One of the new traditions I really enjoy about Thanksgiving
are the daily posts I see on social media from various people. At first I
thought it to be a bit hokey and contrived—in other words—cheesy. It also
seemed to be somewhat of a bragging session with some people.
However, this year I saw a person post how excited they were
for November to be able to express their gratitude on a daily basis. This is
where my attitude changed. I realized this new tradition provided a way for people to actually take the time to think about what they are truly grateful for and express it over an extended period of time—not just on Thanksgiving
Day.
Still A Need For The Old Fashion
On the other hand, I have to give credit to my brother
who also gave a call to action, petitioning his Facebook friends to do more
than make blanket statements of gratitude through social media. He admonished
people to actually express their gratitude in person or through a true
sentiment to those whom they are grateful for—not just through social media.
Thanks And Joy
This brings my mind back to last week’s post about service. I am the type who is most happy when I forget my own troubles and help others. There is nothing more gratifying to me than helping someone in
need or doing something nice for someone else. Seeing the appreciative glow
on their face fills my thoughts and heart for days. I also feel this same gratitude, love and joy when others take the time to serve and help me. There is something to be
said about serving others that brings both the giver and
the receiver joy—and it’s nice to feel that joy from both ends.
So what brings this joy? A thankful heart!
“Now my brethren, we see that God is mindful of every people, whatsoever land they may be in; yea, he numbereth his people, and his bowels of mercy are over all the earth. Now this is my joy, and my great thanksgiving; yea, and I will give thanks unto my God forever. Amen.” - Alma 26:27
Think about it. The things that we are truly most thankful
for are generally the things that bring us the most joy and vice versa. I can
tell you that I was full of thanks and joy when my brother and neighbor helped me
reconstruct the awning to my front porch. I can also name a few other things,
like my wife and my children (which I am most grateful for), like the sister in church who selflessly helps with my kids every week (she is a lifesaver), like a warm house
after putting up the Christmas lights (too early, I know), or even those little
chocolate mints after eating at an Italian restaurant (mmmm...).
Joy and thanks seem to go hand-in-hand. However, we often indulge in the joy, yet forget to express the thanks that so naturally compliments it. The expression of thanks can open our eyes to the blessing
that we were blinded to before and help us find an unrealized degree of joy.
Not just this month, but on a daily basis. Let that sink in for a bit.
So instead of loafing around while gravy drips down your
face or planning your Black Friday special-ops strategy this Thanksgiving, spend a little more
time this week—and from now on—giving thanks! It could do wonders for you and
those around you—but only you can make it happen.
This afternoon I got home ready to tag-team the kids with my wife and begin work on this week's blog post and topic. As my wife was headed out the door she asked, "Would you mind cleaning off and wiping the counters in the kitchen?" I explained I already had plans for the next hour before we had to tag-team the kids back again. She said it was okay...with hesitation.
That should have been my first clue. After she left, I begrudgingly convinced myself that I needed to help out, but all I really wanted to do was get started on this post, because I didn't know when else I would have time to do it. Then came my second clue--I remembered my topic for this week is Service!
Let's just say that I wiped down the kitchen chairs too.
What is Service?
When you hear the word "service," what do you think of? Do terms likes, cleaning service or repair service come to mind? Or is it that cheesy dance movie from 2004, "You Got Served." I hope not. That movie got a 3.3 star rating (out of 10) on IMDB.
The top definition that popped up when I Google searched "service" was: "The action of helping or doing work for someone."
We are not talking about paid service here. No, what we are talking about here is serving others. You know, helping people out when they need a hand and without any sort of expectations in return. Not familiar with that kind of service? Well, let's get acquainted.
Service We Receive
In my mind, service is the opposite of laziness. Let me give you a great example that involves the awning to my front porch. You know the type. Falling apart, rotting away. An eye-sore. Blight. Okay, maybe not that bad, but it definitely needed to be taken care of.
