Sunday, February 15, 2015

One Heart and One Mind

Our way to celebrate 14 Feb 2015 - candy and working on clerk directory work.  Very fun!!


D&C 25:6, 13           
And thou shalt go with him at the time of his going,
and be unto him for a scribe….Wherefore, lift up thy heart 
and rejoice and cleave unto the covenants which thou has made.


If you would like to practice “becoming one” with your companion,


we would highly recommend going on a Records Preservation Mission –  where you have opportunity to be together at all times and practice kindness, patience and love as you go through the tedious process of capturing well-cropped and sharply-focused images for FamilySearch.   We are greatly enjoying this time together.



Elder Smith captured this image to “report” to FamilySearch that we were goofing off…. 
In truth, we were really “evaluating” a 2557 image book.  To evaluate it, we spent .75 seconds on each image making sure there were no fingers showing, all edges were defined; and there were great histograms (white balance), focus, etc.


We noticed that so many certificates noted the cause of death 
as “gripe” in the 1918 and 1919 books we captured (2373 and 2557 images), and discovered via the internet that there was a
worldwide influenza pandemic from 1918-1921.  Valparaiso felt those effects….


 

A quote from Elder Sitati of the Seventy at a Las Vegas East Stake Conference:

"Home – where no one takes more attention than your companion:   Religious freedom is shrinking.  Evil is expanding…. There needs be a hastening of  the work…. This has everything to do with what happens in your home.   The power must come from your home being a holy place.  A home where love is spoken –  where you rejoice being there.  Where no one takes more attention than your companion.   This is part of hastening the work…. When the spirit is right – you will succeed….”   


Sister Carleen Tanner teaches Institute classes in Napa, Idaho.  Her blog is www.carleentanner.com.  Her marriage class last semester suggested as homework to read “…one of the best self evaluation talks on marriage:  

Agency and Love in Marriage by Elder Lynn Robbins, Ensign, Oct 2000, p16.”   Agency and Love in Marriage - Ensign Oct. 2000


Elder Robbins at a marriage sealing said, “One couple has said to me, ‘We have fallen out of love’….  I said to them, “Do you fall out of kindness?  No, you stop doing kind things.  Do you fall out of love?  No, you quit doing loving things….” (We all know – and Sister Tanner has taught:  “Through the power of the Atonement, we can overcome ANY weakness in ANY area.)


Here are a few notes from Sister Tanner’s class on “marriage”:

Heavenly Father sent us to earth with different purposes. 
Divine purpose of men = Preside, Provide and Protect.
Divine purpose of women = Nuture.

Gift given to accomplish purpose to preside – Priesthood.
Gifts given to accomplish purpose to provide – competitiveness, drive to be better, logical and segmented thinking.
Gifts given to accomplish purpose to protect – physical strength, keeping bad influences out.
Gifts given to accomplish purpose to nurture – strong emotions, empathy, inspiration, charisma, service oriented, big picture, women’s intuition, sense of beauty, high moral standard, femininity.

President Howard W. Hunter
“I suppose you would say it is a mans viewpoint to throw a burden upon a woman to maintain the stability and the sweetness of marriage, but this seems to be her divine nature. She has a superior spirituality in the marriage relationship, and the opportunity to encourage, uplift, teach, and be the one who sets the example in the family for righteous living. When women come to the point of realizing that it is more important to be superior than to be equal, they will find the real joy in living those principles that the Lord set out in his divine plan” ( Teachings of Howard W. Hunter, 139).
  
Sis Tanner taught, “[That superior spirituality] is to nurture your home and your children.  If you use that superiority for any other purpose, you abuse it.  If you use it to criticize or try to preside in your home, it is amiss…. Do you feel like thats a blessing or a burden?…When you use it correctly, you lift your spouse….”

The Holy Ghost  by Joseph Fielding McConkie
“…Women are by their very nature more susceptible to revelation…It is natural for the woman to give and be gentle and compassionate….It is for women to give life.  The father presides when the family kneels to pray, but it is the mother that will teach them to pray.”


