Tag Archives: Adam and Eve

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Will Your Children Be Responsible Adults?

A basic law of physics states “for every action, there is an equal and opposite reaction.” If you push on a something, it will move, or push back. A ball will roll; a wall will push back and hold you up.

The same law applies to interpersonal actions. If you do something, there will always be a response, maybe not something you expected, but there will be a reaction. No action occurs in a vacuum.

When dealing with people, our actions can sometimes be misread, with others feeling everything from humor to anger. It would be easy to suggest that we have no responsibility for the  reactions of others to our actions, but this is not so.

If you smile, you will often receive a smile back, but not always. Sometimes the person you smile at will frown at you or growl. Usually, though, you can expect a smile.

If you hit someone, you can expect two or three things to happen. The person who was hit may cry or curse or be startled. He may fall or wobble. Most likely, he will hit you back.

From the beginning of time, Adam and Eve were given the right to make choices, to act as they chose. They were also held responsible. They chose to eat the forbidden fruit and were not allowed to continue to live in Eden. Their lives were changed for themselves and all their posterity.

It has continued to be the same since then. People make choices and must be responsible for the consequences of those actions. Focus on seeking wealth at the expense of family will distance them until the love and closeness is gone. A choice to be honest in your actions and pay your bills allows one to have good credit and trust from others.

Children must be taught responsibility for their behaviors. Children who do not receive this instruction become difficult to live with. They believe the world owes them a living. Nothing is their responsibility, the fault belongs to others.

Children have a right to learn to be decent adults. Though difficult, parents are expected to ensure their children have opportunities to learn responsibility. If they are not taught, society will suffer from more adults who blame others and expect special attention. For some it is too late. Some may learn. Please teach your children.

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Will Your Children Be Responsible Adults?

A basic law of physics states “for every action, there is an equal and opposite reaction.” If you push on a something, it will move, or push back. A ball will roll; a wall will push back and hold you up.

The same law applies to interpersonal actions. If you do something, there will always be a response, maybe not something you expected, but there will be a reaction. No action occurs in a vacuum.

When dealing with people, our actions can sometimes be misread, with others feeling everything from humor to anger. It would be easy to suggest that we have no responsibility for the  reactions of others to our actions, but this is not so.

If you smile, you will often receive a smile back, but not always. Sometimes the person you smile at will frown at you or growl. Usually, though, you can expect a smile.

If you hit someone, you can expect two or three things to happen. The person who was hit may cry or curse or be startled. He may fall or wobble. Most likely, he will hit you back.

From the beginning of time, Adam and Eve were given the right to make choices, to act as they chose. They were also held responsible. They chose to eat the forbidden fruit and were not allowed to continue to live in Eden. Their lives were changed for themselves and all their posterity.

It has continued to be the same since then. People make choices and must be responsible for the consequences of those actions. Focus on seeking wealth at the expense of family will distance them until the love and closeness is gone. A choice to be honest in your actions and pay your bills allows one to have good credit and trust from others.

Children must be taught responsibility for their behaviors. Children who do not receive this instruction become difficult to live with. They believe the world owes them a living. Nothing is their responsibility, the fault belongs to others.

Children have a right to learn to be decent adults. Though difficult, parents are expected to ensure their children have opportunities to learn responsibility. If they are not taught, society will suffer from more adults who blame others and expect special attention. For some it is too late. Some may learn. Please teach your children.

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Lifelong Learning

How Long Do You Want to Live?

Life extends easily into the eighth decade and it is not unusual to hear of one living past 100. Over our history, life expectancy has varied dramatically. In the recent history of the last two or three hundred year, men and women were lucky to live to be 50 or 60.

Women especially struggled to survive through the births of their many children, facing unsanitary conditions and the resulting infections and fevers. Men didn’t fare much better, facing hunting accidents and war injuries with less than sophisticated medical knowledge and technology.

Even in the last century, accidents were fatal. Stories of men or women burning to death from accidents resulting from kerosene lamps are not unusual, nor are stories of death and injury caused by other accidents.

