"That we do ALWAYS remember ..." (what?)

Photo credit below

Most every Sunday, many of us say amen to words¹ we give little thought to during the following week; and after that amen, we partake of bread and water in remembrance and witness of those words—one of which is ALWAYS.² Yet, if we could count our thoughts even on the day of our witness, how would our remembrance be graphed?

Below, in the footnotes,³ is a small sampling of what has become, recognized in this age of digital devices, as the foremost observable obsession / addiction / attraction / distraction of perhaps any age of world history—the ubiquitous smartphone: that thing millions always remember; that millions nigh panic over if mis- or displaced; that thing that commands attention and remembrance.

So how do we always remember Him in the face of such unrelenting distraction? For starters we can acknowledge our failing—we can raise our consciousness to a new level of knowing how little we are aware of His presence (and His desire to be present) in the hours, minutes, seconds, and nanoseconds of our lives. In this world of overload, stress, distraction, enticement, addiction, disappointment, etc., etc., (weapons of Babylon), we can raise our sights to look for God everywhere in:

»  sunrises, sunsets, and stars
»  great rivers and small streams
»  flowers and trees; fishes and forests
»  birds and bees; babies and bladders
»  fingers and toes; eyes, ears, noses, and throats
»  shoulders and spines; elbows and knees
»  breasts, bile, and bowels
»  seeds, soil, sap, and saliva
»  language, laughter, and lymph nodes
»  dreams, decimals, and deliverance
»  electricity,⁴ eclipses, endurance, and electrons
»  parsley, paper, protons, and prayers
»  water, waves, wisdom, and wonders
»  mother earth and mother hens
»  songs, seasons, and  sabbaths
»  hugs, healing, and helping hands
»  repentance, refinement, and redemption
»  sabbaths, sufferings, and salvation
»  faith, hope, and charity
»  (to an infinity of observation)

Indeed (and thought), the places to find and remember Him are innumerable and endless. God can even be found and remembered (with consciousness) in the wonders of the smartphone, but He is far more than digital images, data, or devices.

Perhaps the best place to ALWAYS REMEMBER HIM is in gratitude—for every small (to large) favor, serendipity, protection, inspiration, gift, blessing, and help.

How many times, in a day, can we say: I thank Thee⁵ ... ?

In every thing give thanks: for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus concerning you.
(New Testament | 1 Thessalonians 5:18)

VERILY I say unto you my friends, fear not, let your hearts be comforted; yea, rejoice evermore, and in everything give thanks;
(Doctrine and Covenants | Section 98:1)

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1. Doctrine and Covenants | Section 20:77 ~ ... and witness unto thee, O God, the Eternal Father, that they are willing to take upon them the name of thy Son, and always remember him ... (See also, Book of Mormon | Moroni 4:3)
Doctrine and Covenants | Section 20:79 ~ ... that they may witness unto thee, O God, the Eternal Father, that they do always remember him, ... (See also, Book of Mormon | Moroni 5:2)
2. Always ~ adverb: 1) every time; on every occasion; without exception; 2) all the time; continuously; uninterrupted; 3) forever
3. A small sampling:
▪  Signs and Symptoms of Cell Phone Addiction ~
https://www.psychguides.com/guides/signs-and-symptoms-of-cell-phone-addiction/
▪  Understanding Cell Phone Addiction
https://www.psychalive.org/cell-phone-addiction/
▪  Phone Addiction Is Real -- And So Are Its Mental Health Risks ~
https://www.forbes.com/sites/alicegwalton/2017/12/11/phone-addiction-is-real-and-so-are-its-mental-health-risks/#12eabb7313df
▪  21 Signs You’re Way Too Addicted to Your Phone ~
https://www.rd.com/advice/relationships/cell-phone-addiction/
▪  Smartphone addiction could be changing your brain ~
https://www.cnn.com/2017/11/30/health/smartphone-addiction-study/index.html
▪  Your brain on digital technology ~
https://www.cbc.ca/radio/ideas/your-brain-on-digital-technology-1.4562541
▪  Addicted to your smartphone? How to start kicking the habit ~
https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/british-columbia/addicted-to-your-smartphone-how-to-start-kicking-the-habit-1.4483835
4. If you question electricity, check out The Electric Universe at https://www.thunderbolts.info/wp/daily-tpod/tpods-of-2019-archive/ ; https://www.thunderbolts.info/wp/ ; and https://www.electricuniverse.info/
5, Why I prefer “Thee” (being the intimate form and not, as some allege, a formal, respectful form); see http://dejavu-timestwo.blogspot.com/2010/12/language-of-prayer.html

