No Coincidences

Tag: eternal families

  • One Eternal Round

    One Eternal Round

    I started making some bad decisions in high school. These decisions nearly derailed my life.

    During that time I was becoming friendly with a girl. She knew about some of my bad decision-making.

    One night when we were hanging out I told her I would never get married anywhere but a temple. This interested her. Why, she wondered, would someone like me, who seemingly cared nothing for this religion that I was raised with, care about a temple marriage?

    I explained to her that I believed my church was true. If my church was true, then it held the authority to marry couples for eternity. That church, therefore, sealed families for eternity. I told her if I married someone I didn’t want it to end after we died. If I were to ever get married, I wanted it to be for eternity.

    When I was in college my decision making had gotten increasingly worse.

    On a night I don’t remember, it was later told to me that I bore my testimony to a girl at a party. I don’t remember any of this. Apparently, religion came up and I told her I knew the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints was Jesus Christ’s church on the earth.

    This girl asked the obvious question, “If you know it’s true, why are you doing the things you’re doing?”

    I’m told I said that even though I wasn’t living the standards of the church, I couldn’t deny what I knew to be true.

    That testimony that I don’t remember had a big impact on that girl.

    Years later that first girl from high school sent me a postcard. That girl from high school had gotten baptized. Her postcard was one of a few critical moments that helped me come back to church and changed my life.

    A month after that postcard, in the midst of my difficult journey back to church, I stumbled upon a Facebook message that had gotten blocked and I’d never seen. It was from years prior. It was from the girl at the college party, the girl I bore a drunken testimony to.

    She told me she’d gotten baptized. She told me she had never let me know how big an impact that testimony had on her ultimately getting baptized. I visited her and her budding family. She was sealed in the temple. She had an eternal family. She was happy. It gave me strength to continue on the path of repentance that was so, so hard.

    The girl from high school got married in the temple and now has three kids. She has an eternal family. She is happy.

    A patriarchal blessing is extremely sacred. I share a short line from my blessing with the utmost reverence:

    “Trouble not yourself over lost days, for you are an eternal being”

    I can’t tell you how comforting those words were when I was trying to find strength to stay faithful, and how important those words continue to be to me.

    It is all one eternal round to God (D&C 3:2). He knew I would stumble. What did He do when I stumbled? Put two people in my path that I could somehow, inexplicably, impact at my lowest, during my most degraded behaviors.

    What did He do?

    He put those two people back in my path when they could help me back. He put two people back into my life to help me remember what I always knew, what I was getting dangerously close to forgetting. He put two people in my path to remind me who I was. I am nothing special of myself, but I am a son of God. That is special.

    I marvel at the workings of God. That He loves us so much that He gave us a world so we could leave our Heavenly home, just as children leave their homes here on earth to go out and learn, and grow, and fall. He gave us an earth to fall. But He allowed us a way back.

    I know there is a way back.

    I know that Jesus Christ allows that way back.

    I know that God planned for everything. We are His work and His glory.

    I can never deny what I know.

  • The Haunting of Hill House and Eternity

    The Haunting of Hill House and Eternity

    The Haunting on Hill House is one of the best shows I’ve seen. It’s been out for a while so you’re being forewarned, there will be spoilers. It’s worth watching. Keep in mind there will be some language and mature content. It is still on Netflix. If you haven’t watched, go binge 10 episodes and come back. 

    In the show, Hill House is evil. It drives those within it to madness. It entraps them and makes them make awful choices. Those who stay too long go crazy and lose themselves to the house. Multiple deaths have occurred in the house and those who die there stay there forever. 

    The show makes it clear the house is evil. The last episode begins with a quote:

    “Certainly, there are places which attach to themselves an atmosphere of holiness and goodness. It might also be said that some houses are born bad.”

    It continues:

    “This house, which seemed somehow to have formed itself flying together in its own powerful pattern under the hands of its builders reared its great head back against the sky without concession to humanity. It was a house without kindness. Never meant to be lived in. Not a fit place for people, or for love, or for hope.”

    Sounds evil right?

    Well…

    That’s why the title of this post is a “conflicted message.” The above quotes don’t fit with the ending of the show. Call it Hollywood happy endings if you must. I had a different perspective. I thought of the ending in terms of what I know about heaven, and eternity. 

