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There was a time in my life when the responsibilities of
this world overwhelmed me and I no longer felt that I could stand and fight. My
oldest son was about 9, our family had just moved to Cheyenne WY, and a company
I was a partner in had close its doors leaving me with a 1/3rd share
of the company’s debt. During that time I went to the Lord and asked for help
with everything I had on my plate. I could not cover everything that needed to
be covered and despite all I could do I could see no way out. My mother had
always told me that ‘the Lord helps those that help themselves’, and that is
how I had always expected it to work. But this was different. I couldn’t plan,
think, talk or work my way out of this. No matter how you added it up I came up
short by a long way every time. Thus I could not “help myself” in my eyes. This
would require a miracle. My mother also had told me about turning things over
to the Lord. So I thought I’d give that a try. In my mind I couldn’t “really”
see how God who is over all things in the great expanse of time and matter had
time for me - but I went on anyway. I asked for Him to help me where I couldn’t
help myself. As time went by I saw that things would “fall into place” or just
plain happen that couldn’t be explained away. Time and time again it was an
irrefutable answer in a miraculous way to (what must have been to Him) my little insignificant problems and
little insignificant prayers. It was in fact a direct “miracle” answer to my
prayer. This blew me away!!! Who knew that Father would hear and answer my
prayers in such a direct and amazing way? Not amazing like flooding the earth,
but amazing like all I did was ask? And who am I that he should know me? Or
care enough about me to help me where I could not help myself? And to do it
with no fanfare, just simply be there for me, for us. I felt as though I was
humbled to the dust. Amazed that he would even know me… care for me… That he
would act for me… That he would save me.
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During this time of my life I was so grateful for all that
he had done for me that I would pray on my knees by our couch in the early
morning before anyone else was awake, before I would go to work. Sometimes I would
be carried away in my gratitude for so long I would be late for work. One
morning as the morning sun started to shine through the window and warm the
house, I knelt to pray. In my soul singing praises and glorifying my Father as
loudly (in my heart) as I could, it was as if the birds were chirping and the
earth was singing with me, I was completely enraptured in my thanksgiving when
a thought slammed into my head stopping my train of thoughts, forming words and
those words were rolling in my mind as a loud thunderous echo, “Talk is Cheap!” I heard these words over and over, that thought
stopped me mid sentence could not finish my prayer. It instantly burned in my
soul and impacted every part of me. I felt that I had been scolded or reprimanded.
I pushed up from the spot where I had been kneeling, and stood looking up. I
pointed my finger heavenward feeling insulted. I was embarrassed and angry and
said out loud with grit teeth “Are you saying that I? Me? Brent Case? is “All
talk”.” I guess looking back I half expected an answer right there. It dawned
on me that I already knew the answer. I had been called out. I lowered my
finger, slowly gathered my things, and went to work without another word.
This bothered me so badly I did not return to prayer for over
a week while I tried to figure this out. There was a kind of turmoil or
wrestling match in my head that just kept boiling, and I couldn’t find rest. I
would just review the still pounding impression “Talk is Cheap” over and over. At
first it made me mad, and then it made me sad. The kind of sad that’s like a
dark and rainy day, not a cold rain, just saturating wet and relentlessly
falling on you wherever you go. With all of my soul I really was thankful and I
wanted Him to not just know it, but to never doubt it. I was so sad that I
hadn't shown Him how thankful I was.
What dose “Talk is Cheap.”
mean? To me is means for example that anyone can say they are your friend but then
turn right around and stab you in the back. You can say you’re a good cook but
how does your food taste? I say I love you or respect you but how do I treat
you? Actions are an outward expression of our inner commitment to how we really
feel. Our true feelings are shown everyday by the way we act and they are
always stronger than any words that come out of our mouth. My wife says “When
someone shows you who they are, believe them.”
“Well” I’d tell myself “if talk is cheap he must want or
need something else from me. What could my Heavenly Father, the creator of “everything”
need from me? What can I, an Idaho farm boy, offer the God of everything?
Everything I am everything I have He has given me. I became painfully aware
that even the very breath I breathed was a gift from my loving Father.” It is
true; I cannot even draw my own breath unless he gives me the power to do so. I
would ask myself over and over, “Do I have anything He would want? Can I give
anything he needs?” My mind churned day and night and there was no rest from
these unyielding thoughts.
“What if I did something extra, like something really nice,
something I wouldn’t normally do?” Would that surprise him? Then would he see
that through my actions I am grateful? No! He knows I can’t surprise him. He
knows everything. Even if I did, he would just bless me even more and in my
head my ‘score card’ would show an
even bigger deficit with me falling further and further behind. Brent 1/ God
1000000 How can I catch up? Can I ever get ahead? If I could, then he would
know I was thankful.”
“It would have to be something he wouldn’t expect me to do.
Something I haven’t done before, like what?” I would think.
He knows me too well; he knows my thoughts before I even
think them. I’d guess I can never surprise him.