The question is: how long do you really want to live?

In the far past, it was common for people to live much more than 100 years. Abraham lived 365 years; Methuselah was the longest lived man on record, living 969 years. Adam and Eve lived well into their ninth century. That is much longer than I want to live!

Our lives are easier than theirs; we have all the benefits of electricity and electronics. Easy travel and rapid communication join with near effortless work in the home, food production, and other occupations, especially in comparison to lives just a century ago.

Our lives are more difficult in some ways. Consider the intensity of the challenges of hate, immorality, and evil that inundate us. It is difficult to get through a day without facing scantily clad people caught up in fierce expressions of lust, unless you stay in bed with the television off. Violence, hatred, pornography, abuse, immorality, and many more symptoms of a failing society abound, throughout the world.

Ancient days were not much better. None of the modern conveniences were available. All the work we depend on electricity to do was done manually, often by servants or slaves. Cleanliness would have been difficult. Medical knowledge was adequate, but certainly unable for its practitioners to cure or prevent infections and diseases.

Worse, battles between men were hand-to-hand, face your enemy, and slash him to bits before being destroyed. Women whose husbands and sons went to war could only hope and pray theirs would be the lucky ones to return without injury, if they returned at all.

Women who lived in those early could expect to be attacked and raped without protection of husbands, fathers, or their hired guards. Most men in nearly all ages believed in their right to have sexual relations with about any woman, while holding their wives and daughters to a stricter standard of sexual purity.

Violence and evil of every kind surrounded these people—much like it does today.

Eve struggled in her time in learning to survive a new, uninhabited world. Everything was new requiring thought and effort to overcome the problems, often failing and needing to try many different solutions before finding one that worked. She, too, faced the grief too many of her children who listened and succumbed to the voice of evil.

No, living for multiple centuries is not enticing. Seventy or eighty years is more than enough for any of us!

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Deny the Lie of Abortion

One of the saddest things I read about is the increasing numbers of women, old and young, who accept the lie that abortion is easy. They are using it as a form of birth control. They believe no one is hurt by this process. Unfortunately, abortion isn’t easy, it isn’t birth control, and there is pain, lots of it.

How can it be considered easy to go to a clinic where abortions are performed? It seems easy to make an appointment, drive to the clinic, and follow through with the appointment. I’ve even seen women who make videos of their abortion, smiling and talking about how good it was. I don’t believe it.

I’ve had “D & C” surgeries after miscarriages. It took days for me to heal enough to resume my normal activities. My body hurt. An abortion would hurt at least as bad.

My heart and soul hurt, I was sad to the point of depression. The loss of a child in any situation causes grief, even an unwanted child. I cannot believe a woman would not feel sorrow and depression after giving up a child in that manner.

Even greater pain is felt by the child as it is torn from its mother.

The saddest thing for me is that women have bought into the idea that abortion is acceptable. All life matters. An unborn child is important, at any age. Does it not seem strange that more than 60% of abortions are performed on young, poor, minority girls and women? 30% of abortions occur in black women? Why would we want to lose so many of our children?

As I have been writing about Eve, it seems to me she would be heartbroken to know how many of her grandchildren are “destroying” their children, her grandchildren. Eve rejoiced at the births of her children. The loss of any child would be heart breaking. All children of all “races” are her children, and all children matter to her.

If you know someone who is considering an abortion, do one important thing first. Have an ultrasound; see your child before you destroy her. It will change your mind and save you and the child a lot of pain.

Abortion is not a good form of birth control. The best contraceptive is abstinence. No unwanted child is ever conceived without the act. Prevent the pains of to both child and mother by avoiding unwanted pregnancies.

Abortion is not the best form of birth control. It causes immense pain to the child and both physical and emotional pain to the mother. It is never easy. All lives matter; all children matter, born or unborn. Deny the lie.

