TJ Hirst

During Jesus Christ’s ministry on earth, he performed many great miracles. However, when he taught in the synagogue in his own part of the country, the people questioned his teachings, saying “Is not this the carpenter’s son?”

As a result, “And he did not many mighty works there because of their unbelief.” Matthew Chapter 13:58, The New Testament of the Bible.

We did a fun object lesson in our class this week with an apple in a brown paper bag. I announced that there was something in the bag that no human eye had seen. I asked the students if they believed me. Only one student raised his hand. I showed him the contents of the bag and told him quietly that the seeds in the apple had never been seen by the human eye. He believed me and told the other students he believed. Many of the students still doubted that we were telling the truth.

Following that object lesson, we had an thought-provoking discussion about developing faith and how faith grows when we press passed our doubt and choose to believe. When we show forth a little bit of faith, God blesses us to know we were right to believe him.

I love to see that process occurring in life. We can actually look at life experience and recognize the connection between our belief and the ensuing blessing or miracle that transpires. I especially like to see how God’s hand has touched us with blessings that follow extended periods of faith.

Yet, I realize more fully, that I can allow doubt and discouragement to take over, and the opposite will be true.  Just as Christ did no miracles in his part of the land, he cannot do them in my life when I do not believe. “For if there be no faith among the children of men God can do no miracle among them; wherefore, he showed not himself until after their faith.” Ether Chapter 12:12, The Book of Mormon

Frequently, I make decisions as a mom based on a principle. Inevitably, though, when I state that decision and hold my children accountable for it, they push back with pressure.

When they were younger, they might throw a tantrum. Now that they are older, they either complain or resist. That pressure is uncomfortable for me and often makes me doubt my decisions. I ask myself, “If it is right, then why does it feel so bad or why are things not working out?”

I agonize, but most often, I stick to my decision, tracing it back to a true principle, not a personal preference. I’ve been surprised to discover the same situation when I’ve been a leader of adults. Now,  as a teacher of youth, I’m learning that this may just be a natural reaction for all of us.

We studied the Beatitudes in Matthew 5 in our early morning religion class. We read some descriptions of each and then I asked the high school students to make a visual image depicting each Beatitude. Here’s my daughter’s picture for “Blessed are they which are persecuted for righteousness sake: for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.” (Matt 5:10)

The Mississippi views I pass at the beginning of my day
do not foreshadow the river it becomes.
Yet, the morning moonlight separates the fog
and reflects the possibilities on my day ahead.

Waking Up to A Wordless Wednesday.

I am a novice canner. We had so many cucumbers this year that I made pickles for the first time. I found a good recipe for bread and butter pickles. While I washed the cucumbers, KH said, “Grandma sliced the cucumbers with a cutter that made them look like pickles.” And I even had one of those special cutters.

I mixed the cucumbers, onions, and ice in a bowl and weighted them down with a plate and a jug of vinegar on top. This sat on my kitchen counter for the required hours. Then, I mixed the vinegar, seasonings and sugar with the cucumbers, heated and ladled them into the jars. I processed them and set them on the counter. The kitchen didn’t look as good as they did, and I was glad to finish.

Later that day I made baby dills. I reached for the canning and pickling salt on the top shelf and thought, “I haven’t been in this cabinet today. Did I use the salt in the other pickles? I don’t  remember using the salt earlier. Did the recipe call for salt?”

All those pints of pickles had not been soaked in the salt. I felt sick to death with my mistake. My husband said, “Well, I’m sure they will be fine. We can just salt them when we eat them.”

I knew—and he probably did, too—that the salt changes the texture of the cucumber and makes it a pickle.

At our house, The Parable of the Pickle is infamous. In that talk, Elder David A. Bednar, a member of the Quorum of the Apostles, said:

A pickle is a cucumber that has been transformed according to a specific recipe and series of steps. . . .One of the principal purposes of our mortal existence is to be spiritually changed and transformed through the Atonement of Jesus Christ. . . .A cucumber only becomes a pickle through steady, sustained, and complete immersion in salt brine. Significantly, salt is the key ingredient in the recipe. Salt frequently is used in the scriptures as a symbol both of a covenant and of a covenant people. And just as salt is essential in transforming a cucumber into a pickle, so covenants are central to our spiritual rebirth.

I missed that important step of adding the salt. My pickles may be “ruined” in my mind, but the experience wasn’t. Like he said, “Interestingly, simple and ordinary experiences often provide the most important learning opportunities we ever have.”

And now, my sons, I speak unto you these things for your profit and learning; for there is a God, and he hath created all things, both the heavens and the earth, and all things that in them are, both things to act and things to be acted upon.

And to bring about his eternal purposes in the end of man, after he had created our first parents, and the beasts of the field and the fowls of the air, and in fine, all things which are created, it must needs be that there was an opposition; even the forbidden fruit in opposition to the tree of life; the one being sweet and the other bitter.

Wherefore, the Lord God gave unto man that he should act for himself. Wherefore, man could not act for himself save it should be that he was enticed by the one or the other.

from The Book of Mormon in 2 Nephi 2:14-16