Charity Never Faileth

Today we had a fantastic lesson in Relief Society based on President Monson's talk Charity Never Faileth from the Relief Society General Broadcast last month.  Wendy, our RS president was supposed to teach today and I was excited because as long as we've been serving together, I've never made it to one of her lessons.  I think I jinxed it.  She got very sick last night and couldn't make it to church today.  At first, Chersten and I thought we might team teach but then it worked out better for her to do the whole lesson (whew!) but not before it got me to thinking.

So, in case you haven't read the talk yet, he talks a lot about not judging others, basically about being nice and loving one another.  I thought about times when I have felt judged, and then those times when I judged very, very poorly.  I thought about what judging does to me.  It either makes me prideful or depressed, and neither is a very good option for happiness!  In the Book of Mormon when things are going pretty good for the saints, it is most often a magnifying of their differences that leads to their eventual downfall.

Now I'm not saying we all need to be the same. How boring would that be!!!  But we need not take a negative look at our differences, but rather celebrate them!  I am so grateful for friends and family who have such a wide variety of personalities and talents!

One sister today raised her hand and said that she often holds herself back from doing something she really wants to do because she is so worried about how she will be judged, what people will think.  From the talk, President Monson says:

My dear sisters, each of you is unique. You are different from each other in many ways. There are those of you who are married. Some of you stay at home with your children, while others of you work outside your homes. Some of you are empty nesters. There are those of you who are married but do not have children. There are those who are divorced, those who are widowed. Many of you are single women. Some of you have college degrees; some of you do not. There are those who can afford the latest fashions and those who are lucky to have one appropriate Sunday outfit. Such differences are almost endless. Do these differences tempt us to judge one another? 

 It is a sad day when we don't trust each other enough to be who we want to be, to think that we have to conform to a specific mold in order to be allowed in the circles we want to be in.  It is not a pleasant feeling to feel judged.  I have felt this many times and have realized that some of what I thought was judging was, in fact, a misconception on my part.  I was too busy judging and analyzing everything and taking it the wrong way.  Other times it has been quite real...actual things said to my face about my clothing, my hair, my choice on dwellings, the amount of children we have, etc.  At those times I have to just keep reminding myself that no one knows the whole story.  And if I have to know that about myself, I have to know that I don't know anybody's whole story.  We just simply do not have enough time and energy to judge and be judges for imaginary and sometimes real differences.  What we need to do more of is LOVE.   From the same talk:

 Mother Teresa, a Catholic nun who worked among the poor in India most of her life, spoke this profound truth: “If you judge people, you have no time to love them.” The Savior has admonished, “This is my commandment, That ye love one another, as I have loved you.” I ask: can we love one another, as the Savior has commanded, if we judge each other?

Charity seriously NEVER FAILETH!  What if all week this week we put that to the test.  What would Jesus have me do?  What would the pure love of Christ do for this situation?

What a jumbled mess of thoughts!  But, it's what was rambling around in my head last night.  And as a footnote...I realized that sometimes what we might call comparing is just another name for judging.  Just one last random thought!