The Greatest Glory

I'm still reading Divine Signatures.  The comment that most stood out to me yesterday in my reading was, "Do we not want the greatest glory God has to offer?  How can we get it without making the greatest sacrifice?"  That coupled with a comment from President Monson in Stake Conference Sunday has crystalized in my mind as not only something to really consider but something I need to desire enough to do the things necessary to get to my desired final destination.  President Monson said, "If we don't try, we don't do and if we don't do, why are we here?" 

What this means to me is that we have to continue to stay the course and trust God no matter what we are called on to go through in our lives.  Look for all of the blessings - not all of the problems.  Be willing to do whatever is in our power and circumstances to do without complaining.  Insteading of asking why somone isn't doing something about this or that, we need to do whatever we can to help.  If the only people we help is ourselves and our families, we will have accomplished much.  If it spills over into the lives of others, how much greater the blessing to us, to them, and to the communities around us.

Another statement in Divine Signatures that caught my attention was, "The stronger one's faith is, the deeper one's testimony will be.  The deeper one's testimony becomes, the greater the likelihood is that one will successfully cope with the challenges of life and endure to the end."  When I combined these two thoughts, I came up with what I think is an interesting concept.  Keeping our ultimate goal in mind, we do and we sacrifice.  As we do and sacrifice, we begin to become better acquainted with our Father-in-Heaven and His Son, Jesus Christ.  As we become better acquainted with Them, our faith increases and our testimony grows.  As we acknowledge the blessings in our lives we begin to see the hand of God in our lives and we become happier and more able to cope with our challenges and see them as an opportunity to get to know God better and to become more refined in our abilities to endure.  We begin to enjoy a personal relationship with our Father - and begin to learn of our value to Him and His Son.

The last quote of yesterday's reading is:  "The great paradox of life - joy and sorrow, happiness and pain - is all part of the testing, proving refining process that God has designed for us.  How we deal with that paradox, wil be greatly influenced by our perception of God.  Indeed it could be said that the very core of the testing process of mortality is to see whether we accept God or reject Him; whether we follow Him or turn away; to see how we feel about Him when the [tribulations] begin grinding over our heads, driving out any expectations we might have had that we were going to "have a nice day."

If we become acquainted with our Father we can recognize that our trials (or whatever you want to call them) are like the strings on a guitar or violin.  If they are not tightened just right, they will not produce the vibrations necessary to make beautiful musical sounds.  Rather, we are left with a horrible twang and thunk in its place.  If the strings are wound too tightly, they will snap and the string will be useless and the instument cannot be effectively played.  Our Father know precisely how much tightening (trials) we can handle and will never turn the tuning key more than necessary for us to become that beautiful instrument in His hands.