A friend. A thought. An Answer.

I have a friend from Oregon, who is not the same religion as me. I love her and her husband. John and I have always thought of them as a super amazing couple. I was on her blog today, and at the top it said,

Be filled with wonder

Be touched with peace

BELIEVE in the MIRACLE

May the splendor of this season remind you of Him who is worthy of all our praise.

I have no idea what she specifically meant by it in her own blog...perhaps talking about how we get too caught up in Christmas, that we give more praise and honor to the things of the world than Him. I am only saying that is perhaps what it meant. To me, it took me back two years to when I was in the Relief Society Presidency in our Oregon ward. They brought out the new teaching manual for the next two years. It was teachings from the prophet Joseph Smith. I warned my teachers that I felt strongly that we needed to emphasize Christ, that we needed to make sure that we named him by name at least a few times through out the lesson. It wasn't so much that I didn't believe that Joseph Smith's teaching wouldn't talk of Christ, how could they not, when he is His chosen servant. It was that I worried visitors to our church, would come in, see the book, and believe what the world thinks about Mormons. That being, that we are not Christians that we worship a man named Joseph Smith.

It was kind of a needless worry, when like I said before, of course the prophet Joseph Smith would be teaching about Christ. He saw him in the flesh, he knew he was here to do Christ's work, and even though times were terribly hard for this man, He never denied what he knew. He knew that a restoration of Christ's church had to come forward...he couldn't deny it. In his words, "I have actually seen a vision; and who am I that I can withstand God, or why does the world think to make me deny what I have actually seen? For I had seen a vision; I knew it, and I knew that God knew it, and I could not deny it, neither dared I do it; at least I knew that by so doing I would offend God and come under condemnation."

I know that to people not of my faith, it may seem like we speak of Joseph Smith a lot. The way I look at it, it is partially because it is what makes us different from other Christians. I remember talking to a woman about the church and she said, "It sounds like you believe exactly what I believe." I then reminded her of the Book of Mormon and of living prophets. It does make us different and I believe we are supposed to be different.

I was looking at mormon.org a few weeks back and saw a clip of a woman speaking about how we honor Joseph Smith, it made a lot of sense to me. In essence, she says that we honor Joseph Smith like the early Christians honored Paul. Both were given the responsibility to carry on Christ's Church. Not in their way, but in His. They were men chosen by God and therefore we should reverence their names. You can see the clip here if you would like to.

I am grateful for my friend, who makes me think often about Christ. She is a great exampler of a follower of Christ. Always bearing witness of His divine mission here on earth. He is a WONDER. He is PEACE. He is a MIRACLE yesterday, today and forever. His hand is still in His work. He is still working many wonders, giving peace and performing miracles. I believe it with all my heart. He has not forgotten us, we are written on His heart.

Oh come let us adore and give praise to the One who deserves and is worthy of ALL of our praise.