was a plumber by trade, not highly educated, but he related well with the youth. I told him as I called him to this position that there were two young men in our ward that needed to be picked up each Sunday and brought to church or otherwise they wouldn't come. Their family situations were such that they needed this kind of support. He simply said, "I will do it."

For the next two years every Sunday he picked up Rusty and Tom and brought them to church. Somehow he was able to stuff the two boys into his car along with his wife and their two little children. Often they would come late but they always came and many times Rusty and Tom were able to help with the administration and passing of the sacrament. He brought them to their young men's activities during the week and both boys progressed in the priesthood and were having a good church experience.

I was saddened the day this young man came in and told me that he had a good job offer in another city that would give him the opportunity to buy a home. Shortly after he left I called a new young men's president and told him the same thing that I had told the young plumber about Rusty and Tom. He said, "I will do it." I am sad to report that it didn't happen. Some Sundays he would get the boys there, and some Sundays he would forget, and some Sundays he would delegate it to others who did not follow through. Yes, you know the end of the story. Rusty and Tom became increasingly less active as they grew older and as I write this I know that both of them are basically outside the Church.

I have learned through the years that one of the qualities I admire most in others is the quality of integrity. In the leadership positions I have held during my lifetime my greatest goal was to surround myself with men and women who would say, "I will do it" and then actually DO IT.

In a great council meeting held before this world was even created "...the Lord said: Whom shall I send? And one answered like unto the Son of Man: Here am I, send me...." (Abraham 3:27.)

Never has so much been offered to so many in such few words. He of course, was the epitome of integrity, and our great example in everything. HE DID IT!
"Honesty and integrity are not old-fashioned principles. They are just as viable in today’s world. When we say we will do something, we do it. When we make a commitment, we honor it. When we are given a calling, we fulfill it. When we borrow something, we return it. When we have a financial obligation, we pay it. When we enter into an agreement, we keep it." [F. Sheldon Child]
Dad/Grandpa/Jack
Jack bounced down

If Its Not One Thing It's Your Mother

2010-08-31T17:28:00.000-07:00

!

My good friend John Nelson has often quoted to me the title of this observation when things seem to go bad. In other words, let's blame it on our mothers. We say it in jest but mothers do have an incredible impact on our lives.

I have always thought that my mom had a very difficult life in many regards. As a young 10-year-old girl just a few days before Christmas she was left alone with her sick dad for several hours while her mother and the rest of the family went in a wagon to do some Christmas shopping. Her dad was very sick, but nobody knew just how bad off he really was. He would have her go outside all through the day and climb a tall tree on their property to see if she could see the wagon coming. Finally, just as the sun was setting, she saw the wagon coming up the road and ran out to plead with her mother to hurry home and take care of her dad. Her mother, Halley Young, was a midwife and knew how to handle emergency medical situations. She knew immediately that her husband, Allen, a young man in his late 30s, was extremely bad off. She was able to get someone to come with a car and transport her and her husband to the train depot in Delta, Utah. There were no doctors really in that farming community and she knew that she needed to get Allen, to a hospital as fast as she could. Mom and her brothers and sisters were left to fend for themselves as their mom and dad rode the train to Salt Lake City and the hospital.

It was discovered that Allen had a ruptured appendix. They operated immediately and it looked like he might make it, but within a week he died of complications due to the ruptured appendix. It just tears my heart out to read mom's account of her father's death in her life story. Her mother was pregnant at the time and had seven other children dependent upon her. The oldest boy, Alva, I believe was only 12 or 13 at the time; there were four girls and three boys. The baby yet to be born was to be a boy. Eugene was his name.

The death of her father had a profound impact upon my mom. He was her hero. I think losing her dad affected her personality to a certain extent. Apparently he was a great fun loving person who was always playing games with his children. There was a great deal of love and happiness in her home and in her life and then very suddenly it was all gone. For a number of years after his death Grandma Young would allow no social gatherings in their home and piano playing and singing were forbidden. It was a sad family for quite a period of time until Grandma Young had a vision in which her husband appeared to her and assured her that all was well with him and that she and the family were to get on with their lives and be happy.

Mom had other afflictions to deal with during her lifetime. I can remember when her entire body was covered with open sores. She was allergic it seems to everything. All of her hair was cut off -- not shaved -- but very short to try to fight the allergy. She couldn't wear any of her clothes because she was allergic to everything but one particular fabric. For over a year she struggled with this and I can remember how miserable she was. She had various operations over the years as well, and unbelievably, at a family reunion up in the mountains one summer, a pressure cooker exploded and scalded her body horribly. She was in the hospital for some time getting over the burns, especially on her chest. She also was plagued with a nervous condition and had to receive electric shock treatments on a number of different occasions. With today's modern medicine for nervous disorders her life would have been so blessed. However, she was a woman of great faith and carried on in spite of her challenges and adversity.

Mom was an extremely intelligent person. She did graduate from high school which was not particularly common in those days living out in the country as she did. She was a voracious reader all of her life. I can remember her being the literature teacher in relief society when they had what they called the cultural refinement lessons once each month. Mom taught that class for years and introduced me to some great literature. She would be so excited about what she was reading that I would want to read it also which I did.

She was an outstanding teacher, especially of the youth. Because of the size of our in Ruth, Nevada she was the only teacher I ever had except for my Aaronic Priesthood teachers. It was she who instilled in my heart a love for the gospel. Her Sunday school class when I was a teenager was remarkable as I look back on it. About twice a year she would hold a Sunday school class party at our home. Being the great cook she was nobody ever wanted to miss those parties. She also gave a final examination at the end of each curriculum year. We took these tests very seriously and one of my prized possessions for many years was a copy of The Book of Mormon she presented to me for receiving the top grade on her test that year.

I could always trust my mom's opinion about everything. She would always give me honest feedback if I asked for it. If I played a piano solo or a baseball or basketball game and asked mom how I did I would always get an honest answer I could trust. She was a great mother for boys. Her dad and brothers had been avid sports fans and not having any daughters she was really into sports. She was extremely knowledgeable about baseball, basketball, and football. On a number of occasions she won the football prognostication challenge that appeared in the Ely Daily Times during the college football season. I don't think she ever missed one of my baseball or basketball games. When she started living with us several months out of the year, later in her life, we would watch all of the Lakers games we could on TV. Magic Johnson was her all-time favorite basketball player.

She was one of the world's best homemakers in my prejudiced opinion. Coming from a different era she devoted all of her time and attention to her family. Our home was immaculate. She was a great cook. We had a major desert after every evening meal for as long as I could ever remember. She loved to bake and there was always homemade bread, pies and cakes, and wonderful cookies

I am sure we were all spoiled rotten. I can remember working for Kennecott Copper both before and after my mission. Mom would pack my lunch and the highlight of every shift was to open the lunch bucket and see what culinary delight it contained. Her philosophy was that if we were working full-time that we didn't need to work around the house. She felt that it was her responsibility to keep the home front going as long as we were pulling our weight in the world of work.

My mother was a woman of character and substance. Her influence for good on my life has been incalculable.

I am convinced that mothers have the greatest influence for good or evil on their children than any other factor in this world. I shudder to think what I might have been like without the teachings and influence of a wonderful mother.

Her example and teachings in retrospect prepared me to deal with the little challenge that came into my life the day I became paralyzed and dependent on life support for my existence. She put the backbone into me for which I will forever be grateful.

Dad/Grandpa/Jack

The Billy Shaw Incident

2010-08-28T12:08:00.000-07:00

What became known in our family and in our neighborhood in Ruth, Nevada as the "Billy Shaw Incident" took place one warm summer morning in 1948. Billy Shaw was a Norman Rockwell type looking kid. He had bright red hair, bordering on orange, which was always worn in a flat top. He had big red freckles that covered his entire face, arms, and I would imagine the rest of his body. I'm sure he was a "cute" little boy by anybody's standard. He lived down the street and he and I played together all the time. We were good friends, were in the same class at school, and spent lots of time playing in the neighborhood.
The summer morning in question found us outside messing around in the weeds that grew on the hill below our home. As we were poking around we discovered the leg from an old wooden table. It was quite ornate and looked a little bit like the jousting weapon used by Knights of old as they engaged in mortal combat. A conflict began between the two of us because there was only one jousting weapon and we both wanted it for our own. Before we knew it we were pushing each other and trying to pull the table leg away from one another. Finally this great weapon was dropped to the ground and we were wrestling each other. I was on top of Billy when all of a sudden a hand reached down, jerked me away from him, slammed me to the ground on my back, and threw Billy on top of me. I looked up and saw him Billy's mom standing over us screaming, "Now let's see a fair fight!" Obviously she had not seen the beginning of what was not really a fight but just two boys wrestling a little bit over a dumb table leg. Our energy would have been expended quickly and a compromise reached.

Those who know me well know that I have great patience and a calm disposition. What you may not know about me is that when I get angry I totally lose control; I feel a white heat inside me and everything starts spinning around. I guess I was so incensed by what Billy's mom did that I just totally lost it. I was filled with adrenaline, threw Billy off me, got on top of him, and just started pounding at his face. It reminds me a little bit of the scene in the movie "The Christmas Story". Billy pounded back at me but was no match for my anger. Soon Billy's blood was all over his face and shirt, and my hands and arms were drenched with his blood up to my elbows. Finally his mom pulled me off without saying anything and took Billy home. I was not elated with my victory and instead I was sobbing and sick at my stomach. I remember going to the side of our house and washing the blood off of my arms and hands from the outside faucet. I can't think of any event in my life that has made me feel quite so badly as the day I beat up on Billy Shaw.
I'm happy to report that Billy and I resumed our friendship, which continued through grade school and high school. I can't remember who ended up with the table leg. I don't know why Billy's mom did what she did. I hope she learned a great lesson from her unwise actions. This was really the first fight I had as a young boy and thankfully one of the last. Maybe it was important that I had this fight then than later in life when I could have done severe damage or been damaged by someone much bigger than me. I knew from that experience that I didn't like to fight. I have always felt there was a better way to handle things. However, I have to share my last fight with you, which took place when I was about twelve years old; two years after the Billy Shaw incident.

Another good friend was Jimmy Gardner. His dad had been a semi pro baseball player – a catcher. He had trained Jimmy from his birth to also be a catcher. He and I were great friends and played baseball together continually. When we were 12-year-olds some older teenagers wanted to have some fun and so they talked Jimmy into picking a fight with me. I was across the street from our house with a couple of other kids. We were standing on the bank of one of the water ponds - empty of water now, but with banks about four feet high. We always played baseball in those empty water ponds and it took a mighty blast to hit a baseball over the bank and out of the pond. Anyway, Jimmy and these bigger teenagers came up to us and Jimmy said some insulting thing to me and pushed me hard. As I began to roll down the bank I grabbed hold of his leg and pulled him down with me. He jumped up and in a very cocky voice said, "Come out here and let's finish it!" I don't think he thought I would come out to fight him. But I jumped up and ran over to where he was and threw the hardest punch I could right at his nose. My dad had always told me that it wasn't good to fight, but if you found yourself in that situation to go for the nose with your first punch and if you landed it the fight would be over. Thankfully I didn't hit his nose but came close and stunned him. He grabbed me with his arms and whispered to me that he really didn't want to fight me and let's just quit and go home. I was only too happy to do that and in spite of the taunts of the older boys we went home.

To my knowledge those are the only two major physical fights I ever had. Since then I have learned that it takes more courage to walk away from a fight than to fight. My oldest son, Mike, as a district attorney could tell all of us how fighting can lead to terrible things. The Savior's message of agreeing with our adversaries quickly and then turning the other cheek is absolutely true but not always easy to do. It takes great self restraint not to verbally or physically fight with others; of course nothing good ever comes from it. Love and kindness toward other people will usually help us to avoid confrontations and enable us to live in peace and harmony.
If all else fails however, go for the nose!
Dad/Grandpa/Jack

2

Praise -- Potential Poison

2010-08-24T15:26:00.000-07:00

The other day I overheard a phone conversation between Jo Anne and a good friend. Jo Anne said, "I am married to a model husband." Well, she has never told me that, but to hear her make that statement to her friend was most gratifying. I sort of thought she was telling the truth. Later that day I was looking up some words in my online dictionary and thought I might as well look up the word "model" while I was at it. One of the definitions that caught my immediate attention was, "A cheap imitation." Surely that wasn't the definition Jo Anne was using in describing me to her friend was it? Or was it? I don't think I want to know.

In giving or receiving praise and compliments we need to be extremely careful I believe. A father had just finished giving a little lecture to his young teenage son regarding being kind to all people, using tact, and complementary language in interacting with others. Soon after the lecture the boy went to his first dance. He had only been gone a short time when he returned home with a black eye. His dad asked him what had happened and the boy said he had tried to follow his advice and while dancing with a girl simply said, "For a fat girl you don't sweat very much."

Over the years since my accident I have had more people say nice things about me and to me than ever ought to be. While it is gratifying to be the recipient of such kind words and sentiments, there is also a danger associated with it. To me, the greatest danger is to begin to believe that what others are saying is true and then worse than that to begin to desire to be recognized and to receive the compliments and adulation of others. We may be tempted to believe we are actually something very special and indispensable.

President Hinckley in giving counsel to some young missionaries about to enter the mission field warned them as follows: "It is so very important that you do not let praise and adulation go to your head. Adulation is poison. You better never lose sight of the fact that the Lord put you where you are according to His design, which you don’t understand. Acknowledge the Lord for whatever good you can accomplish and give Him the credit and the glory and [do] not worry about that coming to yourself." [Ensign, February, 2001]

Inscribed in Mortar Board Court at The Ohio State University is the following anonymous poem entitled "The Torch".

The God of the great endeavor gave me a torch to bear.
I lifted it high above me in the dark and murky air.
Straightway with loud hosannas the crowd acclaimed its light,
And followed me as I carried my torch through the dark and starless night.
Til mad with peoples’ praises and drunken with vanity,
I forgot 'twas the torch that drew them and fancied they followed me.
Then my arm grew sore and weary upholding the shining load,
And my tired feet went stumbling over the hilly road.
I fell with the torch beneath me, in a moment the flame was out.
But lo, from the throng a stripling sprang forth with a mighty shout,
Caught up the torch as it smoldered and lifted it high again,
Til fanned by the winds of heaven it fired the souls of men.
As I lay alone in the darkness, the feet of the trampling crowd,
Passed over and far beyond me, their praises proclaimed aloud.
And I learned in the deepening shadow this glorious verity,
‘Tis the torch the people follow, who ere the bearer be.
I read this poem for the first time as a young returned missionary and have pondered its message over the years because I believe it cuts to the heart of a potential problem that we all can experience in our lives. I have thought how important it is as we are called upon to be torch bearers that we always have uppermost in our minds the fact that it is "the torch the people follow whoever the bearer may be." I believe there is always the temptation in any calling we may have in life or in the Church, where we are called upon to "carry the shining load" for a period of time, to get confused in thinking that we are something special as torch bearers. As teachers, or serving in high profile administrative positions in the world or in the Church, if we are not always sensitive to the fact that it is the torch the people follow, we may let the people's praises turn our heads and fill us with vanity. We may begin to think that as a torch bearer we are more important than the flame we are asked to carry and eventually pass on to another.

The Scriptures, as well as secular history, are replete with examples of torchbearers who began to feel they were more important than the message/the torch. Saul, David, Solomon, and most of the Kings of Israel and Judah fell into this trap. Very few people are able to handle well the praise and adulation that comes with the offices of King, President, or dictator for example. I have marveled about how vain and egotistical people like "Herod the Great," or "Suleiman the Magnificent" may have been to have allowed themselves to be given such titles. For some reason I just can't imagine Jo Anne and my children calling me, "Jack the Magnificent," although it does have a nice ring to it.

We see movie stars, athletes, and high-powered academicians for example who at times buy into the praise of the world and whose lives are inevitably destroyed because of it. Most of us will never be Presidents, movie stars, or world-class professional athletes, however, whatever our calling in life, the temptation always exists to strive to be "popular" and in doing so to get in the way of the "torch" it has fallen our lot to bear.

Being paralyzed from the neck down and living on life support for so many years has somehow propelled me into the spotlight and brought me a certain amount of notoriety that I could never have envisioned at the time of my accident. I know that in and of myself I do not have the strength, power, or intelligence to have endured so successfully this catastrophic injury for so many years. I feel the Lord has called me to carry "a shining load" as a testimony to others "... [that] I [the Lord] will ... ease the burdens which are put upon your shoulders, that even you cannot feel them upon your backs... and this will I do that ye may stand [or in my case sit] as [a witness] for me hereafter, and that ye may know of a surety that I, the Lord God, do visit my people in their afflictions." [Mosiah 24:14]

I know that in and of myself I am nothing, and hopefully will always realize that I have a special mission to testify to others that God does visit his people in their afflictions and will strengthen them spiritually that their burdens may be made light and easy to bear.

