The Jitters

For years I was involved in coaching young athletes.  I have also been involved, one way or another, in numerous marriages.  Moreover, I have nearly five decades of adult experience under my belt as a Church worker, giver of sermons and teacher. All of this has exposed me to a phenomenon many have called “the jitters.” 

Behaviors associated with “the jitters” include “butterflies” in the stomach, feelings of illness, insomnia, hyperactivity, weakness, self-doubt, and suddenly what seems to be highly attractive other alternatives.   Thoughts arise such as: “Am I doing the right thing?,” “Do I really want to do this?,” “CAN I do this?”  

In my pastoral role I’ve had some brides-to-be and numerous of my athletes, and even I, as an athlete and coach, had the jitters as the moment of truth has presented itself.

Sometimes when this happens, alternatives come to mind that present themselves as a way out.  These alternatives often become suddenly very attractive and compelling; sometimes these alternatives come as other “voices” or other offers.  There is even a biblical scripture that address the phenomenon: “There are, it may be, so many kinds of voices in the world, and none of them is without signification [so we think].” 

Now, in case you are getting ready to step up to the first tee, or the pulpit, or the wedding alter, or put in mission application papers, something akin to “the jitters” may be suddenly afflict you.  Not that you are not poised, entirely capable, finely conditioned or otherwise worthy or well-prepared.  Most people who occasionally get the jitters are all of these things. Those whose confidence is truly weak never get far enough to get the jitters. 

My sense, based on long experience, is that you will have far fewer regrets if you stick with the plan that brought you to this point; you are now ready to execute.  You are committed and if you reflect for just a moment you will know that others who know you have confidence you can do the job.  If you doubt it, ask them. 

Stick with the game plan.  Don’t let negative thoughts derail you.  Notwithstanding other seemingly attractive alternatives (such as turning around and running) your earlier well-planned and practiced decision and preparation will carry you through.  Now is the time for some affirmations—just have a quick positive talk with yourself then DO IT.  

  

Then you can say with satisfaction, “I have fought a good fight, I have finished my course….” These are the people you hear about.   Quitters don’t make the news. 

Go for it!

Caveat. Even people with evil intent follow this approach to the accomplishment of their nefarious purposes.  I am assuming my readers are otherwise; anyone who can put up with my moralizing has to be.

Boy Scouts of America—Morally Straight?

I was a Boy Scout.  My sons were Boy Scouts.  The organization has a scout oath, and a scout law.  I took the oath; I followed the law.  It made me a better boy; it made me a better man.  I was not alone; it is the largest youth organization in the United States.  I wonder how much longer it will be?

Until now, here is what the Scout Oath said:

On my honor I will do my best
To do my duty to God and my country
and to obey the Scout Law;
To help other people at all times;
To keep myself physically strong,
mentally awake, and morally straight.

Morally straight?

Now, in May of 2013 I weep for the Boy Scouts of America. 

The Boy Scouts of America has been pressured into capitulating to the so called Gay Rights agenda by accommodating to their promotion of their perverted life-style.

  

I deplore the forced corruption of this once fine institutional contributor to the making of men—men of integrity and sound morals and manly qualities. 

I feel very sorry for the executives and leaders of the B.S.A.  I thank them for their wonderful contribution to life lessons for generations of millions of boys like me. I am glad I was taught the Scout Law—to be ‘clean, [and] reverent.’ And I am glad it was part of their mission to ‘reinforce ethical standards’ in my life and the life of my boys. 

I am sorry I can no longer support what they are forced to distort. 

Calamity

As the attention of the nation shifts from one tragedy or catastrophe to another (and will continue in the days ahead), it would be well for us to examine our premises and the conclusions we draw from them.  If not a ‘tragedy’ or calamity of nature’s forces, or of the designs of evil persons, it will come in our own family, or of a close friend or acquaintance or of ourselves.  How are we prepared to view and respond to the inevitable? 