Salt Lake Tribune October 1, 1970 quoting Elder Packer
“It is interesting to know how a man is put together, how incomplete he is.  His whole physical, emotional, and spiritual nature depends on power found in woman.  He has found the other ½ of himself.  He will return again and again.  It strengthens him for what life has given him to transform a man into an able and effective LDS priesthood holder….  There are 2 prerequisites.  First, she must want to….Second, she must know how….Part of knowing how includes the genius of encouraging him to meet obligations without replacing him in his role…without presiding over him.”

 President Uchtdorf said, “I am reminded of a story about a couple who had been married for 60 years. They had rarely argued during that time, and their days together passed in happiness and contentment. They shared everything and had no secrets between them—except one. The wife had a box that she kept at the top of a sideboard, and she told her husband when they were married that he should never look inside.  As the decades passed, the moment came that her husband took the box down and asked if he could finally know what it contained. The wife consented, and he opened it to discover two doilies and $25,000. When he asked his wife what this meant, she responded, “When we were married, my mother told me that whenever I was angry with you or whenever you said or did something I didn’t like, I should knit a small doily and then talk things through with you.”  The husband was moved to tears by this sweet story. He marveled that during 60 years of marriage he had only disturbed his wife enough for her to knit two doilies. Feeling extremely good about himself, he took his wife’s hand and said, “That explains the doilies, but what about the $25,000?”  His wife smiled sweetly and said, “That’s the money I got from selling all the doilies I’ve knitted over the years….                                                                                                                                                 Not only does this story teach an interesting way to deal with disagreements in marriage, but it also illustrates the folly of jumping to conclusions based on limited information.  So often the “truths” we tell ourselves are merely fragments of the truth, and sometimes they’re not really the truth at all.” CES Devotional, President Uchtdorf,  8/12 “What is Truth”                      

Sister Tanner taught, “Women need to know how to take your gifts you have been given and focus those gifts on helping your spouse magnify his divine responsibility.  And men are responsible to help women develop her responsibility to nuture….We are always going to find a way to be offended – don’t…criticize…or belittle…. When you come and bring the gifts each of you has – you create a whole, a one, a complete, a perfect union….

“How we help each other is different.  Heavenly Father gave men the 3 Ps.  Im going to give you the 4 As.  This is how you magnify their Ps.  If you can master the 4 As, they will master their Ps.”
4 A’s = Admire, Appreciate, Affection and Acceptance
Admire him to help him preside
1.  Allow him to preside.
2.  Ask his opinion.
3.  Ask for priesthood blessings.
4.  Go to the temple with him.
5.  Tell him how grateful you are to be at his side.

Appreciate him to help him provide
1.  Stop griping.
2.  Be mindful of budget.
3.  Use it up, wear it out, make it do or do without.
4.  If he wants to buy something for himself – help it happen.
5.  Tell him often you appreciate the sacrifices he makes.

Use Affection and Acceptance to help him protect
Affection:  Let him know he is needed.  Pat his shoulder, give him a kiss, touch and love him.
Acceptance:  Be loyal. (No eye-rolling when your partner speaks….)  “Forget who you thought you married and fall in love with who you married.”  Pres. Hinckley.

Sister Tanner taught, “These are your responsibilities no matter where your husband is right now.  Let him and his weaknesses be between him and the Lord….”

Men, Remember:
Nuture her to help her nuture
1.  Listen to her.
2.  Don’t give an answer.
3.  Express love often.
4.  Help her feel cherished.

President Henry B. Eyring at the Colloquium on the
Complementarity of Man and Woman at the Vatican,
November 18,  2014.  
His speech  "To Become as One," was largely personal, detailing
how his marital union has shaped his views of the institution. …
"We grew together into one — slowly lifting and shaping each 
other, year by year….As we absorbed strength from each other, it
did not diminish our personal gifts."

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