The Lord has humbled me every day that I have lived on life support. A number of times I could have gone into the spirit world but thankfully have been rejected each time. For some reason I don't feel badly about being a "reject" from the spirit world however.

Because of my condition I am very sensitive to the truthfulness of the words of King Benjamin who in describing to his people how utterly dependent they were on God each day of their lives said, "... He [God] is preserving your lives from day to day by lending you breath that you may live and move according to your own will and is even sustaining you from one moment to another..." [Mosiah 2:20]

I pray that I may never be so arrogant as to believe I have some super strength and courage that has carried me through these many years of paralysis. I do know though, as Paul wrote to the Phillipians, "I can do all things through Christ which Strengtheneth me." [Phillipians 4:13]

I try to keep the words of President Hinckley uppermost in my mind and heart when receiving what I consider to be unwarranted praise from others: "... Adulation is poison. You better never lose sight of the fact that the Lord put you where you are according to His design, which you don’t understand. Acknowledge the Lord for whatever good you can accomplish and give Him the credit and the glory and [do] not worry about that coming to yourself."

Dad/Grandpa/Jack

integrity

2010-08-21T12:48:00.000-07:00

While serving as Bishop it became necessary to call a new young men's president. A young man and his wife and two little children had just moved into the ward and I felt inspired that he was the man for the job. He was a plumber by trade, not highly educated, but related well with the youth. I told him as I called him to this position that there were two young men in our ward that needed to be picked up each Sunday and brought to church or otherwise they wouldn't come. Their family situations were such that they needed this kind of support. He simply said, "I will do it."

For the next two years every Sunday he picked up Rusty and Tom and brought them to church. Somehow he was able to stuff the two boys into his car along with his wife and their two little children. Often they would come late but they always came and many times Rusty and Tom were able to help with the administration and passing of the sacrament. He brought them to their young men's activities during the week and both boys progressed in the priesthood and were having a good church experience.

I was saddened the day this young man came in and told me that he had a good job offer in another city that would give him the opportunity to buy a home. Shortly after he left I called a new young men's president and told him the same thing that I had told the young plumber about Rusty and Tom. He said, "I will do it." I am sad to report that it didn't happen. Some Sundays he would get the boys there, and some Sundays he would forget, and some Sundays he would delegate it to others who did not follow through. Yes, you know the end of the story. Rusty and Tom became increasingly less active as they grew older and as I write this I know that both of them are basically outside the Church.

I have learned through the years that one of the qualities I admire most in others is the quality of integrity. In the leadership positions I have held during my lifetime my greatest goal was to surround myself with men and women who would say, "I will do it" and then actually DO IT.

In a great council meeting held before this world was even created "...the Lord said: Whom shall I send? And one answered like unto the Son of Man: Here am I, send me...." (Abraham 3:27.)

Never has so much been offered to so many in such few words. He of course, was the epitome of integrity, and our great example in everything. HE DID IT!
"Honesty and integrity are not old-fashioned principles. They are just as viable in today’s world. When we say we will do something, we do it. When we make a commitment, we honor it. When we are given a calling, we fulfill it. When we borrow something, we return it. When we have a financial obligation, we pay it. When we enter into an agreement, we keep it." [F. Sheldon Child]

My wife, Jo Anne, and other caregivers that have assisted her and me during the years have been men and women of integrity. I take great comfort in knowing they will not cut corners regarding my care. My life is literally in their hands and they know it and they do everything in their power to keep me alive. The quality of integrity is much more important than great intelligence or other talents or abilities. It will compensate for a multitude of other weaknesses. To just DO IT and to be men and women of our word is to be a blessing not only to ourselves and our families but to all who know us.
Dad/Grandpa/Jack

Piano Lessons

2010-08-19T10:58:00.000-07:00

It began the summer I turned twelve years old. My good friend, Doug Godwin, got a new piano that summer. Actually it was an old piano -- an old upright whose age was difficult to determine. It sounded a lot like one of those pianos you hear in old Western movies in the saloon scenes. Doug and I had been friends forever and spent hours each day playing baseball. He played second base while I played shortstop which we would continue to do until we were graduated from high school.
I could not believe that Doug's parents had bought this piano. I had no idea that Doug had any love at all for music. He was never in the band and I just could not comprehend that he was going to learn how to play the piano.

However, as I would walk down the street to ask him to play baseball with me I would hear the piano music emanating from his home. His mother would invite me in and there was Doug with a couple of new piano books just playing away and seeming to have so much fun. The jealousy bug bit me hard and I just knew that if I were to ever hope to be as happy as Doug I too must learn how to play the piano.

We already had an old upright piano much like Doug's in our home. My mom played a little bit but none of us boys had ever learned. With visions of how wonderful it would be to be able to play the piano I approached my mother and asked her if I could take piano lessons. She asked me if I knew where the piano teacher lived and I told her that I did. She said if I wanted to take lessons to go ask the piano teacher if she would teach me. She said that if the teacher agreed that it would be fine with her and I could begin to learn how to play the piano.

The piano teacher in Ruth, Nevada was a lady by the name of Mrs. Shartle. She was in her late '60s and of course to me seemed ancient. She was a tall woman with gray hair and I can still remember her beautiful hands. She had long strong fingers that had undoubtedly been developed from years of playing the piano. She had graduated from the Boston Conservatory of Music and was an incredible piano teacher. I did not know any of this the day I went to her home for the first time. She had been married to a mining engineer who had come to Nevada to work in the mines. They had not been in Ruth long before he died. She however, had fallen in love with Nevada and decided to stay there for the rest of her life.

She lived on Number Nine Hill in a little wooden frame house. It was a company house; very small with a living room, kitchen, and I believe only one bedroom. Number Nine Hill was the tallest hill in Ruth. It was directly across from the Star Pointer Mine, the original underground copper mine that had brought people to Ruth, Nevada. It continued to be worked, but the open pit mine, several miles away was the major operation and the reason that Ruth continued to exist as a town. Number Nine Hill was terraced and contained homes on each level. Mrs. Shartle's home was on the uppermost terrace.

That hot summer day I jumped on my bike and rode as fast as I could to her home. Her Hill was so steep that I ended up having to push my bike the last 50 yards or so to her front door. I knocked on the door and she invited me in. Dominating that little living room was the most beautiful piano I had ever seen. It was a big, black Chikering upright. I would learn to appreciate the fact that it was one of the most superior pianos ever manufactured. It had a gorgeous sound to it. It was the best piano in Ruth and probably the best and most expensive piece of furniture in any of the homes in that little mining town. She put me at ease and I asked her if she would give me piano lessons. She wanted to know if my mother knew I was there and when I told her yes she agreed to teach me. She knew my oldest brother, Allen, having taught him voice lessons some years before. She sat me right down and gave me my first lesson. She gave me several new books that I recognized were very similar to those possessed by Doug Godwin. I can still remember how exhilarated I was riding my bike home and showing my books to my mother.

I immediately sat down at the piano and began to practice the assigned lesson. It was really fun that first-day. As the week progressed however, I began to discover that this playing the piano was a lot more work than fun. I would be practicing the piano when my friends would come by to get me to go play baseball. My mother thought I should get my practicing in before going out to play. With my baseball mitt sitting on the piano bench at my side, and my baseball bat leaning up against the piano, I would put in my time and when the alarm went off on the clock I had set I would be out of the house in a heartbeat.
By the end of the week, and before my second lesson, I approached my mom and told her that maybe I really didn't want to learn how to play the piano after all and could I quit? She looked me in the eyes and said. "Jack, did I ask you to take piano lessons?" I said, "No." She continued, "Now that you have begun you are not going to quit." "But mom, how long do I have to play the piano?" And then I heard the most important word I would ever hear as a young man -- "Forever", she responded. With that statement my fate was sealed. Mom was pretty tough. I can still remember her standing over me while I practiced, counting and making sure I was hitting the right notes. I never got by with any halfhearted practice sessions. If she were to go on a vacation for a week or so visiting her mother or sisters I knew that when she got back I would have to give her a concert and she would know whether I had been faithful in my practicing. Doug Godwin got tired of the piano within the month and quit.

Mrs. Shartle continued to give me lessons until I was about a junior in high school. After the first year with her she made an arrangement with me that if I would chop her wood for her each week after my lesson that she would give me my lessons at no charge. During the subsequent years she would give me a lesson and I would go out in HTL that back and chop enough wood for her to last a week. The only source of heat in her house was an old wood-burning stove in her tiny kitchen, which burned a lot of wood. She would come out and visit with me while I worked. As a boy I didn't realize how lonely she must have been, but she would talk to me for what seemed like hours. I enjoyed her and she inspired me to actually want to learn how to play the piano.

Maybe because of my clarinet playing and familiarity with music, and because I was twelve years old, I progressed very rapidly. It wasn't long before I really began to enjoy playing because I was able to play good music. I became self-motivated and my mother did not have to stand over me while I practiced. At age 14 or 15, I became the ward organist.

I don't know what happened to Mrs. Shartle. She either died or moved away from Ruth. My memory is a little sketchy, but I think she passed away. I had a succession of teachers after Mrs. Shartle, but none of them could compare to her. I went on to BYU and took piano lessons there until I left on my mission. When I entered the mission field I could play for several hours by memory the beautiful music I had memorized at BYU. What a blessing it was to be able to play the piano as a missionary. I played solos; I accompanied others while they sang, and played for every meeting in every branch to which I was assigned.
I never became a great concert pianist of course, but through the piano I gained self-discipline and a deeper love for good music. I will be forever grateful to a strong mother who said to a young boy that he would have to practice the piano "forever"!

Dad/Grandpa/Jack

Piano since

2010-08-19T10:42:00.000-07:00

the summer I turned twelve years old. My good friend, Doug Godwin, got a new piano that summer. Actually it was an old piano -- an old upright whose age was difficult to determine. It sounded a lot like one of those pianos you hear in old Western movies in the saloon scenes. Doug and I had been friends forever and spent hours each day playing baseball. He played second base while I played shortstop which we would continue to do until we were graduated from high school.
I could not believe that Doug's parents had bought this piano. I had no idea that Doug had any love at all for music. He was never in the band and I just could not comprehend that he was going to learn how to play the piano.

However, as I would walk down the street to ask him to play baseball with me I would hear the piano music emanating from his home. His mother would invite me in and there was Doug with a couple of new piano books just playing away and seeming to have so much fun. The jealousy bug bit me hard and I just knew that if I were to ever hope to be as happy as Doug I too must learn how to play the piano.

We already had an old upright piano much like Doug's in our home. My mom played a little bit but none of us boys had ever learned. With visions of how wonderful it would be to be able to play the piano I approached my mother and asked her if I could take piano lessons. She asked me if I knew where the piano teacher lived and I told her that I did. She said if I wanted to take lessons to go ask the piano teacher if she would teach me. She said that if the teacher agreed that it would be fine with her and I could begin to learn how to play the piano.

The piano teacher in Ruth, Nevada was a lady by the name of Mrs. Shartle. She was in her late '60s and of course to me seemed ancient. She was a tall woman with gray hair and I can still remember her beautiful hands. She had long strong fingers that had undoubtedly been developed from years of playing the piano. She had graduated from the Boston Conservatory of Music and was an incredible piano teacher. I did not know any of this the day I went to her home for the first time. She had been married to a mining engineer who had come to Nevada to work in the mines. They had not been in Ruth long before he died. She however, had fallen in love with Nevada and decided to stay there for the rest of her life.

She lived on Number Nine Hill in a little wooden frame house. It was a company house; very small with a living room, kitchen, and I believe only one bedroom. Number Nine Hill was the tallest hill in Ruth. It was directly across from the Star Pointer Mine, the original underground copper mine that had brought people to Ruth, Nevada. It continued to be worked, but the open pit mine, several miles away was the major operation and the reason that Ruth continued to exist as a town. Number Nine Hill was terraced and contained homes on each level. Mrs. Shartle's home was on the uppermost terrace.

That hot summer day I jumped on my bike and rode as fast as I could to her home. Her Hill was so steep that I ended up having to push my bike the last 50 yards or so to her front door. I knocked on the door and she invited me in. Dominating that little living room was the most beautiful piano I had ever seen. It was a big, black Chikering upright. I would learn to appreciate the fact that it was one of the most superior pianos ever manufactured. It had a gorgeous sound to it. It was the best piano in Ruth and probably the best and most expensive piece of furniture in any of the homes in that little mining town. She put me at ease and I asked her if she would give me piano lessons. She wanted to know if my mother knew I was there and when I told her yes she agreed to teach me. She knew my oldest brother, Allen, having taught him voice lessons some years before. She sat me right down and gave me my first lesson. She gave me several new books that I recognized were very similar to those possessed by Doug Godwin. I can still remember how exhilarated I was riding my bike home and showing my books to my mother.

I immediately sat down at the piano and began to practice the assigned lesson. It was really fun that first-day. As the week progressed however, I began to discover that this playing the piano was a lot more work than fun. I would be practicing the piano when my friends would come by to get me to go play baseball. My mother thought I should get my practicing in before going out to play. With my baseball mitt sitting on the piano bench at my side, and my baseball bat leaning up against the piano, I would put in my time and when the alarm went off on the clock I had set I would be out of the house in a heartbeat.
By the end of the week, and before my second lesson, I approached my mom and told her that maybe I really didn't want to learn how to play the piano after all and could I quit? She looked me in the eyes and said. "Jack, did I ask you to take piano lessons?" I said, "No." She continued, "Now that you have begun you are not going to quit." "But mom, how long do I have to play the piano?" And then I heard the most important word I would ever hear as a young man -- "Forever", she responded. With that statement my fate was sealed. Mom was pretty tough. I can still remember her standing over me while I practiced, counting and making sure I was hitting the right notes. I never got by with any halfhearted practice sessions. If she were to go on a vacation for a week or so visiting her mother or sisters I knew that when she got back I would have to give her a concert and she would know whether I had been faithful in my practicing. Doug Godwin got tired of the piano within the month and quit.

Mrs. Shartle continued to give me lessons until I was about a junior in high school. After the first year with her she made an arrangement with me that if I would chop her wood for her each week after my lesson that she would give me my lessons at no charge. During the subsequent years she would give me a lesson and I would go out in HTL that back and chop enough wood for her to last a week. The only source of heat in her house was an old wood-burning stove in her tiny kitchen, which burned a lot of wood. She would come out and visit with me while I worked. As a boy I didn't realize how lonely she must have been, but she would talk to me for what seemed like hours. I enjoyed her and she inspired me to actually want to learn how to play the piano.

Maybe because of my clarinet playing and familiarity with music, and because I was twelve years old, I progressed very rapidly. It wasn't long before I really began to enjoy playing because I was able to play good music. I became self-motivated and my mother did not have to stand over me while I practiced. At age 14 or 15, I became the ward organist.

I don't know what happened to Mrs. Shartle. She either died or moved away from Ruth. My memory is a little sketchy, but I think she passed away. I had a succession of teachers after Mrs. Shartle, but none of them could compare to her. I went on to BYU and took piano lessons there until I left on my mission. When I entered the mission field I could play for several hours by memory the beautiful music I had memorized at BYU. What a blessing it was to be able to play the piano as a missionary. I played solos; I accompanied others while they sang, and played for every meeting in every branch to which I was assigned.
I never became a great concert pianist of course, but through the piano I gained self-discipline and a deeper love for good music. I will be forever grateful to a strong mother who said to a young boy that he would have to practice the piano "forever"!

Dad/Grandpa/Jack

What Will You Take with You?

