A Moment to Remember

Years ago when I was a teenager, our family drove from Henderson, Nevada to visit cousins in Utah. While there, we drove to Salt Lake City and walked around Temple Square. I had only a marginal interest in things that were so old, but I dutifully followed everyone else around. My mom was especially taken by the experience. As we entered the hand-crafted and domed tabernacle something caught my eye. It was the pulpit, framed by choir seats and the famed tabernacle organ pipes. It probably captured my notice because I was seeing something I recognized from TV; likely an occasional general conference or some other important meeting. As my family moved on, I remained behind still focused on the intricate woodwork at which prophets of God had spoken.

Then, in an unexpected moment, I had a clear impression, that one day, I would speak from that very pulpit. It was an odd feeling, but very real to me. I have since realized that the feeling as the the Holy Ghost; a feeling or “voice" I have learned to recognize many times over the succeeding years. But that day it was a bit foreign to me. Nonetheless, I knew what I felt and wondered what it meant. Well, you know how long the attention span of a teenager is. Soon I shook my head and hurried to catch up with my family. Though I have only shared that experience with a few people, I have never forgotten that special moment. Still, the Lord has left me to wonder how such a thing could ever be fulfilled. And of course, the natural man has always tried to get me to believe it was all just a bad case of chills.

Well, on February 17, 2017 at about 5:45 pm, I found myself entering a south side door of the tabernacle. Mom and I were ushered to a seat on the front row facing the same pulpit I had stared at some 50 years earlier. The meeting was a professional event called An Evening with a General Authority. The meeting began on time and we sang the celebrated hymn “Redeemer of Israel" and enjoyed a robust opening prayer. After a few words of counsel from an administrator and an introduction of the special speaker, a choir of teachers and wives favored us with the inspiring number: “Lead, Kindly Light.” Elder Gerrit W. Gong of the Presidency of the Seventy then addressed us. His message was deep and carefully crafted to reach teachers of the Seminaries and Institutes of Religion throughout the world. He obviously had prepared well and left us inspired with his abiding testimony of the Savior of the world. The choir then concluded the Spirit-filled meeting with a new arrangement of “I Am a Child of God.”

That’s when it happened: after so many years, all the stars finally lined up and a revelation was fulfilled. I carefully made my way to the pulpit. The same pulpit from which prophets have testified of the latter-day Restoration of the Church and kingdom of God. The same pulpit where inspired leaders have declared unto latter-day Saints young and old, Jesus Christ and Him crucified for the sins of the world. The same pulpit from which modern revelation has been proclaimed to the ends of the earth. And now, on this night, with a global audience watching or listening in, I stepped up to the pulpit and gave the benediction: indeed, an inspired prayer.

Now, I realize that I have used up a lot of words to tell you a story that could have been shared in a single and quick paragraph. I also realize that many of you have given closing prayers at some time in your lives. But I hope you’ve read between the lines. Clearly this event has a great deal of meaning for me. However, isn’t there something in it for you too? For example, the Lord loved me enough to provide a moment of inspiration that stayed with me, and inspired me, throughout my life. I pondered it now and again, always wondering how it might be fulfilled. Another lesson I’ve learned from this experience has to do with the Lord’s timing. It took somewhere close to 50 years for this moment to come to pass. Wait patiently upon the Lord. One other take-away for me was this: since the event was fulfilled as part of an assignment related to my career, what might that mean for my choices in life? Even a career choice can have lasting and deep meaning and purpose in our lives.

So, try to recognize even the seeming insignificant things in your life. Make sure you give your life meaning. Regardless of the career or life’s choices you make, remember that God is in the details and cares about who you are, what you are becoming, and what you do even at work. There is not a facet of your life that escapes His view. Live with confidence. Approach each day with the sense that there will be meaning and purpose for you as you live it. Believe less in coincidences and more in foreordination. Why? Because God has an individual plan for each of us. He delivered that plan to us in heaven before we came to earth. We can fulfill that plan as we put Him first in our lives and seek to do His will. So, as the Lord revealed to a young prophet Joseph Smith, “be anxiously engaged in a good cause, and do many things of [your] own free will, and bring to pass much righteousness; for the power is in [you], wherein [you] are agents unto [yourselves]” (D&C 58:27-28).

