0545 1-2-2026
I couldn't sleep and was basically composing a "testimony" in my head the last couple of hours.
I don't remember who I heard say the following. I've listened to so many Conference talks and BYU devotionals and so on on Youtube over the last couple of years that they all kind of run together. Might even have been a talk someone gave here in the Ward. But, somebody said that, when we bear our testimony on Fast Sunday, we should give an explanation of why we have that testimony. If I actually did that, I'd take up the whole meeting and no one else would get to say anything. Over my brief 65 years here in mortality, I have had several profound spiritual experiences which have each been bricks in my testimony wall. I've had a wonderful life. In fact, I'm thinking that other spirits, on the other side of the veil, will be jealous of my mortal experience. I'll be ostracized. Kind of a "Teachers Pet" sort of thing.
Anyway, I want to address one of those experiences. Kind of a Readers Digest approach to why I have a testimony.
Near the end of last summer; early September, I think, I was at Parade Rest for one of my shows
and I stayed there overnight. I forced myself to get up and get moving before dawn the next morning and I headed out to one of my favorite places. It's a bluff overlooking the Madison River, where it comes out of the Park. I set up a chair and settled down to watch the dawn on the Madison. Typical West Yellowstone, I was in a coat and hat with a blanket across my lap!
Anyway, I began saying a prayer. It started out as just thanking my Heavenly Father that I could be at that place, in such a setting, at such a time. I began thanking Him for my childhood in that place. That I was blessed to have experienced what I consider to be the most wonderful and wondrous place on earth. Not only to experience it, but to have it be the foundation of my whole being. I'm a direct product of the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem, as much as any rock, tree or creature there. That I got to grow up in that place, with the family I had, the experiences I enjoyed, the things I grew up taking for granted. Such incredible blessings are so hard to even describe. "Thank you" is just so inadequate!
As I thought about these things, I also began going through the rest of my life, in my mind. I contemplated how all my dreams, aspirations, wishes and even some fleeting fantasies came true. I remembered the adventure, the excitement, the love, the joy, the career, family, friends. What an unbelievable life I've been granted.
Then, I started to consider all the ways I'd "thanked" Him for all these blessings. The rebellion, the falling away, the anger towards Him for the things gone wrong, the complaining about things that weren't exactly right. Like the spoiled little rich kid griping about the color of the new car Daddy bought him. Even during the time I was most active in the Church, I remember that my "thank you's" for my blessings were just perfunctory. Sure, I said "Thank you for my blessings" when I said a prayer back then. But it was like a letter home from the military. You know; "Dear Mom. How are you? I am fine. Send money". I look back now and realize that I never truly appreciated the wonderful blessings I had enjoyed and was enjoying.
The times I turned away from the covenant path, deliberately. All those years that I lived here in Townsend and didn't attend Church. It wasn't that I didn't believe or that I'd lost my testimony of the Church. It was, literally, that I had no intention of keeping my covenants with Heavenly Father so I didn't think it would be right to pretend to on Sunday. I knew it would be a sin to take the Sacrament, when I had no intention of keeping the promises thus made. So, I just took the easy road and didn't come to Church.
As I sat in my chair, overlooking so many memory triggers; as I sat there, talking with my Heavenly Father about all these things, I felt such shame and remorse. If "Thank you" is inadequate, how inadequate is "I'm Sorry"? As the tears flowed, I told Him how how sorry I am that I had been so rebellious, proud, selfish, unproductive...I could definitely go on, but you get the idea.
As the rising sun began to burn the mists off the river below me, I...How do I explain this? I guess, if you know you know. A "Voice" in my head, very clearly separate from myself, "said"..."I knew you would do all these things, before you came here, and I gave it all to you anyway."
He KNEW, before I even got here! Did I? In the pre-existence, did I promise to do everything He asked of me, actually believing I would so do? Or, did I have access to the same information that He did and knew I was going to blow the whole trip, through selfishness and stupidity?
And, as I sat, tears and snot running down my face, in the cold light of a Yellowstone morning, I asked Him; "Why?" "Why would you give me so much, knowing that I'd return nothing?" And the clear impression I got was simple: "Because I love you".
So. Do I have a testimony of the Gospel of Jesus Christ? Of the love our Heavenly Father, Jesus and the Holy Ghost have for us? For the truth of the Atonement, of God's mercy and forgiveness? Do I believe the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints is the true Restored Church of Jesus Christ on the Earth today? A resounding "Yes!" to all of the above.
Above all else, Heavenly Father loves us, more than we can even understand. He wants us home. His Son, Jesus Christ, has made it possible for us to go home. I'm not going to hear: "Well done, thou good and faithful servant." That ship has sailed and sunk. But, I can still hear; "Welcome home, my son".
I hope at least the same or better for each of you and I tell you these things in the name of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ...Amen.