2010-08-17T10:41:00.000-07:00

I was doing some reading the other day and came across a statement made by Lowell Bennion many years ago. Lowell Bennion was an educator and author who was well-known in
the world as well as in the Church in his day. He has long since passed away and you may not recognize his name. Based on my own experience the little incident he shared in his book struck a chord with me as being very true and very important. Below is the passage:

"There is a doctor in Salt Lake who will only take patients over sixty-five. One time when I was teaching college students, he said, "Bennion, the saddest patients I have are not the poor and not the physically disabled, but those who didn't use their minds when they were young." He said "the body breaks down, but the mind only slows down. It gets richer as you go through life and you have more things to relate to one another, more memories, if you keep it alive, like a muscle. Don't spend all your time socializing, working, eating, sleeping. Get something intellectual in your life. Get excited about some intellectual dimension of life. Read, read, read, and think, think, think, and be creative in that role. And you will find life taking on an increasing interest even when the old body breaks down, practically, as my back is." (Lowell L. Bennion, The Best of Lowell L Bennion: Selected Writings 1928-1988, edited by Eugene England [Salt Lake City: Deseret Book Co., 1988], 35.)
When I had my accident a number of years ago, I began the process of understanding what this doctor that Lowell Bennion quoted was talking about. In a split second I completely lost the use of my physical body and all I had left was my mind and spirit. Soon after the accident the thought occurred to me that this must be very much like dying and entering the spirit world. We won't be able to take anything into the spirit world with us except what we have in our minds and in our hearts. During those first two weeks in the trauma center what a blessing it was for me to be able to indicate by blinking my eyes while family and friends pointed at items on a specially prepared chart, the scriptures I wanted read. I knew and loved the scriptures and as favorite passages were read to me by my friends and family it was a great source of comfort and peace at a really difficult and terrifying time in my life. The thought came to me then, "What if you had not searched the scriptures for so many years of your life, where would you be now?" It came forcibly to me then and has been impressed upon me even stronger during these past 13 years how important it is to constantly read the scriptures as well as other good books. I am convinced by my own experience that there are few things more important that we can do in mortality to prepare for eternity than this.

How grateful I am that I love to read good books as well as the Scriptures. Because of it, even though my physical body doesn't do much for me, my days are filled with happiness and fulfillment. At my age I feel a real sense of urgency to try to read really good things. I don't know how much time I have left here but I have a desire, perhaps greater than at any other time in my life, to search the Scriptures and other great books in an attempt to be prepared for my mission in the spirit world.
I hate to say it but we are not much of a reading people in our generation. John Adams, Thomas Jefferson, Abraham Lincoln, and so many others would put us to shame. They were voracious readers and profound thinkers and they didn't even have Google. I notice how when our family gets together the majority of the time is spent in discussing the movies and videos we have seen, but almost never does anyone talk about a great book they have read or a significant insight into the Scriptures that they have recently discovered. I don't want to appear to be fanatical regarding this, but I do believe we need to seek for greater balance in our lives. I also realize how busy everyone is going to school, working, and raising families. Time is precious and at a premium. I think however, we could all improve the quality of our lives by disciplining ourselves just a little bit more "to seek learning by study and faith out of the best books."
Take it from one who has in a sense had the opportunity of entering the spirit world that what I am saying is vitally important.
Dad/Grandpa/ Jack
1/9/

Creation

2010-08-14T11:10:00.000-07:00

Many years ago as a young seminary teacher and then as an institute teacher I became fascinated with the creation. For one thing, it didn't make sense to me how this earth could have been created in seven days as the Bible indicates. There is just too much scientific evidence regarding the ancient age of the earth -- and then what about the dinosaurs?
I began an intensive study regarding the creation from a scriptural point of view as well as from what science had to say regarding the subject. I accumulated article after article that eventually filled a very large three ring binder. I studied the laws of first and second thermodynamics, the law of entropy, evolution, cataclysmic creation, and etc.. I read everything Brigham Young and other gospel scholars had to say about the subject. In teaching the creation I felt obliged to share all I knew with my students. I shudder now to think back on those lessons and my poor students. I thought I was really on to something regarding how this earth was created.
Well, as the years have gone by, thankfully I have gained a little more wisdom. As I study
Moses, Abraham, and ponder the creation account given to us in the temple I know that the
Lord in his infinite wisdom is much more concerned that we understand why this earth was
created as opposed to how it was created. I now believe the greatest truth regarding how this earth was created is given to us in the book of Moses. Moses had just asked the Lord how and why this earth was created and all of the stars and etc.. The Lord responded as follows: (Moses 1:32-33.) "And by the word of my power, have I created them, which is mine Only Begotten Son, who is full of grace and truth. 33 And worlds without number have I created; and I also created them for mine own purpose; and by the Son I created them, which is mine Only Begotten."
I suppose this is all we need to know about how this world and all of the other worlds were
created. I am just overwhelmed when I consider the thought that the Father through the Son has created worlds without number. What does that mean? How do you comprehend that? And then the Lord went on to say to Moses - (Moses 1:37-38.) "And the Lord God spake unto Moses, saying: The heavens, they are many, and they cannot be numbered unto man; but they are numbered unto me, for they are mine. 38 And as one earth shall pass away, and the heavens thereof even so shall another come, and there is no end to my works, neither to my words."
The Lord isn't going to tell us more than that about the "how" of creation and I am convinced at this time in my life that this is all we need to know. He is much more concerned it seems that we understand the "why" of creation which he gives in the next vs. (Moses 1:39.) "For behold, this is my work and my glory—to bring to pass the immortality and eternal life of man."
Last week, JoAnne and I were listening to the BYU devotional and heard the most inspiring
lecture regarding the creation that we have ever heard. It was given by John R. Lamb, a professor of chemistry at BYU. He has written over 150 scholarly articles that have been published worldwide in the scientific community. He has been an in residence professor at
four major universities in Europe and etc.. But to me, his greatest credential is that he is a
returned missionary who served his mission in northern Italy. With all of his scholarly knowledge he is a humble and faithful latter-day saint. In speaking of these verses in Moses he gave the following analogy: if you could build a spaceship better than the spaceship Enterprise -- one which could overcome time space and begin your space voyage when
you were first born and only one second old -- and then in your special spaceship take one
second to visit each Star in our galaxy which could support life like this earth and spend just one second exploring it, and if you lived to be 100 years old and traveled nonstop all that time, by the end of your life you would have visited 1.5 billion stars, which is not even one percent of the stars in our milky way galaxy. Beyond that he said that with the Hubble telescope which has been launched out into outer space we are aware of at least 150 billion other galaxies as big or bigger than the one upon which we live.

Then this great scientist said that when he thought of these creations and looked up into the night sky and saw the stars available to human eyes he was always prompted to think of the words in the great hymn, "How Great Thou Art!" "Oh Lord my God, when I in solemn wonder, consider all the worlds thy hands have made, then sings my soul my Savior God to thee - How Great Thou Art - How Great Thou Art!" You see, I had missed the point for many years of my life regarding the creation. I will tell you that as I consider the creation now that my soul sings. And the greatest thought is that somehow this great creator, as unbelievable as it may seem, and in some way we do not understand, knows each one of us intimately and has created all of this for us. All of the worlds that have ever been created have been created for one purpose and one purpose only so that Heavenly Father's Children could have the opportunity of obtaining the gift of Eternal Life.
One of the great scientists of our age, Stephen Hawking, paralyzed and only able to use the
thumb on his right hand, not even being able to speak, and yet the discoverer of great scientific truths concerning the universe, had this to say about the creation: "Although science may solve the problem of how the universe began, it cannot answer the question: Why does the universe bother to exist? I don't know the answer to that." (Stephen W. Hawking, Black Holes and Baby Universes [New York: Bantam Books, 1993], p. 99) "... What is the nature of the universe? What is our place in it and where did it and we come from? Why is it the way it is...If we do discover a complete theory... then we shall all... be able to take part in the discussion of the question of why it is that we and the universe exist. If we find the answer to that, it would be the ultimate triumph of human reason, for then we would know the mind of God." (Stephen W. Hawking, A Brief History of Time [New York: Bantam Books, 1988], pp. 171, 175)
I wonder if an LDS scientist has ever spoken to Stephen Hawking? Thankfully, we know the
answers to his questions have been given to us in our day. I am grateful that my thinking about the creation has evolved to where it is now over the years. My soul does sing when I consider the great creator of heaven and earth. Thanks be to Joseph Smith and modern-day revelation for these great truths that have been restored to the earth in our day. As Alma was confronted by Korihor the antichrist, who had asked for a sign to prove that there was a God, he gave him the following significant message: (Alma 30:44.) "But Alma said unto him: Thou hast had signs enough; will ye tempt your God? Will ye say. Show unto me a sign, when ye have the testimony of all these thy brethren, and also all the holy prophets? The scriptures are laid before thee, yea, and all things denote there is a God; yea, even the earth, and all things that are upon the face of it, yea, and its motion, yea, and also all the planets which move in their regular form do witness that there is a Supreme Creator."
I suppose that this is all we need to know concerning the creation of this earth. But what about the dinosaurs?
Dad/Grandpa/Jack

1/25/02

1/25/02

Is There Anything Else I Can Do for You Today?

2010-08-12T13:09:00.000-07:00

A number of years ago while I was serving as Bishop of the Irvine second Ward I had the opportunity of being blessed with a number of wonderful counselors during that period of time. Each one had strengths that blessed me in my role as Bishop. One in particular did something each Sunday that impressed me then and has continued to influence my thinking over the years. At the conclusion of the regularly scheduled Sunday meetings, and having completed his assignments as a counselor in the bishopric, he would knock on the door to my office where I would be counseling members, which counseling could go on for several hours, and opening the do faith that or a crack he would say "Bishop, is there anything else I can do for you today?" He would do this every Sunday without fail, and although most of the time there was nothing that I could have him do, his offer always filled my heart with warmth because I knew that he absolutely meant what he had said.

I thought then, as I do today, that his words could well form the basis of our attitude in giving service in the church and in our relationships with our loved ones at home. Regardless of the assignment, at the end of the day, hopefully our attitude and desire would be to say to our Heavenly Father, "Father, is there anything else I can do for you today?" And in our relationships with our spouses and children, to have in our hearts the thought and desire, though maybe not verbally expressed, "Is there anything else I can do for you today" would go a long way in making all our lives sweeter and less selfish and self-centered.

I can call Jo Anne at 3 AM needing some help time or another. In just a few moments she will appear at the door my bedroom looking scary at that time of the morning. She responds to my request without ever making me feel that I am imposing on her in any way, and. invariably says "Is there anything else I can do for you?" Not a bad way to live one's life.

Just an observation.

Dad/Grandpa/Jack

Balance

2010-08-10T12:10:00.000-07:00

One Sunday I was teaching a lesson about the birth and early childhood and development of the Savior. In preparing for the lesson I read a verse with which I am well acquainted as I am sure all of you are as well. "And Jesus increased in wisdom and stature, and in favour with God and man." [Luke 2: 52.]

In describing the life of the savior from age 12 until he began his ministry at age 30, I believe that Luke chose his words carefully. I believe, without going into the details of his life, that Luke wanted us to understand that Jesus was a well-rounded and multifaceted person. Not only did he grow in spirituality during those formative years, but also in his acquisition of knowledge, the development of his physical body, and also the social aspect of his personality. I am confident that had we been privileged to know him we would have been attracted to him and would have enjoyed being in his company.

I think in this short verse Luke has given to all of us one of the great keys to an abundant life. We must seek to develop all aspects of our nature, which is as multifaceted as that of the Savior. If we fall into the trap of only developing one aspect of our being (for example the physical) our lives can quickly get out of balance and unhappiness will surely follow.

Thankfully I had a mother who understood this concept well. She loved sports and supported us in all of our endeavors in athletics, but at the same time she introduced us to the world of music, and literature, and emphasized our achievement in academics as well. Because of my mother and her understanding of this principle my life has been blessed on several very specific occasions.

Having made the varsity basketball team as a junior in high school I knew that I had achieved a maximum of joy -- what could be better? As the year progressed, however, I discovered that I had very bad knees that filled with fluid and were exceedingly painful because of the daily pounding on the basketball court. The doctors had no cure except to suggest that I must drop out of organized basketball that required me to practice every day or run the risk of permanently damaging my knees. Seldom in my life have I felt such anguish as I did when I knew that I must give up playing high school basketball. I felt that the bottom had fallen out of my life and that things could not possibly be worse than that. However, because of a wise mother who had introduced me to the world of music, I turned all the effort I had been putting into basketball into music. My senior year, instead of running on to the court in my wonderful and spectacular blue warm ups, to the stirring music of our fight song, "On Ye Bobcats, On Ye Bobcats..." I played the song on my clarinet as part of the Band. I would have much rather been playing basketball, but by spending more time with my music I earned a music scholarship to BYU by the end of my senior year. Because of a wise mother, sports and music have blessed my life through the years.

On August 1, 1989 in one split-second I lost the use of my physical body. I was devastated as you might imagine, but as the years have gone by my life has been rich and fulfilling because of my love for reading, writing, teaching, speaking in public, music, sports, the scriptures, and the relationship I have with the Lord and with my family and friends. I find great contentment and fulfillment in my life now, because as a boy a wise mother encouraged me and made it possible for me to develop more than just one aspect of my being.

How important it is that we as parents give our children every possible opportunity to increase in wisdom, stature, and in favor with God and man.

Dad/Grandpa/Jack

A Bad Day

2010-08-08T19:00:00.000-07:00

A Bad Day
It doesn't happen very often but I was feeling kind of down a while back. I think it might have been the weather which has been very foggy and about 10° below average for this time of the year. I think I felt I was being cheated out of the summer, my favorite season, or maybe it was just that the Los Angeles Dodgers had been on a six-game losing streak. Whatever the cause, sensing my mood, Jo Anne shared with me the following story she heard on BYU TV to help me keep things in perspective.

(Garth Waddoups – "Never Have a Bad Day," – Feb. 2, 2010 -- Agricultural Business/Plant and Animal Sciences Department Chair of BYU Idaho – Practicing veterinarian)

"I came into work one morning and walked into the operating room and saw a White and Black dog sitting on operating table. Usually there is some paper work filled out by the technician telling me what is wrong. But there was none. I had never seen such a mess. The dog was dirty and unkempt, had a swollen eye with a large dirt clod on its head. The dog was very emaciated and gaunt. The technician came in and I asked him about the dog. He said his name was Cholo and that a family had brought him in and that they were in the waiting room. He said they were a Hispanic family - a mother and father and several children and even grandparents.

I went out to talk to them and asked them what had happened to Cholo. The little girl spoke for them. She said a week ago Cholo was hit by a car. He was hurt very badly. His eye popped out of its socket and his head was split open and they could see the brain. Then the mother began to speak in excited, broken English. She said her husband’s friend took him to the desert and shot him 5 times – 3 times in the head and 2 times in the neck. Then he buried him in a shallow grave.

Then about 5 days went by and the husband’s boss called him at home and said his dog was outside and didn’t look so good. The husband said that was impossible because he was dead. The boss said, ‘I don’t think so. This is your dog and you better get over here.” So the whole family went to see if it was really Cholo, and it was.

I asked them what they wanted me to do for Cholo – put him to sleep? The mother said, “Oh no. Cholo is a good dog and he must really want to live and so we must help him.” I told them that it could be very expensive and then he might die any way. The mother said they only had $1200 and hoped it would be enough to help Cholo live. I told them I would go check him out and let them know.

I went back into the operating room and began examining Cholo. The blood from his eye had dried up and had actually pulled it back into the socket and he appeared to be able to see fine. I then looked at his head and realized that it was only the sinus cavity that was exposed and stitched him back together. I then removed the bullets the best I could and he actually seemed quite fine and they were able to take Cholo home."

I was so glad Cholo's life was saved! However, I was also doggone happy that I wasn't that dog! But the more I thought about it I felt that maybe the worst day in that dog's life, in retrospect, actually turned out to be his best. He was still alive and knew he was loved by his family. I'm sure he received more love, dog biscuits, and good bones to chew on than he ever had before. Hopefully he had many good dog years ahead of him.

I thought the worst day in my life was the day I was body surfing at Laguna Beach and in a split second became paralyzed from the neck down and would have to live the remainder of my life on life support. I seemed to have lost so much -- the use of my body, my profession as a teacher, my callings in the Church, and I thought, my ability to be an effective husband and father. I didn't spend much time dwelling on it, but I did think from time to time why this had happened to me.

Part of the answer has come to me over the years from a talk given by Hugh B. Brown, a former general authority and counselor in the first presidency. The entire talk which was given many years ago was reprinted in its entirety in the January, 1973, New Era. It is worth reading.

