Known Only Unto God

My reading this week has been a little different. When I was in San Francisco, I picked up Elizabeth D. Samet’s Soldier’s Heart: Reading Literature Through Peace and War at West Point. She writes about her experiences as a civilian literature professor there, especially about some of the cadets' involvement with literature, mostly classical. Parts of it were hard to understand because she assumes the reader is familiar with the works she’s discussing. It was good reading about the cadets, though, and how the literature touched their lives, not only in the classroom but later in their other assignments.

I do like a number of quotations she uses to discuss reading, obedience, religion, bravery, and sacrifice. I also got a few good glimpses into military history. And I now have a long list of books I want to start reading.

At nearly the last paragraph, she quotes Cormac McCarthy’s Blood Meridian. I can’t remember if I’ve talked with you about this book. I’ve read it, and it is powerful, but it is, without a doubt, the most violent, bloody, gruesome book I’ve ever read—the title is literal. McCarthy claims to chronicle the violence of the West. From page one, there is violence, and on that page, McCarthy explains the reason why the kid is the way he is: “He can neither read nor write and in him broods a taste for mindless violence.” Samet suggests, that through literature, the cadets are able to express and strengthen their humanity.

Literature helps balance our lives.

Samet refers often to three books which she says continue to be favorites of her cadets: Homer’s Illiad and Odyssey and Virgil’s Aeneid. I’m confessing here that I’ve never read them—they’ve been too intimidating.

So this weekend I started with the Odyssey. I found a 2007 American translation by Stanley Lombardo, and I’ve been pulled into the book—it is great and a very good read. I do like the character Odysseus as he struggles against all odds after twenty years to return from the Trojan War to his wife Penelope and son Telemachus. All these stories I’ve heard over the years are now starting to make sense.

A friend today was telling about a recent trip to Tennessee and they were driving by a small Baptist cemetery and decided to walk around. It was an older cemetery with these elaborate headstones and monuments, except for a few rows of simple markers with small Confederate flags in the ground. The only thing the markers said was “Known Only Unto God.” That touched me that these were probably unknown Civil War graves and they were soldiers who had families, loved ones, and lives.

But even if they are unknown today, God does know, and love, and care for them. And He also knows, loves, and cares for us, and we are also loved by so many others who know and care for us—on both sides of the veil.

“The Lord gave us power in proportion to the work to be done, and strength according to the race set before us, and grace and help as our needs require.” Joseph Smith

Team of Rivals

For some time now, I have had Doris Kearns Goodwin’s book Team of Rivals on my reading list. The historian has focused on the role Abraham Lincoln’s adversaries have planned on his Presidency and on the Civil War. Harvard Business Review has conducted an interview with Goodwin about lessons leaders can learn from Lincoln’s working with his adversaries.

Goodwin makes three strong points about Lincoln’s leadership:

•Abraham Lincoln’s genius was to manage the ambitions and egos of his rivals to form a team that could confront the challenges of civil war.
•His ability to create a team of rivals was rooted in an extraordinary level of emotional intelligence. He learned from his mistakes, he shared responsibility for the mistakes of others, and he did not hold grudges.
•Lincoln’s experiences, like that of other presidents in times of emergency, give hope that the United States and other democracies will weather the current crisis.

My students are now finishing semester-long term projects, and it is becoming very clear that some groups are more effective than others. I’ve been able to catch glimpses in which groups take their multiple assignments and contributions and put aside differences and egos to create well-crafted, equally articulated documents. Unfortunately, other groups continue to resist working as a unit, each protective of own ideas and approaches rather than focus on a unified tasks. These weaker groups struggle with poor attendance, assignments turned in “just in time,” yet not enough time to solicit feedback and revision to create a prepared, thoughtful whole—it’s a culmination of pieces that don’t fit.

I’m impressed with Goodwin’s observation: “What Lincoln had, it seems to me, was an extraordinary amount of emotional intelligence. He was able to acknowledge his errors and learn from his mistakes to a remarkable degree. He was careful to put past hurts behind him and never allowed wounds to fester.”