Antonin Scalia: the Loss of a Friend Emboldens Foes

I have followed with interest the news about the passing of Antonin Scalia. Aside from the sincere shock of the news (totally unexpected), I have been saddened by the loss of a sincere friend of the Constitution. His passing could allow for irreparable harm to the balance of power in the United States of America.

Why do I make such an outlandish claim? Well, I know I’m just a basic guy, but let me try to explain it this way.

Speaking if his approach to interpreting constitutional law as a Supreme Court jurist, Antonin Scalia once declared: “I am a textualist. I am an originalist. I am not a nut.”

What an odd collection of ideas. What does being a “nut” have to do with seriously considering the “text” of the Constitution and what it “originally” meant?

Consider Scalia’s own explanation of his originalist approach to juris prudence in some remarks he made at the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars in Washington, D.C., on March 14, 2005. He said:

“I am one of a small number of judges, small number of anybody — judges, professors, lawyers — who are known as originalists. Our manner of interpreting the Constitution is to begin with the text, and to give that text the meaning that it bore when it was adopted by the people....

“This is such a minority position in modern academia and in modern legal circles that on occasion I’m asked when I’ve given a talk like this a question from the back of the room — ‘Justice Scalia, when did you first become an originalist?’ — as though it is some kind of weird affliction that seizes some people — ‘When did you first start eating human flesh?’

“Although it is a minority view now, the reality is that, not very long ago, originalism was orthodoxy. Everybody, at least purported to be an originalist.”

Ahh, I see. In other words, to some an originalist is old fashioned and cannot possibly keep up with the times. So the argument must follow: we live in the day of the information highway and along with advances in science and technology we have far out-distanced the Founding Fathers. We need a constitution for our time that meets modern needs and lives up to the intellect we have achieved over 200 plus years.

Here’s my problem with this argument. In December 1833, God revealed to a prophet this important insight about the Constitution of the United States:

“I have suffered [the Constitution] to be established and should be maintained for the rights and protection of all flesh, according to just and holy principles…

“And for this purpose have I established the Constitution of this land, by the hands of wise men whom I raised up unto this very purpose, and redeemed the land by the shedding of blood” (D&C 101:77, 80).

Though Antonin Scalia was likely unaware of this revelation, his intuition to bring to bear originalism to his work may have been God-inspired. I think we are in desperate need for more friends of the Constitution to maintain a balance with the multiplying foes. And with Mr. Obama wielding the pen, I can only imagine the direction he will choose to go.

Questions to Answer

Gosh, it's been almost a year since my last entry. I guess tough medicine is hard to take. I'm still not over the real sense of loss from our most recent presidential election. I know you can't win them all, but I had expended a lot of time, thought and hope on this one. The loss stunned me.

I think it's time to pick myself up and go on with life. There are still things to be passionate about... and some of them are actually within my power to control. I'm not sure yet what direction things will go for the Basicguy in me, but I'm sure something will come. Could it be a photoblog? It could. How about a writer's blog? It could be that too. Gardening? Sure, why not. It's got to be hiking! Possibly. I do enjoy all of those things so why not?

For years my two loves have been politics and religion. They don't always mix so well, but both have fascinated me. My educational background in history has probably had as much to do with these interests as anything. So, will I never write about politics again? Well, I could never promise that. And what about religion... if it's such a love, why not try your hand with that? Thanks for asking. That's probably the most intriguing question of them all.

Time will tell.