President Brown as a young man was living on a farm he had purchased up in Canada. It was run down and a currant bush on the property had grown to a height of 6 feet. It had all gone to wood, and no longer was producing fruit. Taking his pruning shears he walked over to the currant bush to prune it. He then said:
"... I cut it down, and pruned it, and clipped it back until there was nothing left but a little clump of stumps. It was just coming daylight, and I thought I saw on top of each of these little stumps what appeared to be a tear, and I thought the currant bush was crying. I was kind of simpleminded (and I haven’t entirely gotten over it), and I looked at it, and smiled, and said, “What are you crying about?” You know, I thought I heard that currant bush talk. And I thought I heard it say this: “How could you do this to me? I was making such wonderful growth. I was almost as big as the shade tree and the fruit tree that are inside the fence, and now you have cut me down. Every plant in the garden will look down on me, because I didn’t make what I should have made. How could you do this to me? I thought you were the gardener here.” That’s what I thought I heard the currant bush say, and I thought it so much that I answered. I said, “Look, little currant bush, I am the gardener here, and I know what I want you to be. I didn’t intend you to be a fruit tree or a shade tree. I want you to be a currant bush, and some day, little currant bush, when you are laden with fruit, you are going to say, ‘Thank you, Mr. Gardener, for loving me enough to cut me down, for caring enough about me to hurt me. Thank you, Mr. Gardener.’ ”
Time passed. Years passed, and President Brown was in England with the British Canadian forces fighting in World War I. He was well thought of as an officer and was in line to be promoted to General. He knew in his heart, as did his fellow officers that the appointment to General should be his. President Brown related how he was so proud of himself, his achievement, and how much he looked like a general and obviously deserved to be one. Instead, he was called in to meet with the commanding general of the British Canadian troops in England and was informed that he was being sent back to Canada, would maintain his current rank, and would be training troops instead of fighting. He later learned the reason for this action was that he was a Mormon. Mormons were not highly thought of at that time and he had achieved the highest rank any Mormon had ever attained in the British Canadian Army.

After receiving the bad news on what he then thought was one of the worst days of his life, he said "... and when I got to my tent, I was so bitter that I threw my cap and my saddle brown belt on the cot. I clinched my fists and I shook them at heaven. I said, “How could you do this to me, God? I have done everything I could do to measure up. There is nothing that I could have done—that I should have done—that I haven’t done. How could you do this to me?” I was as bitter as gall.
And then I heard a voice, and I recognized the tone of this voice. It was my own voice, and the voice said, “I am the gardener here. I know what I want you to do.” The bitterness went out of my soul, and I fell on my knees by the cot to ask forgiveness for my ungratefulness and my bitterness..."

At the time of my accident everything in my life was going so well. My family and I were living "after the manner of happiness." There was not a cloud on the horizon and the wonderful dreams we shared regarding our future seemed righteous and achievable and what the Lord would have us do. However, His ways are not always our ways, and the pruning process began. I was like the currant bush that had been pruned. There were tears in my eyes and in my heart. I felt that I had been cut down to nothing and it hurt badly. I didn't clench my fists and shake them at God, crying out in bitterness, "Why did this happen to me," but my heart was broken. I was devastated.

As I consider the years that have gone by since the accident, just like the currant bush, though the pruning was very painful, it was necessary for me to be able to fulfill a mission the Lord had in store for me that I never could have anticipated, aspired to, or envisioned. In order to fulfill that mission I had an important lesson to learn that the "Gardner" knew that for me at least, I could only learn through the pruning.

The lesson I had to learn, and thankfully every one doesn't need to be paralyzed and on life support to learn it, was stated by the Savior to his apostles just before going into the Garden of Gethsemane. "I am the vine, ye are the branches. He who abideth in me and I in him bringeth forth much fruit, for without me ye can do nothing." [John 15:5, emphasis added]

My individualized pruning by the master "Gardener" has taught me this valuable lesson -- I am nothing, and can do nothing, without Christ -- the "true Vine."

If we learn no other lesson during our lifetimes than without Christ we can do nothing, our time here upon this Earth will not have been wasted.

Dad/Grandpa/Jack

Hallelujah!

2010-07-27T13:53:00.000-07:00

Hallelujah! Well, it finally happened. In 2002 I was lying in bed wondering what I could do in my paralyzed condition to be a more effective husband, father, and grandfather. Suddenly a powerful impression came to me that because of my computer and wonderful voice recognition software could write to my children and grandchildren share with them my perspective feelings about life. I started writing that day and over the years have written approximately 200 observations about life. My children and grandchildren have always been my target audience but over the years many others have also begun to receive these observations over the Internet by e-mail.

In January Cedar Fort/Bonneville Books, having read some of my observations, asks if I would work with them to produce a book. I did and the book was published today. The book is titled "It's Good to Be Alive!" It is comprised of a selection of what the publisher and my wife, Jo Anne and I feel are the best of the observations written over the years. There is a lot of humor in it as well as pictures and those things that have helped me to deal with 21 years of paralysis and living on life support. I think you will enjoy it.

I got word today that it will be available at Barnes & Noble, Borders, Amazon.com, Deseret Book, and Seagull. You can get an overview of the book by going to my website: www.jackrushton.com

Excuse me for being so excited but for an old paralyzed guy on life support this is a great day.

Tender Mercies

2010-07-25T18:01:00.000-07:00

Tender Mercies

A couple of weeks ago Jo Anne and I were out in the van running some errands. On the way home she said she needed to stop at Stater Brothers and buy some milk. I kind of wanted to go right home but she promised to buy us an Almond Joy to share (she knew they were on sale that day) if I didn't give her a hard time. I am a sucker for Almond Joys so I gave my hearty consent.

We have cell phones with Bluetooths so we can be in constant communication while she is in the store and I am in the van. Knowing she was only going to be in the store for a few minutes we opted not to activate the cell phones. We should have known better -- do you think the Lord forgives stupidity as well as sin? We were listening to a very interesting book on CD so Jo Anne left it on while she dashed into the store. No sooner had she walked away from the van and entered the store when I heard a sickening noise from the ventilator and it stopped instantly. There is no way to describe the abject terror I experience when I can't breathe. I believe it is compounded in my situation because I can't move either. This has happened to me five other times during the past 21 years and thankfully each time I have come back before I have taken the journey into the happy hunting ground, although one time I did go into an eight hour coma. When I can't breathe I go through three stages before I pass out -- sheer panic, resignation, and what I call the twilight zone. The resignation comes quite quickly after the panic. I realize that nobody can hear me and that Jo Anne is not likely to return immediately to save me in time. I basically quit fighting and wait for the inevitable. Interesting as it was, I was beginning to lose track of the storyline of the book I was listening to; a telltale sign that I was not getting enough oxygen to the brain. Finally I slipped into the twilight zone which is really very peaceful and almost euphoric. In that state I could no longer hear the book. I believe from my own experience that it is extremely easy to die, and after the initial shock that brings on death, whatever it may be, it is really not an unpleasant experience from that point on. I think it is the living that can be hard and demanding!

I have no idea how long I was passed out, but suddenly it seemed I was dreaming or was in heaven or maybe somewhere else, because I was hearing someone speaking to me. As I became more alert I realized it was my book on CD, and I was actually breathing -- hallelujah! As mysteriously as the ventilator had quit pumping air into my lungs it began, all on its own, to start working once again. Just about that time Jo Anne came running back to the van with the milk and the Almond Joy. Believe me it was a joy to see her face again. Glancing at me she said, "You don't look so good!" After a bite of the Almond Joy I got my strength back and told her what had happened. We both felt it truly was another "tender mercy" from the Lord -- a miracle. Some would say it was simply an electrical and mechanical glitch of some kind. We feel the Lord was watching over us, but must be losing patience with us as we seem to be working our guardian angels overtime.

We would never want to be guilty of the sin of ingratitude and do believe, "And in nothing doth man offend God, or against none is his wrath kindled, save those who confess not his hand in all things..." [D&C 59:21]

We believe my life has been preserved countless times because of the "tender mercies" of the Lord. We would be most ungrateful to just assume that what we have been experiencing for 21 years has been "luck" or simply "coincidental."

A number of years ago I was to speak to a large group of youth in a city about 30 miles from our home. It was a Sunday evening and as usual we were running a little late. Just as we entered the parking lot we heard a strange noise coming from beneath our van. As we pulled into the handicapped parking space the noise increased and as Jo Anne tried to put the van in reverse to reposition it a little bit she was unable to do so. Apparently something horrible and maybe terminal had happened to the transmission and it looked as though we were stuck there for good. I panicked knowing that I cannot get into just any vehicle because of the size of my wheelchair and my life support system. Here it was Sunday evening and what would we do, and how would we ever get home safely? I told Jo Anne I just didn't know how I could possibly speak to those young people knowing the situation we were in, and that we should immediately go to work and try to solve this problem before it got any later. She has much more faith than I have and said, "Jack, there is a large group of young people that have come here to hear you speak tonight. You go on in there and do your best and somehow things will work out." I wanted to believe her, but just didn't know how things could possibly work out. However, I decided to go forward, trusting in her faith.

As we entered the chapel the stake president introduced himself to us. I mentioned to him the problem we were having with our van and he told me not to worry about it and that he would make sure we got home safely that night. That was comforting to me but I still didn't see how it was going to happen.

We had a wonderful and edifying experience with the youth. I was able to put vans and transmission problems out of my mind while I spoke, but as the meeting came to an end my heart began to be troubled once again. What would we ever do to solve this problem and get home safely?

Just as the meeting ended and people were getting up to go home, a man who had been sitting with the youth approached Jo Anne and me. He said that the stake president had told him of our problem and that he thought he could help us out. He told us that normally he would not have attended a youth meeting like this because he had other responsibilities that night, but he felt impressed that he should come to this meeting. He informed us that he was a troubleshooting mechanic who worked exclusively on the transmissions of Dodge minivans which is what we were driving. He said he had just returned from a trip to repair some Dodge minivan transmissions, and that all of his tools were in his van which was outside in the parking lot. He immediately went to work on our transmission and was able to put it into a "failsafe mode" which would enable us to get home. The only problem is that we couldn't slow down once we got on the freeway which was no problem for Jo Anne -- believe me! This wonderful man and his wife followed us all the way home. As we pulled off the freeway and slowed down, the transmission began to make some very interesting noises. As we pulled up in front of our home and Jo Anne applied the brakes as she normally does -- no halfway measures -- the transmission fell out onto the street with a gut wrenching series of screeching and grinding sounds.

Wasn't all of this just a coincidence and good luck? I don't believe so! As so many of you could, I could relate countless experiences like the two I have recorded in this observation. Like you, I experience the "tender mercies," of the Lord on a daily basis. How foolish it would be to not recognize the hand of God in our lives.

What does the phrase, "the tender mercies of the Lord," mean? Nobody said it better than Elder David A. Bednar, "... The Lord’s tender mercies are the very personal and individualized blessings, strength, protection, assurances, guidance, loving-kindnesses, consolation, support, and spiritual gifts which we receive from and because of and through the Lord Jesus Christ." [Ensign, May, 2005]

Our daily challenge is to recognize these "tender mercies" in our lives and thank the Lord for them.

I believe the words of Nephi "... I... will show unto you that the tender mercies of the Lord are over all those whom he hath chosen because of their faith to make them mighty even under the power of deliverance." [1 Nephi 1:20]

And so it is!

Dad/Grandpa/Jack

Defense

2010-05-19T17:36:00.000-07:00

From late fall until late spring I am thoroughly entertained by college and professional basketball games. Being paralyzed and mobility impaired, I stand in awe and marvel at the athleticism and skill of these great basketball players. Loving basketball as I do adds some spice and enjoyment to my life which wouldn't be there otherwise. I also have learned great lessons about life from participating in and watching great basketball players and teams over the years.

From the time I was a very young boy I loved to play basketball. We had an alley that ran along the side of our house in Ruth, Nevada. My dad and older brothers sunk a large post in a hole they dug in the alley next to our back fence, nailed a makeshift backboard to the post, approximately 10 feet high, screwed a rim onto the backboard and this would be our basketball court for years to come. We played basketball all year long. In winter we would shovel the snow away from the basket as best we could and then with heavy coats, mittens, wool stocking caps, and overshoes we would play basketball for hours at a time. As spring gradually arrived and the dirt in the alley began to thaw out we would play in the mud, and as spring turned into summer we would play in the dust of the alley. I tried to practice the piano and clarinet before school so that it would not interfere with my basketball after school. I would run into the house, throw my books on to the table, grab the basketball, and head for the alley. If there was nobody to play with I didn't care and would shoot hundreds of jump shots, pretending I was shooting the winning basket for the White Pine County High School Bobcats.

I humbly admit that because of all the practice I became a deadly three-point shooter. The only trouble was that in my era you only got two points for a made basket regardless of the distance. One of my great dreams and fantasies was to play on the varsity high school basketball team. I attended every high school basketball game I could possibly get to as a young boy, and my heart would almost leap out of my chest as the Bobcats would come running out onto the floor dressed in their magnificent blue warm ups as the band played and the crowd sang "On Ye Bobcats, On Ye Bobcats...."

I am going to fast forward to my junior year in high school. 12 boys made the varsity basketball team that year and I was No. 12. My joy was complete the night of our first game as I ran out on to the court in my glorious blue warm ups as the band and crowd sang our fight song. Our coach was Nephi Schwab (not a Catholic), who along with his brother Moroni, had been outstanding all-conference linemen at Utah State University in their day. I had made the team but I had a little problem that coach Schwab was trying to help me resolve. To this day I can hear him screaming at me as I ran up and down the floor, "Rushton, there is more to basketball than offense!" Well, you could have fooled me. I never saw a shot I didn't like and given a little space I could hit most of them. However, I was a defensive liability because of my lack of speed and jumping ability and desire to play defense. You see, defense is hard work and there is little glory in it. Defense in my mind could not compare to the sound of the basketball swishing through the bottom of the net. Defense demanded discipline, hard work and dogged determination. Sad to say, but at that time in my life I was more offense than defense.

I have come to appreciate the words of Nephi Schwab, "Rushton, there is more to basketball than offense!" I know now that as in basketball, there is "more to life than offense" as well. Those things that don't bring to us the spotlight and the cheers of the crowd but demand discipline, hard work, and endurance in the face of great challenges are those things that ultimately matter the most. I suppose we all need to work a little harder on our defense.

Ultimately the kind of defense that will do us the most good in our lives comes not in the form of better home security systems, or arming ourselves with weapons to defend ourselves. The defense we need the most comes from being willing to pay the individual price necessary to obtain the kind of armor described by Paul that will protect us spiritually from the evils of this world. "Wherefore take unto you the whole armour of God,that ye may be able to withstand in the evil day, and having done all, to stand. Stand therefore, having your loins girt about with truth, and having on the breastplate of righteousness; And your feet shod with the preparation of the gospel of peace; Above all, taking the shield of faith, wherewith ye shall be able to quench all the fiery darts of the wicked. And take the helmet of salvation, and the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God...." [Ephesians 6:13-17]

We can't buy this kind of protective armor from eBay or Costco. It is very individualized. Someone else's breastplate of righteousness and shield of faith will do me no good in my individual battle with wickedness and the inevitable challenges and adversities of life. Our defense and armor must be strengthened and polished every day or it will grow weak and rusty and useless. There will never be a day in our lives that we don't need to pray, read the Scriptures, seek to entertain pure thoughts and images in our minds and hearts, and serve others. This is the equivalent of playing sweaty, hard-nosed, in-your-face defense against the Adversary of our souls. If we don't carefully prepare to defend ourselves daily we likely will lose the game of life and experience the agony of defeat instead of the joy Father wanted each one of his children to experience in mortality.

Thankfully I finally caught on to what Nephi Schwab was trying to teach me as a young teenager. I learned I could never win the battle against paralysis and the depression and feelings of hopelessness it can bring with it without polishing and strengthening my armor each day through Scripture study, prayer, trying to entertain pure thoughts, and serving others in my own unique way. All of this is very personal and private, but is far more important than any public thing I could ever do in the spotlight. Yes, there certainly is more to life than just "offense."