That was my idea you
see to surprise him with a gift of kindness or act of service to someone in
need. But then I realized “I can’t do something for him that he can’t already
do for himself.” So what then? What do you give to God? He has everything he
needs.
I erred in my thoughts you see. Everything I could think of
came from a place of pride within myself. I wanted to do… I wanted to fix it… I
wanted to tell him how I would do it. “I” “I” “I”
Finally beaten by my lack of understanding and creativity
and my inability to solve yet another problem on my own. The problem of how to
repay my Heavenly Father, who had done so much for me and me unable to offer
him anything in return. He had always come to my aide so readily, and so
willing to help me, support and love me.
I was beaten, completely aware of everything I was lacking, and
my inability to give back even the smallest token of thanks to the One I owed
so much to. I finally a week or so later returned to that same spot by the
couch in the early morning light to kneel in prayer, completely beaten and
embarrassed by the fact that I couldn’t come up with anything to give Him in
return. Now with tears in my eyes I begin my prayer. “Father I have nothing to
give. But I am so thankful for thee and all thou hast done. I have tried
to think of what I could give thee, or what I could do for thee and have again
fallen short, and I come before you completely lacking. If thou would ask for
something, I would give it.” I felt the warmth of his love start to fill me, like
a warm breeze down the back of my cold neck. The kind of breeze that warms you
up after standing out in the cold for so long. Slowly the thought filled my
mind “If you would just come
to my house to worship once a week, to be with me and my people, to learn of me
and learn of my gospel. Then I would know that you are thankful” I felt
his love for me filling me to full and then to overflowing, almost more than I
could bare, but only in a good way, like you couldn’t feel one more ounce of
love or you’d burst or like you have already burst and its ok.
(You see up till now I had stayed a comfortable distance
from church, only going about twice a month. That was enough for me to say I
was going but not enough to get and hold a calling or assignment or to feel
obligated to participate. I felt like
church was for hypocrites. You know sinners just like me but feeling like they
were better just because they would show up to church once a week and act like
they weren’t the same as me. You see in my mind I was different because I knew
I was a sinner and didn’t feel like I was trying to be anything I wasn’t. But
to me, “in my mind” somehow the way I did it and the way they did it was
different. I was real and they were somehow fake. So I told the Lord in my
prayer that I was sure He didn’t want me to go there and hang out with those
hypocrites. The feeling came again “If you would just come to my house to worship once a week, to be with
me and my people, to learn of me and learn of my gospel. Then I would know that
you are thankful” Well okay? If that’s what you want, then that’s what
I’ll give.
I committed that I would go every Sunday so that He would
know I was thankful, so every week in the beginning of the time following this.
I would walk up to the doors of the chapel, look heavenward and in my mind say
“do you see how thankful I am? I’m going to church. That is how thankful I am!”
He would always answer with a “Thank
you” and I would have a warm feeling. (I am always grateful for my Father’s love and patience with me as I
learn, even when I am prideful.) A funny thing happened as I went week
after week. I started to see my fellow worshipers in a different light. I saw
they really were for the most part just like me. Just people trying their
hardest to make it through life, falling often but willing to get up and try
again, very aware of their own shortcomings. As time went on I even like being
there, and loved to give service by participating in church duties. I like to
show up help and be a part of what was planned. I was learning that “when we
are in the service of our fellow men we are in the service of our God. And sure
enough, the more I did the more I was blessed. I learned if we are willing to
just “show up” Father is willing to use us. To serve in the church the main
requirement is just showing up, He will enable us to do the rest. I also
learned that one of the blessings that came from this experience was that from
time to time there would arise strife in the congregation or ward. This did not
seem to affect me; I didn’t care if someone was a trouble maker, a gossiper, a
back biter, a crook or just hard to get along with. That’s not why I was there,
I was there simply to tell my Father “thank you” and everything else became
irrelevant.
When we go to Father in prayer I have found out that it is
best not to go with a list of things we are willing to do for Him but rather to
go with a blank piece of paper and allow Him to fill it in. He has already told
us what he expects from us. Doctrine and Covenants 59: 8 Thou shalt offer a sacrifice unto the Lord thy God in
righteousness, even that of a broken heart and a contrite spirit.
After His Resurrection, Jesus Christ declared to the people in
the New World:
“Your sacrifices and your burnt offerings shall be done away,
for I will accept none of [them]. …
“And ye shall offer for a sacrifice unto me a broken heart and a
contrite spirit. And whoso cometh unto me with a broken heart … , him will I
baptize with fire and with the Holy Ghost” (3 Nephi
9:19–20). The Savior’s perfect submission to the Eternal Father is the
very essence of a broken heart and a contrite spirit. Christ’s example teaches
us that a broken heart is an eternal attribute of godliness. When our hearts
are broken, we are completely open to the Spirit of God and recognize our
dependence on Him for all that we have and all that we are. The sacrifice so
entailed is a sacrifice of pride in all its forms. Like malleable clay in the
hands of a skilled potter, the brokenhearted can be molded and shaped in the
hands of the Master.
