They Said We Should Do It.

Do what? you say? You know, all of it. At this particular point in my writing therapy I am talking about the all of it that includes praying as a couple, regular dates, regular temple attendance, scripture study. 'They' would be speaking in reference to the prophets, marriage counselors, self-help gurus, parents, etc. To keep a marriage strong, they would say - and do you know what? They were right. I think.
To set the record straight I would like to say here that I married the man of my dreams. K. is the kind of person that any woman would LOVE to be married to. In so many ways he is the glue that holds our family together. The dozens of ways that he shows his love for me make other women envious, though is seems some of my best friends in life have also found husbands who: put the kids to bed, give the kids baths, do the dishes, fold laundry. and don't mind the colors I choose to paint our home.
I would also like to say here that the Gospel of Jesus Christ is the most important thing to me, and to K. also. From the time I was very young I could feel the Hand of the Savior, or of our Father in Heaven, in mine. ALWAYS. Reading back through my journals there are several entries that read something like this: " I HATE my Mom and Dad! They are so mean!!! typical teenager stuff My brothers are so rude, I wish I were an only child! It doesn't matter though because I have my Heavenly Father and I know he is always with me and that HE at least, loves me!"  Even through the years that I dealt with things that no child should have to deal with, even if I were scared or hurt, or angry, I knew that I wasn't alone.
And yet, knowing these things don't make good habits stick on their own. Habits such as praying every morning and night and reading my scriptures every day have never been like second nature. Night prayers have been the easiest, and though I can say that most of the day I carry a prayer in my heart, morning prayers are something that have only become more common-place since becoming married.

You know how sometimes as a parent you think you will go crazy if you have to tell your kids to stop jumping on the bed one more time? So you finally decide they are going to have to learn their lesson the hard way - then they fall of the bed and get hurt badly enough to remember, but not so badly enough to require a trip to the emergency room? I've been finding that when it comes to the basics of family life those things that we hear from our Heavenly Father over and over and over and over again are to keep us from falling off the bed.

After almost nine years of marriage, four pregnancies, four recoveries, four progressively worse bouts of postpartum depression, years of putting husband through school, years of being a stay-at-home Mom on a school teachers salary, medical issues and all of the rest of the typical stuff that life brings - I've fallen off of the bed a few times. In the world of make-believe I've been at the point where the parent is sitting with the injured child vacillating back and forth trying to decide if the child needs to go to the ER. At what point would one consider a child of God as having arrived at the Emergency Room? I THINK I haven't made it there yet. Perhaps the ER is - going inactive, or separating from my husband, having an affair, or picking up drinking? (Alcohol of course, not DDP! ;)

No, I haven't made a trip to the spiritual emergency room yet, but I've spent quite a lot of time nursing wounds that have come from falling off of the bed. Even now, K. and I have fallen off of the bed, and it hurts. It hurts because we were both raised in the church and we should know better. There are LOTS of "good" excuses for why we haven't been so good about regular dates: lack of money for a baby-sitter, lack of a baby-sitter (period), too soon after a baby, too much work to get things ready for a baby-sitter, too tired, too sick, kids sick, too tired, did I mention too tired? All of those "good" excuses would fall into place for attending the temple regularly. Sad as it is, I can't give ANY even LAME excuses for not making prayer as a couple a regular occurrence, as for studying scriptures together (?) well, that IS a lofty goal isn't it?

Our kids have faired much better. For the most part they are well adjusted, happy kids who know how to bear their testimonies (by themselves), take turns reading from the scriptures during family scripture study, look forward to our hectic, sometimes insane Family Home Evenings (which, of course, revolve around who's favorite song will be chosen first and the time and location of refreshments), and can name the prophet at a glance. Spiritually speaking, they are doing pretty well. Emotionally speaking? Does crying and throwing tantrums because so and so took this or that or Mom asked me to pick up WHAT(?!) mean they are emotionally handicapped? Naw...I think they are pretty normal (I hope).