Classic story here: Man sees project. Man attempts project. Man discovers bigger project than he anticipated. Man gets stuck with heap-big mess and no real solution.
Needless to say, I called my younger brother as a recruit. We spent most of the day trying to solve the problem, but found it growing larger. As my brother and I made our attempts, my neighbor from down the street drove past a couple of times and gave us a curious grin and wave each time he passed. Meanwhile, my other neighbors thought we are putting up Christmas lights and proceeded to put their kids to work on their home (awesome).
As dusk approached, the neighbor from down the street drove up again and stopped to see what we were doing. I explained the project and he followed up with a series of logical questions--you know, like stuff about proper tools and materials--all of which we had not really thought about. Seeing our plight, he took me to his home and dished out supplies, then followed me back and watched us fumble for a little bit. However, before I knew it, he was a part of the team. In the end, we had a full-blown, professionally shingled roof for the awning (Oh ya, double awesome)!
As it turns out, my neighbor is a general contractor. That morning he had already driven about three hours south for a job, returned home for a bit, and then drove an hour east for another job. By the time he stopped at my house it was well past dinner. By the time we completed the roof for my awning it was past 10 pm. To top off the night, my Christmas light neighbors realized we were not as festive as they originally thought and came over to see if I needed additional help.
That day four people came to my aid (well, actually five, if you count my wife taking care of everything else for the day). Each served in their own way, but I was equally grateful for all of them. None of them had to do what they did. They all had a lot on their plates and sacrificed their own time just to help out. I could not have been more grateful.
Service We Give
Not all service requires the same commitment of those who helped me. Service comes in many forms, like the example of simply helping my wife with the kitchen counters. What I didn't mention earlier was that my wife had already scrubbed all the pots and pans (the worst chore in the kitchen), all while taking care of a sick child. Other people serve by making donations, teaching a life skill or just providing daily help to a loved one in a difficult situation.
Why We Fail To Serve
I find that the greatest service opportunities I pass up are not when I am too busy, but when I am too lazy. Often, when I am taking the chance to sit down after a day of work, my kids come and ask me to help with something--usually trivial--like tying a bow on something in their room. My robot response is generally, "I will help you in a minute." Then after using that line for about 10 to 20 minutes, I find myself agitated by their relentless requests and resort to doing it. In reality though, if I would have helped them in the first place, I could have been done in less than a minute and truly relaxed for the remaining 19.
The Benefits of Service
I am starting to realize that the little opportunities to give service are never trivial and often have the biggest impacts in our lives. As my children are starting to get a little older and learning to refuse to help around the house, I realize that my own laziness has taught them laziness. However, if I can serve them with the same swiftness that I wish they would render when I asked them to do something, perhaps their reactions might be more positive. Why? Because I will have showed them how to respond in a more positive way. This may sound too idealistic, and sometimes it really is, but as I have gotten my rear off the couch and tried, I have found that it is true for the most part. I have found that they naturally want to show me service in the same way I showed them service.
Service incorporates selflessness, kindness, and sacrifice, which are often accompanied by love and gratitude from those whom we serve or serve us. Who wouldn't want that, right?
Enough with my stories, because I want to hear yours! There are hundreds of ways to serve and probably a thousand more benefits that come from service. I have not even scratched the surface. What has service meant to you? From who? Why? Name just one. Like a friend, a family member, an act, a sacrifice, or a type of service, like that of our military "service" men and women.
Here are a couple of scriptural references to study more about service:
So often we forget that faith takes nourishment in the same way that a seed needs water, sun and soil. It takes faith that a seed will grow into a tree and produce good fruit. But we cannot expect a seed to grow and produce good fruit if we do not nourish it, prune it, and pull out the weeds. We have to do our part. We need to nourish our faith.
Shed The Negative & Pay Attention
How often do we forget to nourish our faith with positive influences, prune out the excess in our lives, and weed ourselves from the doubt that pulls us down? In fact, so often many of us do the opposite.
