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Growing up, primary teachers taught me again and again that Mormons are the happiest people on the earth because they have the Plan of Happiness. I thought that was pretty cool. I liked being one of the happiest people on the earth. In fact, I was one of those happiest people up until sixth grade when I was thrown out of my happy world. What challenged my world so dramatically? A girl (you could have guessed that). Her name was Christine Brauer. She had the most attractive smile I had ever seen. When she smiled, the entire room got lighter. Fortunately, she showed it often. However, what really shook me was that she wasn’t a member of the Church.

Wait. How can she be so happy if she isn’t a member of the Church? How is a non-member that happy and not one of the happiest people in the world? I know I sure didn’t smile that much. That’s when the terrifying self-realization hit: I wasn’t that happy. But even if I wasn’t happy, I was still competitive. I was a member of the Church, and I would be one of the happiest people in the world or else!

So I went home from school one day, ran to the bathroom and grinned where a big mirror hung. I scrutinized my smile, moving it around into every position I could. Not impressive. So I smiled harder, tried to control it, left the bathroom and kept smiling. I became a smiler, and with it, I became happier.

The sixth grade became a lot of fun for me. When other students hated life, I was happy. People came to enjoy my smile, and I got many compliments for it–despite being a little shy. At the end of the year, our class did a big award ceremony. Everyone in the class put down a name for a guy and girl who they voted top in each of the categories. For example, we had the bookworm award and, students would think of which guy and girl seemed to read the most books. The person with the most votes won.

Shy though I was, I was happy and won a fair few awards–I guess because people liked me for just being the kid that was happy with life. One award stood out above the rest. I won the best smile award for the guys, and with little competition, Christine won it for the girls. To be honored next to Christine Brauer for smiling was perhaps the greatest honor I could have dreamed of. Now the award isn’t a big deal to me. What is a big deal is that I’m happy, and I owe it to the Gospel, being determined and Christine Brauer.

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FRG needs more writers, regardless of age, who are interested in writing a guest post for us, so if you have a message to share you may submit a sample of your words to us via our web form at http://youth.fairlds.org/contact.php.  Chances are good that we’ll like what you have to say and set you up as a guest blogger on our site.

Anyone who reads a topic line like that has got to wonder what I mean. I know. I wrote it.

Personally, I’m a cool guy. Why? Simple.

Some people think football is cool. Sorry, it’s not. Rugby? Oh yeah…real cool. I love Halo as much as the next guy (and I think I can beat him, too), but I wouldn’t call it cool. Board games on the other hand are very cool–like Settlers of Catan (I think I can beat the next guy at that, too).

Cool comes in many colors. For example, all the new military technology is pretty nifty. Yeah, that’s right; I said nifty, and I’m not ashamed.

Skateboards would be cool, but I can’t ride one, so I’m not so sure.

Anyway, the point is anything can be cool. Don’t expect everyone to agree with you, but since you define what’s cool, their opinions don’t count. But the more cool things you know about, the more you’ll get along with people. Experiment!

Still, that doesn’t mean everything should be cool. I know guys who used to be on hard drugs. Definitely not cool. You can ask them. There’s a bigger and more important thing that we should never let be cool. That’s church.

Well, some parts we can make cool–like youth nights. Try staying awake in seminary; it’s worth it. What’s never cool is the sacrament. If you really wanted to, you could pretend it’s cool: “You take the sacrament? That’s pretty hip. Me, too.” It doesn’t really work; does it? It shouldn’t.

Taking the sacrament every Sunday is how we make a personal promise to Heavenly Father, showing that we are going to be better people now. I regret a lot of things each week. My goal is to never regret the same things I did the week before. Taking the sacrament is like hitting benchmarks which show how I’m doing. If I hit the same problem week after week, I need to put more energy into it so I can make taking the sacrament a rewarding personal report: “Heavenly Father, I did it. What’s next?” Sacrament is not the time to repent; it’s the time to be forgiven. But wait! Is repenting cool?

No. People who backpack know it’s cool. People who repent know it’s not. But wait. If I’m a cool person, should I stop repenting? What do you think?

If the purpose of life was to be cool, then we wouldn’t need repentance. Repenting often means we made the wrong things cool, and now we know it. Do you remember the time when you did something to get your friends to like you more? No, I’m not talking about the gallon challenge. It was worse than that, and you knew it (or know it now). I’ve been there, too. I stopped, made sure my friends knew I stopped (not always easy, but always important), and then it came time to let God know I stopped. Part of it was telling Him I wished I didn’t do it in the first place. That’s repentance.

Repentance isn’t fun, it’s not cool, and it doesn’t make anyone cool. But it does give us the chance to try again and try harder. Then we can be cool again.

If you’re into paintball, sweet. If you like mysteries, nice. If you and I make sure cool doesn’t replace our link to Heavenly Father, then everything we do will have more meaning and feel better. Not cool, but definitely worth it.

Let me attempt an introduction.

I’m your Sunday evening blogger. Recently, I returned from my mission in Sydney, Australia and am now at BYU-Provo pretending to study ancient biblical history (because it would be a joke to say I understand it). Apart from my mission, I’ve been involved with FAIR’s Rising Generation’s parent organization (FAIR) since I was 16. My passion for defending the faith is as much a part of me as my toes. Getting rid of either would cause me discomfort.

