"Tyrants are but the spawn of ignorance, begotten by the slaves they trample on."

 Audio

I’m going to start today in John 11. Mary and Martha are mourning the death of their beloved brother. These two devoted women have accepted the divinity of the Savior, Jesus Christ. They believe in Him with all their hearts. In fact, when he arrives, four days after Lazarus’ death, they both express the exact same sentiment. First Martha in verse 21 and then her sister, in verse 32, “Lord, if thou hadst been here, my brother had not died.”

 I can imagine the scene a week before, as Lazarus’ illness progressed. I doubt very much there was any sleeping. These two, faithful sisters likely sat up through the nights, anxiously attending to their brother and always with one eye toward the distance, looking for the light of the Savior’s approach, in constant, pleading prayer. “Oh, let Him come, before it’s too late.”

This story, in the aching hearts of two women whose faith is both beautiful and laudable, illustrates the principle I want to share today. It’s a cautionary message, more for me then for anyone. You see, Mary and Martha knew that Jesus could have saved their brother, that is extraordinary faith. But, even their expression of faith, “Lord, if thou hadst been here, my brother had not died,” is laced with limitation. Knowing exactly how this story ends, the message I wish to share today is very simple, “Never put limits of the power of Jesus Christ and His atonement.”

It’s almost funny how casually we talk about the omnipotence of God without ever really considering what it means to us personally. The scriptures tell us…”He hath made the earth by his power, with God all things are possible, All power is given unto me in heaven and in earth, there is no power but of God,  The Lord God omnipotent reigneth, He is mightier than all the earth, and able to do all things.” But somehow, even though we know that, we believe it, we profess it, we occasionally stumble when it comes to its application. 2^nd Nephi 27:20. “I am able to do mine own work.” His work. “To bring to pass the immortality and eternal life of Man.”

 

And yet, so many of us suffer from crippling cognitive dissonance on this point when it comes to our own salvation. We, like Mary and Martha, might profess our faith in Jesus Christ’s power with a statement beginning with a qualifier like “If.”  “If thou hast been here, If I never make this mistake again, If I had never missed a family night, If I read my scriptures more, If I choose the right career, If I am always patient with my children, If I had a better marriage, If I could get over my fear…then the Lord could save me.” Brothers and Sisters, Never put limits of the power of Jesus Christ and His atonement.

 

This talk is on repentance, but I am not going to review the four “R’s” or talk about how faith is an action word. You already know that. I think sometimes in our admirable culture of self-sufficiency and pioneer style consecration; we need to be reminded that “not everything is about us.” The work of Salvation belongs to Jesus Christ, He who is “mighty to save.” This means that your faults, insecurities, personal failings, family dynamics, neuro divergences, and even the magnitude of your sins, don’t factor into it at all. The only thing you need to bring to the table, the only thing you can bring to the table is your willingness to accept the Savior and keep trying. Repentance is not even about never sinning again. It’s about always coming back when you do. It’s not about you. It’s about Him. Elder Uchtdorf taught: “Salvation cannot be bought with the currency of obedience; it is purchased by the blood of the Son of God.”

And from Doctrine and Covenants 45:

Listen to him who is the advocate with the Father, who is pleading your cause before him—

 

Saying: Father, behold the sufferings and death of him who did no sin, in whom thou wast well pleased; behold the blood of thy Son which was shed, the blood of him whom thou gavest that thyself might be glorified;

 

Wherefore, Father, spare these my brethren that believe on my name, that they may come unto me and have everlasting life.

 

It’s not, “Behold how great Brother Jones is or behold all the awesome things Sister Jones has done, or even behold how very sorry they are” It’s “behold the Atonement of Christ.”

 

Sometimes we inadvertently place our own human limitations on the power of Jesus Christ by looking for exceptions, failing to see his miracles, or assigning time limits to when and where the Lord will intervene in our lives. These human tendencies cut off repentance and healing. They turn our focus back onto ourselves.

Years ago I was teaching a fantastic group of ten-year-old girls in primary. One week we were having a lesson on eternal families and one young lady, her name was Becky, declared, “I will never have an eternal family because my dad will never get baptized.” We were only in that ward for four years and, after his baptism, Becky’s dad served faithfully as my home teacher for two of them.

In that case, despite assuming she was an exception, there was a quick and powerful miracle in store for Becky’s family. That’s not always the case. Another girl in that same primary, Emily, always raised her hand the quickest when the music leader asked if anyone had a favorite song. Without fail, she would ask to sing, “When I am Baptized.” She chose that song because, despite the fact that she and her mom attended all their meetings every week, neither of them had been baptized. Her dad wouldn’t give permission for his family to join the church. And so she came, week after week, wanting her life “to be as clean as earth right after rain,” and knowing that the promises of the gospel were as much for her as any of God’s children. I don’t whether or not she’s still waiting.