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Lifelong Learning

Keep Your Brain Healthy

Regardless of our station in our life, each of us will find greater happiness if we continue to learn. Even people who no longer work for a paycheck or salary have a need to continue to learn.

Studies have shown that when you exercise your brain, diseases that destroy your ability to remember are less able to affect you. If you have a family history of Alzheimer’s or Dementia, or if you’ve been involved in an accident that damaged your brain, even if only slightly, you will want to do everything you can to protect your brain.

If you don’t learn something new, you have wasted your day. You have wasted an opportunity to grow and learn and you missed out on keeping your brain active and healthy.

So much of our lives are spent in competition, we begin to believe even developing our brains should be competitive. In some professions, competition is important, as car racing.

“Even if you cannot reach those who are ahead of you, one is bound to keep always learning, and especially acquire experience in racing and credibility.” –Aryton Senna

Racing to catch up with another car, or to catch up to the next guy, or even to learn something new can benefit you and your brain. A study I read several years ago studied nuns who worked to stay mentally active. They lived well into their 90s, mentally alert and active.

So, what do you do to maintain a healthy brain? Keep it active. Play games that stimulate it. Read. Learn something new. Complete a word puzzle. Put together a jigsaw puzzle. Solve logic puzzles. Write a book. Tell your children and grandchildren the story of your life.

I chose to write books. I hope to have my first book ready before the end of June, telling the story of Eve. She spent much of her life learning.

What are you doing to keep your brain active?

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Must We Use It?

What is with all the bad language and need for sex in everything we see and read lately?

Many of the books I read are very nice books, with good plots and great ideas, until the author decides the F-bomb is required. Authors and others seem to be unable to express emotion without using foul, disgusting language.

Everywhere you turn, in movies, advertisements, television and often stores, banks and shops bad language slips through. Sometimes it’s a word or two, others the air seems to be clouded with the blue of the language.

The F-bomb isn’t the only word that crops up to blue the air. The name of our Savior, in part and in its entirety, explodes from the mouths of babes. Words we considered merely dirty when I was a child are considered appropriate fillers flowing from children, teens and adults. Additionally, sacred names of Gods are reduced to common terms with no respect or honor noted.

I mentioned my concern to my teens a few years ago. They informed me the language heard in R- and X-rated movies was mild compared to what they heard every day in high school. Sadly, this has not improved. The atmosphere is worse in high schools, middle schools, and even elementary schools. During the years I taught it was a constant battle for me to keep the language in my kindergarten class appropriate. Five and six-year-old children spewed dreadful language they heard on television, the playground, and at home.

Many years ago we knew a Marine officer who told us of his command. Junior officers and senior enlisted were expected to control their language. He said intelligent people discipline their more effectively without the use of foul, disgusting, or unholy language. Certainly, if a Marine can do this, everyday people can manage to clean up theirs.

Add to the language that distorts and burns our ears, is the commonness of sexual innuendos. Advertisements of all kinds suggest their products will allow users will make them look, act, or feel sexier. Tight clothing, short skirts, plunging or open necklines are worn by many—anything to suggest an opportunity for the illicit.

There is a general loss of dignity and honor. Good and wholesome words are replaced with slang and filth at every level. Men and women dress themselves and their children as though they are objects to be toyed with rather than beautiful individuals with possibilities for success. Hope is lost. Bad has become good, good is evil. Even the language supports it. When things are wonderful, the word “bad” is spouted.

As I am writing of our first parents in Eve Remembers, I suspect they would be horrified by the use of inappropriate language and the blatant sexuality. In their home, it was not so. But, Adam was a prophet and a seer. He probably saw our day, and was saddened that so many of his children have turned from Father to the Destroyer.

What do you think? Are people around you lazy in their speech, unable to find better ways to express themselves? Or do they uplift the world about them with clean and wholesome words?

What about you authors? Do you litter your writing and foul the mouths of your characters with filth and f-bombs? Or do they find better ways to express themselves?

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Work Over Welfare

Most days a comment is found on social media suggesting the need for everyone to work to earn their keep. Frequently, a commenter will express a need to work in order to pay for others to live.