The fact of the matter is that in this day and age it's getting to be easier and easier to find a trip to the ER  inevitable after falling off the bed. The falls are harder, the recoveries are slower and the long-lasting limps are, well, longer-lasting. Injuries that used to take just a few stitches to fix are now requiring major surgery - with medical bills left over!!
I'm getting the impression that we are out of time. The Lord has told us plenty of times what to do and the next time we jump we are going to fall flat on our faces! At this point in my life I have had to realize that my marriage is the part of our family that needs a band-aid. Duh! Of course Satan would attack there! If he wins in driving K. and I further and further apart, he succeeds in destroying a family.  Below is a quote from President James E. Faust that reminds me of what is obvious to spiritual eyes if one were to look around at what is happening in the world.
"There have always been two great competing forces in the world. These began before the world was created. These opposing forces are the forces of good and evil. Between these two powerful forces each of us is caught in a tug of war. In simple terms, that which is good comes from God, and that which is evil comes from the devil.  You can’t have it both ways and find true happiness; some have tried, but in the long run all have failed....There is a price to pay for success, fulfillment, accomplishment, and joy. There are no freebies. If you don’t pay the price that is needed for success, you will pay the price of failure. Preparation, work, study, and service are required to achieve and find happiness. Disobedience and lack of preparation carry a terrible price tag....There is a continuing sifting process going on. We are reminded of the parable of the wheat and the tares. In that parable the Lord said, “The kingdom of heaven is likened unto a man which sowed good seed in his field,” but while he slept, his enemy came and sowed tares among the grain, so that when the blades of wheat sprouted, so did the weeds. The man’s workers did not understand how weeds got into the field and asked if they should go and pull the weeds. The owner of the field said no, because while you pull the weeds, you also pull up the grain. So he counseled that the grain and the weeds grow together until the time of harvest, when the wheat would be bundled separately from the weeds. The disciples of Jesus asked the Savior for an interpretation of the parable, and the Savior answered: “He that soweth the good seed is the Son of man; The field is the world; the good seed are the children of the kingdom; but the tares are the children of the wicked one; The enemy that sowed them is the devil; … and the reapers are the angels.... As therefore the tares are gathered and burned in the fire; so shall it be in the end of this world.”

The Mom part of me comes naturally...I've been taking care of kids my whole life. The wife, married to a GUY, sharing everything, discussing too many things, working together part of me is like meeting an alien in the mirror - not so natural. Yet, natural or not, my brain and my soul have been speaking to each other and they've decided that they need to wake up my heart and get it into the right place in ALL of the areas of my life, not just SOME of the areas. Looking at the GRAND PICTURE helps. It helps to realize that even though my attention is dominated by my very present little family, if I were to step back and take a look from, say, Kolob, I would see much, much more. I would see good people surrounded by the tares of the world. I would see the hand of the Lord in places that may not seem obvious. I would see all of the problems and sicknesses and natural disasters as necessary occurrences as the earth is being prepared for the Second Coming of our LORD. I would most likely see many, many members of the church, just like myself. Sons and Daughters of God who were raised in the gospel, married in the temple, valiant-at-heart people, who are being choked by the tares of the world. Keeping with the metaphor the solution to the problem is to send down my roots to access the living water that I know is available. You know what the interesting thing is? This 'falling of the bed' isn't one of those problems that my young womens' leaders talked about. It wasn't put in front of me to make a choice when I was 13 that when I was 31 I would fight for my family and put the teachings of the gospel and the light of the Savior so obviously ahead of ANYTHING else that there would be no margin for error. I am making the choice right now, and I am going to teach my children about the choices that they will have to make too. What the members of the church, and anyone who desires to follow the Savior needs to remember is this: The only things that are really happening in the world right now are the things that are going to prepare the earth for the coming of our Savior. If each of us, brothers, sisters, parents, grand-parents, great-grandparents, would make every decision with this GRAND PICTURE in mind, then we would be safe. Safe from a trip to the ER, and safe from being thrown into the burning pile of tares. Sigh, don't I WISH I had been one of those super people who listened and obeyed in the same breath? Ah well, better late than never huh?

PS Have a Wonderful Thanks-giving! Christmas tree goes up tomorrow!! Yipee!!!