Obama's Victory in Defeat

Well, it's been a while since I last posted. I've wanted to, but no profound thought has surfaced to the top. I know, you're thinking that nothing profound has ever risen to the top with me. That might be more accurate than I'd like to admit. Nevertheless, something finally surfaced and I'm going to share it.

I have thought about broadening my subject matter in this blog. I've tried it before, but it didn't last. I always keep gravitating back to one thing. Why am I so hung up on politics? I love photography, but I couldn't get that to stick for more than one blog. I love my family, but even that was hard to maintain in any consistent form. I even tried lessons learned from life and failed there also. I guess there is only one thing left to do... politics. I just wish I was more insightful.

Well, all I have to share today is this. Mr. Obama is going to lose the election this November (2012). I agree with Rush Limbaugh... I think he will lose by a larger margin than the polls indicate at this point in the race. Mr. Obama will lose because he deserves to lose. Misguided policies and the lack of real leadership and free enterprise know-how have doomed him. True blooded Americans, who have noticed such political weaknesses in the president and have largely kept their suspicions to themselves, will overwhelmingly vote against him in the secret confines of the voting booth.

Yet, even though I truly believe all of that, Mr. Obama, in the end, will still claim victory. In his self-ingrained arrogance, Mr. Obama will see victory in defeat. Why? Because he will glory in the fact that he successfully duped the American people. He'll declare that Americans are stupid and easy to manipulate. All you have to do is feed them lies and deny accusations; carefully spin your message so it looks like you are there to help them; pin opposing messages as intolerant; and fine-tune the blame game... it's always the other guys fault.

The sad part about this scenario, which will play out later this year and into 2013, is that he'll be right. As I've written before, Mr. Obama got where he is by being a convenient American, Christian, and black man. He used these things to manipulate voters to back him and he has used Americans and American institutions ever since as his personal play-thing. Why? Because he could.

I hope we as a nation and a people learn something from all of this. Our country is precariously close to a cliff constitutionally, financially, and politically. We cannot afford to let this happen again. Basically speaking, wake up America! If we don't, there will be no America as we know it left to awaken.

A Day to Remember

Happy Memorial Day! At least my celebration can be happy. I'm sitting in my own home that I was free to have had built and to buy, looking out a window at a tree that I was free to plant with my own hands, in a yard that I am free to trim and mow, and will later today be free to grill chicken and burgers while the kids freely play games in the yard. I'm sure the redundant words have already made the point I'm trying to make.

We get so caught up in the fun and games of having a day off from the regular requirements of life and often forget the reason for the day. There are many such days that we often forget about their real meaning and purpose. With each of them, Christmas, Easter, Independence Day, etc. there is something to remember. Memorial Day is no different.

This was driven home to me recently in a conversation with my mother. She told me about an experience my father had on the USS Cleveland during WWII. My dad is no longer with us, and though he had told many stories about his experience in the Navy, he had never told this one. I guess he was either trying to forget a bad memory or shield his children from some of the worst parts of war.

They had received word of another vessel that had been attacked by Japanese war planes. The ship was disabled and had suffered horrific casualties. The Cleveland was dispatched to rescue and recover. They found it floating listlessly at sea. After survivors were brought aboard, a detail was sent to board the ship for clean up. My dad was assigned that detail. He reported to my mother that as they boarded the damaged vessel, death and destruction became immediately evident. Blood smeared the decks along with body parts strewn everywhere. Piece by piece they filled bags and then proceeded to wash the evidence of death off the decks and into the sea. Some really do make the ultimate sacrifice.

This experience apparently had a profound influence on my father. He told my mom that from then on he did all he could to become an officer so he could void such a detail in the future. He did eventually become a Chief Petty Officer, but never said whether he had suffered such a detail again. Obviously, war is a terrible thing and best to be avoided if possible. But sometimes there is no other option. My dad was a proud veteran. He fought in one of those wars that could not be avoided. He did his patriotic duty and survived as a patriotic American for the rest of his life.