Since the last economic crash, many hard workers are left jobless. Employers don’t trust them to be the same honest employees they were before the crash and their subsequent loss of employment. After six months of unemployment, many human resource departments ignore these workers without serious contemplation. Regardless of past performance and education, loss of employment eliminates them from the viable job seeker pool.

Is it any wonder many of these previously successful men and women whose unemployment benefits are used depend on government food supplements, welfare, and medical support?

Many who are lucky enough to continue in employment since the last crash believe the crush of supporting the now unemployable is on their shoulders. And the burden is theirs, if they are part the shrinking middle class. Good people lost homes, families, and reputations because of factors beyond their control.

How will we overcome this debilitating circumstance?

It does not help to denigrate the jobless, though they may have lost all hope for positive position. Some lost all hope.

Greed and selfishness are rampant. Those without work, without hope, demand from those who are employed and filled with hope for success. “Surely the wealthy should give of their substance to the poor,” they cry. But, why would the wealthy or the middle class continue to seek success if all they do is pass that success off to the jobless? All that ever does is lead to a median level of poverty, and destroy the desire to achieve.

How is this to be solved?

Among the first commandments given to man was the command to work, to earn a living “by the sweat of the brow.” No longer could Adam and Eve pluck life from trees. They were required to learn, to experiment, and to work. It was not easy for them. Life is not easy for families. Men and women worked to develop the land, grow food, and domesticate animals.

In the past century we live an apparent life of ease. Electricity is our slave; machines do the heavy work once forced upon our ancestors. The individual energy expended to provide for a family is significantly less, but we are still commanded to work, to earn life “by the sweat of our brow.”

Is this the answer? Allow men and women the right to develop the dignity that comes from honest labor. Rather than give people money and things, give them the opportunity to work and rebuild confidence and lost reputations. Regardless of public opinion, people prefer to work, to provide for themselves and family.

I call on employers of big and small businesses to lift the ban on hiring those who lost jobs because of the economic slowdown, and have not worked for more than six months. Give people a chance to regain self-respect and dignity.

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Families, Traditions, and Choices

Parents have always wanted the best for their children. We want them to be beautiful, healthy, and prosperous. We’d like them to be more successful than us. Children want to be more prosperous than their parents. They desire greater success than their parents found. Sometimes it works, other times it doesn’t.

Throughout history parents have also been saddened when children have left the values held dear. Children become enthralled by foreign ideas, becoming lost to family ways of life and culture. A glance at the past century will illustrate the point.

Cities enticed young people away from the farms and mores of families from the country. A desire for easy living seduced them from the solid values parents believed in from their childhood. Later, things like cars, alcohol, and women beguiled children from standards parents felt were important.

Of course, parents do not begrudge a child’s success. Long ago, children were tied to the land, or required to continue the occupation of their fathers, regardless of the desires or talents of the young. These parents were cheered by any growth and improvement beyond their own. Great stories rarely come from a son continuing in his father’s livelihood. It is when the son or daughter break away and try new things that wonderful tales are shared.

Sometimes, the breaking away from childhood ethics and teachings cause parents great sorrow. The beliefs of a parent are deeply held, not given up because the world changes around them. Through time, a child leaving the religion of their parents has been a time of grief.

Eve felt heartache when her children chose to leave the faith she and Adam learned from their God in the Garden of Eden. Many children chose the darkness of the destroyer rather than the light of the gospel. Since then, this has been a source of sorrow for believing parents of all sects.

When I wrote Eve Remembers, I imagined the following conversation between Eve and her beloved Adam:

  “How did we lose them? We taught them.” I stood and began to pace.

“We taught them,” Adam said, his voice soothing. “Remember, they must have agency to choose, or we will be giving in to Lucifer’s plan. He wants us to force them to obey. We cannot. We must trust that they will return to the light.”

