A spot of beauty!

There are things that go on in a Ward that are behind the scenes.  Few know of the Church assistance, the service, rendered by a Ward Bishop.  Sometimes no one knows except for the Bishop and recipients.  A person's dignity is respected by confidences kept.  Assigned by the Bishop, I've been involved in some of these situations, with him or solo.  There is a common thread for each person.  There is always something that is indicative of past hopes. 

I have seen ramshackle places with struggling people barely hanging on but in the midst of this there is always, somewhere, a spot of past hope.  Usually neglected but still there.  I've seen it in an overgrown blooming rosebush in need of deadheading or weed infested unkempt perennials or several, long-ago planted spring bulbs, that have shared their brief beauty. A rickety splintery picnic table, under a tree, that supports a swaying faded wornout birdhouse.  Dibs and dabs of past hope peeking through the neglect. 

I think of a man's grey-white sparse hair carefully combed, Elvis duck-tail  style, t-shirt sleeves rolled up,  rolled cuff jeans, beat up old fancy car.  I mention Elvis and some songs that I know he, as I, must have danced to in our teens and he breaks out in a mostly toothless grin.  I think of the wild boys of the 50's that stuck their ciggies in that t-shirt cuff.  Here he is, an older version, of those boys. I think of his Mother, surely she had hopes and dreams for this now ravished looking man, and how she'd feel seeing her son, sitting here, in such desperate need of help. He sits with his arm around his ill wife and looks hopefully to the kind wise face of our young Bishop.  Little, do any of us know, his wife will soon die- further breaking his heart.  His roadmap-lined face, reflect his pain and suffering.  Consequences perhaps of choices he now regrets? 

The ashtray heaped. butts overflowing. beer can nestled in the mess.  a stench filled, overwhelming dirty room, that has no semblance of order.  yet still ....little touches of Victorian decor... a smoke-hazy window covered by a worn out ragtag lace curtain- it's days of use long gone...  and again I realize....at one point each of these people have all had dreams of beauty. Hope. Expectations. 

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At what point does a person start to realize, the dreams of their youth lie abandoned, somewhere behind them, and their life is now overbearingly hard and hopeless? 

At what point do I offer the balm of Gilead, without judgement, and help this person to stand up, square their shoulders and soak up the peace of the Gospel....soothing and smoothing and healing all the roughness, as that balm penetrates clear through to the broken heart.   Do I hesitate introducing or reminding them of the goodness, the kindness and the mercy of the Savior?  Do I speak hope to the hopeless?

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I observe their life happenings and check my attitude. Am I judgmental as the Book of Mormon says we are prone to be... "The man has brought upon himself his misery; therefore I will stay my hand, and will not give unto him of my food, nor impart unto him of my substance that he may not suffer, for his punishments are just--" do I make them suffer? do I "grind the faces of the poor", as Isaiah mentions, into the life they have created for themselves? Do I rub their faces in it?

United yellow-shirted Helping Hands will not be stepping in to help them.  They are not strangers, in some nearby community, distanced several miles from my house.  So ordinary, in fitting the classification of the welfare poor, they don't stand out as being any worse off than the others. Their common plight, will not cause our community churches to unite and rescue them. 

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Who are these folks?... faceless names, that perhaps I glance at, while hurriedly sliding my index finger down my Ward Directory of Members.  Scanning/darting eyes check the list, as I quickly look up a phone number/address, for a familiar faced name. 

All are potential Ensign stories in the making, of their potential individual rescues, by me, a potential good Samaritan.  Or sadder stories, felt and told by them, at some future time, of what might have been, had I reached out in my own limited way.

The saddest words ever penned

Are these four words...

What might have been?

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If not me?...who?

If not now?...when?

Do I miss the mark?.... Glancing the other way, when mucking out is more needed, than tidying up?  When digging out is needed- am I merely dusting?  Do I feed them a loaf of homemade bread and bypass the Bread of Life? 

Is it possible, that wee worn-out spot of beauty in their life, is a key to their potential?  A shriveled up dream? The heart the Lord looks to?


     At one time wasn't the Gospel beautiful to them?

We will always have the poor with us.

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Ye beat my people to pieces, and grind the faces of the poor, saith the Lord God of Hosts.   Isa 3:15   2 Nephi 13:15

The man has brought upon himself his misery.......Mosiah 4:16-27