Life Rock Five! My Neighbor

Hearken unto me, ye that follow after righteousness, . . . look unto the rock whence ye are hewn, and to the hole of the pit whence ye are digged.
—Isaiah 51:1

Who needs my help?

So far, we’ve talked about four different “Life Rocks.” Life Rock One: We know who God is, and we know who we are. Life Rock Two: We know whose we are because Jesus bought us with His blood. Life Rock Three: We know what we believe. Life Rock Four: We know where we should go. These Life Rocks deal mostly with ourselves, with what’s in our minds and hearts. But we are not alone, we are surrounded by Heavenly Father’s children, and He loves them, too. What is our duty to them? That’s Life Rock Five: Love your neighbor.

If you’ve ever flown on an airliner, you are familiar with the safety briefing given by the flight attendants. They always say something like, “In the unlikely event of a loss of cabin pressure, an oxygen mask will fall from the ceiling.” Then they follow with some instructions that might sound a little selfish at first: “If you are traveling with a child or someone who requires assistance, secure your own mask first before assisting the other person.” That’s not selfish—that’s just reality. You can’t help someone else, no matter how much you care about them, if you’re unconscious.

The same idea is true spiritually. Your own spiritual well-being should be your first priority. When we’ve got that figured out, however, we can forget ourselves and turn to help others. Jesus expressed a similar idea in these words: “When thou art converted, strengthen thy brethren” (Luke 22:32).

Your Life Review

Sometimes we don’t reflect on the fact that we are writing our life’s history every day, and that our history is being recorded. This point was powerfully reinforced in a presentation by Brother Brent L. Top called “What’s On the Other Side?” He talked about people who have died on the operating table, or in an accident of some kind, but who were revived and brought back to life. Amazing things happened to these people while they were “dead.” Brother Top explored these near-death experiences in the context of our knowledge of the spirit world from the scriptures and the prophets, and the discussion was absolutely fascinating. Many of the people who “die” and come back experience a “life review,” which is a complete reliving of everything they’ve ever done in their life, and it all happens in an instant.

For some people, this life review is beautiful, and for others, it’s excruciating. One man expressed:

For me, it was a total reliving of every thought I had ever thought, every word I had ever spoken, and every deed I had ever done; plus, the effect of each thought, word and deed on everyone and anyone who had ever come within my environment or sphere of influence, whether I knew them or not. . . . No detail was left out. No slip of the tongue or slur was missed. No mistake or accident went unaccounted for. If there is such a thing as hell, as far as I am concerned, this was hell. (Kenneth Ring and Evelyn Elsaesser Valarino, Lessons from the Light, 160; emphasis in original)

It’s interesting to me that the scriptures also speak of a “life review,” or of the fact that everything we do is somehow recorded. Jesus taught, “Every idle word that men shall speak, they shall give account thereof in the day of judgment” (Matthew 12:36). Amulek testified that “we shall be brought to stand before God, knowing even as we know now, and have a bright recollection of all our guilt” (Alma 11:43).

One of the most powerful and most common effects in the experience of those who die and come back is a readjustment of their priorities. They become much less materialistic and much more loving and caring toward others. Hopefully, we don’t have to go through a near-death experience to realize what we’ve been taught a million times through the scriptures and the prophets: Love your neighbor! Help one another! You’ve heard this little saying a million times, too, but it’s really true: It’s nice to be important, but it’s more important to be nice.

If we really know what we say we know, and if our lives are really built upon these powerful Life Rocks, we ought to be the happiest and the nicest people in the world!

I have wept in the night
For the shortness of sight
That to somebody’s need made me blind;
But I never have yet
Felt a tinge of regret
For being a little too kind.
(Author unknown)

The Great Commandment

I’ve heard there are 613 commandments in the Old Testament, and the rabbis in Jesus’ day would often debate about which were the most important. When the opportunity to ask Jesus this question came along, they took it: “Master, which is the great commandment in the law?” (“The law” refers to the first five books of the Old Testament.) Jesus answered, “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind. This is the first and great commandment. And the second is like unto it, Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself. On these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets” (Matthew 22:36–40).

You might have noticed that the two most important commandments both begin with the same profound phrase: “Thou shalt love . . .” Most of us have very little problem with loving God. In fact, it’s possible to become so devoted to God that we can neglect our neighbors. We might wish to escape from the world, build a retreat in the mountains, and pray and read and meditate all day with no contact from the outside world. But Jesus has commanded us to love our neighbors, and we can’t love them if we’ve run away from them. Jesus prayed for His disciples, “I pray not that thou shouldest take them out of the world, but that thou shouldest keep them from the evil” (John 17:15).