Dad/Grandpa/Jack

Malpractice

2010-04-05T17:32:00.000-07:00

Malpractice
"Whatsoever thy hand findeth to do, do it with thy might..." [Ecclesiastes 9:10]

A few years ago Jo Anne had surgery on both of her feet. The first couple of days she experienced severe pain and I told her she was a bit wimpy, and that I would have been able to endure the same procedure without even any anesthesia. Well, given the circumstances she didn't respond very well to my paralyzed humor. She recovered quite quickly thankfully, but for a few days she had to roll around in a wheelchair and we looked like a very interesting couple to say the least.
She actually had the same surgery about 10 years before this latest and new procedure, but the doctor didn't do it correctly and so she had to have it redone. Fortunately for the public with feet problems this doctor quit the medical profession, under some duress I believe. His former partner however, agreed to do the new surgery at no charge and it seems as though he did as good a job as he possibly could given the circumstances. You don't find that kind of a person around much anymore.
Don't you just love people who have paid the price to gain knowledge and training in their special fields and then who have the integrity to do it "... with [their] might....?" I suspect if we were suing kinds of people we could have sued the first foot doctor for malpractice.
A couple of days before the surgery we drove out to Riverside County to watch our son, Mike, give his opening argument in a death penalty, serial killing case. Mike was a deputy district attorney at the time. This case involved a particularly heinous crime committed by two extremely evil and wicked individuals. Mike had been preparing for this trial for several years. Although he is our son and we are very prejudiced, he did a masterful job in a 2 1/2 hour opening statement to put the case in proper perspective in the eyes of the jury. He seldom glanced at any notes and everyone in the courtroom was riveted on every word he spoke. We went back two days later and observed him skillfully question witness after witness as he began to build his case. I was very impressed with his intense preparation and desire to see justice done for the victim -- a young 14-year-old girl -- and her family and young friends. The young friends who at the time of the trial were now in their late teens and early twenties were absolutely overwhelmed that anybody would care enough about this one, little, seemingly insignificant girl, to invest so much time and effort into bringing her murderers to justice. The trial went on for over six months. The jury finally came back with a death penalty verdict which was unprecedented because one of the serial killers was a young woman. Based on what I observed in that courtroom I don't think Mike could ever be accused of malpractice. If so it wouldn't ever be because of a lack of effort on his part as he works with all his "might" to see justice done.
The contrast between the first foot doctor, the second foot doctor, and Mike has caused me to reflect on the fact that almost anybody in any walk of life is susceptible of being guilty of malpractice. I believe malpractice is more a question of motive than knowledge and training most of the time. A respiratory therapist, a caregiver, (I am especially concerned that these vital people in my life are never guilty of malpractice) a painter, a wallpaper hanger, a carpenter, an auto mechanic, a wedding coordinator and caterer, and even spouses and parents, and etc., could all be guilty of malpractice if they don't do with all their "might" what they have promised and are supposed to be doing.
What about teachers? I am quite sensitive about this having been a teacher for most of my life. I still am always asking myself if I have prepared sufficiently and pondered deeply and long enough to teach an adequate lesson regarding significant gospel topics. I hope I am never guilty of malpractice because of a lack of preparation or effort and that I could only be blamed for stupidity. I am sure there have been a few students over the years that perhaps would have been justified in suing me for malpractice. I have always tried hard however to never be guilty, as a teacher, of slaying my students as Samson did the Philistines. "And Samson said, With the jawbone of an ass...have I slain a thousand men." [Judges 15:16]
I suspect the quotation from Ecclesiastes at the top of this Observation cuts across every aspect of our lives --"Whatsoever thy hand findeth to do, do it with thy might..." [Ecclesiastes 9:10]

In our professions, as students, in our church callings, as spouses and parents, and citizens of this great nation we must never be so negligent and sloppy in what we do that we could ever be rightfully sued for malpractice.
Perhaps an important thought in all of this was given by the transcendentalist author (1817-1862) Henry David Thoreau: "Do not hire a man who does your work for money, but him who does it for love of it."
Dad/Grandpa/Jack

March Madness

2010-03-27T13:22:00.000-07:00

"March Madness"

I have been an avid follower of "March Madness" for many years – the men’s basketball NCAA tournament. I hate to admit it, but I am a basketball junkie. Even at my age, I must confess there is still a fire burning inside me regarding this sport. My love for basketball is irrefutable evidence of a misspent youth playing basketball anywhere and everywhere I could and as often as I could. In fact, up to the time I was hurt, I played basketball with co-workers, on church teams, with my kids, neighbors and relatives at family gatherings.

Jo Anne, who could not understand my passion for this sport in the early years of our marriage, is now as grateful as I am for the entertainment it has provided me following my injury. Since being paralyzed, it has brought me hours of enjoyment that, had I not been a fan, would perhaps of been filled with self pity and boredom. While involved in a game, I actually lose my sense of self and become fully involved in what I am watching. For a short time, my body becomes irrelevant and there is no distinction between me and the other fans that are also caught up in the moment. My love for this sport has only intensified through the years.

I must tell you about the time that "March Madness" almost cost me my life. My wife, Jo Anne, and my youngest daughter, Jackie, and I had gone to St. George to visit some of Jo Anne's family. It was toward the end of March and I was a little nervous that I would not be able to see the NCAA championship game. My whole trip brightened considerably, however, when Jo Anne's brother, Danny, who lives in Mesquite, Nevada, invited me to come over because he was going to be watching the championship game between the University of Arizona and the University of Kansas on his big screen TV. I eagerly accepted his invitation, but wouldn’t you know the day before the great event the battery to the ventilator on the back of my wheelchair died. Jo Anne tried to locate a new one, but the right battery could not be found in all of St. George. The medical supply store found a garage who said they could order one, but that it might take a few days to get it.

The ventilator worked just fine as long as it was plugged into an outlet in the wall. I figured since breathing is better than not breathing, I really had no choice but to stay put. Not much fun for a vacation. Then a light went on in my head -- pure revelation. My ventilator is equipped with an internal battery. It is a safety feature in case the main battery dies and one is not close to an outlet. If fully charged, it is supposed to last about one hour – something we had never yet put to the test. Well, I knew that it was less than an hour from St. George to Mesquite, and the way Jo Anne drives, it would even be a shorter time period than that.

I finally convinced Jo Anne to take me and promised her that it would be okay. So late in the afternoon of the game, she and her youngest daughter, Jackie, loaded me into the van and off we went. However, I did not calculate in my plan the unexpected.

Just as we were about to get on the freeway, Jo Anne realized we needed gas. As if that wasn’t enough, we took the wrong off-ramp to get to Danny's home and got lost. We were still some distance from our destination when the internal battery ran out of juice. At that moment we discovered that when the ventilator dies, it gives a big, sickening gasp - its last breath and mine – and completely shuts down. The next sound is another safety feature – an alarm begins ringing. It is quite a gut wrenching sound to the person who is depending on the ventilator for his air. With Jo Anne at the wheel, we had prepared Jackie in advance if the worst case scenario should happen. Standing, ready and able to help her Dad, she pulled out the trusty ambubag (a hand operated air pump) and began pumping air into my lungs via my trach attached to my neck. As Jackie, not quite 12 years old at the time (we train them young at our house) began pumping air into my lungs, she realized that she had me in a very compromising situation – to her advantage. While pumping like a good daughter, the questions started coming - “Dad, could I have a new bicycle?" "Yes,” I gasped out. “Yes, anything, just keep pumping!" "Dad, how about a year's pass to Disneyland?" "Yes,” I agreed again. “Just keep squeezing that bag!"

We finally screeched to a stop in front of Danny's home and he came running out into the driveway with a long extension cord. Soon the ventilator was happy once again as it took over the job of pumping air into my lungs to the relief of us all – especially Jackie who had done such a good job. In fact, she had this incredible smile on her face. I could just picture visions of bicycles and Disneyland dancing in her head.

Plugged into the wall, munching on chips and dip, drinking root beer, and watching Arizona beat Kansas on the big screen TV, I was truly in heaven. I temporarily put out of my mind the fact that later that night -- it turned out to be midnight -- we would have to make the mad dash back up the gorge to St. George to the safety of another extension cord and wall socket. Jo Anne, giving a great imitation of an Indy 500 driver, got us home safely.

Well, am I crazy or what? Was it really worth risking my life to be able to watch that game on the big screen TV? Any normal rational person would say of course not! But for somebody infected with the "March Madness" disease - yes, it was worth the risk.

It is so hard to get basketball out of your blood. I think I am in pretty good company though. I love this passage from President Spencer W. Kimball's Journal which he wrote as a young man: "It is a great occasion. Many people came tonight who have never been before. Some of the townsmen say basketball is a girl’s game but they came in large numbers tonight. Our court is not quite regulation. We are used to it, our opponents not. I have special luck with my shots tonight and the ball goes through the hoop again and again and the game ends with our High School team the victors against the college team. I am the smallest one and the youngest on the team. I have piled up the most points through the efforts of the whole team protecting me and feeding the ball to me. I am on the shoulders of the big fellows of the Academy. They are parading me around the hall to my consternation and embarrassment. I like basketball. I would rather play this game than eat." (Edward L. Kimball and Andrew E. Kimball Jr., Spencer W. Kimball (Salt Lake City Bookcraft, 1977), 65)

I can totally identify with President Kimball's sentiments regarding basketball. From President Ezra Taft Benson's biography comes the following incident: “Ezra remembers his father swearing only once. The Oneida Stake Academy was playing Brigham Young College in Logan, and late in the game Oneida trailed by a point after failing to convert on several attempts. Ezra suddenly got the ball and an exasperated George yelled. ‘Hell, T. put it in!’ It was shocking to the local citizens coming from George Benson, but apparently they understood his enthusiasm and anxiety.” Ezra continued, “When we finished with a one-point victory, Father was overjoyed.” (Sheri L. Dew, Ezra Taft Benson: A Biography (Salt Lake City: Deseret Book, 1987), 39)

Have I ever been tempted to utter a cuss word during a Lakers or BYU basketball game? Well, hopefully those of you with sound minds will have mercy on those of us who are smitten by "March Madness." If you unfortunately happen to be married to someone with this affliction, let me give you the following counsel. As you offer your prayers for your loved one, use as a pattern the words of the distraught father who brought his son to Jesus to be healed. "Lord, have mercy on my son [husband]: for he is [a] lunatic..." [Matthew 17: 15] And then we must never forget Paul's counsel to the Thessalonian Saints: "... comfort the feebleminded..." [1 Thessalonians 5: 14]

On the bright side, "March Madness" comes only once every 12 months!

Dad/Grandpa/Rushton

Duty

2010-03-17T17:56:00.000-07:00

A while back, after a particularly difficult day, Jo Anne said to me, "Jack, we really ought to write a book about our experiences together since your accident." I agreed that it would make for some interesting reading. She then said, "And if we write that book I have the perfect title for it. We will call it "The Work and the Glory!" I looked at her in amazement and told her that really was a good title but a very famous author (Gerald N. Lund) had pretty well used it up. She responded, "I know that, but it would still be the perfect title for our book because for some reason I seem to do all the work and you manage to get all the glory."

For the past 20 years I have been unable to do one thing for myself physically. All my physical needs have had to be met by family and friends. Primarily the responsibility has fallen upon Jo Anne who has worked tirelessly in my behalf. I believe she has done it out of love but also out of a sense of duty.

Although I really can't do anything of a physical nature to repay her for all she has done and continues to do for me, I have felt I have a "duty" with regard to her as great as she has to me. And so you might ask, what is my "duty" toward her as my wife in this unusual situation? I believe it is, among other things, to be as pleasant as I can be, totally open in my communication with her, complementary, filled with gratitude for every act of service she performs on my behalf, and never being critical of her in any way. I believe this is my "duty."

The dictionary says of duty: "Duty: Synonym -- respect...
Obligatory tasks, conduct, service, functions that arise from one's position... a moral or legal obligation ... the force of moral obligation." [Merriam Webster Dictionary]

I have gained a great appreciation for the importance of duty in our lives by reading a most interesting book entitled, Nelson's Trafalgar, written by Roy Adkins. Reading this book has been a sobering, but at the same time, an inspiring experience. The author has quoted extensively from the journals of the captains and seamen. There were 17,000 British sailors who fought in this bloody and horrific sea battle -- the last major sea battle fought by wooden ships with sails. The blood and carnage is a bit difficult to read about, but at the same time it heightens one's appreciation of sea life and war in the early 1800s and the courage of those involved.

Of the many things I could share with you from this book I will confine myself to the importance of "duty" that enabled Admiral Lord Nelson and his captains and seamen to win the important battle of Trafalgar.

The Battle of Trafalgar was fought on October 21, 1805, off the coast of Spain near the large Spanish city of Cadiz, and at a point near the coast called Trafalgar. Napoleon had his French army poised on the coast of France ready to cross the English Channel and invade England. He couldn't do this however, unless he knew that he had destroyed the British Navy and could cross the Channel unmolested. The French and Spanish were allies and had a vast combined fleet of French and Spanish warships that was much larger than anything that Great Britain could put together at the time. France and Spain had the ships and the manpower but they didn't have Admiral Lord Nelson.

The British Navy had been blockading the harbor at Cadiz for months, but finally the combined French and Spanish fleet was able to escape which led to the showdown at Trafalgar. The leaders of the British Empire knew that if the British fleet was defeated by the French and Spanish that a French invasion would be inevitable. Admiral Lord Nelson, the Admiral of the British fleet, was given the assignment by his government and King to destroy the French and Spanish Armada. Nelson was a brilliant tactician and had gained vast knowledge of how to successfully conduct a sea battle between wooden ships with sails. He had been wounded in a previous engagement, losing one of his arms and an eye, and never again experienced robust health. Much of his life was spent at sea where he had also suffered from scurvy and other diseases incident to sea life in those days. He was only 5'4" tall but seemed so much bigger in the eyes of those he led.
Just before the English engaged the combined fleet, Nelson signaled from the flagship Victory the one and only message his captains and seamen would receive from him before and during the battle, "England expects that every man will do his duty." When this message was received it had an electrifying effect among the men on the ships. Seemingly, the desire in the heart of most of the British sailors that day was to do his duty come what may. Severely wounded men and officers remained at their posts doing their duty until victory had been gained and their beloved England saved.
In fact, Nelson's final famous words (as related by Victory's Surgeon, William Beatty, who was with Nelson when he died) were "Thank God I have done my duty." According to Beatty, he repeated these words several times until he became unable to speak. To do their "duty" seems to have been at the heart of all that was important to Admiral Lord Nelson and his men. Doing their duty they saved England from Napoleon's armies and ultimate domination of the Western world as we now know it by the Dictator-Emperor.
I believe that "Heavenly Father expects each one of us to do his/her duty." To be able to say at the end of one's life, "Thank God I have done my duty!" would undoubtedly be the crowning achievement of a life well lived. Or as the Apostle Paul said, "I have fought a good fight, I have finished my course, I have kept the faith!" (2 Timothy 4:8)
Dad/Grandpa/Jack

Are You Listening?

2010-02-06T13:25:00.000-08:00

Jo Anne took me to Costco a while back to see if I needed Hearing Aids or was just tired of listening to her and was tuning her out on purpose. Thankfully, the Costco Hearing Aid technician saved me. After an extensive test, he revealed to us that indeed I had lost 25 to 30% of my ability to hear in both ears. He recommended a pair of $1000 Hearing Aids, but when I tried them out all I could hear was the swooshing noise my ventilator makes as I breathe. I pretty much had to choose either breathing or hearing better, so I immediately opted for breathing. Much to my chagrin Jo Anne hesitated for some time weighing the options, but also finally agreed that maybe breathing was just a little bit more important than hearing well. I was very relieved!

However, I believe hearing well and especially listening carefully to others is almost as important as breathing. When I think of the people I enjoy visiting with the most it is invariably with those who really listen to me and seem genuinely interested in what I have to say. When I am in a crowded place like Costco for example, most people don't pay much attention to me but on occasion a random individual will approach me and say, "Wow, what an incredible wheelchair you have. How does it work?" And then they really listen and ask even more questions like "What happened to you anyway?" Whenever I have these experiences with strangers my life is enriched because they are validating me as a human being and a person of worth through their desire to hear and listen and understand.

Jo Anne is a good listener. She hears everything I say and many times things I don't say or didn't think I said. Since my accident, on occasion we have had some heated conversations about various topics and just as I am about to make a winning argument she will reach over and pull my air hose off my throat -- end of conversation, end of empathetic listening -- end of life?

Many years ago I learned a great lesson about the importance of listening. I was teaching seminary at the Utah State Industrial School in Ogden, Utah, which in reality was a prison for juvenile delinquents who had run awry of the law.

One year while I was teaching there I would go to the maximum security unit once each day to teach a class to the boys incarcerated there because they were considered to be dangerous or a security risk. They wore blue jeans, white T-shirts, tennis shoes with no laces, and were extremely depressed and unhappy. Several guards watched them 24 hours a day from a glass booth strategically positioned so that the kids were never out of earshot or sight.

Almost all the boys attended my class, not because I was a great teacher, but because I didn't work for the state and therefore had no power over them. It was a diversion for them, to have someone like me visit them while they were doing their time in maximum security.