Working collaboratively, especially in forced situations, can appear to be a team of rivals, yet through a willingness to meet a cooperative goal, groups can achieve what can’t be accomplished alone. Goodwin reminds us that the “idea is not to put your rivals in power—the point is to choose the best and most able people . . . for the good” of the project. Then the team of rivals can become a productive team.

Regretfully Yours

During the closing scene of Quantum of Solace, M asks James Bond if he has any regrets. Bond responds with “No.” He then asks her if she has regrets, and she replies, “Of course not. That would be unprofessional.”

In the new April 2009 issue of Harvard Business Review, Dr. Michael Craig Miller, MD titles his article, “Go Ahead, Have Regrets.” He’s not talking about the rending emotion that paralyzes us or bombards us with failure. Rather, Miller claims that regret can be valuable because it can help clarify things in life and set us in a different direction. Because regret is a powerful emotion, that same power can motivate us to change and to do.

Miller quotes the Danish philosopher Soren Kirekegaard: “Life can only be understood backwards, but it must be lived forwards.” So it’s ok to look back and determine what hasn’t worked or where a direction is wrong—these are “frank reappraisals.” Now it’s time to look forward and determine how to turn those poor choices into meaningful experiences.

Regret-driven analysis does not mean rationalization or excuse making. In terms of the gospel, regret can allow us to act rather than to be acted upon. Regret can give us perspective, especially if the regret results from spiritual promptings, and those some promptings can guide us as we redirect our lives.

Rather than ignore or even not acknowledge regret, James and M, it is professional and healthy to understand life backwards but live it forwards.

Wilderness Survival

This week I’ve been thinking about wildernesses. Part of this is probably because I’ve been thinking a Marine student soon to be deployed to Afghanistan—I’ve been trying to imagine what it’s going to be like for him. From whatever I’ve seen, it sure looks barren—a wilderness. However, for members of the church, a wilderness doesn’t mean that it is God-forsaken. Think of the wilderness experiences in the scriptures and church history. Of course, there’s Moses and the children of Israel, Lehi and his family, Zion’s Camp, the Mormon Battalion, Joseph’s Liberty Jail, and the Saints exodus from Nauvoo. In all cases, the wilderness experience becomes a spiritual training/proving ground that results in glorious blessings—a promised land. Think specifically of Lehi’s family and the Prophet Joseph. Look at all of Nephi’s learned lessons: the Brass plates, the Tree of Life, the broken bow, the sweetened uncooked meat, the ship building, the sea crossing, the great division and separation of the family—all of these take place in the wilderness. Yes, these are incredibly difficult experiences, but also notice that Lehi’s family is led by angels, the Holy Ghost in the form of a man, visions of the Savior, the Liahona giving directions and counsel. I wonder if those wonderful blessings would have happened had they not been in the wilderness.

Think of the Prophet Joseph in Liberty Jail. This weekend, I reread D&C 121-123 which are his letters from Liberty Jail. Those sections, particularly, D&C 121 include some of the most sublime language, pleading, and assurance in all of scripture. Elder Neal A. Maxwell has called this Joseph’s Liberty Temple experience—a temple in a wilderness.

President James E. Faust has said, “In the agonies of life, we seem to listen better to the faint, godly whisperings of the Divine Shepherd.” And President Spencer W. Kimball has said, “We can . . . tell that we are making progress by the attention we get from the adversary. . . . This has been the lot of the Lord’s people from the beginning, and it will be no different in our time.”

How often in the scriptures do we get the Lord’s promise that He will “lead thee by the hand, and give the answers to thy prayers” (D&C 112:10), “thy God shall stand by thee forever and ever” (D&C 122:4), “know thou, my son, that all these things shall give thee experience, and shall be for thy good” (D&C 122:7), “fear not what man can do, for God shall be with you forever and ever” (D&C 122:9), and one of my favorites, “Therefore, dearly beloved brethren, let us cheerfully do all things that lie in our power; and then may we stand still, with the utmost assurance, to see the salvation of God, and for his arm to be revealed” (D&C 123:17).

I know we have had wilderness experiences before in our lives, and we’re still in the wilderness, but know “[our[ prayers are acceptable before [Him]” (D&C 124:2), and He is with us, guiding us, comforting us, blessing us. We are His, and we are being led and more importantly being prepared for glorious blessings that will only come because of our faith in Him as we journey through this seemingly endless wilderness.