As interesting as my life story is, I’ll spare you any more. Instead I thought you’d prefer something a little more insightful. I want to highlight a few benchmarks on the common path every Latter-day Saint must take.

What common path am I referring to? Within the realm of the God’s big plan for us, there’s a part called life on earth. Truth is, we’re living it right now. Life hands us vastly different circumstances, and each obstacle is unique. My challenges aren’t your challenges, and your challenges aren’t mine, but we live on the same planet, and we want the same goal: To return to Heavenly Father. To do this right, we have to embark on the path of perfection. Some parts of the path are common to all of us.

First, we have to build faith in the Savior. If we don’t trust Jesus Christ, He can’t help us (much like you could never help me if I didn’t trust you). We get our faith in different ways, but we all need faith to become perfect.

Another step on the path is baptism. While we treat baptism as something sacred, it turns out there’s nothing magical or mysterious about the process of being baptized. First, we step into the water. Then, someone with authority (a man holding the priesthood in our Church) says a prayer, immerses us fully into the water, and lifts us out. It’s that simple. Our name goes on Church records as a new member and we get a certificate.

What makes baptism so significant is it’s symbolism. Just as Christ died, was laid in a tomb, arose, and came forth resurrected, we go under the water (“buried” in it) and rise out as a symbol showing we want to follow Christ. Baptism is a contract (covenant) with God showing our seriousness. What makes it a miracle is that Heavenly Father dismisses all our sins to that point and lets us start over again, morally clean. It’s partly His show of support for our new life. We’ll go into more detail about baptism another time.

For now we’ll go over one more event on the path to perfection which is often ignored and rarely treated seriously. On the path to perfection, every member of the Church will confront anti-Mormonism. Trials of faith are essential to our growth, and we can’t be perfected without them.

Not all anti-Mormonism is the same. It may come from pamphlets distributed from other churches, it may be a friend accusing you or your parents of practicing polygamy at school, or it may be an atheist on the Internet mocking Christ. However frequent, and with whatever level of intensity, you will have to face it, and knowing what to say will help when it comes.

The reason I dedicate so much time to defending the faith is to help you and for you to help others. As Elder Christofferson said, “We need strong Christians who can…defend the truth of Jesus Christ against moral relativism and militant atheism” [1]. Physically we are strangers, but our spirits make us family. And if we want to be successful on the path to perfection, we have to do it together–you and I, our friends, relatives, and even our enemies. May we not be persuaded by what the critics say. Instead, may we be bold and firm, “ready always to give an answer to every man that asketh you a reason of the hope that is in you” (1 Peter 3:15) in defending what we know is true. Let’s lift each other up.

—footnotes—
[1] D.Todd Christofferson, “The Power of Covenants,” Ensign, May 2009, 19–23. In addition to this, C.S. Lewis said, “To be ignorant and simple now–not to be able to meet the enemies on their own grounds–would be to throw down our weapons, and to betray our uneducated brethren who have, under God, no defense but us against the intellectual attacks of the heathen. Good philosophy must exist, if for no other reason, because bad philosophy needs to be answered.”
C.S. Lewis, “Learning in War Times”, The Weight of Glory and Other Addresses, 1965, 28

I’m a big fan of missionary stories. I can’t think of anyone who doesn’t love the story of struggling companions who endure grueling weather and opposition and finally find a family at the last door of the street that keenly wants to be baptized. As they say in the Field, this is the stuff dreams are made of.

When I arrived in Sydney, Australia at the beginning of my mission, I fully expected to participate in similarly wonderful stories.

I quickly found that perspective and attitude played a big role in how I saw events–whether I amazing coincidences were mere chance or subtle miracles. My companions and I loved swapping stories. There is one that I particularly loved from my companion, Elder Jensen.

Elders Jensen and Zang were in a middle-of-nowhere town called Dubbo with only a small branch to work with. Imagine a small dusty town where every door has been knocked on by missionaries for months. People comfortable living away from anything exciting wanting only to live their lives without interruption hear “knock, knock, knock” by a couple of strange preachers trying to persuade them to change. Their reaction? Well, missionary work is tough in those kinds of places. Since the traditional approach didn’t work so well, Elder Jensen and Zang threw in a few less than normal strategies into their days. For example, they liked to cook for the members of the branch and build them up.

One day, the two missionaries decided to make pancakes for a young woman in the branch and surprise her with them–no reason why…just to be nice. When they arrived, the woman courteously thanked them for the gift. They left happy, knowing they did something small but nice for the sister.

She told the missionaries later how they helped her make one of the most important decisions of her life. Before they arrived, her boyfriend had given her an ultimatum: “Choose the Church or choose me.” She struggled all day to decide which path she would pursue. She loved him but knew that leaving the Church would compromise her search for happiness.

However, when Elder Jensen and Zang dropped by, she immediately knew which choice would make her happiest. Not knowing they were led by the Spirit, the two elders saved her from leaving the Church and missing out on so many great blessings from remaining active.

Simple acts of kindness do more good than we sometimes imagine. If we keep a healthy attitude and perspective, we will see ourselves participate in miracles for others when they need them most.

What missionary stories inspire you?