Missionary Work and the Atonement, by Jeffrey R. Holland

This is an excerpt from a talk I read often on my mission...

Almost everything I have said here has been an aid directed toward the missionary process, ultimately toward the investigator. May I close with an extended testimony about how focusing on the Atonement helps full-time and member missionaries and mission leaders.

Anyone who does any kind of missionary work will have occasion to ask, Why is this so hard? Why doesn’t it go better? Why can’t our success be more rapid? Why aren’t there more people joining the Church? It is the truth. We believe in angels. We trust in miracles. Why don’t people just flock to the font? Why isn’t the only risk in missionary work that of pneumonia from being soaking wet all day and all night in the baptismal font?

You will have occasion to ask those questions. I have thought about this a great deal. I offer this as my personal feeling. I am convinced that missionary work is not easy because salvation is not a cheap experience. Salvation never was easy. We are The Church of Jesus Christ, this is the truth, and He is our Great Eternal Head. How could we believe it would be easy for us when it was never, ever easy for Him? It seems to me that missionaries and mission leaders have to spend at least a few moments in Gethsemane. Missionaries and mission leaders have to take at least a step or two toward the summit of Calvary.

Now, please don’t misunderstand. I’m not talking about anything anywhere near what Christ experienced. That would be presumptuous and sacrilegious. But I believe that missionaries and investigators, to come to the truth, to come to salvation, to know something of this price that has been paid, will have to pay a token of that same price.

For that reason I don’t believe missionary work has ever been easy, nor that conversion is, nor that retention is, nor that continued faithfulness is. I believe it is supposed to require some effort, something from the depths of our soul.

If He could come forward in the night, kneel down, fall on His face, bleed from every pore, and cry, “Abba, Father (Papa), if this cup can pass, let it pass,” ¹⁶ then little wonder that salvation is not a whimsical or easy thing for us. If you wonder if there isn’t an easier way, you should remember you are not the first one to ask that. Someone a lot greater and a lot grander asked a long time ago if there wasn’t an easier way. (emphasis added by Holden)

The Atonement will carry the missionaries perhaps even more importantly than it will carry the investigators. When you struggle, when you are rejected, when you are spit upon and cast out and made a hiss and a byword, you are standing with the best life this world has ever known, the only pure and perfect life ever lived. You have reason to stand tall and be grateful that the Living Son of the Living God knows all about your sorrows and afflictions. The only way to salvation is through Gethsemane and on to Calvary. The only way to eternity is through Him—the Way, the Truth, and the Life.

I testify that the living God is our Eternal Father and that Jesus Christ is His living and Only Begotten Son in the flesh. I testify that this Jesus, who was slain and hanged on a tree, ¹⁷ was the chief Apostle then and is the chief Apostle now, the Great High Priest, the chief cornerstone of His Church in this last and greatest of all dispensations. I testify that He lives, that the whole triumph of the gospel is that He lives, and because He does, so will we.

On that first Resurrection Sunday, Mary Magdalene first thought she saw a gardener. Well, she did—the Gardener who cultivated Eden and who endured Gethsemane. The Gardener who gave us the rose of Sharon, the lily of the valley, the cedars of Lebanon, the tree of life.

I declare Him to be the Savior of the world, the Bishop and Shepherd of our souls, the Bright and Morning Star. I know that our garments can be washed white only in the blood of that Lamb, slain from the foundation of the world. I know that we are lifted up unto life because He was lifted up unto death, that He bore our griefs and carried our sorrows, and with His stripes we are healed. I bear witness that He was wounded for our transgressions and bruised for our iniquities, that He was a man of sorrows acquainted with grief because upon Him were laid the transgressions of us all. ¹⁸

I bear witness that He came from God as a God to bind up the brokenhearted, to dry the tears from every eye, to proclaim liberty to the captive and open the prison doors to them that are bound. ¹⁹ I promise that because of your faithful response to the call to spread the gospel, He will bind up your broken hearts, dry your tears, and set you and your families free. That is my missionary promise to you and your missionary message to the world.

L'isle Joyeuse

I've decided I really like this song by Debussy. It's quirky and magical. Yes! Quirky and magical! Can you believe it? You should listen to it, but only if you're cool and cultured, like me. Just kidding, I'm not that cultured. Performing it here is Angela Hewitt. She should probably wear more clothing, but she's still a good pianist. So leave her alone. Oh, and hurry and listen to it, before it gets removed off my blog like every other video I post on here. The end.



DeathCrush

I'm sitting at my desk at my new job. I think I need a lesson in posture or something, because I really have no idea how to sit at a desk. I could be breaking my back or getting carpal tunnel or something. So far, I haven't packed myself a lunch for this job yet. I haven't stopped at a store and bought cup noodles or anything. All I do is walk to Arby's every lunch break. I need to stop that. Sitting at a desk all day + fast food is probably not ideal for my health. So far then, I am endangering myself in three ways. Bad desk posture. Sitting all day. Arby's.

I realize that this post is quite uninteresting, but I figure I should describe my new job. I sit in a cubicle. It's kind of lonely, there's only one other person in this entire row. People, using their awesome CaptionCall telephones, and who are hard-of-hearing, place a phone call to someone. I hear the voice of this "someone," dictate orally what they say, and what I say pops up on the screen of the CaptionCall user. The end.