A perspective that has greatly tempered and informed my views on the seeming tragedies of our lives was that given over 50 years ago by a great Church leader of my faith—a man named Spencer W. Kimball who knew intimately, through revelation and his own suffering, that of which he spoke.  Following are some of his edited and paraphrased remarks (in italics) taken from his address at Brigham Young University titled “Tragedy or Destiny?” Interspersed, in standard type, are some of my thoughts which were stimulated by his remarks. 

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Many People critically blame every tragedy upon the Lord—they ask, Why did the Lord let this happen?  People who ask this need to check their premises.  

Was it the Lord [who caused this]?  Was He responsible? Or did He in His wisdom allow it to happen? 

Was it untimely…do we know?

Could the Lord have prevented this?  Yes! But if He did, the very purposes of mortality would be frustrated.  For we need opposition in order to exercise our agency which, in turn, drives our responses to such ‘tragedies.’ Mortality is our test. Suffering can make saints of people.

Every act of God is purposeful …He sees the end from the beginning.  Man, often, does not; we “see through a glass darkly.”  But not all things are ‘acts of God.’

[Because death is the most riveting of life events, are some people, or all people,] appointed unto death at a certain time?  Yes. “To every thing there is a season, and a time to every purpose under the heaven: a time to be born, and a time to die….” 

Even the righteous will not always be healed as we appropriately pray for them or be spared these events of mortality.  Pray as did Jesus, “thy will be done.” But know, even solemn prayers may be answered…negatively and that is God’s will.

Know that we are born into a fallen world.  We will all experience pain, sorrow, suffering and death; they are part of what we came here to experience and respond to.  Through and because of them we learn great lessons and are sometimes given great opportunities to respond.  Bless the responders.  

But provision has been made for these eventualities.  Without the Fall there would be no need for a Savior or for a plan of redemption. The Atonement of Jesus Christ as our redeemer and Savior is the central doctrine of the Christian faith. We will live again.

It seems clear that the Lord does not , like we usually, consider death a calamity.  Death is a part of life. “The Lord takes away many, even in infancy because they were too pure….” (Joseph Smith, Jr.) He takes them to a better place.

Even seeming tragedy may be a part of a purposeful plan.  Or it may be the consequences not of God’s will at all, but of man’s choices or actions.  Many wars or acts of crime or terrorism or preventable catastrophes may be of this nature.  Many die before their time because they abuse themselves or are careless… (but many more –most?--have an allotted time to live).

The gospel of Jesus Christ  teaches us that there is no tragedy in death…but only in sin.

Of course we do not want any to suffer or to die.  But think of the consequences of that if we had the power, without the wisdom, to curtail suffering and death:

Would we spare  Jesus of Gethsemane and Calvary? Would we have the apostle Paul healed from his ‘thorn in the flesh?   Would we protect the martyrs for Christ?  What of all the innocents, the infants, the little children, the mentally handicapped? Jesus knew when “my time is come”   and I think he knows when our time is to come.  Until that day, because we do not know when our ‘time is come’ we should live as fully as we can, a day at a time,  as long as we can exercise some control of our own destinies. We should do what we can to prepare, but we should not fear.  

Is eternity so frightful…so awful?  No.  The righteous or innocent have absolutely nothing to fear.  

“Be still and know that I am God.” (Doctrine and Covenants 101:16)

Crimes Against Young Women/Children

As is the case with all my weblog essays or postings, this is not a fully developed treatise, but within the limitations of my time and my readers’ interest and patience I believe you will quickly know where I stand in regard to this issue. 

I deplore the crimes we hear and read about against young women and children—the abuse, the abduction, the molestation and sexual exploitation, and I condemn the people who commit these atrocious acts. I believe our laws and criminal justice system should deal much more harshly with these predators and perpetrators.  It matters not whether the abusers are family members, posturing religious leaders, the neighbor next door, or drive-by abductors.  They have gone beyond the pale.  They need to be put away for good. 