    The climax of the final episode comes when one of the characters learns the true nature of the home. He learns his father always knew the nature of the home and protected his children from it. We, the viewers, learn alongside this character what has been happening all along.

    The show is based around a family who moved into the house. The mother is lost to the home and commits suicide. Before committing suicide, she brings a young girl, the daughter of the groundskeepers, with her. Extremely dark.

    The father whose wife committed this act tells the parents of the young girl that he plans to burn the house to the ground, burn the hill, and salt the earth. They beg him not to do it. Their daughter is now a part of this home. She appears as a living, breathing child, though she is none of those things. Her soul belongs to the house.

    The father agrees to keep the groundskeeping family on to protect the home and spend the rest of their lives with their now perpetually 9-year-old daughter. The father/owner of the home leaves the home, and his dead wife, and takes his kids away. He wants to protect them from the home and let them experience life.

    We learn at the end that the father would occasionally visit the home to be with his wife. His wife experiences life as some sort of dream. She doesn’t know how much time has passed. She doesn’t fully comprehend her situation. Part of her mind appears to have been lost.

    Back to the climax of the show. Many years after the initial tragedy of losing his wife to the house, we see the father come back one last time. He ends his life there so he can spend the rest of time with his wife who he loves. The ultimate emotional moment of the show comes when the groundskeeper carries in his dying wife, and with tears he sees her with his daughter and a baby. I assume it is a baby that died in the home long ago. What the old groundskeeper is seeing is heaven. He is seeing the opportunity to be with his wife, daughter, and baby forever.

    There are two ways to look at this. Either Hill House is evil and what they are seeing is a counterfeit of heaven. Those who die there will spend some amount of time there, whether it be 100 or 500 or 10,000 years, but they won’t spend eternity there together.

    Or.

    The other option is this is heaven. The family will spend the rest of time and eternity there together. I’ll take the happy ending.

    What I know of heaven is that it will be where families are together forever. Families are meant to be together. Families are meant to be eternal. While many believe the family unit is just an earthly device, I cry foul! God gave us this powerful, important, sustaining, empowering, frustrating, growth promoting unit only to see it demolished after our test here? Doesn’t make sense. 

    Families are forever. Families are eternal. It’s the great truth of the gospel. It’s a great comfort to me, as I sit here and look at my daughters. Heaven can’t be heaven unless I’m with them forever.

    There were some good themes in this show that made me think. There’s a whole other spiritual implication from this show that analogizes leaving the Garden of Eden. It was a deep show if you let it be. But the greatest message was at the end – about family, about how important family is, that there is nothing more important than being with your family.

    That is what God has given us: eternal families. What a blessing that is.

    “Love is the relinquishment of logic. The willing relinquishing of reasonable patterns. We yield to it, or we fight it. But we cannot meet it halfway.”

  • Children Need Their Father

    Children Need Their Father

    I went on a weeklong river rafting trip. I believe it was the longest time I’d spent away from Ivy. A large portion of that trip, I did not have my cell phone with me.

    When I got off the river and started driving back to Las Vegas with my family, I checked my phone and learned that Ivy had not had a good week. Meltdowns, tantrums, refusing to sleep. Apparently, she’d had a very hard time in my absence. I didn’t even recognize the girl being described.

    Many theories were tossed around to explain the behavior: teething, out of her routine (they stayed at my in-law’s house), she was sick, her shoes were too tight. I knew the truth. She missed her daddy. I couldn’t wait to get home and comfort her.

    I’ve written about missing Ivy before. This was the first time, it seemed, she could really miss me. I just finished a book, What a Difference a Daddy Makes by Dr. Leman that talks all about the importance of a father, especially in a daughter’s life. It talks about how a father reinforces confidence and helps a daughter relate to men as she gets older. It talks about how moms have a tendency to parent and do things one way, and the balance of how a father generally does things is important to a child’s development. This is at least partly why The Family Proclamation says, “Marriage between man and woman is essential to His eternal plan. Children are entitled to birth within the bonds of matrimony, and to be reared by a father and a mother who honor marital vows with complete fidelity.”

