If...You Can...

This has been reprinted a thousand times over, but wanted to share it to my blog. 

It certainly applied to my mission and it has recently applied to my most recent calling, mostly in things that were going on in the stake, and things that I also strove, struggled, and even failed to do in response to challenges. 

If you can keep your head when all about you

Are losing theirs and blaming it on you;

If you can trust yourself when all men doubt you,

But make allowance for their doubting too;

If you can wait and not be tired by waiting,

Or, being lied about, don’t deal in lies

Or, being hated, don’t give way to hating,

And yet don’t look too good, nor talk too wise;

If you can dream—and not make dreams your master;

If you can think—and not make thoughts your aim;

If you can meet with triumph and disaster

And treat those two impostors just the same;

If you can bear to hear the truth you’ve spoken

Twisted by knaves to make a trap for fools,

Or watch the things you gave your life to broken,

And stoop and build ’em up with wornout tools;

If you can make one heap of all your winnings

And risk it on one turn of pitch-and-toss,

And lose, and start again at your beginnings

And never breathe a word about your loss;

If you can force your heart and nerve and sinew

To serve your turn long after they are gone,

And so hold on when there is nothing in you

Except the Will which says to them: “Hold on”;

If you can talk with crowds and keep your virtue,

Or walk with kings—nor lose the common touch;

If neither foes nor loving friends can hurt you;

If all men count with you, but none too much;

If you can fill the unforgiving minute

With sixty seconds’ worth of distance run—

Yours is the Earth and everything that’s in it,

And—which is more—you’ll be a Man, my son!

Two Types of Prayers: Enos and Mahonri Moriancumer - the Brother of Jared

Prayer is a natural part of any Latter Day Saint's routine and spiritual skillset - indeed, prayer is what keeps you attached to the world before this one and lined up with the next while you're in a holding-pattern called mortality. 

In the book of Mormon we read about two different types of prayers offered by two different men: Enos and the Brother of Jared.  

Enos' prayer reached high to the heavens until the night and he was finally heard by the Lord, or acknowledged.   However, Enos' prayer began with reflecting on his father's words about the joy of the saints and the words of eternal life, and his soul hungered until he knelt down in mighty prayer. His prayer was very much a prayer of conversion. 

The Brother of Jared (whose name we learn was Mahonri Moriancumer), by contrast, in regards to the issue of the light inside the boats, as well as air approached the Lord, talking shop and business. 

The Brother of Jared's prayers were, by contrast more along the lines of, "You have said...we have this issue...we're asking how do we do this...?" 

The Lord responded with a solution to the issues of the air (a mechanical marvel if you've never seen it - and to think that the Lord provided them technology that they could build and could understand) and then asked what he thought should be done on the issue of light. 

The Brother of Jared presented sixteen molten stones to the Lord to be touched by His finger - and tradition holds that Noah's ark was lit similarly, and Noah learned of the idea of stones from bars of gold that had been lit and given to Adam and Eve that provided light after they were driven out of Eden.  

And the Lord had no problem with that, did that, and said, here's two more, those 16 will allow your physical eyes to see, these two will allow your spiritual eyes to see. 

However, the Brother of Jared understood the issue and knew how to talk to the Lord, presented a problem, and was able to listen and work with him, whereas Enos poured his heart out until late at night when he was heard. 

My testimony is as a terrestrial world commences, in order to keep up with the Gods, you'll need to be able to speak to the Lord like the Brother of Jared, step by step, climbing upwards and never going backwards.  Know the problem, ponder it, present it, and work with the Lord and be able to hear His directions. 

Realizing the Savior only had to learn a lesson once to understand it, that's why He was teaching in the temple at age 12 and astonished everyone with His learning, He did not need to be taught and there was no one who could teach Him. He never went backwards, as soon as he had knowledge, he implemented it and the entire way walked by faith until faith became knowledge. 

My closing thought is that it gives new meaning to "walk with the Lord" - I'm going to propose that they walk at a very fast pace...let's try and keep up, the way we used to before this life.