I've Been Absent

I know...I know...I've been gone for a while and I can't promise I'll be back too soon, but I want to try.  I want to write something that will keep my mind focused on what I should be focusing on, not where it seems to always be going.  That that it is a bad place, but just not good for my own self-thinking.  So here I am trying to get my thoughts down, again.........I'm sure there aren't very many people following me any more, so this will probably be just for me.  But that is just fine.

My mind has been very clouded the past few months because of my own doing.  Not blaming anyone for my own thoughts.  I just seem to not be thinking the right way right now.  Today in Sacrament meeting and Relief Society it kind of hit me hard because of two of the songs we sang.  I think I need to remember the words to the hymns and look up the scriptures associated with them.  Maybe that will get my mind where I should be.

Our opening songs was Truth Reflects Upon Our Senses.  Oh, boy, does it ever!  I've always thought this song had more of a lecture meaning than any other song in the hymn book, simply because it does!  The verses don't seem to go with the chorus because the chorus is just about our Savior guiding us to Him.  But, I suppose if we live the message of the verses, that is where we will more likely return. The verses tell us we should not judge others without being open to the same judgement ourselves.  We can't tell someone they need to change something, or pull the mote out of their eye, if we don't acknowledge the beam in our own eye.  No one is without some problems of our own.  We are told by the Savior that we should judge not, because it is high to be a judge.  If we want to be pure and holy we must love others, no matter what we may see in them.  I read through the two verses that we don't usually sing (I wonder why?)  The last few lines really made me think:

Now I'll take no further trouble;
Jesus' love is all my theme;
Little motes are but a bubble
When I think upon the beam.

I know the beam that is referred is the beam in our own eyes, not a glowing beam, but a larger hindrance than a mote in our friends eyes.  I always thought of the mote and beam as like a sliver and a big wooden beam.  The beam in my eyes makes it difficult to see the mote in my friend's eye.  But then I got thinking was there another meaning to the beam?  Could it be the beam that Jesus carried when He went to the hill and was died for me?  When I think upon that beam, I am reminded that He died to save me from the sins I have committed, sins like judging others. I have had trouble with this lately, and I need to look at myself and see what I can do to get that out of my eyes and look at others more clearly.

The other song we sang in Relief Society was Lord, I Would Follow Thee.  We only sang the second verse, but there it was again:

Who am I to judge another When I walk imperfectly?
In the quiet heart is hidden Sorrow that the eye can't see.
Who am I to judge another?  Lord, I would follow thee.

The last verse reminds us we should love everyone as Jesus loves us.  He will help us find the strength to do so, then we hear ourselves pleading to love our brother, promising the Savior we will follow him.  Oh, how I need to remember this, and apply it in my life every day.

I need to look past my own thoughts and feelings and just learn to love as He has loved me.  It doesn't do me any good to look at their faults because it makes mine all the more out there for others to see what I am doing wrong.  It makes me look like a smaller person when I can't follow the Savior's example and love.
I will be working on this.