Sourdough Starters

Boudin’s sourdough French bread is a San Francisco tradition. Last week, I had Boudin sourdough three different times. On Thursday for lunch I had a turkey cranberry sandwich with turkey, cranberry sauce, red onion, lettuce, and mayo on sliced sourdough bread. On Friday for lunch I had a turkey avocado sandwich with turkey, havarti cheese, lettuce, tomatoes, mayo, avocado on multigrain sourdough bread. And Friday night at Pier 39 on Fisherman’s Wharf, I had thick, creamy clam chowder in a sourdough bread bowl.

While I was growing up, sourdough pancakes were a Saturday morning tradition. We’d pull the starter crock from the back of the refrigerator and mix up the pancakes—nothing tastes like sourdough pancakes.

That sourdough starter intrigues me. Sourdough does not use commercial yeast; instead the “wild” yeast germinates and leavens the bread. After five days, the starter is yeasty and ready to use. But we use only part of the starter and refresh it with more water, flour, water, and potato flakes so it can “sour,” ready for the next use. The same starter is used and refreshed continuously, often for years and years. My parents used the same starter all the time I was growing up, and Boudin’s maintain that they have been using their mother starter since 1849.

I like that starter of the past becomes both the starter for the present and the starter for the future—all in one crock. I can’t help but think that the relationships we develop with others over the years often function as the “starter” for us.

Each of us individually represents all the people who have influenced us throughout our lives. These individuals have “started” us to become who we are now. And their influence continues to impact us as we “start” another relationship or connection which in turn grows and develops and “starts” us and others in new directions.

At the beginning of the semester when my students and I first meet, we’re all “starters,” and during the semester we eventually leaven and strengthen each other—we become a part of each others’ lives. And as we leave class, we will continue as “starters” to leaven and bless additional individuals’ lives.

I’m grateful for my students and the blessings and meaningful contributions they make in my life. They're good “starters.”

Thieves and Locks

I was in San Francisco at the Conference on College Composition and Communication—the biggest conference on college writing. It's a good conference because it not only discusses theory, but it gives some good, hands-on direction as well.

The session that touched me was called “Writing of War, Writing of Peace.” They had six vets talk about their writing—they belong to a single writing group that has helped each of them publish their work. They talked on writing about incredibly difficult situations and experiences and how to work through issues. Then they read some of their work—very, very good. An additional individual presented who is a journalist who chronicled the experience of a young Sudanese boy soldier—his book has won major awards.

One of my favorite vets is Marine Sean McLain Brown from the Persian Gulf War who read two poems “Easter” and “White Flag.” In his talk he said that “everyone who has experienced trauma is a vet.” Below in the quotation box is Brown's "Easter.

While traveling and at nights, I read a fabulous book by the Australian Mark Zusak called The Book Thief. It’s one of those books that has had a profound impact on me. It’s the story of a single neighborhood in Germany during the rise of the Hitler’s Third Reich and World War II. It’s mostly the story of a nine-year-old girl throughout this time until she turns fifteen. She occasionally steals books.

The Book Thief is about how Hitler destroys people with words, yet this young girl steals the words back as she reads books with a young Jewish man hiding in their basement, with her German neighbors to calm them in bomb shelters during air raids, and with an angry mother who has lost her sons in the war. She writes her own beautiful story though the horrors of the world that surrounds her. The book’s narrator is Death, who isn’t unkind or frightening. Death is just exhausted, and he continues to watch Liesel as he crosses her life. It’s a very, very good read.

How do we make it through these troubling times we face in our lives? Prayer is a significant answer. Prayer and dependence on our Father gives us power. Elder Neal A. Maxwell has said prayer is like a combination lock—to have effective prayer, we need to get three tumblers to line up just right. The tumblers include faith, personal righteousness, and God’s will.

So although there are thieves out there who are trying to take what who hold precious, remember that there is the combination lock of prayer that can protect and restore us.

