Witnessing of God

Posted by Emily M. | July 19, 2010 | 23 Comments

As a teenager I recited the Young Women theme every week in church. “We are daughters of our Heavenly Father who loves us, and we love Him. We will stand as witnesses of God at all times, and in all things, and in all places…” I thought that the phrase, “stand as witnesses of God,” roughly translated to “I will be modest and not swear or watch bad movies, and if someone around me is doing something bad, I will show them by my example that they are choosing badly, and they will therefore be inspired to repent, or at the very least respect me for having integrity.” I took the phrase in isolation, “stand as witnesses of God,” without really thinking about who God is or what He wants me to witness of.

I don’t fault my teenage self for my interpretation, but I think there is much more depth to standing as a witness than I realized. Context is everything:

Mosiah 18: 8-9, Alma the Elder preparing people for baptism at the Waters of Mormon:

[A]nd now, as ye are desirous to come into the fold of God, and to be called his people, and are willing to bear one another’s burdens, that they may be light;
9 Yea, and are willing to mourn with those that mourn; yea, and comfort those that stand in need of comfort, and to stand as witnesses of God at all times and in all things, and in all places that ye may be in, even until death, that ye may be redeemed of God, and be numbered with those of the first resurrection, that ye may have eternal life—

The phrase “stand as witnesses of God” is the culmination of a logical progression of thought, not an isolated phrase. First we bear one another’s burdens, we mourn with those that mourn, we comfort those that stand in need of comfort, and by so doing we stand as witnesses of God. Not in the way I thought of as a teenager, witnesses of good standards (with a touch of moral superiority in there too, I confess), but in the same way Christ witnesses to us of His love: with His stripes, we are healed. When someone enters into their own place of grief to mourn with us, that act of shared mourning witnesses of God’s love, and heals.

I learned this recently during the aftermath of my miscarriage, when I was overwhelmed by the many people who shared my grief, who witnessed of God’s love to me. I felt a deep determination that I would be like them, that I would be that kind of witness. I am still trying to figure out how. I do all right if my house is clean (is that silly?) but the more cluttered my life is, the less I’m able to step outside of it and find ways to mourn, to comfort, to witness of God. I’m slowly figuring it out, though, reminding myself that “at all times, and in all things, and in all places,” in addition to looking outside my home, also means “be a witness of God’s love to your kids around dinnertime when everyone is cranky, at bedtime when they don’t want to get ready, when you’re trying to leave for church and someone can’t find their shoes.”

I want my children to keep the commandments, from the deeper empowering covenants we make, to all the rules I intended to witness of as a teenager. But I believe that the best way to be a witness of the beauty of God’s laws is to also witness of His deep, abiding, eternal love.

Who has been a witness of God’s love for you? And what did you think “stand as witnesses of God” meant when you were a teenager? How did you apply that then, and how do you apply it now?

Comments

23 Responses to “Witnessing of God”

Angie f
July 19th, 2010 @ 9:07 am

Because I grew up where there weren’t too many members, standing as a witness of God for me as a teenager could be tied up in the Pres. Monson quoted phrase “live so that those who don’t know Christ will want to know Him because they know you.” (or something to that effect). That idea has changed most for me as I have grown because my teen life was burdened more with melodrama than with much actual sorrow.

As an I adult I have marveled at the woman who, though struggling with her non-verbal autistic granddaughter each Sunday, still asks if she can come clean my house after we’ve all been sick because she so desperately wants to show her love for the bishop and his family. I have marveled at how holding a hand really can hold up a heart, how total strangers serving ham and funeral potatoes at my grandparents’ funerals really did make me feel loved. I have wondered at how a primary teacher who really loves my difficult son makes me feel loved. I feel a lot of wonder these days.

