followers of my faith [Mormon Monday 71]

Last week I was reading in D&C 20 and came across these two verses:

30 And we know that justification through the grace of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ is just and true;
31 And we know also, that sanctification through the grace of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ is just and true, to all those who love and serve God with all their mights, minds, and strength.

I love thinking about justification and sanctification. In my mind, I think of it like a cup. A cup that's full of gross stuff. Justification is making the cup clean. Sanctification is polishing, improving, and making the cup less susceptible to the stains from gross stuff.

Both steps are necessary. And both steps are important. And neither are possible without the grace of Jesus Christ, according to the above verses. One thing that these verses indicate is that sanctification requires more work on our part, while justification answers the ends of the law. So that's something to think about.

Just a quick thought for a Monday!

supposed to retire; we'd rather it lit itself on fire

Just very briefly...

I think I can quit this game now. (I even did a little better before it all went pear-shaped, but this was the last screenshot I took.)

As you can see, work has been very productive lately. (I have actually been super busy the entire time I was methodically working on this game, but I had to multitask or my brain would leak out my ears.)

and the words, they're everything [10]

For FHE this week we had a tri-ward activity and one portion of it was speed dating. For some reason. Anyway one of the suggested questions was if we knew what LARP-ing was. And I do! Because, as I told the guy who was shocked and appalled at my knowledge, "I have my finger on the pulse of geek culture."

And these WWIS posts prove it. Well, they more prove that I have a passing knowledge of pop culture, but pop, geek, all the same these days.

For example, this meme recently had a resurgence when the President himself made a video employing it:

Except my hashtag was maybe a little less ironic. I know how taxes work.

I'm not even in these fandoms but I know an awful lot about these franchises (okay, full disclosure, I've watched some of them):

I may as well start writing fanfic, I've got such a handle on these characters!

Speaking of fanfic, no one is surprised at my ability to see Harry Potter in everything.

Tell me you can't see that Potions class. I kind of want to write it.

I know the following tweet makes more sense if you assume it's hockey-related (never seen a hockey game or this movie, but I was a child of the 90's. I've heard of The Mighty Ducks). But that's not where my mind went:

I'm not entirely sure whether Arthur is pop culture or geek culture or just...not culture. And I don't know where Love Ducks falls on that scale either.

This one is the truest of all truisms:

We love recommending books to each other. And to everyone else. Which reminds me, I never did a second-half 2014 roundup. Sorry.

I think this one is SO hilarious. Like, I heard the song the other day and I started laughing because I couldn't stop thinking about how funny I am.

I guess you are what you eat...

followers of my faith [Mormon Monday 70]

One of our prophets, presumably the one just previous to the current, is said to have remarked that instead of treating prayers as a phone call, with a distinct opening and closing, and the business concluded, he opens his prayer to the Lord in the morning and closes it at night, and it continues throughout the day.

So it's less like a phone call and more like a text conversation, that just rolls through the day and doesn't require an end or beginning. Can even span multiple days (I don't really know how this works, I'm not a big texter).

Then the thought came to my Relief Society president, who is the source of this story, that it's like a text conversation but God mostly responds in emojis and you have to try to figure out what that means.

For an example of only communicating by emojis, I turn to a fictional character determined to be an uninvolved participant in what happens around him, so he only uses emojis in his tweets to illustrate that he never speaks on camera (because he's behind the camera). So here's Nathan from Classic Alice*:

I know what this says, because I saw the episode. But I imagine for most of you it's pretty cryptic.

I love the imagery of trying to figure out what's meant by the revelation you receive. It's even more poignant for me because guess what emojis look like on my phone:

That's me, communicating with my eyes my utter pleasure at getting empty squares via text when I'm supposed to be getting something else.

So helpful! And so completely apt to how I feel most of the time. Guess I should reread some old posts of mine about prayer and see what I can learn from myself.

I still love the idea of keeping a conversation with God in your heart all the day long. Also I'm pretty sure that's what's recommended by scripture...

Yea, and cry unto God for all thy support: yea, let all thy doings be unto the Lord, and whithersoever thou goest let it be in the Lord; yea, let all thy thoughts be directed unto the Lord; yea, let the affections of thy heart be placed upon the Lord forever. (Alma 37:36)

Sounds like a good plan to me.


*By the way, Classic Alice is in an extended period of fundraising for their next season, so I definitely recommend checking it out. If you like it, donate a couple dollars to the cause. You'll not only get a new season of Classic Alice (which is great), you'll also get other perks that you can read about on their funding page.

veiled in paper, reading line by line the pain there

As mentioned previously, I've recently recovered some of my old files. The following poem (well, song, really, but not only did I stop mid-stanza on the lyrics I never even started on the music) is one thing I found.

And since I have a bit of a tradition of posting poetry in honor of Valentine's Day, here you go.

All Paper is Made of Carbon
You never did trust me
With any of your things
I guess it’s only right
I’m not trusted with your heart

Sign here, you said,
in triplicate, you said
Promise me you won’t
Lose or break it

And you handed me
A carbon copy of my contract
Canary yellow
As if it were special that way

Oh, don’t you see
All paper is made of carbon
This yellow page
It’s only as good as your trust in me

The very next day
It didn’t take long, did it?
You asked for it back

Yep.

No idea where that one was going. Seemed pretty bitter, but forgive. It was February 2008.

Oh now I have some inspiration to keep working on this! Love when that happens.

Oh, don't you see
All paper is made of carbon
This yellow page
Burns just the same as anything else

Right??? The only logical place for this song to go??

Alternatively,

My heart is made of carbon
And feels just as fragile
As the yellow page you tore
You just lost and broke my heart

Or both. I still don't have a direction in mind for this song, so as far as we're concerned they're all viable lyrics.

(In truth, I probably won't ever finish, but it was fun to come back to it for a little while. I need to write something happy...)

followers of my faith [Mormon Monday 69]

Still haven't found the source for my RS President's Hinckley quote I mentioned last time. I'll probably post about it next week anyway, but in the meantime, enjoy this for-real sourced quote from President Gordon B. Hinckley.

If you are wondering how this is going for me, it is not. But Lent is coming up and all my vices will magically disappear at that time. So that's good. However, I am still striving every day to be a little better. Just in case it'll start working. :)