After a very simple lesson regarding fundamental principles of life like working instead of stealing, being honest instead of lying, respecting the sanctity of life, and etc. I would stay another hour to do some individual counseling. The boys would frantically gather around me at the conclusion of our formal class saying "Brother Rushton, talk to me today, please talk to me!" I would try to give everyone a fair chance from day to day. I quickly learned however that what they were really saying, instead of "Talk to me, talk to me," was "Listen to me, please listen to me!" I would say very little during those counseling sessions but I would give them my undivided attention. It seemed to help. Their problems were so overwhelming I doubt that even Solomon could have had the wisdom to help solve them. In maximum security I learned how important it was and is to truly be listened to. I got the feeling that many of these disturbed young men had never truly been listened to by a significant adult in their lives. Sad to say, many of these young men died violent and premature deaths or ended up in the state penitentiary. No, they didn't live happily ever after because I listened to them I hate to report, but at least for a few hours of their lives in maximum security, somebody truly listened to them and it was a soothing balm for their harrowed up souls if only for a brief period of time.

I think perhaps the greatest gift we can give to our spouses, children, and our friends, is to truly listen to them, giving them our undivided attention. Turning off the TV, looking away from our computer screen, closing the book or leaving an important unfinished task to listen to a loved one will convey love like few other things can.

In a wonderful talk that strikes a chord with me (Ensign, May 1991) about the importance of listening, Elder Russell M. Nelson, among other things counseled:

"A wise father once said, “I do a greater amount of good when I listen to my children than when I talk to them...The time to listen is when someone needs to be heard...Parents with teenage youth may find that time for listening is often less convenient but more important when young people feel lonely or troubled. And when they seem to deserve favor least, they may need it most...some couples seem not to listen to one another... If marriage is a prime relationship in life, it deserves prime time! Yet less important appointments are often given priority, leaving only leftover moments for listening to precious partners..."

Breathing or listening is a hard call. But just as breathing gives life to the body, so does listening give life to all the precious relationships we have in mortality.

Many years ago as I was lying in a hospital bed in the ICU of our local regional trauma center and learned that I had lost forever, in mortality anyway, the use of my physical body, I realized that the only thing that meant anything to me in that moment was the relationships I had with my family, my friends, and the Lord. Nothing else I had accomplished in my life, no worldly possession, no degrees or honors of men meant anything to me. If learning to listen better can strengthen all those relationships, how we ought to work at it! Are you listening?

Dad/Grandpa/Jack

The Importance of Knowing Who We Are

2010-01-21T11:24:00.000-08:00

January 19, 2010, Observation:

Jo Anne and I were out driving one afternoon and pulled up behind a big black pickup truck with huge oversized tires and a sign in the back window that said "Quad for Sale!" She looked over at me with a big smile on her face and said "What a great idea! I wonder how much I could get for you?" I could just picture myself driving around in my power wheelchair with a similar sign dangling from a string around my neck.

Lest you think badly of Jo Anne however, I heard her talking to one of her friends on the telephone the other day and she said to her, "I have a model husband." I was elated with her description of me and felt it was right on target, until I looked in my online dictionary and found that one of the definitions for "model" is "A cheap imitation."

I have been called lots of things since my injury such as "handicapped," "physically challenged," "mobility impaired," "quadriplegic," "Quad," and a few others I can't mention, or at least don't want to.

Before my accident I felt I had a pretty good idea of who I was, but after the accident I was a little shaky for some time regarding that subject. Quite frankly, for an extended period, I really didn't know who or what I was. It was devastating!

In some ways I felt I had left the human race I had been part of all my life. Something inside me however, rebelled against the idea of being labeled as something that I then perceived as being inferior compared to a normal person.

To add to my feelings of inadequacy and uncertainty as to who I was after my accident, just a couple of months after I was injured I experienced one of the most humiliating and demeaning experiences I have had in my life. It took place at Rancho Los Amigos Hospital where I spent six months being rehabilitated, in so far as that was possible. Thinking I had a blood clot in my leg one day, my doctor had me taken to the basement of one of the buildings at Rancho to have a test run that would determine whether his diagnosis was right. Because of the nature of the test he felt it would be safer to take out my speaking valve in my trachea system and put me back on the cuffed trachea that didn't allow me to speak. So down I went into that dark, cold, windowless basement room, unable to move any part of my body, lying on a gurney, and unable even to speak. The lab technicians rolled my gurney into a dark corner of the room. For the next hour or so they acted like I was not even there while they told each other immoral stories, cussed, blasphemed, and shared with each other the raucous, sleazy escapades they would be involved in that evening. Finally they did the test, never addressing me directly, and treating me as though I were a completely irrelevant and inanimate object.

Thankfully, having studied the Scriptures many of the years of my life, beginning in the mission field in Central America, I was reminded of it, and began to internalize some eternal truths regarding who I was. It began to make all the difference in the world.

A number of Scriptures began to mean a great deal to me. When the Lord appeared to Moses as recorded in Moses 1 he called him "my son" three times in verses 4-7 and in verse 6 he said to Moses "... and thou art in the similitude of mine Only Begotten Son and mine Only Begotten is the Savior..."

I believe He wanted Moses to know who he really was because of the great work Moses had been called upon to do in leading the Children of Israel out of Egypt and into the Promised Land. Moses was empowered and strengthened as it was revealed to him who he really was. I believe as it was with Moses so it is with each one of us as we come to know and internalize the great truth that we are sons and daughters of God created in the similitude of His Only Begotten Son-the Savior.

After this vision closed, Satan immediately appeared to Moses tempting him and saying "... Moses, son of man...worship me..." [Moses 1:11] [Emphasis added]

Moses was able to withstand this assault from Satan because he knew he was a son of God. By calling Moses son of man Lucifer hoped to deceive and weaken Moses and even entice him to be one of his followers.

When Satan came to tempt Jesus after he had fasted and prayed for 40 days and nights he devilishly introduced two of the three temptations with the challenge "... if thou be the son of God..." Satan knew that if he could place doubt in Jesus' mind regarding who he was that he could destroy him and the work he was sent here to do.

So it is with each one of us. Knowing who we really are strengthens us and empowers us to be able to fulfill our foreordained missions in mortality.

Gaining strength to overcome adversity and the Adversary by knowing who we really are, reminded me of an experience Joseph Smith had as a young man.

Elizabeth Ann Whitney, the wife of Newel K. Whitney, wrote in her journal: "Joseph Smith, with his wife, Emma, and a servant girl, came to Kirtland in a sleigh early in 1831; they drove up in front of my husband's store. Joseph jumped out and went in; he reached his hand across the counter to my husband and called him by name. My husband spoke, saying: "I could not call you by name as you have me." He answered, "I am Joseph the Prophet; you have prayed me here, now what do you want of me?" [Helen Mae Andrus, Hyrum L. Andrus, They Knew the Prophet, 39.] [Emphasis added]

That winter day in 1831 when Joseph met Newel K. Whitney and his wife in their store in Kirtland, Ohio, he was only 26 years old. I find it both remarkable and at the same time reassuring that this young man could with such confidence, announce himself to the Whitneys as "Joseph the Prophet."

I believe Joseph was able to endure all of the afflictions he suffered during his lifetime because he knew who he was.

Thankfully, I came to understand that I was not just a "handicapped" person, "mobility impaired," or a "Quad." Oh, I am all of that of course, but so much more -- a son of God created in the similitude off His Only Begotten Son.

Having internalized that truth I need never give in to the depression, despair, and blackness that accompanies the temptations that the Adversary places in my path.

Dad/Grandpa/Dad

Mornings

2009-12-26T12:16:00.000-08:00

Mornings

I believe it happened during a month when I was spending an inordinate amount of time in bed because of a pressure sore. Thankfully, when I spend time in bed I am able to work on my laptop computer making the downtime not as "down" as it would be otherwise. For some reason I was spending a lot of time reading the Old Testament. I just couldn't seem to get enough of it. I was reading 2 Samuel one afternoon when some words just leaped off the page at me. These words were David's final words recorded by the author or authors of Samuel, preserving a metaphor regarding Jehovah, Christ, The God of Israel. "Now these be the last words of David...The God of Israel...the Rock of Israel spake to me [saying]...And he shall be as the light of the morning, when the sun riseth, even a morning without clouds..." [2 Samuel 23:1-4] [Emphasis added]

I think David's metaphor concerning Christ struck such a responsive chord in me because of my love for the precious rising of the sun I have witnessed and enjoyed during my lifetime.

I have diminished eyesight. I can't really see out of my right eye and only good enough out of my left eye to read on my computer with the fonts magnified to the max. I can watch TV if I sit close enough to the screen and also movies if I am close to the front of the theater. However, one of the things I still am able to enjoy about life is to wake up each morning just as the sky is beginning to gray and witness the sun beginning to stream through the two large windows in my bedroom. To me it is a glorious and comforting sight.

I believe my love of the morning began when I worked for Kennecott Copper Corp. each summer as a young man. I would make enough money each summer working for Kennecott in Eastern Nevada to pay for two semesters at BYU the following fall and winter. I invariably worked what was known as the "Graveyard Shift" which began at 11:30 p.m. and ended at 7:30 a.m.

The summer I worked as a drill helper I will never forget. The drill was mounted on a rig that could be driven slowly from site to site depending on where holes needed to be drilled. We would drill holes all night and then in the morning the powder crew would come and fill the holes with explosives, ignite them, and the entire town would shake, rattle and roll for just a few minutes during the moment of explosion. Immense electric shovels would then scoop up the shattered earth which contained the precious copper ore, and deposit it in large trucks for ultimate transport to the mill and smelter.

Once the drill began its work the driller and his helper didn't have much to do but watch the drill and correct any problems that might occur.

The Liberty Pit in Ruth, Nevada, where I worked is located in a mountainous area which is more than 7000 feet in elevation. I remember standing and shivering outside in the very cold Nevada night air, hour after hour and night after night, anxiously awaiting one thing -- the arrival of morning. The Nevada nights were beautiful, full of stars, but I felt a great joy inside me as I looked at the Eastern Mountains and could discern them against a graying sky. The dark would reluctantly and imperceptibly give way to the powerful light of the rising sun. The morning star would still be visible, and then the sun would just seem to explode above the mountains and bathe me in its warm, life-giving rays. The long, cold night was over, and one of God's greatest gifts to his children, a new day, had dawned.

In the mission field I became an "early morning Nazi"(translation -- fanatic). I made it part of my mission to always be out of bed before any of my companions. I felt so righteous (self-righteous) as I would sit at my desk studying Spanish and searching the scriptures for an hour or so before my companions would begin to stir. Those hours, undisturbed by the awakening world, became precious to me. I would always make a point of going outside, or looking out the window as the sky would begin to gray to witness another glorious morning burst upon the world.

Arising early did not end with my mission. My most productive time of day was in those early hours before the sun would break over the horizon.

While I served as bishop my two oldest children were in early morning seminary, but not old enough to drive. We had an old Volkswagen bus and I would take my two children and pick up three or four of their friends and drive them to the chapel each morning. While they were in seminary I would run from the chapel up a street that led me into the foothills. My run would begin in the dark, but as I would return, the sky would begin to gray and by the time I reached the chapel to pick up the kids, the warming rays of the sun heralded that indeed, once again, a new day had been born.

I could go on with many more sunrise experiences, but suffice it to say, I think I know why David chose to describe Christ the way he did: "... He shall be as the light of the morning, when the sun riseth, even a morning without clouds..." David was a shepherd boy who cared for his father's sheep in the hills surrounding Bethlehem. How many long nights did he spend guarding those precious sheep, anxiously awaiting the glorious sunrise and dawning of a new day? How he must have enjoyed the warming and life-giving rays of the sun that would come each morning bringing life to him, the sheep, and to the earth.

Christ himself said: "... I am the light of the world: he that followeth me shall not walk in darkness, but shall have the light of life." [John 8:12] Christ disperses darkness, the darkness of sin and of death. Light and darkness cannot occupy the same space at the same time. David's metaphor is very powerful in teaching us that Christ is as the "light of the morning, when the sun rises, even a morning without clouds", dispelling the cold darkness of night and symbolically reassuring mankind that just as the night of death will come to each one of us, so will their come a glorious and literal "morning" of resurrection.

The scriptures reveal the following significant truth as well: "...Christ...is in the sun, and the light of the sun, and the power thereof by which it was made. And the light which shineth, which giveth you light, is through him who enlighteneth your eyes, which is the same light that quickeneth your understandings... Which light proceedeth forth from the presence of God to fill the immensity of space— The light which is in all things, which giveth life to all things..." [Doctrine & Covenants 88:7,11,12-13]

I believe when Christ comes to usher in his millennial reign he will come as the "light of the morning, when the sun rises, even a morning without clouds." I hope we will all be "morning" people then.

Yes, mornings are special as they remind us of the "light and life of the world".
Dad/Grandpa/Jack

Wisdom Teeth

2009-12-04T12:13:00.000-08:00

December 2, 2009, Observation:

Well, I hate to admit it, but I am not nearly as wise today as I was a couple of days ago. I had to go to an oral surgeon to have a bottom wisdom tooth and the one next to it extracted.

When I was a young married man I let a dentist in Ogden, Utah talk me into pulling all my wisdom teeth. As it turned out it was not a very wise decision on my part. He started in the afternoon and by 8 p.m. I was still in the chair with only the two wisdom teeth on the right side of my mouth having been pulled. As he was working on me he would say things like, "Oops, I think maybe I shouldn't have done it that way," and etc. He wanted to make an appointment to pull out the wisdom teeth on the left side but for some reason I did not feel inclined to take him up on his offer. He said that at some point in time those remaining wisdom teeth would be a problem to me. I never wanted to see the fulfillment of his prophecy and ever since that time one of my life's goals was to die before the wisdom teeth went bad on me. No such luck!

In all honesty it was a brutal experience. Several times during the procedure I wanted to cry, but old men are supposed to be tough and so I stifled the desire to scream, moan and groan, and just suffered in silence.

The longer the tooth extraction took, the oral surgeon began to look, in my mind's eye anyway, like a hairy, muscle bound, 800 pound gorilla, who was trying to pull my head off.

I must admit that as the procedure continued on and seemed that it would never end I was only thinking of one thing and that was me -- Jack Rushton and the pain and misery I was experiencing at that moment. With the oral surgeon's hands in my mouth, along with his various instruments of torture, I was not very concerned about those troops who had been recently killed at Fort Hood, Texas, and their surviving families and loved ones, or the thousands that have been killed in recent earthquakes and tsunamis, or the poor starving children in Africa, or even some dear friends that are suffering from severe health problems much worse than mine -- I was only thinking about one thing -- me!

I had the same feeling when I suffered my injury many years ago. I was consumed with "me." I was totally self-absorbed in my pain and in that condition could not reach out to help others or to even be concerned with their unique and individual challenges.

I take comfort in the fact that I think all of us, because of our humanness, are much the same way. Victor Frankl, the author of the important book, "Man's Search for Meaning", drew the following analogy regarding the relativity of human suffering: "... a man's suffering is similar to the behavior of gas. If a certain quantity of gas is pumped into an empty chamber, it will fill the chamber completely and evenly, no matter how big the chamber. Thus suffering completely fills the human soul and conscious mind, no matter whether the suffering is great or little. Therefore the "size" of human suffering is absolutely relative." [Man's Search for Meaning, Pages 61-62.]
I believe what he is saying is that if I am having wisdom teeth pulled out in California while people in Fort Hood, Texas are being slaughtered by a maniacal killer, or the good folks in Samoa or Peru are losing their lives because of earthquakes and tsunamis, I am going to be much more concerned with my pain than theirs. I believe like Victor Frankl that each individual's suffering -- regardless of the kind or "size" -- can completely fill his soul and conscious mind leaving little room to be concerned about the miseries of others. Because of this I also believe one of the challenges we all face is to rise above our own self-absorbing pain and misery and be able to reach out emotionally and spiritually to help others in need.

I took a life altering course at BYU as a junior. It was called "Major British Authors." My teacher, absolutely the best one I ever had from kindergarten through graduate school, Nan Grass, had written her doctoral dissertation on the great English writer, John Donne (1573-1631).