Opinions of BLATANT REBELLION

Here are my latest opinions.

The MPAA is not a divine institution. As such, I believe many mistakes are made in the rating of movies. Take, for example, the Matrix. Pretty much everyone I know HATES this movie, because it's rated R. If I ever suggest to a group of friends that we should watch it, I get a whole big pansy cry-fest about how it's rated R, and we have been counseled by church leaders NOT to watch rated R movies. But it's okay to watch...say...Anchorman? Pretty much any Will Ferrell comedy? Dozens of PG-13 flicks containing a FAR heftier amount of profanity (including F bombs), inappropriate sexual dialogue, and sex scenes in general? The worst swear word in The Matrix is the "s" word, and as far as I know, having watched that movie only several times, there is no sexual dialogue, and there are no sex scenes. Does this film deserve an "R" rating? Use your head. Use what you know about all the movies you've ever watched, and judge for yourself. There is a decent amount of violence, but nowhere near the violence of say...Braveheart or Gladiator or some obnoxiously unnecessary gory slasher flick.

If you had to CHOOSE between watching a filthy PG-13 movie and a rated R movie that contained nothing inappropriate whatsoever, what would you choose?

"Whoa. Holden is right." 

Granted, most rated R movies are probably rated that way for a reason. But here and there, there comes a film that I think doesn't deserve that kind of rating. Am I being a disobedient scumbag because I feel this way?  Should I be subject to church disciplinary action because of my belief that you really need to use your head and judge for yourself? Or maybe I just really like the Matrix. The end.

Opinion #2: Am I a terrible person because I really don't care about the proposition 8 fiasco? Regardless of whether I feel homosexuality is "right" or "wrong," gays being allowed to marry, as far as I can see it, doesn't affect me personally. If this was an issue that impeded upon my rights in some way, I might be against it. If this was an issue that gave homosexuals more rights than heterosexuals, I would probably react. But maybe someone else can clarify for me? Perhaps this opens the door for more homosexual rights in the future that would affect me? Explain. Someone. Now.

What Is This

Boil away the bitterness!

This would be my campaign slogan if I was running for president. Because, face it. Candidates are kind of mean to each other. And then in the same picture, there would be some sort of food, boiling. I don't know. Something that's bitter before you boil it. Broccoli rabe maybe?

Moving on with that subject...Brother Romney won in Florida because he...wait for it, wait for it...HAD MORE MONEY. And so was able to make more negative television ads demonizing Newt Gingrich. Angry angry. Everybody is just so angry at each other. Yes, when my son says he wants to grow up to be president, I will say to him, "You go for it son. You go chase your dream. You go make billions of dollars first though, because you need all that money to make nasty negative ads about your political opponents." Because without all those billions of dollars, he will NEVER HAVE A CHANCE.

I'm Learnding!

My classes this semester...

Abnormal Psychology
Interpersonal Communications
Introduction to Physical Therapy
Mammalian Histology + Lab

It's strange because it seems as though most of my schoolwork this semester will be studying. Very little homework. It sounds nice but I'm afraid I won't actually have the desire to pull out a textbook and study. Histology is neat, but quite difficult to fully understand. I'm just psyched to get into the physical therapist assistant program next fall and put biology classes on hold for awhile. As much as I love biology, but it's time for a rest. Oh, and it's time for some decent income to start coming into the Green house.

I never thought this would be my career goal just a couple years ago. I was leaning towards doing something with music, or maybe journalism, but physical therapy? Baloney! It's a good thing that they make you get your generals, because I really rooted out a bunch of crappy potential interests that I never want to look into again, like economics and geography (meteorology, to be more specific). It was my decision to take human anatomy that put me on my current path of interest.

The human body is just so incredible. Here we are with our bodies, just hanging out on earth, like we've been doing for the past million years, and we still don't even fully understand how they work. Every organ system, in a healthy normal body, works in such beautiful integration. You mess up one little part, and everything else gets screwed up. Which is a bad thing, but it shows you how much everything works together. Yeah, teamwork! Go Jazz!

Dream Within a Dream

Here, I have created the architecture of my latest wild dream within a dream. It may bore you. It actually kind of bores me just looking at it. There was familiarity in this dream, like I had had it before. As you will see, I discovered a locker in the bottom left part that contained a key. This key, as it seems in dreams past, was unable to open the safe. This dream was different though, as the safe opened. Inside was a cassette tape (?) and a card that looked like a temple recommend. In the dream, it seemed like the tape was extremely important, but I don't recall that I listened to it. The card opened a secret door on the east side of the pool, leading to...gasp...ANOTHER POOL. This pool was really deep, that's all I know. There were showers on the east side. For some odd reason, it was really significant that this second pool existed. There were many people running around and frolicking in pool #1, but I was the only one that happened to stumble upon pool #2. 

Oh, background. In this dream, I was driving from St. George to Idaho, and happened to stop in Provo. So that's where this takes place apparently. 

The reason this dream has stuck with me for the past several hours is because of just how significant it was that I stumbled upon the secret swimming pool, as though I had been trying to open that safe forever, and only now was I successful. There was some major excitement. Strange how emotions run in a dream like that.

Later on (in layer #1), I was telling somebody all of this, and apparently in the pool dream, I was in complete lucidity. The end.