My most personal experiences with standing seem always to come when my life is as messy as can be, but I can still hold someone’s hand or take someone’s children for a while. This is not because I’m all that good at grace in chaos, but because it is when these experiences happen that I realize how even these tender acts of standing and sharing and loving require more than I have and I am most truly allowing the Lord’s love to pass through me.
Angela
July 19th, 2010 @ 9:25 am

This is beautiful, Emily. I remember the visual I had of what it mean to “stand as a witness of God” when I was young: something akin to a girl standing alone on the top of a hill for everyone to see or (worse?) look up to. But your post has crystalized for me the way it actually should be visualized: of a person in the midst, surrounded by other people whom she’s serving or loving and who are serving and loving her. A person who’s so busy serving and being encompassed about by others that it would be difficult for anyone to pick her out of the crowd.
Rose
July 19th, 2010 @ 10:40 am

I always thought it meant to spread the gospel. To be a witness that the LDS church is true without being a jerk about it.
Janet
July 19th, 2010 @ 11:46 am

What a beautiful thought and post. Thanks for sharing!
Natalie
July 19th, 2010 @ 11:53 am

These thoughts are beautiful. I love the concept. I wish we didn’t recite the YW theme like robots… I dream of planning an activity where we can discect it to make it mean just a little bit more than it does.
Jill Shelley
July 19th, 2010 @ 12:47 pm

“be a witness of God’s love to your kids around dinnertime when everyone is cranky, at bedtime when they don’t want to get ready, when you’re trying to leave for church and someone can’t find their shoes.”

You said it best right there!
Claudia
July 19th, 2010 @ 1:32 pm

Well stated. I remember hearing my dad talk about seeing walking by his mother’s room and see her kneeling in payer at the beginning of the day. He had no doubt that she had a testimony and that she loved God. She witnessed to him in that way.

Some time ago after I had been briefly hospitalized with a bleeding ulcer I was amazed at the love and kindness that was poured out and the comfort the ward was to me at that time. I didn’t have to call any body. They just came. It has happened time and time again whenever my need was most great.
Jen
July 19th, 2010 @ 3:49 pm

I really enjoy it when I can tell that someone has focused on having the spirit in preparation for a sacrament talk. Maybe I just have a dry ward, but those moments when I can feel the spirit witness are so valuable to me.

I also like the mention of love as a witness. I remember the stunning realization as a teenager that when He says “love your neighbor,” that includes all of the “neighbors” who live in the other bedrooms in my house. It was easy then to treat friends better than family. Sometimes it still is.
Emily M.
July 19th, 2010 @ 4:42 pm

Thanks so much, everyone, for your comments.

Angie, I just love your last paragraph, so I’m quoting it again:

My most personal experiences with standing seem always to come when my life is as messy as can be, but I can still hold someone’s hand or take someone’s children for a while. This is not because I’m all that good at grace in chaos, but because it is when these experiences happen that I realize how even these tender acts of standing and sharing and loving require more than I have and I am most truly allowing the Lord’s love to pass through me.

That is perfect.

Angela, that’s how I thought of it too. And I’ve been rethinking my post today: it could be a good thing for teens in need of acceptance to value standing alone. I think there’s a reason witnessing can be portrayed that way. But the best kind of witnessing is what you have described, going about doing good.

Claudia, that reminds me of stories about my grandma. My dad and his siblings always saw her praying for them.

Jen, that was a stunning realization for me too, that “stand as witnesses of God at all times” applies to my relationship with my family more than anything else.
Deja
July 20th, 2010 @ 10:17 am

I’ve been thinking about this today, almost exactly this: how wrong I got it as a teenager, how I’m just barely figuring out what faith/atonement/service means, what it means to have a real relationship with God.

I’m also wondering: Is there any way for that not to happen? A way to teach my kids (who don’t exist yet…) how to really apply these doctrines? Or is this just what it means to be a teenager?
Emily M.
July 20th, 2010 @ 12:06 pm

Dang, I thought I did the HTML right to make Angie’s quote appear in block letters, but I didn’t. Imagine quotes around the second paragraph of my comment there.

Deja, since posting yesterday I have also wondered how you would teach this to teenagers. It seems like there’s a big emphasis on choosing the right in the face of peer pressure, which does lead to the model of witnessing as a lonely event. I was so completely self-centered as a teenager that I don’t know if I could have understood witnessing in this way, although it would have been good for me if I did. I’ve never worked with the Young Women, so I am not sure how I would approach it.
Angie f
July 20th, 2010 @ 12:46 pm

I think childhood and teenagehood are pretty self-centered states of being–developmentally that’s how our brains work. The idea of community has to come after we learn to see outside ourselves a bit. So, I think it’s right and appropriate that when we’re so naturally focused inward that we learn to stand alone and that as we as parents and leaders slowly teach our children to see outside themselves we can add to the idea of solitary witnessing the idea that we stand together, we hold hands, we hug, no girl need be an island.