"Easter" by Sean McLain Brown
On Easter, the girls dressed up in white hats with pink chiffon ribbon, pretty dresses with daisies and sunflower,
and us boys with new patent leather shoes and freshly starched ironed shirts and off to church we would go
and after come home to look for our Easter baskets with the sun still shining and father and mother there on
the porch looking on and laughing. What good times. I hope God will bring me home so I can hunt for eggs
in the field behind our barn, listen to the low short whistles of screech owls as they dive after mice while fireflies
weave-and-bob like Lilliputian lanterns. But here there’s only the high pitched whine of sand flies in my ears, the
twenty-miles of switchbacks to hump before sundown and we have to make the northern hill and no one knows
why but when; it’s Easter and we don’t have any eggs but plenty of grenades and no white hats but Kevlar helmets,
and no starched shirts but flak jackets. But at night on the perimeter, when the rain clears and light from the moon
shines across a field, I listen for low short whistles and the skitter of field mice across my boots, and the
phosphorescent glow of tracer fire streak red and orange through frozen air, like spring bonfires with winter wood,
or Easter lying prone in the mud, marking time, with nothing to do but wait for the sun.

Handshakes

The Prophet Joseph Smith was visiting his parents in Far West, and a group of angry men arrived to say they were going to kill him. His mother Lucy Mack Smith relates,”[Joseph] looked upon them with a very pleasant smile and, stepping up to them, gave each of them his hand in a manner which convinced them that he was neither a guilty criminal nor yet a cowering hypocrite.” Joseph then began a conversation with them explaining how the Saints had been mistreated. The men in the end, offered to protect the Prophet. One of the men said, “Did you not feel strangely when Smith took you by the hand? I never felt so in my life.” And the other man replied, “I felt as though I could not move. I would not harm one hair of that man’s head for the whole world.”

Can you imagine the power of that handshake—his goodness simply emanated from and through him.

Two contrasting characters have stood out for me this week that have helped me make another connection with the Prophet's handshake. I have read for the first time Christopher Marlowe’s Doctor Faustus. (Marlowe was a contemporary of Shakespeare.) Doctor Faustus is from a humble beginning, but because of his desire for learning, he spent his life studying until he had all knowledge. But he wanted much more to the point that he made a pact that Lucifer could have his soul if Lucifer would grant him a servant for twenty-four years to do Faustus’ bidding and to teach him more. Lucifer allowed one of his most powerful devils Mephistopheles to serve Faustus. From the very beginning until the very end, there is a good angel and others who warn Faustus and provide opportunities for him to repent, yet Faustus is so determined that he ignores them. Of course, at the end, Faustus pleads for Lucifer to free him, but it is too late.

Think of our desires, which may be noble and good, but are they taking us away from others and from God? Are we receiving warnings that we don’t hear or that we ignore? Will there come a time when it is too late to change or we’ll not want to change?

The second character is Steinar Steinsson from Halldór Laxness’s Paradise Reclaimed. I just learned of Laxness a couple weeks ago—he is the Icelandic novelist who won the Nobel laureate for literature in 1955. Laxness is a strong Catholic who lived in the strong Lutheran country of Iceland. Paradise Reclaimed, set in the 1880s, is about Steinar of Hlidar, Iceland, who is a gentle, generous man. Steinar gives their valuable horse and an exquisite mahogany chest he has made to the visiting king of Denmark. He sees only the best in people, which is why he listens to and protects a Mormon missionary. Steinar wants to do what is right and what is good, even if it costs his family dearly. He leaves his paradise homeland and arrives in Spanish Fork, Utah, and becomes a brick maker and layer until he eventually returns to Iceland as a Mormon missionary.

No matter the hardship, Steinar does what is good, and he only wants to assist and bless people and learn the truth. He trusts, and he works.

Steinar and Faustus are such contrasts, but I find that I can identify with both. Yes, there are times I also want Faustus’ noticeable and dramatic power and influence (he is able to control popes and kings) but also Steinar’s gentle, quiet strength.

Which gets us back to the Prophet Joseph. He does have power, influence, gentleness, and quiet strength. But all of that comes through the power of the Holy Ghost, the grace of Christ, and his own goodness. Joseph has told us that when we are instrumental in God’s great work, “He will endow [us] with power, wisdom, might, and intelligence, and every qualification necessary; while [our] minds will expand wider and wider, until [we] can circumscribe the earth and the heavens, reach forth into eternity and contemplate the mighty acts of Jehovah in all their variety and glory.” --That is power!