    I believe I was 16 when I first hung up on my mom while she was talking. I promptly received a call from my dad. The usual mild-mannered, relaxed father I knew was gone. I was told over the phone, in no uncertain terms, that if I EVER hung up on my mother ever again, he would kill me. I believed him. He told me I was to treat my mom with respect. It was an important lesson I needed to learn. It was the last time I ever hung up on my mom.

    This is an example of why kids need their dad. Dads, in society, have gotten a ridiculously unfair reputation. Dr. Leman in the aforementioned book noted the unfair representation of fathers on television. Fathers are almost always bumbling blockheads that can’t get anything right. This is unfair and wrong. It has built a belief in society that fathers aren’t needed, or worse, that they cause more harm than good. Fathers are important.

    So how was Ivy when I returned home? An angel. The most well-behaved, happy, sleeping babe you ever met. She smiled ear to ear the moment I saw her when I got home. It was such dramatic joy that I almost didn’t believe all the propaganda I’d been hearing about her. She just needed her daddy.

    Before I could get too cocky, Beth had a doctor’s appointment during the week. It was Ivy and I for a couple hours. Then I got to witness all the behavior I’d seen.

    A growing girl needs her daddy. She also needs her mother. We’ve seen that Ivy is way happier when it’s all of us together. Ivy’s still relatively fresh from heaven. She knows the importance of family and the The Family Proclamation.

    I’m grateful to understand the importance of family. I’m grateful to have a small inkling of how important I can be to Ivy’s life. I’m grateful that Beth continues to be such a great mother. I’m grateful to have an amazing family to help me understand these things. I’m grateful that families can be forever.

  • Grandma, I will see you soon

    Grandma, I will see you soon

    I believe Sandra Leach was in her early 30s when she accepted the message of the missionaries of Jesus Christ. I have thanked her for that choice every day of my entire life.

    I love you Grandma. Thank you.

    The greatest gift my grandmother gave me was the gift of a gospel household and a gift of the knowledge of the great Plan of Heavenly Father.  Why is this the greatest gift?  Death should hurt.  Because I know where my grandma is going and because I know I will see her again, death becomes less a sting of bitterness and more a quiet celebration.  I know who is greeting my grandmother, I know the peace and joy she will have as she waits for us to finish our race.  Especially when a good person passes, and there’s few better than my grandma, Sandra Leach, I know where she’s going is so marvelous and wonderful.  It will be sad for us who have to stay.

    It will be a brief stay away.

    I know that Grandma has a lot to do. I know that she’s working alongside Laura now.

    Soon, one day in the near future, when my race is hopefully won, I will meet her again.  We’ll sit in some glorious place I can’t describe; I don’t have the vocabulary or ability to imagine the setting of Heaven.  We will sit and we will go over every single book she read, that she passed to me, that I read.  The books will be in the hundreds!  The notes we’ll share!  I can’t wait.  We’ll have so much to discuss.  She’ll have so much more to teach me.  Just like she taught me here, she’ll teach me there.  I’ll thank her.  I imagine there are happy tears in Heaven.  I can already see and feel tears of joy pouring from my face as I thank her for leading me there.  I will thank her for her perseverance, effort, and determination to raise a righteous home.  I will thank her for teaching my mother about God, and Jesus Christ.  I will thank her for listening to the missionaries.  I will thank her for her faith.  I will thank her for the foundation she established so I could live a joyful life leading to the ultimate joy.  That moment with her and my loved ones.  Discussing our life past and the great future ahead.

    I long for eternity.  I know eternity is just on the other side of me closing my eyes for good from this existence.  I don’t long for death.  I’m not anxious to leave all I love here.  I am excited for my future of laying a foundation of love, faith, and obedience for my daughters.  I am excited for my time on this earth to do all the things my grandmother taught me were important.

    How can I ever thank my grandma for what she’s given me?  I can only give it to my daughters and all those around me.

    Thank you, Grandma.  Thank you from the bottom of my heart and soul.

    I don’t long for death, but I am excited for it.  I am excited for eternity with you.  I have no fear of death because I know it will be on God’s time and terms.  I know it will be for a purpose.  Death will only mean temporarily leaving others to reunite with family that has gone ahead.  How great it is to have no fear of death.  How great it is to know why I’m here. Thank you, Grandma, for that gift.