Whenever I am stressed, struggle with a situation or have a bad day, I find myself counting and listing off every little stress, struggle or problem in my life, almost as if no one could achieve so great a feat as having as many problems as me. Admit it, we all tend to do it. It is only human that when we are stressed our minds naturally gravitate to everything else that is stressing us out.
There are lots of valid excuses, exceptions, and problems in our lives to negate our faith. However, sometimes our problem is that we simply do not pay enough attention and place enough focus on the right things. We can't expect to grow an apple tree if we plant seeds for a lemon tree. Similarly, you wouldn't spray poison on a seed or rip it out because you were unsure that it would grow. So, why would spray poison on your faith or rip it out of your heart because of a fear that it will not work?
Shed the negative and pay attention.
Believe It Can Work
Paul from the New Testament taught, "...faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen (Hebrews 11:1)."
Some people can honestly say, "I tried everything and nothing came of it."
However, failure--or what may seem like failure--is only a failure if we learn nothing from it. Faith is always a success if we learn and grow from it.
Likewise, faith is not truly faith if we try, but do not believe that it can actually work. You need both belief and effort. Believe it can work.
Keep Trying
No real success ever came without effort. God will bless you for your continued efforts. So don't give up.
I started this week by talking about building faith. So let me close this week by advocating that if we want to build faith and find the benefits of it in our lives, we must:
I don't know about you, but in my life it seems like "Faith" is a reoccurring theme. Not only faith in God, but also faith in myself, faith in others, faith that my family is safe when I am not with them, faith that I will get that project for work done on time, faith that my wife won't kill me when she finds out that I forgot to do the dishes (oh wait, that's hope...probably vain hope too), faith that I can keep up with my high-energy children, faith that I can do what is right at the right time, faith that I don't screw everything up trying so hard or not trying hard enough--which all kind of circles back to Faith in God.
If you are anything like me, I learn the most from my experiences and I like to learn by hearing about other's experiences too. I love a good story and finding a life lesson from that story. I have lots of stories, just ask anyone who knows me. So I thought I would kick-off this blog with my most recent story on Faith.
The Direction
Recently, my wife and I have made a lot of decisions surrounding my career path. During this effort I was visiting my dad and he was talking about his service in the Navy and how amazing it would be to have one of his kids be in the military. In the past I have not thought much of these types of comments because I have a couple of past medical issues, like hernia surgeries that I thought would disqualify me. However, this time I felt inclined to entertain the discussion further and soon learned that I might be eligible for a waiver.
The more I spoke with my dad the more I felt a strong and ever-growing prompting to look into joining the United States military. Immediately after our conversation, I looked at my wife and asked her to go for a drive with me. As we drove, I conveyed the strong promptings I felt to look into the military. Over the next month, the more we spoke about it and looked into it the more confident we felt through a strong and ever-growing peace.
The Fear
But it seemed so contradictory. The whole idea of joining the military scared us! It seemed to contradict everything we prayed for in a job—like being able to give more time to my family. However, one thought motivated me to keep my faith: “I do not want to be swallowed by a whale like Jonah.” I could just picture myself walking by a pond at a local park, when out of no where a giant whale jumps out and swallows me whole! Or for that matter, the next time I visit Sea World, Shamu may jump the tank and swallow me as I sit helplessly licking a Popsicle in the stands. Not really kids.
The Faith
With kidding aside, what figurative whales could truly swallow me for not listening and not having faith enough to trust that God would not lead me astray? I do not think that God is vindictive. In fact, I believe that God actually saved Jonah that day when he was swallowed by a whale. I believe that when we fail to put forth faith in God, we fail to see clearly the direction He is trying to give us. Thus, by failing to see His direction clearly, we lead ourselves into harm’s way. I mean, Jonah was the one who went on the boat and then told the crew to throw him overboard, not God.