Let's reach out to shake someone’s hand, someone who needs our strength.

Tender Mercies--Horton Foote

Horton Foote died March 4, 2009, at the age of 92. Rarely does an author’s, poet’s, or playwright’s death affect me, but when I found out about Foote’s death, I sensed both a loss and a determination.

Foote seems so gentle and hopeful because of his characters, and I will miss that. So often with contemporary dramatists, it seems the focus is on the ugly, the downtrodden, and the depraved. It’s hard reading about such hopeless individuals in such hopeless situations.

Foote’s characters, however, have an element of goodness despite their difficult situations—they may just make it to a better stage of life. The two that convey that feeling are Mac Sledge from Tender Mercies and Mrs. Watts from The Trip to Bountiful. Mac is a deep down-and-out drunk cowboy songwriter who has lost his career and his family, but because of determination and the love of a woman and young boy, he changes and blesses lives. Mrs. Watts is an oppressed, emotionally abused elderly woman who just wants to return to her childhood home that no longer exists, but who eventually finds peace in the present.

My students were able to connect with both of Foote’s characters and screenplays last semester in which they explored own relationships not as removed as they first appear. In fact, Foote’s strength is in creating the common character who isn’t much different than we are.

So I feel a loss because of Foote’s death. But I now have a determination to read more of his works. I want now to focus first on his Orphan Home Cycle plays—I have much to read and many new characters to become a part of my life.

I look forward to discovering and feeling the hope that Horton Foote expresses in the following quotation:

"I have enormous respect for the human being, because they're asked to take on a lot. And I don't think there's any easy solution. But I think the journey is what you have to finally be satisfied with, but not be afraid of the lessons one has to learn ... it ends up as grace. And you grow, you find a way to continue." --Horton Foote

Ephraim Hanks and Adobe Bricks

Ephraim Hanks had just arrived in the Salt Lake Valley two weeks earlier. He was beginning to build their first home. He had already got heavy pine timbers for the frame, and he also had the eight inch adobe brick. He hired a bricklayer, and the two of them began laying the brick walls in the hot Utah summer.

They worked well together and had made a lot of progress over a few days until the walls were waist high. They had hardly noticed the dusty carriage pull up. Inside was President Brigham Young, who didn’t get out, but just looked at the brick work, and looked at Ephraim. Ephraim remembered looking into Brother Brigham’s blue eyes and hearing him say, “Make the walls sixteen inches and not eight.” Without another word, the carriage drove off, leaving Ephraim standing there. To build the walls sixteen inches, they would have to tear down everything they had done, get more timbers, and twice as many bricks.

The brick mason, said that Brother Brigham was just talking off the top of his hat, and that most of the homes used only six inch bricks—there was no need to redo their work. Ephraim sat down and thought. He stood up and began tearing down the wall. He told the mason, that he had come across the plains from Nauvoo and from California with the Mormon Battalion because he knew Brigham was a prophet of God. It didn’t matter to him if Brigham were talking off the top of his hat or if he were receiving revelation, he would do what the prophet asked him to do.

Ephraim built his walls sixteen inches thick. A week after the home was finished, the rains came, especially heavy in the mountains, and waters flooded the valley, washing away nearly every home in its path, except for Ephraim’s sixteen inch thick walled home.

After reading that experience, I began to examine myself and asking how closely do I listen and follow President Monson. I have become very aware that what the Prophet says is the same as the Lord speaking, so how closely am I listening to the Lord?

I then thought back to last October conference, and I couldn’t remember anything President Monson had said, except for the announcement of the five new temples. This weekend, I reread President Monson’s four talks at the last conference, underlining passages that I felt were meant just for me. I then typed them and printed them to slip into my scriptures so I can more easily pay attention to these messages. I’ll pass these along to you, but I’m certain that if you did this also, you would find different messages.

My testimony of President Monson has been strengthened incredibly this week just because of this experience. I’m so grateful for a living prophet and for his messages to us. Here’s just one message from the last conference that I really like: “Remember that the Lord will shape the back to bear the burden placed upon it”—isn’t that great?