I’ve met teenagers who are the only members of the Church in their schools. Oh, how I admire them! They know their beliefs are on display every day, and the entire student body’s impression about what Mormons are all about comes from them personally. What a burden they must feel! But what an opportunity to let their light shine, so that others will see their good works and glorify their Father in Heaven (see Matthew 5:16). If this is your situation, if you happen to be the only member or one of a handful of members in your school, oh, how the Lord must love you! I’ll bet you’re surrounded by angels every day to buoy you up! You can do it, and the rest of us admire you and support you. You never know how far your example will go, or what effect it might have, even years down the road. So be not weary in well-doing! Thanks for representing all of us to your school. Your very presence and your good example can be an expression of love for your neighbor.

Midas Touch or Master’s Touch?

Perhaps you’ve heard the story of King Midas, who wished that everything he touched would be turned to gold. His wish was granted, and he was thrilled and amazed when he touched rocks and sticks and they became gold treasures. Today, we refer to a person who is successful at nearly everything he or she tries as one who has the “Midas touch.” However, we mustn’t forget the rest of the story. King Midas ordered a huge banquet, but as soon as he touched his food, it turned to gold. He suddenly found he couldn’t eat. (Gold bricks are nice to have, but for dinner, I prefer mashed potatoes and gravy.) Then it got worse—he touched his own daughter, and she turned into a statue. Suddenly, he hated the gift he thought he wanted so much.

“And make my fries golden brown...”

Rather than the Midas touch, what we should wish for is the Master’s touch. Perhaps we could try to see every person as the Lord sees them, to love them with the pure love of Christ. Perhaps we could remember that Jesus gave us an incredibly simple rule to follow, which we often refer to as “golden”: “Therefore all things whatsoever ye would that men should do to you, do ye even so to them” (Matthew 7:12).

The phrase “pure love of Christ” was confusing to me as a teenager. Does it mean Christ’s love for me, as in, “I am loved with the pure love of Christ,” or is it my love for Him, as in, “I feel the pure love of Christ in my heart”? Or is it a quality of love, as in, “We should love our neighbors with the pure love of Christ”? The answer is yes—to all three. Elder C. Max Caldwell cleared it up for me when he taught:

I considered what was meant by the phrase “love of Christ.” That answer is critical because “the Lord God hath given a commandment that all men should have charity, which charity is love.” (2 Ne. 26:30.) If we must have charity, then we must know what it is. The phrase “love of Christ” might have meaning in three dimensions: 1. Love for Christ 2. Love from Christ 3. Love like Christ. (“Love of Christ,” 29)

You could go off to school every morning with the goal that someone would feel the pure love of Christ coming from you. Now, I wouldn’t walk up to someone and use those exact words, necessarily, but you have the power to make someone’s day if you really want to. You could even express Christ’s love for all people in secret.

My thirteen-year-old daughter, all on her own, tried something like this at her school. She composed little anonymous notes and started leaving them in the desks and lockers of her classmates. She wrote them on the computer so that no one could detect her handwriting. They were always very kind notes, complimenting a certain trait or a remembering a nice thing the person had done. It created quite a buzz at her school; no one knew who was leaving the notes, but, every day, someone would get one. Her entire class became a little kinder and a little more considerate of each other. My daughter used the Master’s touch at her school.

Watch these amazing young men “love their neighbors” right into the Church:

Inviting All to Come unto Christ

You could try the same thing at your ward or branch. You could make it a personal mission: “Whoever comes into contact with me today will feel better about themselves because we talked.” Just watch what it does to your spirits! Watch what it does for theirs! Notice the smile that comes across your face as your head hits the pillow at the end of the day when you know deep inside, Someone had a better day today because of me. Loving your neighbor can be as simple as leaving a note.

Get Up and Go

If you ever have a day when you’re feeling a bit down, listen to this advice from Elder Marion D. Hanks:

At the moment of depression, if you will follow a simple program, you will get out of it. Get on your knees and get the help of God; then get up and go find somebody who needs something that you can help them find. Then it will be a good day. (“Make It a Good Day,” 7)

I love all the “g” words in that paragraph: Get God, then get up and go! Jesus taught His disciples to “love one another,” and then He added a stunning phrase: “By this shall all men know that ye are my disciples, if ye have love one to another” (John 13:34–35).

Did you catch that? How will all men know? Notice what Jesus said, but also notice what He did not say: He did not say that we will know a disciple by how many books he has read, or by how many scriptures he has memorized, or by his white shirt and tie. Personally, I love to read books and memorize scriptures, and every Sunday you’ll find me in a white shirt and tie. But that does not make me a disciple of Christ. To know if I’m really a disciple, you’ll have to see if I have love for my neighbors. That is how Jesus said we can identify His disciples. Loving others is what we want to be found doing, and that is Life Rock Five.

Life Rock Five

When I am converted, I must strengthen others.

The most important commandments begin, “Thou shalt love.”

I can share the pure love of Christ.