BLIND BY CHOICE

A few weeks back I saw something that baffled me, that scared me, that quite simply left me stunned, and angry, and puzzled at the amount of stupidity that was before my eyes. My two little ones and I were enjoying the afternoon shade in our front yard when all of a sudden comes a car whizing around our corner, going quite fast, with much whooping and hollering coming from its open windows and then through that open window I saw it. I saw the thing that sent me into such great shock and rage. I saw a young man sitting in the drivers seat blindfolded. He had a beanie pulled down over his eyes and all of the passengers, as well as the driver, seemed to be having a joyous adventure without thought to the consequences that could have and may have resulted.

What if my son had been riding his bike on that corner and they had clipped it. What if they hit another car. What if they hit a child who was crossing the street to play with a friend. What if they hit a tree or a poll or really what if anything bad had happened. I immediately got out my phone and reported the incident to the police. Then the rest of the day was spent with feelings of frustration, anger, and complete shock at what I had witnessed.

Then as time went on, a thought came to me: in essence we sometimes actually might do this ourselves. Really? Are you kidding me? I would never get into a car and put something over my eyes so that I can't see and risk hurting myself or others. But do I?

Here are my thoughts on the situation:

• When we choose to make certain choices it may fulfill a desire for entertainment or pleasure right now but in the end we might hurt (or kill) others or ourselves spiritually, emotionally, and/or physically.


• Our sins can blind us from current and future decisions. We may rely on very unreliable sources to guide us through the roads of life. In the end we'll crash.


• The passengers in the car were, in a way blindfolded, as well. They all did not have their eyes wide open to choices they were making. They were allowing the "blind to lead the blind".


• Little wrong choices may only fog our vision but as we continue to make wrong choices slowly but surely are eyes are darkened more and more and it is harder to see the Light.

Just as I looked on this situation with abhorrence. We should "not look upon sin save it were with abhorrence" (Alma 13:12). Let us make concious choices to keep our vision acute and alert and ready for the choices that lie before us. Let us stay away from choices that may blind us and lead us down a path of darkness and danger. Let us be spiritually aware, always seeing what lies ahead.

The Wrong Way

So a few weeks ago a realtor knocked on our door and asked if he could put this sign in the corner of our yard and as you can see we allowed him to stick it in our lawn. Then yesterday I looked out our window and saw that someone had turned it so that it was pointing the wrong direction.

Often Satan and his helpers are found doing this very thing and they make us think that we will find what we are looking for down that road that they point us to but as many of us have discovered the hard way the "house" or the destination we had hoped for is not there. Where we thought we'd find joy and fulfillment we find frustration, dissapointment, confusion, guilt, and heart-ache.

We must be in tune to the Spirit so that we might recognize when Satan is trying to change our course and quickly point our arrows toward the correct Way.

John 14
3 And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again, and receive you unto myself; that where I am, there ye may be also.
4 And whither I go ye know, and the way ye know.
5 Thomas saith unto him, Lord, we know not whither thou goest; and how can we know the way?
6 Jesus saith unto him, I am the way, the truth, and the life: no man cometh unto the Father, but by me.

Jesus Christ is the Way and if we follow Him we will never be lost and our journey and our final destination will bring great joy, fulfillment, and peace.

A World-Sized Swirly

As I was putting my little boy to bed last night I was thinking of my bout of Labyrinthitis and this post when I suddenly drew a conclusion...experiencing vertigo is like receiving several world-sized swirlies, not that I have ever experienced the typical head in the toilet kind myself. But really, it is like having your head stuck in your little world and then having that world just spin and spin around you. Honestly, I think I'd prefer to receive a good old fashion swirly in the bathroom thrown to what I have experienced with this whole inner ear problem. It has been a ride.

So two weeks ago today, I woke up at 5:00 am with the room just spinning around me. I thought it was weird but fell back to sleep when it stopped but then just 15 minutes later it started up again, but worse. I then began my vertigo ride of terror. It was horrid. I was spinning and whirling and swirling all the while having the garbage can as my only view. I was certain that something was really wrong, terribly wrong. As my husband went to the computer in search of some clarity the thought seriously crossed my mind that I had a brain tumor and then he came back with a few options. He said it could be an inner ear problem and one more option that I don't recall and then he paused and said it also mentioned brain tumor. I was scared to say the least. While I whirled and spinned and lost my cookies several times I looked at my kids and my honey and cried. I really was scared, scared that what I had would cause me to leave my little family.

As we know the story ends much better than that - Labyrinthitis a deep inner problem, not a brain tumor or anything close to that in severity. I still think of this as the most horrible sickness I have ever experienced considering I get motion sick probably easier than anyone I have ever met. I can get sick driving in my own neighborhood if I am not paying attention. But with all of that said I would take a bout of physical vertigo any day over the spiritual whirlwind we can experience when we are selectively obedient.


