2024/15 PRETTY SURE

We have a practice in our church where one Sunday a month the congregation has a little open mic event. People can come up to the podium and speak their truth, or their desire for truth, or frankly whatever else they want because nobody knows what anybody else is going to say when they get up there. What is expected is that we witness to the power of our Savior’s atonement in our lives. I’ve been to six decades of these monthly meetings and they are surprisingly predictable and almost always heartwarming. They’re called Fast & Testimony Meetings. We attend them in the spirit of fasting, having abstained from a couple meals beforehand. Fasting is an interesting and potentially effective spiritual tool.

When I was young and got that electric feeling that I should get up and “bear my testimony”, which is LDS-speak for testifying that you believe in Jesus Christ and his restored gospel, I would stand and begin with “I know…”. I know this church is true. I know Joseph Smith was the vehicle used to restore a church as it was in the time of Christ. I know we have a living prophet. I know the Book of Mormon is a real and complete translation of scripture. Lots of I know’s.

Now that I’m on the threshold of old age I know better. 

And I know less.

Instead, you're more likely to hear me say I’m pretty sure.

Last time I remember standing at the open mic I frankly admitted I wasn’t sure of much. I have lost my absolutes. I’ve replaced them with hope.

If I die, though, and find out Jesus Christ is not the maker, director and redeemer of this world I'll be shocked.

For now I’m going to trust the “pretty sure” in my life. I mean, it would be reckless to run headstrong into “I don’t know and who cares?” The Devil himself could have a hey-day with me. I'm trying to remember to avoid the black-and-white and all-or-nothing. I'm learning to be tolerant of not knowing, to get comfortable with questions. At the same time I feel a need to nurture the purest places in my heart, to ask the cynic to leave and to use the spiritual tools that have indeed worked for me in the past. I try to blow gently on that little flame deep inside me. Gentle enough to keep the spark alive but not so hard it flutters and dies. 

If I'm wrong about all of it, I still think it sourced a pretty amazing life journey for me. 

Will my Lord understand if the road I took was a little more crooked than necessary? I guess I can't say for certain, cuz I'm not him... but I'm pretty sure he will.

Today is my friend Sally Jo's first birthday without her body.
I posted this photo and comment on her Facebook page