The love of God and searching for gifts

So I recently reserved the url "giftsandguides.com" for this blog. It only seems appropriate considering that these are subjects that are close to me. I remain grateful for the gifts and guidance I have received. As I use them, I feel that I raise my own soul - or that my own soul is raised - far more than the lives of others that I can help bless.

I'm going to stray a bit from the subject and just mention my gratitude for the gifts in my life. For Julie. She is my center and core. I know that when I am good with her, I can reach out and try things - I can risk. I can dare and reach. I can go beyond what's comfortable, because she is at my center and she keeps me from tipping over when I reach too far. It's perhaps a strange analogy, but it's the best description I have for how I feel.

I'm grateful for powerful people around me. I've been looking for five powerful people because I understand that you become the five people that you hang around the most. These people are Julie, Makay and MaryAnn, Tony and Pele. The last two folks might be surprised to know that I include them in my five, but they have great traits that I admire and long to be around. M&M? They're just awesome people. They think I'm cool because I give. The reality is that, like I mentioned above, I love how I grow when I assist them. Then there's that other thing: I know that we all have to grow; it's our duty and responsibility. Most people grow through trial. Julie and I are the exception, and I'm so very grateful for that. I much prefer to grow through giving and I'm grateful for the opportunity to grow that way.

Then there's my children and grandkids. I love them. Especially the grandkids.

So here we are, today in 1 Nephi 10. I had to bounce a while before I found this chapter. Nephi started talking about gifts in verse 17 and that got my attention: how did Nephi get his gifts and what does that say about how we can do it?

"And it came to pass after I, Nephi, having heard all the words which he saw in a vision...I was desirous also that I might see, and hear, and know of these things, by the power of the Holy Ghost, which is the Gift of God unto all those who diligently seek him.."

So we have that magic word here: Gift. Nephi had the gift of knowing that what his father said was the word of God. He had the gift of the Holy Ghost, that open pipeline with heaven so that he could also know the word of God directly. He had the desire to know of his father's vision directly, and he was given the gift of seeing what his father had seen directly. Then he was given more.

He described the tree of life in a way that hadn't hit me before. I've read this verse probably a dozen times before in my life, but its significance hit me differently this time. Here is a beautiful tree, a white tree and it represents the love of God. It reminds me of a tree I saw during christmas a number of years ago. Who wouldn't want to live in the glowing love of God? How could anyone not want to just stay there and bask in the warmth of His love?

Apparently, many of us would prefer to avoid that. There is the large and spacious building where most prefer to live. The naysayers, those who choose less for themselves.

But then there is the iron rod - the word of God. I've known that forever too, but it's more clear now. The word of God gets us to that tree. Upon a moment's reflection, of course it does. God loves us, he wants us to be at that tree. He would simply tell us how to get there, and he does. His instructions are the word of God. Pretty brain dead simple when you think about it.

It also tells me that those who are not following his instructions, also known as the building inhabitants, cannot bask in his love. They may claim to, but either they don't know what his love is or perhaps they may be lying to themselves or others, or maybe there's a substitute they're looking at and thinking it's whatever. I don't know. I do know that I've felt a small part of God's love, and there's nothing else like it.

Nephi knew that to get this gift, he had to first hear all of his father's words, then listen to "the things that he spake by the power of the Holy Ghost", then be desirous to know more, to diligently seek him and be open to the gift that the Lord and the Holy Ghost wish to provide. I believe that's the pathway for all of us.