{"id":3385,"date":"2006-08-27T08:08:40","date_gmt":"2006-08-27T12:08:40","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/timesandseasons.org\/?p=3385"},"modified":"2006-08-27T09:19:35","modified_gmt":"2006-08-27T13:19:35","slug":"daily-discipleship","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/timesandseasons.org\/index.php\/2006\/08\/daily-discipleship\/","title":{"rendered":"Daily Discipleship"},"content":{"rendered":"

In her thoughtful and enlightening book Leaving Eden<\/em>, Amber Esplin tells the story of a young girl named Judith. Near the end of the novel, Judith\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s brother dies and she confronts the chasm that opens in his absence. Though Judith must at first face the bitter sadness that inevitably accompanies death, she finds some catharsis in the Gospel and eventually settles into a tenuous peace. She finds, in fact, that her brother\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s death gives substance to the spiritual forms that had formerly seemed, to her, quite unreal. This epiphany grants Judith a new perspective on life; in the novel\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s closing pages, Esplin gives voice to some of Judith\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s resulting thoughts:
\n
\n\u00e2\u20ac\u0153Judith had reached the edge of the park now. A white gazebo stood a little way off, in the center, and a few lights glowed mistily through the trees. A fine, cold rain tingled against her face. She inhaled deeply. On a night like this, it was easy to believe in eternity, easy to think of herself as a wanderer on this planet, a lonely traveler yearning for a home that was nowhere on this earth. She had all sorts of maps and compasses to get her back where she belonged, is she\u00e2\u20ac\u2122d just be patient and stay on the path. But it was such a long journey. What if her mind wandered, just for a little while? She thought of the ladies gathered at the Church last fall, those women gluing dried plants while they talked about Gabriel\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s imminent death. Some of them probably knew what it meant to grieve; Judith understood now, especially since her conversation with her mother, that people\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s outward persona was only a fraction of their true selves. Perhaps many of them had experienced a night like this, a time when they stood alone beneath the misty lights and glittering stars and whispered to themselves, \u00e2\u20ac\u02dcI\u00e2\u20ac\u2122ll make it home. I see the path clearly now, and I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122ll get there.\u00e2\u20ac\u2122 Had they managed to stay on the path ever since, or had there been detours? Where were they on that very night? Judith almost wished she could have asked them, though she couldn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t think how she would have phrased the question. \u00e2\u20ac\u02dcHow did you stay true to your moment of truth?\u00e2\u20ac\u2122 She might have said. \u00e2\u20ac\u02dcWhen times had passed and you had to do all the usual things just to keep life moving along, when your days became filled again with household chores or school or work, how did you remember what was important? How did you clear a view through all those distractions so you could keep your eyes fixed on eternity?\u00e2\u20ac\u2122\u00e2\u20ac? <\/p>\n

Many (or most?) who belong to the Church have some deeply spiritual reason for so doing. For some, death and a night alone amidst the stars give birth to a brilliant epiphany. For others, the knowledge comes more gradually\u00e2\u20ac\u201daccumulating like age\u00e2\u20ac\u201dbut is still just as profound. For still others, missionaries bring a spirit and testimony that open up new spiritual vistas.<\/p>\n

For me, the knowing occurred most dramatically when I was fourteen. I went, that summer, to the sacred grove and knelt to ask for knowledge\u00e2\u20ac\u201dnone came. Four months later, however, I was preparing a home-teaching lesson when, while reading in JSH, I came across these words: \u00e2\u20ac\u0153I saw a pillar of light exactly over my head, above the brightness of the sun, which descended gradually until it fell upon me\u00e2\u20ac\u00a6.\u00e2\u20ac? Without any other noticeable impetus (I had largely forgotten my experience in the woods from a few months before), testimony burned \u00e2\u20ac\u0153like fire in my bones\u00e2\u20ac? and the spirit cascaded upon me\u00e2\u20ac\u201da waterfall of warmth, knowledge, and assurance.<\/p>\n

As Esplin points out, however, the knowing itself is not enough\u00e2\u20ac\u201dit is the nurturing of testimony that requires lifelong devotion. Indeed, beyond just caring for testimony, we are asked to be daily disciples; we are asked to take up the cross and seek\u00e2\u20ac\u201dwhether at work, school, recreation, or home\u00e2\u20ac\u201dto strive to be more like Jesus.<\/p>\n

And so, I ask: how do we keep our eyes fixed on eternity while we are engaged in temporalities? How do we keep testimony, fragile as a moonbeam, burning brightly? How do we, with crying children, or pressing deadlines, or a belligerent boss, or clueless co-workers, or abusive parents, or unfaithful spouses, or departing parents, or intellectual doubts, or any other of life\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s myriad concerns, seek to be more like Jesus? How do we, despite and because of what befalls us, keep becoming the people God wants us to be? <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

In her thoughtful and enlightening book Leaving Eden, Amber Esplin tells the story of a young girl named Judith. Near the end of the novel, Judith\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s brother dies and she confronts the chasm that opens in his absence. Though Judith must at first face the bitter sadness that inevitably accompanies death, she finds some catharsis in the Gospel and eventually settles into a tenuous peace. She finds, in fact, that her brother\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s death gives substance to the spiritual forms that had formerly seemed, to her, quite unreal. This epiphany grants Judith a new perspective on life; in the novel\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s closing pages, Esplin gives voice to some of Judith\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s resulting thoughts:<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":92,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3385","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-corn"],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/timesandseasons.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3385","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/timesandseasons.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/timesandseasons.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/timesandseasons.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/92"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/timesandseasons.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3385"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/timesandseasons.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3385\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/timesandseasons.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3385"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/timesandseasons.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3385"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/timesandseasons.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3385"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}