You're Strong Enough (14 page)

Some things are harder to be forgiven of than others. For example, if you had beaten someone up and badly hurt them, this would be harder, and take longer, to be forgiven for than if you were to yell at a brother or sister. Though some sins are harder to be forgiven than others, it’s important you seek forgiveness in all things, so that you may get back on your path for this quest and not have to pay the price in the next life.

Having an unrepentant soul will darken your path more than any sin or mistake.
If you do not seek forgiveness for your sins, then the Spirit of the Lord will withdraw and Satan will have His turn at you.

Repenting and trying to make good decisions will give you the breastplate of righteousness. The breastplate of righteousness does not symbolize being perfect, it symbolizes trying to do your best through righteous living (i.e., deeds, acts, repentance). This breastplate guards against the temptations and fiery darts of Satan. Without this protection, you are an easy target for Satan.

Beware of the lies Satan tells

Just Because You Can doesn’t
Mean You Should

With the increasing amount of darkness in our world, there comes a concept from Satan that many of the youth are accepting. The concept is: Just because you can do something to others, gives you the permission you should. Let me give you some examples of
just because you can doesn’t mean you should
. Just because you’re bigger than someone else, doesn’t mean you should pick on them. Just because you are being bullied at home, doesn’t mean you should bully others at school. Just because your friends are doing something bad, doesn’t mean you should. Just because you can have sex with anyone because you’re good looking, doesn’t mean you should.

Satan will try to convince us that, because we can do something, we should do something and that’s where freedom lies.
Satan is a liar, for those we have harmed we will have justice served on our head, here or in the next life.
Be careful what you do in this life, for there is always a ripple effect when it comes to our choices.

The Ripple Effect

God has given us the power to choose. As a result, we may feel
just because we can do
in our lives
we should
. Watch out. Satan does not tell you about the ripple effect of your choices. What you do to cause others harm will be accounted unto you until it stops (the ripple effect). Let me give you an example of the harmful effect of abusing your free agency and hurting others.

Let’s say you come from an abusive home where your father constantly hits you. You feel, because you have been hurt, you should be able to hurt others. One day, you feel especially angry because your father hit you before you left home for school. As you’re on your way to school, you see this smaller kid (let’s call him Bobby) coming down your side of the street. As he gets close enough to you to walk by, he accidentally bumps into you. As a result, you lose it. You feel, in that moment, that you have the right to hurt Bobby. You’re pissed off at the world and you’ve been hurt by your father.

With the anger built up inside of you, you hurt Bobby really badly. Once you are done, you go your own way, leaving Bobby there groaning in pain. After an hour lying there on the sidewalk, Bobby finally gets up to go home. His home is already full of pain and suffering. Bobby has nothing at home to comfort him. All he has at home is a mom dying of cancer. He is left alone to now deal with not only taking care of his mom, but of being beaten up and having no one to talk to about it. Bobby’s anger builds. He feels life is serving him up a lump of coal. He, too, lashes out at the next person he sees.

The kid (Tom) Bobby hurts because of his anger, now, in turn, hurts someone else (Joe) and so on. According to the ripple effect, the demand of justice will be served to not just Bobby, who did the damage on Tom, but to the person who started it. Our choices are so powerful that they can affect generations for good and bad (the ripple effect).

The same thing applies to a good deed. If you see a boy drop his books in front of his locker and you walk over to help him, this, in turn, makes him feel awesome. Then he assists another person who also was having a bad day. All of those good deeds that day will be accounted unto you for good, because you started the ripple effect of uplifting others.

Choose wisely.
Your choices could affect hundreds of people for good or bad.
With that said, if you are the one hurt, please do not pass it down the line. You never know what circumstances the afflicter came from. Forgive the one who hurt you and stop the ripple effect. Not only will this help you here, but it will help the afflicter in the next life (which will help you).

If you are the one who started a negative ripple effect in your life and in the lives of others with your poor choices, I recommend you seek forgiveness through the atonement and try to make amends. Making amends by doing a good deed for those who you have hurt can reverse the negative effects into positive ones. You can’t take back what you did (that’s what the atonement is for), but you can try and make it right through helping others.

Don’t Judge too quickly

You never know what circumstances others may be going through. For instance, I have found that many bullies come from abusive homes. They are angry and have not forgiven those who harmed them. They feel justified in harming others.

My daughter proved this point in third grade. A bully in her school, whom we’ll call Lisa, constantly pushed her and other kids down, butted in line, called others names and tried to create fights. One day, my daughter tried my lesson in kindness with Lisa. After about a week of my daughter inviting Lisa to eat with her, play with her and do homework with her, Lisa’s heart was changed. They became friends. Later, my daughter discovered that Lisa’s parents had just gotten a divorce. Lisa was very angry about it.

Sometimes, all bullies need is someone to be kind to them, listen to them, love them, uplift them and befriend them. Don’t be too quick to judge another. Each of us is on our individual quests. Each has to conquer Satan. Each will have trials to overcome.
And each will be searching for relief, help them find it with kindness.

My Quest for Relief

As I was growing up, I saw a lot of pain and suffering in my home because of my parents’ divorce. I saw my mom struggling to raise eight kids by herself. The other four were either in college or on missions for our church. My mother used to badmouth my father all the time and make us feel guilty when we went with him. She pushed her kids to be perfect in everything we did, especially cleanliness. She verbally and mentally abused us when things weren’t going her way, all because she was emotionally blind from the divorce.

For years, I didn’t understand why my mom treated us so badly and felt so out of control. For Heaven sakes, we had just lost our father in the divorce. But as time went on, and after running away from home and living with my father, I started to understand. I found out my own mother did not have the best upbringing. She had been rejected in a lot of ways by her family. So, when my father rejected her by getting a divorce, it absolutely crushed her. Furthermore, I learned that when people feel out of control with their feelings and their own life, they will try to control everything and everyone around them, believing it will fill that void.

When I finally understood that my mom’s worst fear was to be rejected and she was spinning out of control, my eyes were open to why she couldn’t see what she was doing to her children. I learned then never to judge anyone until you walk in their shoes. As I understood her grief, it became easier to forgive her for her misdeeds. And as I did, I found relief from my negative feelings.

Everyone has a quest that is full of trials and challenges that they must go through and no one will do it perfectly. After my parents’ divorce, my mom was just barely surviving. She could barely save her children from the pain they were going through. I found the relief I was searching for by understanding why my mom did certain things. Relief will come when we don’t judge others, but try to understand what they’re going through and forgive them.