Family

I think the idea of family has some pretty vital and important roots. Deep within the shielded mystery of life resides the second most powerful and intriguing secret—gender. There is male and female; two different, marvelous, and complementary entities. When we say: It's a boy! It's a girl! We speak of that which we know to be true, but do not fully understand. None of us do, though some may think they do. The compelling urge to create in order to sustain our own life envelops the desire to procreate in order to sustain our kind. We live to create, to be fruitful and multiply and replenish the earth with others who will do the same. There is a desire to have joy in our posterity. It has always been so. (Exceptions and aberrations are just that and they do not change the rule.) The entire process is, in a sense, a fragile and delicate desire that is subject to significant frustration and pain as well as euphoric fulfillment. The divine rules for engaging male and female for their intended purposes are real. They should not be ignored; the consequences for their violation can lead to great heartache. In contrast, however, there is no greater joy than that which comes from careful, consistent compliance to this urge for union between male and female in the the human family.

I believe family is an eternal as well as a temporal social structure and it fulfills its true purposes both on earth and in heaven. Life is eternal and so is family. In the ultimate sense, everything about life seems to be about family. Things on earth are patterned after things in heaven. It's not complicated. Yet ironically, ever since Adam and Eve, the earthly family has been in jeopardy. In my world view, everyone is or can be part of three basic families: (1) a pre-earth family—where Heavenly Parents provided us with a spirit body; (2) an earthly family—where earthly parents provided us with a physical body to house our spirit being and personality; (3) the opportunity to join a spiritual family—with Jesus Christ as head of the household and His Church as the mothering agent. This is what Jesus was explaining to Nicodemus when he inquired and was told: “Ye must be born again.” Just as entry into mortality involves water, blood, and spirit, so joining Christ's family requires water, blood, and spirit. (John 3:1-7;Moses 6:58-62; Mosiah 5:6-10; 2 Corinthians 6:17-18; Romans 8:14; Galations 4:4-7.) It is this family that prepares us for the resurrected body that will entitle us to live with and be part of our Heavenly Father's family following this earth life. Next, perhaps I could say something about the tendency we humans have to reject and substitute rather than accept and obey.

Exploring Some Terms

Let's begin this experiment [viz. an old man trying to blog] with some clarification of the title--dynamic agency. I believe dynamic is one aspect of its opposite which would be static. Everything, it seems, has its opposite. Is that really true? (Some people think it's a big issue but this is not the time to discuss it.) In the case of this blog, we are simply dealing with what is active more than that which is inactive. Active stuff exerts power, inactive stuff doesn't. (For example, a woman might think 'man on a couch', or something like that.) As someone long ago noticed, there are things that act and things that don't. Without getting academic about it, lets just say there are things that are alive and things that are dead--not alive. That's how it appears to me at least. And then comes the terrible question, What is life? Think about it! Well, I am happy with the idea that life is a mystery and a mystery is a truth that can only be known though revelation. This idea does, however, raise even more questions to consider, but not right now--at least not right here. For the moment, perhaps we could be content to think the mystery of life is hidden in this notion: existence is more or less a field of energy information and people are beings of light. (This makes contemporary physicists happy.)

The rest of us should be pleased to understand this means the critical truth about our bodies would not reside just in our flesh, blood, and bones; perhaps in electromagnetic fields, waves, photons, and possibly [undoubtedly probably] other unseen phenomena which might even include intelligence. In other words, it is credible to conclude there is more to each of us than what we can see with our eyes--unaided or aided. It is self evident, we have spiritual as well as physical dimensions. This should not be dismissed, overlooked, or forgotten. Our children deserve to have this more expansive view of themselves and the world in which they live.  We are of great worth--every soul, in fact, is of great worth. And there is a lot of other important stuff on this planet capable of acting rather than just being acted upon. We do not reside on a dead planet and in a singular way humans are quite unique. Humans are more than a product of the mineral kingdom, the plant kingdom, or the animal kingdom which too many modern textbooks overlook.  There is more than adequate evidence to sustain the idea we are part of the kingdom of God. This has a lot of important implications.

Now we come to the second notion--agency. For me this term has two very important connotations: (1) agency is a realm in which a person is free to act. (2) It is also capacity--a power--to act, make choices and create--in the sense of organizing existing elements for some purpose or other. This all has to do with an environment of (a) truth--a knowledge of things as they were, as they are, and as they will or can become and (b) light--the enabling understanding or wisdom to apply truth in safe, useful, productive, and appropriate ways. From my perspective this--personal dynamic agency--is what mortality is all about and it is intentionally manifest in family. I have concluded for me, it is a lot easier to rear children on dirt than it is on asphalt. Next we can consider more about 'family.'

Introducing My New Book

I am so happy to share this new book with friends and family.  

It is now available at the BYU Bookstore. 

This blog is in progress and in early stages of construction.  

Come back soon!