From where do these unacceptable and damaging practices perpetrated upon the helpless or innocent come?  They come from brutish, uncivilized and morally bankrupt perverts (men mostly). They come, at least in our country, frequently from men who themselves seem to have been brought up in dysfunctional or non-morally- grounded homes or social environments. Yet that does not excuse their actions.  Upon investigation it seems that most of these people have been influenced by violent and sexually explicit or exploitive videos, movies, and television programs. There are few people who are forced to view these things.  Many or most are social isolates. 

Moral behavior for them, as well as for us, I believe, is “caught” as well as taught.  These abusers were once children themselves. It is the nature of many children, boys especially, to model the negative behavior of what they see and experience or participate in as they become older. One becomes like those he is around or sees constantly portrayed in ‘entertainment’ media. Traditions and culture are perpetuated for good or for ill. 

Upon whom are these crimes committed?  Children, especially ‘pretty children.’ 

Young children, by their nature as trusting, dependent, and initially helpless beings naturally align themselves with their parents and family and have no inherent reason to distrust their neighbors, teachers or other adults.  Yet these adults, more often than totally random strangers, become the children's assailants.  Children naturally love their homes and caregivers until trust and hope has become so damaged by repeated tyrannical or abusive treatment or by neglect that passive vulnerability or despair sets in and suicide, for some, seems the only way out.  My wife and I saw this in Samoa—a nation that ‘loves’ their families but because of victimization by extended family members or village neighbors has the highest female suicide rate in the world. These things are tragedies that must be stemmed. 

Recognition that the child in one’s stewardship or proximity is in reality a child of God (atheist or agnostic readers please read on) needs to be addressed in remedying the problem of child abuse or exploitation.  Just as we are not our own, (from a Christian perspective see I Corinthians 6:19-20) the children who live with us or are taught by us or simply come into our circumstantial space are not ours to use or abuse.  For parents, our children are loaned to us to love and nurture and rear to adulthood in righteousness. (see Ephesians 6:4; Colossians 3:21)  For others there is a civil duty to protect our young. This must be more forcefully taught from the pulpit and in the home and in our community organizations and more broadly understood by all. If people really believed and understood this, many behaviors would change.  

As knowledge of who these children are and whose these children are is critical for parents and all other caregivers, so too a child must understand his or her own undistorted identity and human rights.  It is his or her right that no adult can morally abrogate.   (See Romans 8:16; Psalms 127:3.) Even those who are not nominal Christians should know that children are not things to be used or abused. Children are not property of parents and young girls are not objects to be used by undisciplined and evil male predators. 

For a purportedly or historically Christian nation, then, if our society is to regain civility and protect our young, the culture of Christ must once more be afforded more credibility and pervade our homes and our culture at large. The Christian scriptures are more than literature: they are a guide to behavior that can bring peace, stability, and hope to individuals, families, communities and nations.  Christian leaders (most of our elected leaders are at least nominally Christian) and disciples of Christ must repeatedly teach and consistently model the behavior spelled out in our holy books if we hope for things to change. And until things change, we must be more concerned and protective of the victim or potential victim than with the perpetrator.     

I end with portions of a document that our country is a signatory of—though not ratified or accepted fully, to my knowledge—The UNICEF Convention on the Rights of the Child: Children’s rights and Responsibilities pamphlet (written in the 2<sup>nd</sup> person for the child):

•   Article 19. No one should hurt you in any way.  Adults should make sure that you are protected from abuse, violence, and neglect.  Even your parents have no right to hurt you.
•   Article 34. You have the right to be protected from sexual abuse.  This means that nobody can do anything to your body that you do not want them to do, such as touching you or taking pictures of you or making you say things that you don’t want to say.
•    Article 37. Even if you do something wrong, no one is allowed to punish you in a way that humiliates you or hurts you badly. 
• Article 42.  All adults and all children should know about the Convention on the Rights of the Child.  You have a right to learn about your rights and adults should learn about them too.