"Now Behold, I, Jarom, write a few words according to the commandment of my father, Enos that our genealogy may be kept...these things are written for the intent of the benefit of our brethren the Lamanites." Jarom 1:1-2
Yesterday I got to go to the temple with Ryan :) It was awesome, and probably the last time we will be able to go before we are married! In the temple we preform ordinances (baptism, confirmation, marriage) for the deceased members of our family-our ancestors. We do it with the faith, that although right now they don't have bodies, someday they will be resurrected, and we will see them again. 1 Corinthians 15:29 "Else what shall they do which are baptized for the dead, if the dead rise not at all? why are they then baptized for the dead?"
In the meantime, they exist, they are here with us, I feel them in my life and I know they are our angels.
The other day I was driving through a storm without my glasses on (like a dummy that forgets her glasses sometimes even though she needs them to drive). All I could see through the wind shield was dark grey madness punctuated by two red tail-lights I was desperately trying to follow. It was dark and scary and I remember thinking "this is it, this is how I die, on my way to pick up Ryan...I hope he finds a ride home." The car in front of me was going too fast for me to keep up, and I found myself all alone on the road. I just wanted to see again, at one point I felt the wheel move slowly to one side and my hands with it. That was when I realized, the road had started to curve without me noticing, and had I continued to go straight I would have driven straight into the concrete divider in the middle of the road. Why did the wheel move? In the moment I didn't think to correct the movement. It was like someone had placed their hands on mine and moved the wheel with me, the way that Pancho did when I was learning to drive.
I honestly couldn't say what happened, but I felt like God was hearing me ask for help on that drive, and He sent someone. Maybe someone who loved me, someone who wanted me to live, someone who has been watching.
When a person passes away without the Gospel, what happens to them? What happens to all the mistakes they made in their life? Their joys, their guilt, their sorrows, their memories-do they all cease to exist with them? Some say they do, but I am not one of them. Could you imagine having a perfect memory of your guilt and pain, with no way out? No way to go back and change anything or to at least ask for forgiveness? I think that that would be it's own dark and scary storm. God doesn't just leave His children in storms like that. He always sends help. He sent His Son Jesus Christ to overcome sin and death so that when we needed a Savior from the storm, He could get us through it, He could show us a way out, and guide us out by the hand.
After Ryan and I had been baptized and confirmed for these members of my family, we waited in the lobby to receive their names and I opened up the Book of Mormon to these verses in Alma chapter 26
"Yea, we have reason to praise him forever, for he is the Most High God, and has loosed our brethren from the chains of hell.
Yea, they were encircled about with everlasting darkness and destruction; but behold, he has brought them into his everlasting light, yea, into everlasting salvation; and they are encircled about with the matchless bounty of his love; yea, and we have been instruments in his hands of doing this great and marvelous work.
Therefore, let us glory, yea, we will glory in the Lord; yea, we will rejoice, for our joy is full; yea, we will praise our God forever. Behold, who can glory too much in the Lord? Yea, who can say too much of his great power, and of his mercy, and of his long-suffering towards the children of men?
Behold, I say unto you, I cannot say the smallest part which I feel."