My oldest is on the cusp of YWhood (11 1/2) so I will soon see how well my ideas will work. She’s still having a pretty difficult time seeing beyond her own nose
Sue
July 20th, 2010 @ 1:45 pm

You make an insightful distinction here.

Initially, I interpreted the phrase much as you did, and I wasn’t even a teenager when I first heard it. But it was inspiration received while reading the entire scripture in context, later, that helped me realize the full meaning.

I am still in the process of trying to put it into action. Thanks for reminding me!

=)
Michelle
July 20th, 2010 @ 11:51 pm

I see standing as a witness as being both about our standards and about our love and service. I feel our leaders point us to both when they talk of following and becoming like Christ.

As for teaching teens to look outward in love, I think this is one reason why service projects are so regular (around here they try to do them once a month or so).

I also think that such service can include the youth leaders in the planning, thinking about ways to reach out to those who may be ‘different’ and may feel like they don’t fit in, or about those in need, about ways to shed some cheer to others, to do some good, to life the hands and hearts that hang down.
Michelle
July 21st, 2010 @ 12:31 am

BTW, Emily, I LOVE this, and I think this may very well capture something so significant about the core of the gospel and the plan of salvation. I mean, if we serve the whole world but aren’t kind to our families, what does that say about our discipleship, really?

“[B]e a witness of God’s love to your kids around dinnertime when everyone is cranky, at bedtime when they don’t want to get ready, when you’re trying to leave for church and someone can’t find their shoes.”

Simply profound. Thank you.
jendoop
July 21st, 2010 @ 11:12 am

Thanks for your interpretation, it is good and so much at the heart of what being a Christian is.

As for teenagers understanding it… that’s where grace comes in. Try to teach it but understand that usually that type of understanding only comes after life experiences teach it.
Selwyn aka Kellie
July 21st, 2010 @ 11:21 pm

I never knew about the YW values until I was called as a leader a year after baptism at the grand old age of 22.

For me witnessing is so much easier if it’s done for/with/from love. Most of my witnessing is done in the chaotic privacy of my own head – I try consciously to do as the Lord would have me do. Doesn’t always work, but the effort is becoming easier, and people are still getting helped and loved.
Shalissa
July 22nd, 2010 @ 2:22 am

I echo everyone’s praise for this, especially the reminder for my dinnertime and bedtime (agh!)

Actually, asking me to meta-cognate about the phrase helps me realize that before I can better “stand” as a witness, I just need to better SEE as a witness; i.e. spend more time watching closely for God around me in the every day moment.

The next image that came to mind was this: If I knew a crime or accident was about to occur, how carefully would I watch the details unfold, so that I could accurately witness afterward?

Do I watch every day that acutely?–So that I see all the nuances of God’s love? THEN I’ll have more to witness.
Deja
July 22nd, 2010 @ 11:59 am

Shalissa, what a lovely and wise thought.
Adri
July 23rd, 2010 @ 3:32 pm

Emily…just wanted to say ‘thanks’ for sharing this scriptural epiphany with us at the retreat. I actually used your same logic and interpretation in a talk I had to give in Church last week. You are an inspiration!
Jennifer B.
July 31st, 2010 @ 10:10 pm

Emily, thank you for such lovely thoughts. I love this!
Emily M.
July 31st, 2010 @ 10:40 pm

Shalissa, yes. Seeing clearly helps me stand better. My vision is prone to wander, but I’m working on it.

Hi Jennifer B! And Adri and everyone who commented, thank you. It seems like I’ve been running into the phrase “mourn with those that mourn” often since I posted this, and it reminds me of this discussion every time.
Jen
August 1st, 2010 @ 6:16 pm

I agree with all of the comments already made. Beautiful post!

Growing up focused on the commandments, it is easy for me to look back and have, very much, the same vision as you did as a Young Woman…..as an adult I have been so relieved to come to the realization that more often than not, “standing as a witness” is not so much about keeping rules and being an example as much as it is being an instrument on behalf of the Lord. How better to stand for Him than to stand in for Him in times of trial, need, sorrow and support? And what about times of joy, for that matter? Often we forget about witnessing during the good times!!

Love to you all, sisters!