The Easiest Upkeep

The way to regularly maintain and increase your spirituality is to apply the habits known as the Sunday School answers: Reading the scriptures, saying your prayers, going to church, giving service, and so on. However, most of these require a somewhat substantial investment of time and effort. However, one of them is so quick and easy, we can do it even while we're actively doing other things. Of these forms of spiritual upkeep, the easiest by far is prayer.

Prayer simply means talking to God. This is usually done vocally, while kneeling or standing, with one's eyes closed and one's arms folded, but it's actually extremely flexible. We can pray vocally, or just in our heads. Kneeling and folding your arms is respectful, but not necessary; we can pray in any position. We can even pray with our eyes open, which is helpful in emergencies and while driving. The main purpose of prayer is to connect our hearts to God's, and almost any way we do that can be considered a form of prayer.

Prayer is so easy, I'm surprised we don't do it more often. The scriptures urge us to "pray always," and that it actually possible, even while we go about our daily lives, assuming that it doesn't matter that we probably can't pray in our sleep. We can literally spend every waking moment with a prayer in our hearts, so why don't we? Prayer is so easy, and its benefits are so great, it makes sense for a person to pray almost constantly, and thus constantly maintain their connection with God through the Holy Ghost. The other forms of spiritual upkeep take up a certain amount of time, but praying is something we can do almost effortlessly while we're doing other things, thus requiring almost no investment of time or energy.

Yet, despite the low cost of prayer, the benefits are amazing. At the very least, it helps us connect to the Holy Ghost, who can offer us a good deal of guidance and other aid. We can also request special blessings and even miracles through prayer, and many of those prayers have been answered affirmatively, depending on the individuals' needs. Prayer can be a key to revelation and it can bring great peace to your heart.

Several months ago, I bought a watch with an hourly chime to remind me to pray frequently. I encourage you to pray frequently as well, and that is an invitation that I am very comfortable extending, since I know it'll cost you next to nothing to accept it and it will grant you blessings far greater than the cost of the investment. I know that we're busy and that it's hard to find the time or energy to do the other Upkeep things, but since praying costs us next to nothing, we will almost always have the time and energy it takes to pray.

Essential Upkeep

It has occurred to me that, in making my commitment to blog daily, I have set an unusually high bar for myself. In order to share some spiritual insight on my blog each day, I need to have an average of at least one spiritual insight per day. That is, I need to have or be inspired with a blogworthy thought at least once each day, on average.

That doesn't always happen. Of course, that's largely my fault. My scripture study has been plodding and inconsistent, and I don't always devote thought to looking for spiritual analogies in my daily life, though such analogies often find me anyway. When I started my blog, I planned on watching/reading/listening to at least one General Conference talk per day, and I haven't been doing that, either. The main reason I haven't been getting as much inspiration as I'd like is because I haven't been devoting enough time to searching for it.

And it doesn't help that neither of my D&D games contained many good ethical quandaries. Sure, I could blog about the need to exercise wisdom when potentially performing a noble self-sacrifice or about the importance to step in and break up arguments between friends, but neither of those ideas really struck me as being blogworthy. They might be blogable, but they're not blogworthy.

I'd like to have more thoughts that are definitely blogworthy. But to do that, I will have to spend more time studying the gospel, and of course, the main question becomes "When?". First thing in the morning would be easiest, but since it's Summer, the mornings are really the only time I can do yardwork. Of course, I could study at some later time, but I would then have to pick a specific time and then commit to studying the gospel then, and hopefully remember to.

Setting aside time to study the gospel regularly is surprisingly difficult, but it's one of the few ways to regularly receive inspiration, and for someone who maintains a daily spiritual blog or would just like to have more inspiration in his or her life, it's essential.

