Tis the Season

Hey kids!
Whew! It has been a long, wonderful, couple of days!
Aphrodite has certainly been keeping me on my toes, but she's just too much fun!

It is such an exciting time of year.
Sunday is Easter and the weekend after that is General Conference!
(The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints [aka the LDS Church] gathers twice a year to hear the prophet, apostles, and members of the quorum of the seventy speak for two days.)
I am really excited for General Conference!
AND we are quickly approaching the year anniversary of when I met Larry, and when we started dating!
The time really has flown by!

Anyway, I thought I would just share a few things that have been on my mind recently.
I know that there have been so many debates right now about so many controversial topics, but I don't care to address that at the moment. If you want to know what I believe, go to lds.org and find "The Family: A Proclamation to the World".
Or click here.

What I would, however, like to discuss are my feelings about Easter and the Savior.

I find it difficult to put into words what I feel about the sacrifice Jesus Christ made for us.
I'm a rather private and shy person, so I don't talk too much about things that are really important to me.
How that makes any sense, I'll never know...
I don't think this was always such a personal topic for me. I finally got just the beginning of the true meaning of the phrase "He died for me" through my thick skull about a year ago.
I always kinda thought, ok, Christ died for everyone in the entire world. Somehow, I had this picture in my head of Christ looking at all of us in the pre-earth life and saying, "Yes, they are worth it"
What I didn't get was that, it wasn't because there were so many of us who would need someone to pay the price.
No.
It was because each and every one of us, individually, were worth dying for.
It came into my mind like this:
"If you had been the only person to ever live, on this earth at this time or any other, the sacrifice would have been worth it."
And do you know why it was worth it?
Because Heavenly Father and Jesus Christ loved us so deeply.
Not just "us" but you and me, personally.
See, I believe that Heavenly Father has a plan for us. And the whole purpose of this life is for us to gain experience so that we can return to our Father in Heaven and live with him. But we have to be perfect in order to do that. We couldn't be perfect without a payment for our sins which disqualify us and make us unworthy to be in his presence. Without payment, we cannot enter Heavenly Father's kingdom. We couldn't do it ourselves. In the ultimate act of mercy, Jesus Christ stepped up and said
"Father, thy will be done, and the glory be thine forever." (Moses 4:2)
All so that we could have eternal life. So that we could live, forever, with our beloved Father in Heaven.

It all seems so simple laid out like that, but we seem to have a knack for complicating things down here. We blame things on ourselves, God, and each other when no blame is necessary. What does it matter if someone has wronged us? I'm sure we have all heard "Vengeance is mine, saith the Lord." which we take to mean, let it go and Heavenly Father will make sure vengeance is carried out for you.
But, if we are supposed to follow an example, the truest and greatest example of pure love ever given, why do we seek so passionately for the score to be settled? Christ lived a perfect life, and died for all of us who will fall so short of that bar because each and every single one of us was worth it. Not just the people who are kind and generous, but for those who are not. For those who are faltering, for those who take advantage of us, for those who are selfish and mean.
Think of it.
He died for them individually too.
If that person, sitting in a prison cell, had been the only human being on the planet, Christ still would have deemed the sacrifice worth it.
It's not like a game of duck, duck, goose. You're worth it, you're worth it, you're not worth it so the Atonement isn't for you, you're worth it, you're worth it...
NO!
So why do we treat people that way?
We are all guilty of it at some point or another.
It's not just certain people who believe one thing, or a group who believes something else.
At some point in our lives we all began searching for reasons to feel we were better than someone else.
That we are, somehow, worth more.
This idea that because we are smart, wealthy, poor, gay, straight, white, black, or purple somehow makes us better than anyone else is entirely false.
And it spreads into the silliest of things!
Try talking to someone about your wisdom tooth experience and how terrible it was. (Or you can look up Brian Regan and hear all about it) I can bet you they will come back with a worse story. We try to one-up each other. How silly is it?!
My point is, we are all loved so much by someone who matters more than the person with the worst wisdom tooth experience. But more than that, He loves them too. And that's what matters.
Why can't we treat each other that way?

To me, Easter isn't just about cute fuzzy rabbits and chocolate eggs (although those are excellent perks!), it's about the immense and incredible joy that can be ours because of one beautiful act of love and sacrifice.

Christ, who never wronged anyone, who loved without reserve, who forgave freely, who only wished to give us the greatest gift ever conceived of, suffered in Gethsemane and was killed so that we might live.
Why?
Because of love.
Innocent Christ gave his life willingly so that those who were not innocent might have joy.
That is what Easter is about.
Let's renew our commitment to follow that incredible example.





I hope we can all become a little better this Spring.
I love you all and I hope you have a beautiful Easter.

Less Than Three,
Sarah



(Picture on Pinterest here)