Photo Credit: Photo by Sara Kurfeß on Unsplash

Prologue to Divorce

Interesting how information often comes in clusters. Ten days ago I posted “Sins & Secrets”¹ after encountering, without intention, several bits of information that moved my thoughts in that direction. In studying those bits of information, a pattern characteristic of marital infidelity revealed itself. Then yesterday, a more concise pattern was unexpectedly encountered in a memoir, entitled, Rescue the Captors: Written from within a Marxist guerrilla camp in Colombia, the true story of a kidnapped jungle pilot. The author, Russell M. Stendal, added several appendices to his memoir and in the fourth one entitled, “The Fatal Tailspin,” he wrote:²

Jesus describes three steps to the break-up of a personal relationship. First, anger is allowed to build in our mind against our brother (or [spouse]). Second, our bottled up angry thoughts spill out as words of insult to the other person’s intelligence. … Finally, the inner motives of the other person are questioned and condemned. This causes heart to heart communication with the other person to abruptly cease  (p. xxxviii, bold emphasis added).

If there is an unresolved, unreconciled problem in a home, similar to the one that Jesus has been describing here in Matt. 5: 27–30 and if we are on the outs with our spouse even temporarily, it opens us up to a very dangerous temptation. As we walk down the street, all the other members of the opposite sex that we see take on added attraction. The thought occurs to us: “Hey, why didn’t I marry one of these beautiful people instead of the ‘old grouch’ that I left back at home.” As the mental fantasies build in our mind, our eyes start roaming onto any opportune target that presents itself. Sooner or later chance presents us with the possibility of actually living out one of our fantasies. The transition from mental adultery to physical adultery is surprisingly smooth provided that the relationship with the original spouse remains interrupted  (p. xlii, bold emphasis added).

The point that I believe Jesus wants to make is that seemingly innocent little impure thoughts wreak tremendous havoc on our lives and cause us permanent loss. If we allow impure thoughts such as anger, malice, unforgiveness, or impure sexual fantasies a place in our minds, they are seeds that we will be unable to prevent from germinating and translating themselves into actions. If this happens we might bear the scars of our folly for all eternity  (p. xliii).

Divorces start out with little, seemingly insignificant details and fester until they are out of control. Even a minor little grudge, if nursed long enough, can develop into a full-fledged divorce. Once adultery has taken place, all it takes is one more minor spat with the spouse, and bags are packed, bridges are burned, and the family destroyed in favor of beginning marriage anew with the “someone else” who is available and waiting (p. xliii). God can forgive and restore us after a divorce, but something is irrevocably lost whenever a marriage is broken  (p. xliv).

In Jesus’ description of the vicious cycle of how personal relationships can be destroyed, starting with a buildup of anger and ending in a divorce, the place that he tells us to watch out for the Evil One is at the very end when the Enemy would like to help us rationalize our problem and pretend that it really wasn’t our fault. If at any stage during the breakup of a personal relationship, we are able to honestly face our share of the blame and come to God with the broken attitude of the “poor in spirit,” throwing ourselves upon his mercy, it is possible to break the vicious circle of evil feeding on itself and replace it with the positive, opposite, upward spiral of mercy and love described by Jesus in his beatitudes. Remember: Good can also feed on itself and get better and better the longer we spend planting seeds of mercy, forgiveness, love, and justice. In the Kingdom of God the sky is, literally, the limit. Unlike evil, which can only corrupt and destroy that which was once wholesome and pure, good is creative and knows no upper bounds. There is no upper limit to what God can do with a human life if we are willing to co-operate with him  (pp. xlv-xlvi, bold emphasis added).

Oh, that we could see the pattern at its beginning; that we could acknowledge faults within ourselves; that we knew and lived the Beatitudes; that we were always willing to co-operate with Him.

And how déjà vu this pattern when we begin to divorce ourselves from God.

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1. http://dejavu-timestwo.blogspot.ca/2015/11/sins-secrets.html
2. Stendal, Russell, Rescue the Captors: Written from within a Marxist guerrilla camp in Colombia, the true story of a kidnapped jungle pilot LIFE SENTENCE Publishing. Kindle Edition. (2011-04-21).
Additional Stendal quotes:
How can such “beautiful people” have such horrible divorces? How do personal relationships fall apart? Jesus says it all starts the minute we begin to harbor a grudge against someone else in our family  (p. xxxvii).
When our conscience begins to make us feel uneasy and insecure, due to a damaged personal relationship in our life, how easy it is to head for church to salve our conscience instead of swallowing our pride and going to see the person we have wronged. Jesus says that he doesn’t want to see us in church, or even receive an offering from us, until we have tried our best to reconcile any broken relationships with those around us. Even if the problem seems to be only 1% our fault and 99% the fault of the other party, we are still required to seek the other person out  (pp. xxxix-xli).
Most patients requiring psychiatric treatment have, at the root of their problem, an unreconciled hatred for someone, coupled with bitterness and unforgiveness  (pp. xli-xlii).