Why Guidance is a Divination Spell

One of the most useful spells in D&D is Guidance, which gives a +1d4 bonus to any skill check you make. Whether you're trying to spot a hidden door, remember a piece of information, haggle for a good price, maintain your balance, or shove a door open, Guidance can help you do it better. It's a very versatile spell. But what I find odd is that it's a Divination spell, a kind of spell that involves giving the user more information. I would have thought that it would have been a Transmutation spell, the kind of spell that changes something into something else. A Transmutation spell can change stone into mud, a non-magical item into a magical item, or a person who is naturally good or bad at something into a person who is supernaturally good at that thing. Enhance Ability, another spell that can make a person better at any skill, is a Transmutation spell. Yet, Guidance is a Divination spell. Why? How can Divination make a person better at physical tasks?

God knows everything, so He knows the best way to do everything, even physical tasks. He can inspire us to know where to put our feet and hold our arms to maintain our balance. He can help us know exactly where to push on a door to get the most leverage toward forcing it open. Every physical task has a mental component, and God's guidance can help us sort out that mental component and give us a physical advantage.

So when we pray for His guidance, what we will get is information, but that information might still be able to help us with a physical task. He can inspire us with a knowledge of the right way to do whatever we're doing, no matter what it is. That's part of what makes the Holy Ghost such a valuable companion, and it's what makes Divination such a versatile spell. Sure, they mostly only give us information, but that information can teach us how to do anything.

Differing Moral Decisions

The world has lots of problems in it, many of which cannot be easily solved. These problems force us to consider the moral principles involved in the situation and weigh our moral values. Sometimes, when we do this, we can come up with responses that we can consider morally correct. Other times, we have to settle for the least-objectionable solution while we try to come up with a better one. Sometimes, there are no good answers. So, let's be careful not to judge people too harshly for some of the moral (or immoral) choices they make. Some of these choices are painfully difficult, and almost everyone prioritizes moral values differently, meaning that we're going to end up making different decisions. Some of those decisions may be right or wrong, but it's often difficult to judge. So let's try to focus on our own moral dilemmas and leave the judging of others up to God.

Some Thoughts on Failure

We sang Follow the Prophet in Primary today, including the verse about Jonah:

Jonah was a prophet, tried to run away,

But he later learned to listen and obey.

When we really try, the Lord won’t let us fail:

That’s what Jonah learned deep down inside the whale.

I wonder about that third line, though. "When we really try, the Lord won’t let us fail." I don't think that's true. Certainly not in all cases. There are people who have "really tried" to break world records and create new invention and have failed. Perhaps "really trying" includes trying until we succeed, but even for those who refuse to give up, some things aren't meant to be. Even someone really tried to destroy the church, and devoted every waking moment of their entire life to that effort, I'm pretty sure the Lord would let them fail. Effort does not guarantee success.

However, can effort guarantee success when we are trying to do something that God wants us to do? It doesn't always feel like it. I try to be a good person, and I know God wants me to succeed at that, but it's not easy, and I sometimes fail. Does that mean that I didn't "really try"? Possibly. No matter how hard I try, I could theoretically try harder, and I don't always feel like trying as hard as I can. I suppose what I need to figure out what it means to "really try."

But I had also wondered whether failure is an essential component of human development. We learn from failure. If we never fail, then we will have a smaller variety of experiences from which to learn. It could be that some lessons can only be learned from failure. If we have to fail in order to learn certain lessons, and if we need to learn those lessons, then at some point, it would be necessary for us to fail.

Fortunately, whether failure is an essential experience or not, we humans are very good at it, so we are at no risk of missing out on essential life lessons due to insufficient failure. But what about Jesus? If failure is essential, wouldn't Jesus be missing "an essential component of human development"? If it's essential that we fail so we can learn lessons that can only be learned through failure, then that means that Jesus would have had to have failed at something, which might conflict with His perfection.

However, to satisfy His need for failure, Jesus could theoretically have failed at something inconsequential, like carpentry, and learned all the failure-based lessons He needed to learn from that one experience of carving wood poorly, or it could simply be that we don't really need to fail at all. Yes, we learn from failure, but it's entirely possible that every lesson we could learn from failure could also be learned in other ways. Maybe we don't need to fail.