Because of her love for the writings of John Donne, we as her students began to love them as well. She felt his prose was the most sublime ever written in the English language. I do not doubt that statement was just hyperbole on her part.
One of her favorite passages from his writings, and one of my favorites as well, comes from his "Meditation 17, from Devotions Upon Emergent Occasions." (1624) "...No man is an island, entire of itself; every man is a piece of the continent, a part of the main. If a clod be washed away by the sea, Europe is the less... Any man's death diminishes me, because I am involved in mankind; and therefore never send to know for whom the bell tolls; it tolls for thee..."
I have pondered for years about what John Donne wrote so long ago, and believe he described beautifully an eternal principle. Truly, "No man is an island" and any man's death (or suffering) diminishes us because, hopefully as he stated "... [we are] involved in mankind...."

As I think about Donne's words I cannot help but think of the suffering experienced by all of God's children during their Telestial tour of duty upon this earth. As we struggle with our own pain and observe the pain and suffering of others we have several options available to us. We can, for example, ignore and pretend we don't see the suffering of others. At our worst we could take advantage of the sick and weak and take from them what little resources they may have, or on the other hand, be willing to give of our means and time to bless the unfortunate about us.

One thing I know for sure, based on my own personal experience, none of us will ever successfully traverse this Telestial terrain alone without the love and support of others.

We need one another! That is the genius of the organization of the Church. We simply cannot go it alone. Eugene England, many years ago, wrote a profound essay entitled "The Church Is As True As the Gospel!" This was no clever play on words but a profound statement regarding how a divinely inspired Church organization would bless us with the love, support, and strength of others to carry us through, because truly, "No man is an island." Without my family, friends, and the love and support that has been constant from members of the Church since the day of my injury I would certainly have perished long ago.

When the hairy, 800 pound gorilla comes into our lives and is trying to pull our heads off hopefully we will be able to see beyond our own pain and misery and reach out to bless others, and in so doing bless ourselves as well.

Dad/Grandpa/Jack
"It's Good to Be Alive!"
http://www.observationsbyjack.blogspot.com/

2009-11-28T18:14:00.000-08:00

The Great Debaters
I am very wary of recommending movies for others to see. We all have such different tastes and sensibilities. If I recommend a movie I think is great and you watch it and think to yourself, "Boy, old Jack has finally lost it," it just makes me feel badly. Therefore, it is with some trepidation that I am going to skate out onto thin ice and recommend a movie I have seen a couple of times. Each time as it comes to an end I have tried to get out of my wheelchair and give those around me a high five.
The movie I am referring to is "The Great Debaters" released in 2007, starring and directed by Denzel Washington. I am sure that many of you have already seen it.
The film, based on a true story, revolves around the efforts of debate coach and poet, Melvin Tolson, (Denzel Washington) at historically black Wiley College to place his team on equal footing with whites in the American South during the 1930s, when Jim Crow Laws were common and lynch mobs were a pervasive fear for blacks. In the movie, the Wiley team eventually succeeds to the point where they are able to debate Harvard University (Actually Hollywood felt a debate with Harvard would be more prestigious than the one that actually took place between the Wiley team and the debate team from the University of Southern California, the reigning champion debate team in the United States in 1935.)
The movie also explores the social milieu of Texas during the Great Depression including not only the day-to-day insults and slights African Americans endured, but also a lynching. Depicted as well is James L. Farmer, Jr., who, at 14-years of age, was on Wiley's debate team after completing high school at that tender age and who would go on to be a powerful figure in the civil rights movement during the 50s and 60s. [The information cited above is from Wikipedia]
Although they were not necessarily the focal point of the story I was most impressed by James Farmer Sr. and his son James Jr.. James Farmer Sr. was born on June 12, 1886 in North Carolina. After graduating from the Cookman Institute in Jacksonville, Florida he came to Massachusetts on foot to attend college. In 1918 he earned his Ph.D. from Boston University becoming one of only twenty five African-Americans who held Ph.D.s at the time. He was the first African-American from Texas to earn a Ph.D.
Farmer could read English, Aramaic, French, German, Greek, Hebrew, and Latin. He was a good, moral man as well, and tutored James Jr. to follow in his footsteps. [Information from Wikipedia]
To me, the highlight of the story was the often repeated advice James Farmer Sr. kept giving to his son, James Farmer Jr. when James Jr. was tempted to not study or give his best effort as head researcher for the debate team, because for many months in 1935-36 James Jr. never had the opportunity of actually engaging in a debate which was his dream and passion. In those moments of discouragement his father would say to him, "We have to do what we have to do so we can do what we want to do!"
For some reason I can't get that statement out of my mind. It just rings so true and is very important to me. "We have to do what we have to do so we can do what we want to do!" So many people, both young and old, have dreams of doing great things -- things they want to do -- but are unwilling to pay the price to do what they have to do each day so they can eventually do what they really want to do.
I suppose every missionary that has had to learn a foreign language for example, can hopefully identify with that statement. About a hundred years ago when I went to Central America to serve a 2 1/2 year mission there was no MTC or language training. We were told to buy a good Spanish College grammar book and bring it with us. I had visions of speaking fluent Spanish and communicating effectively with the people -- this is what I wanted to do. To get from where I was to where I wanted to be was a long arduous journey. Each day I had to do what I had to do to become fluent in a foreign language. Rising each day between 4:30 and 5 a.m. for months, conjugating verbs, memorizing vocabulary, and spending hours reading out loud from the Spanish Book of Mormon alongside the English Book of Mormon as well as the Bible, after many long months I was able to do what I wanted to do and dreamed of doing.
This truth of course applies to so many aspects of our lives. I believe one of the great lessons we hopefully learn early in our lives is that we have to do what we have to do so we can do what we want to do -- or more importantly become what we want to be.
My son John is an ER doctor. He truly did not like his first two years of medical school at USC. It was all theory and little or no hands-on work with patients who had health problems. I know there were times he wanted to throw in the towel and maybe do something else with his life. Finally however, after doing for two years what he had to do, he finally was able to do what he wanted to do -- be a doctor and help people. He is currently a critical care doctor flying wounded troops from Afghanistan to Germany and after they are sufficiently stabilized, flying them from Germany to Walter Reed Hospital in the United States. What satisfaction this must give to him to help keep these special people alive so they can get the help they need to improve the quality of their lives. Had he thrown in the towel prematurely and not done what he had to do when he had to do it he never would have been able to do what he really wanted to do with his life.
I'm going to tweak the James L. Farmer philosophy just a bit, but I think in an important way. My life has taught me that "We must do what we have to do so that we can do what we may have to do."
Life being what it is, full of bumps and detours and curves that we never expected to see, some of us may never really get to do what we wanted to do and dreamed of doing. However, if we have consistently done what we have had to do we will be prepared to do what we have to do when life introduces unexpected, difficult, and mostly unwanted circumstances to us.
Good movie! Important philosophy!

Jack

Blood for an Enemy

2009-11-17T13:55:00.000-08:00

"Blood for an Enemy"

Our son, John, is an ER doctor. The Air Force paid for his education and he agreed to serve in the Air Force for the next three years blessing wounded troops with the skills he had gained in medical school and his residency.

John and his friend Matt Mecuro, as 16-year-olds, were body surfing with me that fateful day when I had my accident and were able to get me onto the beach and basically saved my life. John was very involved in my care until he left on his mission, and through it all gained a desire to study medicine.

His home base is in Las Vegas, Nevada, at Nellis Air Force Base. Each year, he is deployed somewhere in the world to practice ER medicine as needed. His first deployment was a big army base outside of Kabul, Afghanistan. He and two other ER doctors managed the ER unit 24 hours a day and seven days a week. Part of their duty was to take turns going out in helicopters to pick up the wounded.

I thought you might enjoy hearing about John’s first helicopter experience and about what took place. What follows is his e-mail to me.

"Hey Dad and family,

"So things are going well here. I went on my first helicopter mission a few days ago. It was pretty exciting. We had to go pick up an enemy combatant who was shot while trying to set up an IED (improvised explosive device). We flew about an hour to where the patient was being held. He was shot in the bottom while bent over setting up a bomb, but the bullet went into his stomach and hurt his intestines and nicked a big artery in his pelvis. By the time I saw him he had already gone through 11 units of blood, which was the entire supply of blood at that base. Throughout the chopper ride back, I had to monitor his vitals and had to keep giving him drugs to keep him sedated. He kept waking up and looking at me, so I kept giving him drugs to knock him out.

"We flew really close to the ground, about 200 feet. The surrounding area is really pretty and you would never know there was a war going on. There are a lot of rivers and farms, kids playing soccer, etc. In the helicopter was myself, 2 pilots, and 2 soldiers looking out both sides of the helicopter for possible enemies on the ground. Behind us we had a big black hawk helicopter loaded with guns that was covering us incase we came under fire. I was a little nervous on the flight to the get the patient, but on the way back I was so busy keeping him stabilized that I didn't have time to think about the dangers.

"Its pretty amazing the effort we make to take care of the enemy. I don't think they would do the same for us. I mean the guy got all the blood at that one base. If one of our soldiers had gotten hurt, there would not have been any blood for them. Also just think of the risk involved in just going to pick the wounded enemy up. When we arrived with the patient, we discovered we were also out of B- blood and we actually had to get volunteers to give their blood to this guy who was essentially trying to kill us. I think it says something really special about this country that we would put so much effort into saving people like this."

I don't know about you, but reading John's e-mail made me feel proud to be an American. Imagine risking your life to save the life of an enemy who is seeking to take your life -- even giving him your own blood. We do value human life and freedom in this country!

I believe that many of the pundits in Washington, DC could benefit from reading John's simple little e-mail. I know many are opposed to what we are doing in Iraq and Afghanistan, and maybe President Bush got us into this war on terrorism in Iraq prematurely -- who really knows? But isn't it refreshing to know that we really are trying to do something very good in the world and that we place such a high value on human life, dignity, freedom and liberty.

There is a spirit of pessimism and negativism abroad in the land. Ten years ago President Gordon B. Hinckley described it as follows: "... there is a terrible ailment of pessimism in the land. It's almost endemic. We're constantly fed a steady and sour diet of character assassination, faultfinding, evil speaking of one another. Read the newspaper columnists. Listen to the radio and television commentators. The writers of our news columns are brilliant, the commentators on the electronic media are masters--but they seem unable to deal with balanced truth, notwithstanding their protests otherwise. The negative becomes the stuff of headlines and long broadsides that, in many cases, caricature the facts and distort the truth--at least the whole truth." [CES fireside, March 6, 1994]

President Hinckley, in that same CES fireside talk, also said while speaking of the United States of America: "I know that she has problems. We've heard so much of these for so long. But surely, my brothers and sisters, this is a good land, a choice land, a chosen land. To me it is a miracle, a creation of the Almighty. It was born of travail. The Constitution under which we live is the keystone of our nation. It was inspired of God. Of it the great Englishman Gladstone said, "As the British Constitution is the most subtle organism which has proceeded from . . . progressive history, so the American Constitution is . . . the most wonderful work ever struck off at a given time by the brain and purpose of man" ("Kin Beyond Sea," North American Review 127 [September/October 1878], p. 185).
Since 9/11 we feel we have truly been put upon as a nation. Can you even imagine what it would have been like to have been living in England at the beginning of World War II when Nazi Germany had already overrun most of Europe and was threatening to invade England as well? Thankfully for Western civilization there was a Winston Churchill, who like President Hinckley, was the essence of optimism and courage. He rallied the people as no one else could in that dark and desperate time. In speaking at Harrow School which he had attended as a boy he significantly said: "Do not let us speak of darker days; let us speak rather of sterner days. These are not dark days: these are great days--the greatest days our country has ever lived; and we must all thank God that we have been allowed, each of us according to our stations, to play a part in making these days memorable in the history of our race." [Address at Harrow School, 29 October 1941]
And then Churchill spoke the following stirring words to his countrymen after the disaster at Dunkirk when the prophets of doom were prophesying disaster and the imminent demise of the British Empire: "We shall not flag or fail. . . . We shall fight in France, we shall fight on the seas and oceans, we shall fight with growing confidence and growing strength in the air, we shall defend our island, whatever the cost may be, we shall fight on the beaches, we shall fight on the landing grounds, we shall fight in the fields and in the streets, we shall fight in the hills; we shall never surrender." [Speech on Dunkirk, House of Commons, 4 June 1940]
I believe we need the spirit of a Winston Churchill today in this country. Our way of life, the way of life that inspires us to give our blood to the enemy to save his life, must be preserved at any cost. Whatever your feelings about the war on terrorism or about President George W. Bush, don't you believe we have just begun a battle to the death with a very evil ideology that would rob us of everything we hold dear?
Thank you John, for reminding us that we do belong to a pretty special country!
Dad/Grandpa/Jack

2008-06-14T09:10:00.000-07:00

I discovered the writings of Charles Dickens as a young student at BYU many years ago. I would say my two favorite books written by Dickens are "Great Expectations," and "A Tale of Two Cities." I have felt at times like many of you I am sure, that the opening lines of Dickens', "A Tale of Two Cities," are very descriptive of most of our lives.

"It was the best of times, it was the worst of times...it was the season of Light, it was the season of Darkness, it was the spring of hope, it was the winter of despair, we had everything before us, we had nothing before us..."

Life is very dynamic and ever changing. It is never static, and the best of times can quickly become the worst of times, while our spring of hope can be turned into a winter of despair. Often times these seemingly polar opposites are found operating simultaneously in our lives.

I was thinking back about the six long months I spent at Rancho Los Amigos Rehabilitation Hospital immediately following my accident 19 years ago. A season of hope had been turned into a winter of despair in a split second, and I thought at the time that the best of times had all of a sudden become the worst of times. Instead of having everything ahead of me I could see nothing ahead and light had turned into blackness. However, even during that season of darkness, there were brilliant flashes of light that dispelled the gloom and hopelessness and made the worst of times the best of times, even if for just short periods of time. Let me explain.

There was an African American nurse that worked the night shift from 7 p.m. to 7 a.m. about three nights each week. She radiated a spirit of love and light that penetrated my dark world every time she was with me. Every morning before she would leave to go home, knowing that with the shift change I would probably not see another nurse for at least an hour, she would get a basin full of hot water and with a washcloth she would wash and massage my face in a most loving and caring way. It was not doctor's orders and no other nurse ever thought to do it... but she did, and she did it every morning she was there. No one can know how good that felt, especially when you can't feel anything in your entire body except your face and the top of your head. But as good as it felt physically it even felt better emotionally to have someone, really a stranger, show that kind of love and concern.

Another flash of light that always brought hope and made the worst of times a good time was the care given to me by an African-American nurse's aide. He was a big man, muscular, an Afro hairdo, ear rings, various tattoos, and a loud voice. You wouldn't want to meet him in a dark alley late at night. Poor Jo Anne was afraid to leave the hospital that first night that he was to be a participant in my care. How true it is that looks can be deceiving. I was never treated with such respect, kindness, and tenderness by anyone at Rancho than by him. He couldn't do enough for me. I always rejoiced when I realized he was to be my helper during a 12 hour period. It was obvious to me that what he was doing was not being done out of a sense of duty but out of love and deep concern for me and the other young men in our spinal cord injury unit. He had a great sense of humor and made me feel good in spite of myself and the trauma I was going through.

My physical therapist at Rancho was a little, barely 5 foot tall girl, with blond hair who had the heart and spirit of a tiger. She pushed me, never showed pity for me, and worked me as hard as she could each time she came into my room. She gave me exercises I was to do to strengthen my neck muscles and would accept no lame excuse for not doing them religiously. I can still hear her footsteps in my mind marching down the corridor to my room. Had she been in the Army she would have surely been a general. She was my advocate and cut through the bureaucracy and red tape of the county facility I was in, and while my roommates and others in the spinal cord injury unit were still languishing in bed, she had me up racing through the corridors of the hospital terrorizing everyone in sight in a mega, breath control power wheelchair. When I left the hospital and sadly said goodbye to my two roommates who had been at the hospital months before I got there and wouldn't leave for months after I left, it just didn't seem fair they didn't have my same physical therapist. She kindled a light inside me through her toughness and no-nonsense approach to my care, and made me believe in myself and that maybe I could have some kind of life even in my paralyzed condition if I were willing to work hard enough.

These, and many other experiences I have had throughout my lifetime, have helped me to realize that there are going to be seasons of light and dark, hope and despair, times when we feel we have everything before us and then suddenly nothing. We can't control circumstances but we do have the power to not let our individual circumstances control us.

I believe one of the important things that helps us through the hard times and keeps us from succumbing to the circumstances life brings to all of us is what I choose to call the lovingkindness manifest to us by others -- the kind of loving kindness I experienced at Rancho.

