Birth

I found this old conference talk while doing some research on Mark 5 (and the story of the swine), and was quite touched with the message. However, since we’re expecting a couple of new grandsons within the next month, I think I’ll leave it in the drafts folder until I can add some pictures of current newborns. Welcome to earth, William and Austin!

I just came across this evidence of procrastination. Now William and Austin are ready to celebrate their first birthdays! And we’re studying the Book of Mormon and not the New Testament! However, I’m going to post this anyway, and not back date it. Along with reviewing this post, reading Elder Sill’s talk (link below) would be great preparation for Easter this year. 

Birth by Elder Stirling W. Sill

He reminded us of what a gift just being born is, and I’m grateful for that reminder. This talk could also go with John 3:3-5, because it talks about the importance of being reborn spiritually, and not just once, but over and over.

Elder Sill concludes with this glorious reminder that our purpose here on earth is to prepare ourselves to return home to God. Here’s a poem by John Gillespie Magee that he shared:

High Flight

Oh! I have slipped the surly bonds of earth
And danced the skies on laughter-silvered wings;
Sunward I’ve climbed, and joined the tumbling mirth
Of sun-split clouds—and done a hundred things
You have not dreamed of—wheeled and soared and swung
High in the sunlit silence, hov’ring there.
I’ve chased the shouting wind along, and flung
My eager craft through footless halls of air.
Up, up the long, delirious, burning blue
I’ve topped the wind-swept heights with easy grace
Where never lark, or even eagle flew—
And, while with silent lifting mind I’ve trod
The high untrespassed sanctity of space,
Put out my hand and touched the face of God.

 

“That is the purpose of our lives, that by keeping His commandments the offspring of God may become even as their eternal parents. The greatest good fortune of our lives, my brothers and sisters, is that we have been created in his image and have been endowed with a set of his attributes and potentialities. And if we live as we should, then on some future Easter morning, we may be born again into his presence to live with him in the celestial kingdom throughout eternity.”

I guess it’s an Easter talk as well. Happy Easter season!