But if we don't need to fail, why do we? Is it because what we try to do conflicts with the will of God? Not always. Is it because we don't "really try" consistently? Possibly, though I'm still not sure exactly what that phrase really means. There have been times when I felt that I was really trying to do the Lord's will and I failed. Maybe I wasn't trying hard enough. maybe it wasn't actually God's will that I succeed, or maybe God sometimes does let us fail, even when we "really try".

The Priesthood, the Plagues, and the Lesson Plan

For my lesson, I will begin by testing / refreshing my class's memory of what (or rather, whom) we learned about last time: Moses. I might remind them about the circumstances of his birth, and I'll definitely remind them of his calling to free and lead the Israelites. To fulfill that calling, he would need to use a special power, the Priesthood, which he got from his father-in-law, Jethro. Hopefully, they should have learned all of that last time, but it was two weeks ago and I was asked to help in another classroom, so I doubt that the kids will remember all that, especially since I'm not 100% sure they were taught all of that in the first place.

After explaining that Moses had gotten the Priesthood from Jethro, I'll ask my class what the Priesthood is normally used for. Then, after getting some normal answers, I might ask what else the Priesthood might be used for, which is a questions whose answers may include just about anything, including the ten plagues of Egypt, the parting of the Red Sea, and the transformation of sticks into snakes (manna is actually part of next week's lesson). I'll also make sure to point out that the blessings we receive are usually based on our needs. If we don't need a plague of locusts, God probably isn't going to send us one, even if we ask for it, but through the Priesthood, we can request and receive the miracles we need.

At some point, I'll have to mention that one thing that we can't do with the Priesthood or with any other power is take away another person's agency. God might have been technically capable of literally forcing Pharaoh to change his mind, but that's not what God does. God lets us make our own decisions, even when those decisions cause trouble for us and for everyone around us.

Ultimately, I'd like to leave my students with a fresh understanding of God's power, how His omnipotence means not only an infinite amount of power but also an infinite variety of powers. Apart from a few paradoxes and lines that He chooses not to cross, God can do just about anything. And as long as we're on His side, miracles will happen for our benefit. I'll teach the kids that they have an almighty Heavenly Father watching out for them, and He will lead them to the Promised Land if they are wise enough to follow Him.

Why Did God Use Plagues?

Considering God's omnipotence, I find it odd that God would use plagues at all. If He just wanted the Israelites free, couldn't He have accomplished that more directly? Instead of subjecting everyone to one plague after another, God could have just killed the Egyptians or had the Israelites jump straight to the part where He splits the Red Sea. Perhaps God spent all that time on those plagues largely just to prove that He could. Maybe He wanted to make sure that both the Egyptians and the Israelites know how much power He had, and perhaps He wanted to teach that lesson over the course of enough time to make sure that the message actually sunk in, or at least should have sunk in. After what must have been weeks, if not months,of supernatural events, both the Egyptians and the Israelites had had plenty of time to learn that God was a supremely powerful being, and one who should not be crossed. Yet, the two peoples went on underestimating Him, and they ultimately got what was coming to them, but after all those plagues, you couldn't say that they hadn't been warned.

Sometimes, God does something different from what we thought He should have done, and that is never for lack of ability. God can do literally anything He wants to do, so when He used plagues to eventually free the Israelites, that's not because He couldn't have done it any other way. God could have free the Israelites more quickly and less destructively, if He had wanted to, but for whatever reason, He decided that a series of plagues were the best tool for the job.

We don't always understand why God does what He does or why He doesn't do something else instead, but we can know that it's not because of any lack of ability. God can do whatever He wants any way He wants, but He always does what's best, and He does it in the best possible way. We might be able to think of a number of "better ways" to free the Israelites, but God knew the best way to secure their freedom, and that way, for some reasons,  involved a series of plagues.