Spiritual Insights...and other stuff

Until I was eight or nine, the only thing I remember ever listening to on the radio was classical music or church songs, mostly the Mormon Tabernacle Choir. I was completely ignorant of the world of music outside of this narrow selection, and that ignorance made me judgmental. On one occasion that I remember particularly well, my parents were gone and had left us with my older cousin Serena, who is such an amazing person, by the way. Anyway, we were in the old ten-seater blue van and she did the unthinkable - she changed the radio station . I was appalled. To think, my own cousin would leave the safety and security of Handel and hymns to fling herself off the cliff of some devilish "pop" music! To make matters worse, she started moving to the groove  with a complicated combination of claps, snaps, knee taps and lap pats. I looked around me to see the reaction of my siblings, only to find that they were moving to the groove, too!!  So there I was, confronted with a real-life m

"Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called the children of God" (Matt 5:9)   I hope you enjoyed the video. True story, by the way. Sometimes I think I should be more like my second-grade self. Wasn't I such a doll? I was cute, too. See, I'll prove to you. Look here-- Check me ouuuuuut. That's me in the middle, in case you weren't sure. That's Josh on my right, the best Dragon Ball Z gamer in our grade, and Nate on my left, who was good friends with Sarek (the one who punched me in the face). Man, I look good. Even without my gorgeous curly locks that now flaunt my dome, I was quite a hunk, dontcha think? Sorry for getting distracted. (Come on, don't pretend you don't like mini-me.) Anyway, I was a cute, innocent little kid, right, and I had peace emblazoned on my soul. Fighting was a big NO-NO in my house growing up, so I assumed it was bad everywhere. My family read scriptures every morning, and Jesus said &q

If you're married, about to get married, or the thought of getting married has ever occurred to you, people will tell you things like, "Yo  home-dog, I'm just lettin you know, your baby gurl ain't always gonna take your side " or  "L isten sister, there will be times when you and your sweetie disagree, so beware" or " Now son, the occasion will arise from time to time when you two don't see eye-to-eye."   I don't know what it is, but  e veryone is obsessed with this idea. They can't let you go into marriage thinking you're never going to have conflict with your spouse--they couldn't live with themselves if they didn't warn you about it. Familylife.com  says, "There  is no way to avoid  conflict  in your  marriage." Wow. That's awesome. And motivating. There is no way; conflict is unavoidable. Without offering detailed examples, I would say that there probably  are  ways to reduce conflict, and we