" In the premortal existence, ours was not a selective obedience. We did not pick and choose which parts of the eternal plan to follow. I learned that lesson on our first night flying solo in pilot training when all of us were given the instruction: “Don’t fly acrobatic patterns at night. You are beginning pilots without instrument flight training.” Some time later, an otherwise good pilot and a great friend chose to disobey that command. As he flew loops and barrel rolls through the night sky over Texas, he looked through the cockpit canopy and thought he saw stars above him, but he was really seeing the lights of oil rigs below. He was experiencing vertigo: the g-forces on his plane made it seem he was right side up, yet he was upside down. As he pulled up on the stick to climb higher into the night sky, he dove toward the earth and crashed into the twinkling lights of the oil field below.

When you are flying an airplane, if you change your position by just one degree at a time, your inner ear cannot detect the change. Brethren young and old, when we practice selective obedience, we change our position relative to the Lord—and usually by only one degree at a time. As the deceptive forces of the adversary work on us, we cannot detect them, and we experience spiritual vertigo. While it may seem like we are going in a safe direction, we are in fact headed for disaster. In the preexistence, our decision to follow the Lord was all-or-nothing. Following that pattern through our mortal probation will get each of us back to our Heavenly Father" (Robert D. Hales, “To the Aaronic Priesthood: Preparing for the Decade of Decision,” Ensign, May 2007, 48–51).


Let us keep our "spiritual inner ears" strong so that we don't begin to lose our balance, to become dizzy along the straight path, and thus lead ourselves to a deadly spiritual fall caused my spiritual vertigo. Let us remember that we cannot afford to be selectively obedient. I have seen too many lose focus, begin to wobble, and finally spin out of control. Let us stay away from the world-sized spiritual swirly that Satan offers.

A Lesson from "Green Eggs and Ham"

Last night while I was reading my little boy a bed-time story, "Green Eggs and Ham", by Dr. Seuss, one of the illustrations stuck out to me. Well, I have always quite enjoyed these two pages, they just make me smile. I generally find them clever and funny and refreshing but this time they stuck out to me spiritually and I made a parallel.

So here are the two pictures. Take a close look, maybe even click on them to enlarge them. Look at the faces of all of the characters.

Maybe you caught what I saw or maybe you are thinking "yeah, so they're all happy and smiling, what's the big deal?" Well, now take a closer look at their situation. I love it. In the first picture they have just plummeted off the railroad track and landed upside down on a boat and yes they are still smiling, most with their eyes closed, and look quite simply content. In the second picture, they are sinking into the water. The driver of the boat is upside down in the water still holding the wheel and is as happy as clam. The passengers of the train, the sinking train, look quite peaceful and content themselves again with their eyes closed. I really quite enjoy these pages.

So you are probably wondering what spiritual parallel I possibly made with these two pictures, and well here it goes.

Have you ever started to "sink" spiritually but didn't even realize it until a big wake up call? Do you ever allow Satan to convince you that you can be content and maybe even complacent with where you are at and slowly but surely he starts to drag you down with a smile?

Now maybe take a look at the pictures again: We are the drivers of our own ships (lives) but do we sometimes allow Satan to take our ship out from underneath us and we don't even see it? Are we sometimes the passengers on Satan's train and don't even recognize it? Are our eyes sometimes closed to the things of the Spirit?

I think we all sometimes fall into the category of being Spiritually Blind. I think that this is one of Satan's greatest tools. In Doctrine and Covenants 78:10 it reads, "...Satan seeketh to turn their hearts away from the truth, that they become blinded..."

Satan is the darkness that blinds us and the Savior can be our Light to make us see. Under Blindness in the Bible dictionary it reads, "In addition to the healing of physical blindness, the mission of Jesus included curing blindness to the things of the spirit. He made an application of this in John 9: 5 when, in conjunction with healing the man born blind, he declared that he (Jesus) was “the light of the world.”


James E. Faust shares how we might gain this Light for ourselves:
"The Light in Their Eyes," Ensign, Nov. 2005, 21

"Hearing the words of the Lord lifts us out of spiritual blindness 'into his marvelous light' (1 Peter 2:9). Much of that light comes from our discipline, dedication, and consecration..."

One of my very favorite scriptures also talks about staying away from this spiritual darkness or blindness and receiving more light, it reads (D&C 50:23-24):

"And that which doth not edify is not of God, and is darkness. That which is of God is light; and he that receiveth light, and continueth in God, receiveth more light; and that light groweth brighter and brighter until the perfect day."

Let us open our eyes to the Light of the Lord. Let us strive for the companionship of the Holy Ghost that we might know when we are sinking and becoming spiritually blinded. Let us ask ourselves if the things we are doing are edifying us, and then if not, let us seek for the Light and help it grow in our lives. Let us open our eyes to the spiritual Light of the Savior.