“I know.” I stopped pacing and stood in front of him, looking into his brilliant blue eyes. “I thought the sorrow of children would be in giving birth. Now I find that it comes as they make choices we would rather they would not. It is so much harder now, just watching, not able do anything.”

Today, parents continue to struggle with the sorrow of a child’s rejection of long held beliefs and traditions. Some manage to stay close, glad the child has found joy in the new found religion. Others become estranged, refusing to speak to each other.

Wouldn’t it be nice if we could find common ground, building trust and love amongst loved ones?

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Child Birth is “Worth It”

I shared a post on Facebook today, a picture with words describing a mother’s love for her child. The post shares the love we as mothers feel for our children long before they are born. It also suggests we may make mistakes, but we try our best, and will always love our children forever.

It’s true. We love our children long before we see them, often before we are aware of their movements. Even my unexpected child was loved long before he was big enough to let me know all was well inside. My affection and love for all of my children grew long before their births.

God told Mother Eve “I will greatly multiply thy sorrow and thy conception; in sorrow thou shalt bring forth children. . .”[1] Delivering children is difficult and painful for most women. We struggle through hours of pain as the child moves through the birth canal, finally pushing his head and shoulders out, both are much wider than the opening. Childbirth hurts–no argument from me.

Some women attempt to circumvent the pain with drugs that dampen or hide it. Others endure Caesarian Section deliveries, thinking unconsciousness will eliminate the pain. NOT. It does not work that way. I was surprised by the agony of the after pains brought on after mine. Our bodies must undergo the experience of birth.

Happily, the pain recedes, in our joy of having a little child to love and care for. Ask a new mother if she remembers the pain even a few days after the birth of her beloved child.

In a section of my book, Eve Remembers, Eve shares with her oldest daughter this idea.

“Mama, what is it really like to give birth? I was there when both Abigail and Abri were born. I heard your pains. But, what is child birth really like?”

“You heard me moan, even cry out in pain, for it is given to women, sorrow and pain in childbirth. I will not tell you child birth is easy, you have seen me. It is not, but, the joy after is greater than the pain. Because of the intense pain during the birth of a child, the joy of welcoming a new little life into this world is as exquisite as the pain. It makes pain worthwhile, different from other injuries. As I followed your growth, watched you become lovely young men and women, the pain becomes a nearly forgotten memory, I remember the pain for only a short time after the birth, then the joy of your lives takes over, wiping away the pain.”

“The pain is terrible, and still you can forget? I helped you with Abigail. Her birth was easier than Abri’s. Even then, you worked so hard to move her out of your body. How can you forget such pain?”

“The pain still lingers in my memory, but is swallowed up in the joy of holding her, nursing her, seeing her smile, watching you and your brothers and sisters meet and love her. All that erases the memory of the pain. If I had not forgotten, I would not have had you, or any of your other brothers or sisters after Absalom.” I smiled at her. “Great joy overcomes the pain and sorrow of birth.”

“I think I understand. Even when I know it will hurt to put my hand into the nettles to gather leaves for tea, like the one father gave you after you had Abigail, the pain is worth it to gather them. The value of the leaves is greater than the pain.”[2]

Moms, do you agree? Tell me about your deliveries. Were they forgotten? Did the joy of your little one overcome all the pain? Please share.

If you’d like to know when Eve Remembers will be coming out, feel free to share your name and address with me.

 

[1] KJB, Genesis 3:16

[2] Eve Remembers, Angelique Conger, p. 266

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A War on Families

A war on families attacks from all directions, among all peoples, and in all countries of the world.

This may seem to be a strong statement, but if you consider the attacks from all sides, you will see this is not overly strong. Families are divided from their support structures, losing basic definition, and children are being lost to the murder of abortion.

From the beginning, families consisted of father, mother, and children. Eve and Adam were the first parents who obeyed the command to multiply and replenish the earth. Life was not easy for these first parents, they continued as parents to the end of their long lives.

A mother and a father is required, can’t exist without them. Even though this is truth, and cannot be denied or changed, people are trying to change the composition and structure of families.