So, again, Happy Memorial Day! If for just a moment, take a little time to remember what this day is all about. If nothing else, think about my dad and the many who sacrificed all for the freedom, liberty, and hope of this nation that we still enjoy.

And then, while you think of those who gave their lives for this most important cause... think of ways you can live for it.

All in the Family

Recently we had a family gathering at our house. All of our kids and their families came for dinner... all except our son and his family in San Antonio (but we even skyped them in for some of the festivities). It's always quite the experience to have the whole clan together like that.

Well, as usual, I was running late because of church meetings. Dinner was scheduled for 4 pm and I pulled into the garage at 5 pm. I hurried through the door into the kitchen hoping my wife had thought to save me some food. The first sight was the dining room table. Various family members sat visiting at the table having finished whatever had been served on their plates. I was crestfallen.

I hurried in to look for any leftovers on the kitchen counter. Luckily my wife had ensured that I'd have two of her famous beef enchiladas along with some trimmings. I settled in to a nice meal.

By then the grandkids were laughing and screaming and chasing each other around. Toys were scattered all over the house. My kids and their spouses had lively conversations going on. My wife was fully entrenched in the conversations also.

At one point I sat comfortably on a couch surrounded by my family. Though they were each busy doing something else, they were smiling; happy to be together. Suddenly, out of the corner of my eye, I saw my granddaughter Jenna walking along as happy as she could be gnawing on my toothbrush. Somehow she had reached above her head into a drawer and pulled out whatever she could find. All I could do was smile and hope that she didn't come down with something from grandpa.

Now, I'm sure if anyone was on the outside looking in, they might think that what they were seeing was mass confusion. But not to me... it was simply family. Isn't family simply food, fun, chatter, games, joy, laughter, in depth conversations, supporting each other, spending time together, and yes, even sharing toothbrushes? I think so.

Well, all I can say is, I look forward to our next get together. I hope everyone has such moments in their lives. There is nothing like a real genuine family. No wonder one religious leader once declared: "The earth was created, that families might be" (Russell M. Nelson, Ensign, May 2000).

Let the Wind of Change Blow

The wind blew like crazy last night. Our windows rattled, screens shook, and sounded ominous. The lights flickered and interrupted our reading for a moment. I looked at my wife and assured her we had a working flashlight nearby. Then I thought of the new generator I got for Christmas. Would we have to use it so soon? I hadn't even unboxed it yet


Well, fortunately it didn’t come down to dealing with an emergency. Though the winds continued to howl and whine, we soon fell asleep and missed the rest of the winds assault on the Salt Lake Valley.


The morning, though cold, brought sunshine and blue skies. It was absolutely gorgeous. Quite a contrast from the weeks before. Salt Lake Valley often sports an inversion in the winter. It’s a murky layer of not so pleasant smog... best not breathed in large doses. We’re told to cut down on our driving and to stay indoors if possible. For some the smog can actually be on the deadly side. But today was bright, clear, and beautiful... what a relief. 


As I thought about the needed change in this new day, I remembered the wind from the night before. What seemed threatening the night before actually cleared the smog from the valley. The murky atmosphere that tended to affect our moods and trap numerous particles in the air was gone... blown away by the wind. 


So it is with winds of change. We all experience a certain murkiness in life. This murkiness can affect our moods and attitudes. If it gets thick enough it also affects how far we can see. Sometimes it can be filled with things that are dangerous to us... impeding our essential progress in life. That's when the storms of life or the winds of change actually do us a favor. With life's murkiness blown away, we can see clearly again and feel hope and excitement. Life is once again gorgeous and beautiful.

So here we are, the end of yet another year... the turning of another page in our lives. Have you experienced any murkiness in 2011? Has it been hard to “see” clearly? Are you ending the year with a discouraging mood or attitude? If so, maybe 2012 can provide a needed wind of change and blow away life’s murky smog. I have a feeling though that whether the wind blows is up to you and me. So this New Year, let the winds blow.