A real hero

Friday morning I walked into the Insight offices, blurry eyed from a week of little sleep and cradling a life-line of diet Pepsi in my right hand. For one more day I was going to lose myself in a manic to-do list at work and forget about everything that was so imperfect about my life. At the end of the day I would experience one more illusion that I was a hero because I had accomplished an impossible to do list and inched one step closer to my professional ideal.

Then I got a text message that stopped my already caffeine strained heart. A dear friend had gone into pre-term labor with her two precious twins, only 22-weeks old, fighting to come into the world entirely too early.

Later that day I got to go to the hospital to see my friend. A barrage of thoughts had been rushing through my head in the hours that preceded that visit. However, they were all trumped by what I saw.

I left that experience with a conviction that this world knows no stronger heroism than that of a mother. All professional ambition is hollow compared to the heroism of a mother. Even in the face of harsh odds, there wasn’t a snowball’s chance in hell that my friend would let anything happen to her children while she could do anything about it. In that moment, I saw how much she loved those little girls who she hadn’t even seen yet. The moment was life changing. I hope that even without seeing that moment, those little girls can comprehend just how much their mom and dad love them.

This weekend the members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Later Day Saints gathered for the semi-annual General Conference. For one Sunday, I stopped and listened as the ordained apostles of the church and disciples of Jesus Christ shared their testimonies and the hope they had in their Savior. Sunday morning Elder Robert D. Hales described real heroism. Passive does not mean weak. Love is not a failing. I am seeing more and more that the path the Savior walked is not for the weak. His example of love in adversity is one that, when applied in our modern lives, could very well push us to the edge of our endurance. But that is heroism.

Elder Holland:

“My beloved brothers and sisters, I testify of angels, both the heavenly and mortal kind. In doing so, I am testifying that God never leaves us alone. Never leaves us in the challenges we face, nor will he, so long as time shall last or the earth shall stand or there shall be one man or woman or child on the face thereof to be saved. On occasions, global or personal, we may feel that we are distanced from God … in lost and dreary places …. But even then the father of us all is watching and assisting. And always there are those angels that were watching all around us. Known and unknown, mortal and immortal … In the process of praying for those angels to attend us may we be a little more angelic ourselves. With a strong arm and a little faith … Perhaps then we can be emissaries from God …”

“And whoso receiveth you, there I will be also, for I will go before your face. I will be on your right hand and on your left, and my Spirit shall be in your hearts, and mine angels round about you, to bear you up.”

D&C 84:88