Families always have been a father, mother, and children. There are times when this changed, when dad is lost to a battle, or mom is lost in childbirth or other illness. In the centuries before the middle of the 20th, families most often included grandparents, uncles, aunts, and cousins. Industrialization encouraged families in search of employment to separate from the strength and support of extended family. Children became dependent on a parent or neighbors in times of challenge or trouble. No longer were families able to depend on the love and help of nearby extended families when children needed extra attention.

The division of the nuclear family from extended support of grandparents and others leaves many without help in times of economic difficulty. If the challenge is as simple as needing a ride to work or someone to watch the children while parents work, young parents who left the extended family behind find little help, unless kind neighbors step in to help.

Divorce is not a new state in our world, the Savior mentions it in the New Testament, but this sad state of affairs is more common than strong, stable marriages. Couples who are faithful to their spouse and maintain a loyalty to family more than a few years seem to be rare. Even in religious congregations with tenets stressing strong families and stable marriages, divorce is rampant.

Divorce divides families in ugly ways. Children are torn, living for a time with mom, and then must leave to live with dad. At best, parents live close, and are thoughtful of their children, raising them with similar attitudes, in one school, visiting the other parent frequently. In a worst case scenario, parents live long distances away, fighting battles through the children, tearing all kindness and love for the other parent from the hearts of the children. Many variations on these themes litter the relationships of previous families, but in every one a child is deprived of the full love and attention of a parent, often deprived of social and economic stability.

In the past half century, families degenerated to the point that couples “try things out”, bounce from one partner to another, sleeping around, having a one night stand, or forming “relationships” rather than marriage. Children become the “results of a relationship” rather than beloved children brought into a family, wanted by both parents. Often, mothers with multiple children, borne from multiple fathers, find none take responsibility to stay to teach and love their offspring. The once unheard prospect of single mothers and fathers is apparent, sharing children—or not.

Today, men and women living “divergent” lifestyles, claiming to love another of the same sex as husband and wife, are attempting to force a change in the very nature and definition of family, demanding place in the structure. Living together as “couples” is one thing, but the insistence of the appellation of family enforces the contention of families under attack. How can same sex couples possible increase, multiply and replenish the earth, as commanded in Genesis? It is impossible! Children require a father and a mother, not two fathers, not two mothers. Yes, they use means of artificial impregnation, and they can adopt. But to produce children, a mother and a father are required. Other means are biologically impossible in any other situation. Plain and simple.

The vilest attack on families comes in the guise of “liberation” and “choice”. Women are honored by the press when they commit murder of an unborn child. Liberation and choice ended when the woman made the choice of unprotected sex. Abortion is a kind euphemism for an ugly act. Once a child is conceived, the time choice is passed a human exists, and destruction of the child at any stage is murder. Women sometimes lose the opportunity of choice for other children after abortion. Not something to cheer about, unless the hidden agenda is no family, no children.

The attack on families comes from all directions. Families lose cohesion and support brought from living near extended loved ones. Divorce and shacking up force children into single parent homes, with all the attendant challenges. Men and women of the same sex are determined to marry and maintain “families”, though physically impossible for the couple to conceive children. Murder of the unborn called abortion spreads across all peoples in an attempt to “get rid of an unwanted problem”. No people, no nation is exempt. This is worldwide.

Certainly, these are not the only projectiles hurled in an attempt to destroy the family. These are the worst, and the most visible. We cannot solve all these problems. We cannot force others to change. We can stand firm for the family, avoiding the sorrows of broken homes and single parents with all the efforts of our being. We can refuse to abort children, give them to adoption if unable to personally care for them. We can stand with our spouse, determined to continue together, regardless of the struggles. We can stay in touch with children who moved to distant places, and parents, brothers, and sisters from whom we departed. We can reunite in love with grandparents, uncles, aunts, cousins and grandchildren whenever possible.

Fight back. Save the family. Stand together as families supporting families.

 

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