So my wife and I approached the Lord in prayer. We expressed that we felt His promptings to look into the military and asked for doors to be open. We expressed our fears, but focused on our faith and willingness to follow regardless. Then, as quickly as we asked, doors were opened. I found a position that exactly fit my expertise and it was in the Navy—just like my dad. In fact, it was so good that if I were accepted into the program, I would start four ranks higher than what my dad retired at after 20 years.
The Challenge of Our Faith
The only problem was that I had just three weeks to prepare for the selection board deadline. In that time I would need to study, take a test, conduct three interviews, gather dozens of personal records and history, fill out a ton of paperwork, and get scheduled for a full physical exam.
Unfortunately, with each step we took, we found road block after road block. But knowing of God’s goodness, we took the same steps at each road block that we took before—we prayed to God for direction and His miracles to open doors and clear paths. At one point it looked as though a simple miscommunication with the recruiter was going to foil three weeks of non-stop hard work, only a few days before the deadline. So we prayed for God’s miracles. The next day we learned that the recruiter called the national office to see if he could submit my application and provide one remaining part a couple of days after the deadline. To his surprise, he learned that the deadline was pushed back an entire month. My wife and I also felt surprise and relief, although we immediately recognized God’s hand.
During the next month we put forth relentless effort as my wife continued to work full-time and I worked part-time, helped manage a political campaign and served in the clergy for my local congregation--not to mention caring for our three beautiful kids. But just as before, we ran into roadblock after roadblock with the application process. In fact, only four days before the submission deadline, the recruiter told me that he never received a college transcript I ordered a month earlier. I spent the next day tracking down an amazingly helpful friend and personal connection--all while praying and paying--to have the documentation shipped in time.
The Lessons
With each step I felt humbled at God’s hand and mercy. I felt like I was blind folded and listening for the right voice to guide my next step, trusting that I would not fall.
I never fell. I never even tripped. I never felt weak or vulnerable. In fact, I felt strong, at peace, and more in control of my life than ever before.
Strangely, I didn't get accepted into the Navy. And not because I was not qualified. The day before the submission deadline, the Navy's national medical board denied my request for a waiver for an unforeseen medical item 15 years earlier. My application never even made it to the board for review. Three months of searching, working, praying, following and more came to an abrupt dead end. Seems anti-climatic, huh? Emotionally, it was.
Some may ask questions like, “Where was God when you needed Him?”or "Why would God lead you to a dead end?" or “What happened to your faith?” To that I simply say, “God and my faith were both there all along.” We may not understand all of God’s direction in our lives, but if we listen, our character, integrity and strength will grow beyond what we can measure or accomplish on our own. And really, isn't that what faith is truly all about?
During those three months I learned to trust and exercise patience in a way I had not before. Our willingness and humility deeply expanded to a point we did not realize we possessed. Most importantly, my wife and I grew closer together and to God. We depended on each other and God. Our love and lives became more fortified as we worked together. Prior fears were washed away, while hope filled our hearts and turned into faith.
At the end of Jonah's experience with Nineveh--when he actually went--he discovered that his fears were in vain. To his great surprise, the people listened, believed His words and repented. (Jonah 1 -3)
My point is that faith teaches us to move past our fears and recognize that we don't know everything--but God does. We cannot always be in control of the journey, but we can control our character while we travel. Faith gives us hope to reach further, try harder and do better. It makes us better people.
If you are struggling with your faith and sincerely looking for help, please share and read about other's experiences that may help you. Remember that a seed cannot grow into a tree over night and neither will your faith--you have to nourish it. We'll talk more on that later!
On that note, I leave you with this video about exercising faith even when we reach a dead end. I am sure that a lot of you have incredible experiences of faith to share. Watch this video and please share your thoughts, stories and comments below about faith. What is Faith? How do we build it? Why do we need it? How has it strengthened and blessed you or those you love or admire?
