Meridian Magazine : : Print

Beings of Light
By G.G. Vandagriff

In a sobering article, Wall Street Journal, columnist Peggy Noonan tells us that “Hatred Begins at Home.” She talks about a 1982 visit to Northern Ireland:

Whenever I think of war, I think of this ... I was in Northern Ireland, and a local reporter was showing me around Derry, the center of the Protestant-Catholic conflict. The neighborhood we were in was beat up, poor, with Irish Republican Army graffiti on tired walls. There were some scraggly kids on the street.

Suddenly an armored British army vehicle slowly rounded the corner, and the street came alive with kids pouring out of houses, grabbing the heavy metal lids of garbage bins, and smashing them against the pavement. They made quite a racket.

A woman came out. She was 35 or 40, her short hair standing up, uncombed. It was late afternoon, but she was in an old robe, and you could tell it was the robe she lived in. She stood there and smirked as the soldiers went by. She'd come out to register her dislike for the Brits, and to show the children she approved of their protest.

As I watch this nothing sort of scene, I thought, That's where it comes from. That's what keeps it alive.

I knew what kind of person she was. She was lost, neglectful; she was what would come to be called dysfunctional, and whichever of the kids were hers, you could tell she wasn't giving them order or safety, not often.

But here at this moment, she was being responsive to something — the presence of the enemy. And she was showing an emotion: hatred.

And I thought: Those kids banging the lids on the pavement, they are going to wind up like her, and for some utterly human reasons. To get her notice and approval. To ally themselves with her grievances — if they can't have access to any other part of her, at least they can have her resentment. To be part of her world, of any world.

Could anything possibly be cited that would demonstrate more clearly the effect of values taught in the home? How can we possibly combat such a growing evil as the destruction of the loving family?

One Heart at a Time

I have realized lately that King Benjamin had it absolutely right when he began his great sermon by appealing to the hearts of his hearers. Only by individually applying the saving and salving grace of the atonement to our lives, do we have a chance of becoming “beings of Light” in this life.

The world will not be changed by legislation. It will never be changed, even within the Church, from the outside in. It has to be changed one heart at a time through the atonement.

This sounds nice, but is it too abstract? Let us take it apart and examine it. The Lord explained it very simply in his Sermon at the Temple recorded in 3 Nephi. He said that he had fulfilled the law of Moses, and that now the sacrifice that was required of them was not a “blood sacrifice,” but something that was much harder. He wanted from them their very hearts.

He said in 3 Nephi 12:19, “I have given you the law and the commandments of my Father, that ye shall believe in me, and that ye shall repent of your sins, and come unto me with a broken heart and a contrite spirit.”

His hearers no longer had to look forward to His coming with sacrifices in his similitude; they had to become literally His. How do we become His? The Lord was very specific about that, as recorded in Matthew 22:37, “Thou shalt love the Lord they God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind.”

All. All is the operative word.

In his conference address, “The Atonement: All for All,” Elder Bruce C. Hafen explores the meaning of all with his customary eloquence:

If we must give all that we have, then our giving almost everything is not enough. If we almost keep the commandments, we almost receive the blessings ... Some people want to keep one hand on the wall of the temple while touch the world's “unclean things” with the other hand. We must put both hands on the temple and hold on for dear life. One hand is not even almost enough.

The rich young man had given almost everything. When the Savior told him he must sell all his possessions, that wasn't just a story about riches. We can have eternal life if we want it, but only if there is nothing else we want more.

So, our first step in becoming His is consecration. Every literal thing in our life must be in tune with His will. We must be willing to go down on our knees, and give up everything — our fears, our sins, our “little cottage in Babylon,” and “becometh as a child, submissive, meek, humble, patient, full of love, willing to submit to all things which the Lord seeth fit to inflict upon him, even as a child doth submit to his father.” (Mosiah 3:19).

In my life, there was a huge prerequisite I had to get past before I could offer this consecration — trust. Because of continual violations of my trust in my life, I had no experience with trusting unconditionally. I didn't think I could ever have the simple faith of a child.

Being a child had been very scary for me. I didn't want to give up my control. I didn't see that I really had no control. It was only when I was near to losing my life that I could be brought to the state of contrition necessary to open my wounded soul to God and say, “Take it. Do with it what you will. I am obviously not doing a good job.”

The reward I received for finally trusting my Heavenly Father with my life was a real life. Not mere coping and stumbling — but an outpouring of well-being and bounteous blessings comparable to Job's after his trials.

So what happens next, after we have established this wonderful two way trust — our offering of a broken heart and a contrite spirit? This vertical aspect of the atonement? Let's go back to Matthew and see what the Savior said next: “Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself.” (Matt. 22:39)

Becoming Beings of Light

If we have the vertical part down, this horizontal part comes easily. When we have been blessed by the saving balm of the Savior's love, when we have become intimately acquainted with Him, we want nothing more than for everyone we know to have that blessing. We can see that such a change of heart has blessed us so abundantly with peace is the only true balm that exists in the world today.

Then, returning to the Sermon at the temple, we hear him say “Verily, verily, I say unto you I give unto you to be the light of this people. A city that is set on a hill cannot be hid.

Behold, do men light a candle and put it under a bushel? Nay, but on a candlestick, and it giveth light to all that are in the house; therefore let your light so shine before this people, that they may see your good works and glorify your Father who is in heaven.”

This is how we become beings of light. This is how we pass on the blessings of the atonement of Jesus Christ to all the world, one heart at a time.

Following their conversion, Ammon and the sons of Mosiah were so “fired up” that they had a perfect vision of this. They knew the true answer to peace with the Lamanites was not war, but the saving truths of the atonement. As they embarked on their mission, the Lord said:

Go forth among the Lamanites, thy brethren, and establish my word; yet ye shall be patient in long-suffering and afflictions, that ye may show forth good examples unto them in me, and I will make an instrument of thee in my hands unto the salvation of many souls. (Alma 17:11)

As we can see from Peggy Noonan's sad observation, children know what is important to their parents, and they draw their identity and their security from that knowledge. Our children will not be strangers to Christ if we are not. Neither will our neighbors or our business associates.

As the world grows increasingly dark, we will not dwell in darkness, but in the warm, bright clasp of our Savior's arms.