I use the word lovingkindness because I think it is more descriptive than the words charity or love, although all these words are synonyms describing the "pure love of Christ." The word lovingkindness is used numerous times throughout the Scriptures to describe God. The vast majority of the references come from the book of Psalms. For example: "Because thy lovingkindness is ^abetter than life, my lips shall praise thee." [Psalm 63:3] "How excellent is thy lovingkindness, O God! therefore the children of men put their ^atrust under the shadow of thy wings" [Psalms 36:7]

The lovingkindness manifest to me by so many during my lifetime has always helped to make the worst of times the best of times, and magically turned seasons of darkness into seasons of light.

Perhaps the greatest gift we can give one another, given the challenges and problems we all face, is simply to treat all with whom we interact, especially family members, with lovingkindness.

Dad/Grandpa/Jack

Mothers

2008-05-13T18:20:00.001-07:00

May 10, 2008, Observation:

When our daughter Rachel, was in elementary school, her mother would frequently dress her in a little pink T-shirt that had three words emblazoned on the front in a feminine script made out of some kind of girlish, silvery, glittery material. The three words were: "Girls Are Smarter!" Every time I would see that message on my little daughter I would kind of wince because I knew the truth of it. Also, had she chosen to do so, Jo Anne could have dressed Rachel in a little pink T-shirt with a different message for each day of the week like: "Girls Are Kinder," "Girls Are Sweeter," "Girls Are Special," and the list could go on and on.

I know that gender was determined in the pre-earth life when we were organized from "intelligence" by God to become either men or women. I rather suspect that he took all of the high-grade intelligence -- the most intelligent, most compassionate, and most kind, from which he created "women" to be the mothers of mankind. From what was left over he created man. By the way, this is Jack Rushton doctrine and should not be mistaken for gospel truth.

The children of good mothers are blessed throughout their lives and have their characters shaped and molded because of the qualities and character traits that are an inherent and integral part of womanhood and motherhood.

The women in my life, my great grandmothers, grandmothers, mother, and the mother of my children have all had a great impact for good upon their posterity, and upon me in particular, because of the womanly qualities and character traits with which they have all been so abundantly blessed.

Of all the multitude of virtues I could mention that these great women possessed that have blessed my life I will only mention one in this observation. It is a character trait possessed by all of these women that I have grown to treasure and value as it has impacted my life for good.

Let me introduce this quality or character trait that has impacted my life so much by sharing with you a brief experience from my mother's autobiography.

"Mother was expecting her eighth child. Papa went to the cedars to get a load of wood. It was a short while before Christmas. They were both thirty seven years old at this time. It was in 19l6. When papa came home he didn't feel at all well. He had terrific cramps and became seriously ill. I remember Mama and Louisa (her oldest sister) went to Hinckley in the buggy to get our Christmas presents and I stayed home with Papa, I had an earache. He was sitting by the stove and I sat at his feet with my head on his lap. I know how he must have felt being so ill and watching for mama to come home. He had me go out and climb up in a tree to see if I could see them coming home." (He had a ruptured appendix and with no doctor available out in the country -- they lived in the little farming community of Abraham, near Delta, Utah -- Halley, his wife and my grandmother, took him to Salt Lake City to a hospital on the train on Christmas day.) "He passed away on January 12, 1917. He was buried on January 14, 1917 at Hinckley, Millard County, Utah. It was just a month to the day before my tenth birthday. What a sad, sad family. I will never forget the funeral and my papa lying there so cold and white. All seven of us sat together in frightened solemn silence. It was our first experience with death and it seemed so final."

My grandmother was resourceful, tenacious, and hard-working and was able to keep the family together. The kids all worked hard on the farm. Halley, my grandmother, was the postmistress, a midwife, and through this job and what the farm produced, was able to sustain her large family.

My mother, as well as her seven brothers and sisters, knew how to work and work hard. This character trait was and is possessed in rich abundance by all the women in my life. You may think it a strange character trait to highlight but not really.

These women were strong, resourceful, and understood the "law of the harvest" which is we reap what we sow. They didn't moan, wallow in self-pity, give up, or ever think that the state or Church should take care of them when tragedy struck unexpectedly. They only knew one way -- work hard!

My mother tried hard to pass on to her boys this work ethnic character trait by both precept and example. I believe her efforts were successful.

My brothers and I all received the same message from her: "Go to college! Don't end up working in the mines!" We somehow got the message because all four of us graduated from BYU and went on to receive graduate degrees as well. We weren't very smart but our mother taught us to work hard.

Mom taught us integrity in doing our work. When we scrubbed our linoleum floors on our hands and knees under her direction, she always made sure we got the corners. We learned how to do dishes the right way -- her way! She kept me working at the piano and taking lessons until it eventually evolved from an onerous daily task to something I truly began to love. I learned much more than just music -- I learned how to work hard and stay with something challenging until I had achieved a goal.

My mom was smart. A philosopher once said that no man can ever fully recover from the ignorance of his mother. This is a negative statement but at the same time I believe it is very true. Mom put the backbone into us as well as the work ethic. Every day as I am able to sit at my computer and work for hours on end I have to thank my mother for her example of working hard and with integrity and blessing me with her work ethic.

Jo Anne, like my mother and grandmothers has been blessed with a great work ethic and integrity in all she does. The oldest daughter in a family of 10 children she had great responsibility placed upon her shoulders as a very young girl. A visiting young cousin who didn't know the family really well observed Jo Anne -- age 12 or 13 at the time -- working around the house, cooking, cleaning, etc., and said to her, "How much do they pay you for working here?"

Jo Anne has been an incredible example to me and to her children of living the law of the harvest and of working hard and with integrity. She has encouraged me to work hard and has never tolerated me using my physical condition as an excuse for not being productive. What a blessing! She has given me many psychological kicks in an unmentionable part of my anatomy that has made me work hard and do and achieve things I never would have attempted without her encouragement and example.

Jo Anne, like all the women in my life thankfully, can be best described by two phrases: "True Grit," and "Pure Gold."

Without these smart, sensitive, kind, compassionate, and hard-working women in our lives I am afraid most of us men wouldn't amount to much. How grateful I am that God created woman, and if you read the creation account carefully it was his crowning and most significant creation. How right he was in knowing "... it is not good that man should be alone."

" And the Lord God said, It is not good that the man should be ^aalone; I will make him ^ban help meet for him... she shall be called ^bWoman, because she was taken out of Man...And Adam called his wife’s name Eve; because she was the ^amother of all living." [Genesis 2: 18, 22-23, 3: 20]

"I Wish it Were Yesterday"

2008-05-13T16:53:00.000-07:00

In the spring of 1962, I was in the Army and stationed at the Presidio of San Francisco. My Saturdays were free and one beautiful spring Saturday afternoon I was walking down a busy street in San Francisco. As I passed a large movie theater I noticed on the marquee the words: "Westside Story" by Leonard Bernstein. I had no idea what it was about; I thought maybe it was a Western. I have always been a sucker for cowboys and Indians. Having nothing better to do I bought a ticket and went in. It was an unexpected and delightful experience, and "Westside Story" has been one of my favorite Broadway musicals from 1962 to the present.

In a "rumble" (gang fight) between rival gangs, the "Jets" (whites) and the "Sharks," (Puerto Ricans) the leader of the Sharks was inadvertently stabbed to death by the leader of the Jets. The police came, the gang members all scattered, and later that night two of the Jets met up with one another. They were visibly shaken by what had happened, and in the ensuing conversation one of the boys said "I wish it was yesterday!"

I have seen the movie and listened to the music more times than I would care to admit. However, it is that haunting phrase, "I wish it was yesterday," that always captures my attention.

August 1, 1989 at about 3 p.m. while body surfing at Laguna Beach, California, in one split second I was paralyzed from the neck down and would live on life support the remainder of my life, however long that would be. Around midnight the head neurosurgeon sent all of my friends
and family home so he could perform additional tests to determine the extent of my injury. I have never felt more alone than I did when my loved ones departed that night. I was strapped to a board, still in my swimming suit -- an ugly looking thing, a sick yellow color I had purchased because it was on sale -- still covered with sand, with several big hoses shoved down my mouth and throat to enable me to have the oxygen I needed to stay alive. No, the last thing I was thinking of was "West Side Story," and the phrase "I wish it was yesterday!" However, those words described my state of mind at that moment perfectly.

Yesterday had been such a beautiful day as we acted the part of tourists in Laguna Beach. Our little girls, Rachel, age nine, and Jackie, age four, were having a great time as were Jo Anne and I. life just didn't seem to be able to be any better. I was serving as stake president, loving my assignment with CES; we had just had our first two grandsons born several months before, and our second son Richard was on a mission in Columbia. There was not a cloud on the horizon of our lives, and it looked like we were going to live "happily ever after."

As I was alone in the regional Trauma center that night I absolutely could not believe what had happened to me and to my family. How would we ever come through this tragedy? How would we survive financially? How would I be able to be an effective husband and father? If I were permanently paralyzed how on earth could I ever endure living this way? Those kinds of questions continued to run through my mind at warp speed all through that tortured night. Truthfully, what was happening was that I was crying out from the depths of my soul, "I wish it was yesterday!" I am sorry to report that "I wish it was yesterday," was my cry for much longer than I ever would like to admit.

The day finally came however that I came to understand that in order to have peace and for life to be productive, meaningful, and of the highest quality possible, the phrase "I wish it was yesterday," had to be eliminated from my mind, my heart, and my vocabulary.

That kind of thinking leads our lives into a cul-de-sac or a dead end that will take us nowhere. I suppose most of us have done something we have regretted, or had something done to us, or to a beloved family member that has erupted from the depths of our souls the sentiment, if not the exact words, "I wish it was yesterday!" Oh, how we would like to go back to the "good old days" when a seemingly tragic event is perpetrated by us, or inflicted upon us by others, or by life itself. I believe it is human nature -- "the natural man" -- to have that knee-jerk reaction to the challenges life can bring our way. It has been so since the beginning of time. As Eve was giving birth to her first child I wonder if she ever had a fleeting thought, "I wish it was yesterday" back in that beautiful garden?

One of the problems Moses had leading the children of Israel out of Egypt, was to get Egypt out of them. Those folks always wanted to go back to the "good old days" which really weren't that wonderful in reality, but only in their minds now that the going was tough: [Numbers 11:5] "We remember the fish, which we did eat in Egypt freely; the cucumbers, and the melons, and the leeks, and the onions, and the garlick:"

The "I wish it was yesterday" way of thinking eventually cost them dearly as none of that older generation was permitted to enter the "Promised Land" but wandered in the wilderness 40 years until their carcasses rotted in the desert wilderness with the "Promised Land" visible on the horizon, but was unapproachable by them because of their false way of looking at life and rejecting Jehovah and his desires to bless them.

Lot's wife had a similar challenge as she looked back at "Sodom" with longing eyes and was turned into a pillar of salt -- an inanimate object that could not act, but could only be acted upon. She was unable to move forward; her progress came to an abrupt end which is the same thing that happens to all of us who live in the past and can't let go of it and move forward to the "Promised Land."

I would imagine as Joseph was sold by his brothers as a slave that as he trudged behind that camel train with a rope around his neck that he couldn't help but thinking "I wish it was yesterday!" Things were so good in Jacob's tent for him as the favored son. "How on earth could this have ever happened to me" he must have thought a few times. Thankfully, our worthy and magnificent progenitor, refusing to live in the past and finally, as a 30-year-old, having been a slave and prisoner in Egypt for almost half his life could have this written about him, "... the Lord was with him, and that which he did, the Lord made it to aprosper." [Genesis 39:23]

The same can happen to each one of us as we "... press forward with a steadfastness in Christ... and endure to the end..." [2 Nephi 31:20]. Regardless of what may happen to us we simply must press forward, never looking back, refusing to say or entertain in our hearts the thought, "I wish it was yesterday!" If we do so the Lord will be with us as he was with Joseph and cause us to "prosper."

Not an Observation

2008-04-22T06:41:00.000-07:00

Several weeks ago I was preparing to teach the Isaiah chapters found in
the Book of Mormon to our Gospel doctrine class. For some reason I was
riveted on the concept of the "Ensign" that would be raised up in these
last days.

Of course we know this Ensign of which Isaiah spoke is the Church of
Jesus Christ that would be restored to the earth in these latter days.
As I read 2 Nephi 21:12, "And he shall set up an aensign for the
nations, and shall assemble the boutcasts of Israel, and gather
together the dispersed of Judah from the four corners of the eath."
There are 12 other references in the Scriptures regarding this "Ensign."
As I read them all, I could not help but start singing to myself one of
my favorite hymns, "High on the Mountain Top." I began "googling" (my
voice recognition software does not recognize it as a legitimate word
but I think it's a pretty good one) on the Internet and found a
beautiful account regarding how this hymn came into being. I thought I
would share it with you in the hopes that it will help you to appreciate
gathering of God's children in these latter days.

The story of
High on the Mountain Top
by Joel H Johnson
This is the story behind the writing of "HIGH ON THE MOUNTAIN TOP" by
Joel Hills Johnson as told by his wife Margaret Threlkeld Johnson to her
grandson Bernard A. Johnson.

Joel H. Johnson established a sawmill in Mill Creek Canyon soon after
arriving in the Salt Lake Valley. Sawing lumber for the "Building up of
Zion" was Joel's church calling. This meant that he spent his time
sawing prime lumber and delivering it to the tithing office. In lieu of
wages, he would go to the storehouse and get what was needed for him and
his family.

As he made his wagon trips up and down the steep canyon, he often
thought about the flag that had been planted on Ensign Peak. He knew he had safely made it down the mountain with his load when he turned north
and headed for the tithing office. He always breathed easier when he
could look up at that peak and see Old Glory waving.=20

In the early spring of 1850, Joel loaded up a load of prime lumber and
headed for the tithing office. As he headed into the lot that housed
this office, he noticed that there were several other wagon loads of
tithing offerings ahead of him. He stopped his team, unhitched the
horses and turned them into "Brother Brigham's" pasture, and sat down to
wait his turn to unload.=20

Being a warm spring day, Joel sought the shady side of his wagon, leaned
back against the wheel and waited. As was his habit, he pulled out a
piece of paper and prepared to write. He found himself thinking about
the breeze and how it must be making 'Old Glory' ripple. In his mind he
pictured how it must look there on the top of the peak under the clear
blue sky as it waved and fluttered in the breeze. His mind painted such
a wonderful picture.

Almost as if written by unseen hands, words began to appear on the
paper:

"High on the mountain top, A banner is unfurled. Ye nations now look
up;It waves to all the world." In Deseret's sweet, peaceful land-On
Zion's mount behold it stand! For God remembers still His promise made
of old That He on Zion's hill Truth's standard would unfold!Her light
should there attract the gazeOf all the world in latter days. His house
shall there be reared His glory to display And people shall be heard
In distant lands to sayWe'll now go up and serve the Lord,Obey His
truth, and learn His word. For there we shall be taught The law that
will go forth, With truth and wisdom fraught To govern all the
earth;Forever there His ways we'll treadAnd save ourselves and all our
dead. Then hail to Deseret! A refuge for the good, And safety for the
great, If they but understood.That God with plagues will shake the
worldTill all its thrones shall down be hurled. In Deseret doth truth
Rear up its royal head; Though nations may oppose, Still wider it
shall spread;Yes, truth and justice, love and grace,In Deseret find
ample place,=20

He originally titled his poem "DESERET". It was later changed to HIGH ON
THE MOUNTAIN TOP.=20

Joel finished his poem, folded up the paper, put it in his pocket, and
went about the task of getting his lumber measured and recorded. Much
later in the day, he went home.=20

Sometime later he showed his poem to John Taylor, then a member of the
Quorum of the Twelve. President Taylor liked the poem so much, he asked
if he could keep it. In those days, words only were written down and
then sung to familiar folk tunes. In just a short time it became one of
the favorite songs where ever the Saints gathered=20

This poem was only one of hundreds that Joel H. wrote. But it became one
of his most recognized ones. His poetry centered around four themes: His
love and devotion to the gospel, his love of the Prophet Joseph Smith,
his love of his family, and his desire to enjoy life, liberty, and the
pursuit of happiness for himself and all other human beings.

Because today there is some controversy over the exact date this song
was written, this account is being written. In his journal he states
that at eighteen years of age "I commenced writing religious songs and
hymns upon various subjects, some of which may be found in Zion's
Songster, or the Songs of Joel, a work of my own, but many are lost."
Throughout his journal are many examples of his poetry. * See page 2 of
JHJ journal volume 1.

Dad/Grandpa/Jack