Sins & Secrets

If there was ever a pattern of recycling déjà vu it might be in all those cases of infidelity. We do not have to look far to see the repetitious pattern in the famous. Remember Paula Broadwell, Kobe Bryant, Bill Clinton, John Edwards, Newt Gingrich, Jennifer Lopez, David Petraeus, LeAnn Rimes, Meg Ryan, Mark Sanford, Arnold Schwarzenegger, Eliot Spitzer, Dominique Strauss-Kahn, Anthony Weiner, Tiger Woods, et al., al., al.

So what is the pattern? Does it manifest in the not-so-famous—the man or woman next door? Apparently—and by many reports¹—increasingly so. History is full of “infidels.” God’s recurring lament was that His covenant people had gone a whoring (His words) after other gods—had become covenant-breakers.

So here is a short checklist for marital infidels—for covenant-breakers with both God and spouse:

□  Have I checked values and principles at the door of “my feelings”?
□  Do I claim my infidelity is someone (everyone) else’s fault?
□  Have I become cold, angry, cruel or fake with my spouse?
□  Do I lie about or attempt to keep secret my comings and goings and whereabouts?
□  Am I paranoid about someone reading my texts or answering my phone?
□  Do I flare up at any suggestion or suspicion about my behavior?
□  Am I addicted to the drama (and the “fix”) of it all?
□  Do I acquiesce to uncomfortable things so my paramour won’t betray me?
□  Have I let my sins and secrets turn me into a sociopath?²
□  Is my whole life a lie?

If you haven't heretofore recognized the pattern, know this: others have. And know this: The perennial déjà vu is that every infidel will be exposed. If not in this life (though the odds may favor it), it will come at the Judgment when all former pleasures and passions will be as nothing to the pain and anguish of confronting one's own stupidity(?), duplicity(?), pride(?), narcissism(?), myopia(?).

Know this too. All those warning voices of “end-times”; of getting things right with God; of repenting before it is too late; of taking full responsibility for sins and clearing secrets—all these are not pie-in-the-sky. The time we have to get things right is unbelievably short.

Know also: No secret is safe with other sinners; and no secret is safe from omniscience.

For there is nothing covered, that shall not be revealed; neither hid, that shall not be known. Therefore whatsoever ye have spoken in darkness shall be heard in the light; and that which ye have spoken in the ear in closets shall be proclaimed upon the housetops. (New Testament | Luke 12:2-3)

For verily the voice of the Lord is unto all men, and there is none to escape; and there is no eye that shall not see, neither ear that shall not hear, neither heart that shall not be penetrated. And the rebellious shall be pierced with much sorrow; for their iniquities shall be spoken upon the housetops, and their secret acts shall be revealed. (Doctrine and Covenants | Section 1:2-3)

P.S. “Why is it, that when [we] can supposedly seduce any person in the world into liking [us], [we] still don't like [our]self?” (Quoted from D B.³)

BUT, above all, know this: There is help, healing, and forgiveness when we turn our life back to Him.

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1.  Listen, read, understand how tragic this all is:
◦   http://beyondaffairs.com/suspicion-confrontation/signs-of-infidelity/
◦   http://womensinfidelity.com/adultery_wife.html
◦   http://podcast.cbc.ca/mp3/podcasts/current_20151112_50275.mp3 - Neil Strauss rethinks his pickup artist past confessing 'The Truth' about relationships - Nov 12, 2015 (2/3)
◦   http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/toronto/ashley-madison-data-1.3196636
◦   http://podcast.cbc.ca/mp3/podcasts/spark_20151108_19183.mp3 - Spark #299: Spy-on-your-spouse apps, ...   (begin at minute 32:45)
◦   http://www.cbc.ca/news/technology/how-technology-is-lifting-the-covers-on-infidelity-1.1144992
◦   do a google or book search on infidelity, if you need additional witness beyond these articles, mp3s, and the AshleyMadison scandals.
2. http://dejavu-timestwo.blogspot.ca/search/label/Sociopath
3. Quote from D B post of October 13, 2015 from Customer Reviews for Strauss’s book The Truth: An Uncomfortable Book About Relationships at http://www.amazon.com/Truth-Uncomfortable-Book-About-Relationships-ebook/dp/B00ICN31SA/ref=sr_1_13?s=digital-text&ie=UTF8&qid=1447866175&sr=1-13&keywords=neil+strauss&pebp=1447866193036&perid=1J00DE8C9WJG7QYMAKN7