Joseph F. Smith taught, “Jesus had not finished his work when his body was slain, neither did he finish it after his resurrection from the dead; … And when will he? Not until he has redeemed and saved every son and daughter of our father Adam that have been or ever will be born upon this earth to the end of time...”

Neither Becky’s dad nor Emily’s are exceptions. You and your family aren’t either.

Sometimes we place limitations of the Savior’s power by failing to see and acknowledge the miracles that are happening all around us, every single day.

I have to shake my head whenever I hear someone express regret that there seems to be fewer miracles in our day then there was in the scriptures, or even in the pioneer times.  I think we need to ask ourselves what, exactly, a miracle is. Gospel Topics defines it simply as  “a divine manifestation of God’s power.”

When my grandpa was born, the average global lifespan was 31 years. For most of human history, 1 out of 2 newborns wouldn’t reach 15. This held true for my grandmother’s family, four out of eight children died. But I have eight living children. My oldest daughter had pneumonia as a newborn. Rhianna was born premature. She was the same gestation as an aunt of mine who only lived 20 hours.

I don’t suppose I’ve ever seen a seagull clear a crop of locusts. But I have never in my life been one bad harvest away from starvation, either. I think grandma would see that as a miracle.

Nowhere are the miracles of modern life more apparent than in the lives of women. We can read the scriptures, study the words of modern prophets, share the gospel, research our family history, and write boring sacrament talks all without getting out of bed. If Mary and Martha had had a dishwashing machine, they both could have sat at the feet of Jesus to listen. President Nelson begged his sisters to become gospel scholars, but it is the power of God that makes that possible for us today.

 In 2001, President Oaks described Family Search as a miracle. Since that time, when the site boasted a total of 640 million entries, it has grown a little. In 2024 you could search  20.5 billion entries. For any non-mathematicians, that second number is more than 32 times the first. The salvation of the dead cannot be described as anything but miraculous.

It took 40 years to build the Salt Lake Temple. Dedicated in 2023, The Helena Montana temple was assembled on site in around two weeks.

Despite the fact that studies are showing a horrifying drop in religious faith globally (including 17 percent in the last ten years in the United States-the largest ever recorded), the worldwide number of convert baptisms for The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints reached an all-time high during the 12-month period from June 2024 to May 2025, surpassing any previous 12-month period since the church's founding in 1830. Just look at what the Lord has done just in our own ward.

Last year, there were 10 percent more seminary students than the year before. How can teenagers getting up at 5 in the morning to attend a religious class be anything but a miracle? Having served in seminary the past year, I can tell you every single one of those youth IS miraculous.

And each Sunday, a worthy 11 or 12 year old young man, passes you the emblems of the atonement and hands you the power to allow Jesus Christ to burn your soul clean of sin. During his lifetime, Jesus taught that the very reason he performed miracles was so that everyone could know that he was capable of forgiving sin, of healing us from the darkness of this world. If we limit the definition of a miracle to something that will be acknowledged as the power of God by someone who does not have faith, we are eliminating all miracles, because people without faith have never developed it because of signs. They can explain away absolutely anything God does.

Miracles haven’t ceased. Perhaps they’ve become too common. So common, we don’t even recognize them anymore. God is enacting constant miracles in preparation for the second coming. The scriptures teach that God cannot do miracles if we do not have faith. I don’t think our faith effects God’s power to act. I think our faith is required in order to recognize miracles when they happen. Only by faith can a divine manifestation of God’s power strengthen, empower and sanctify us. Miracles are intended to show us the power of God. And once you start seeing them, you can’t stop.

“Whether is it easier to say to the sick of the palsy, Thy sins be forgiven thee; or to say, Arise, and take up thy bed, and walk?

 

“But that ye may know that the Son of man hath power on earth to forgive sins,

 

“I say unto thee, Arise, and take up thy bed…”

 

“And in nothing doth man offend God, or against none is his wrath kindled, save those who confess not his hand in all things...”

It’s hardest to see the small miracles when we desperately need a big one that never seems to materialize. I guess there are times when we call cry like Joseph Smith in Liberty Jail, “Lord, How Long?” One of the greatest limitations we set on the power of Jesus Christ and His Atonement is to assign times when we feel blessings should be received, prayers should be answered, or change should be finished.

Going to church is hardest when we’re struggling. It’s difficult to sit through sermons about all the blessings of doing your best and wonder why it doesn’t feel like you can see those blessings in your life despite really trying to do what God has asked of you.

One thing I have never doubted is my ability to receive revelation. I would always say that, “even though I don’t get specific answers very often, when I do, I know.“ When those answers came, I would walk forward with complete faith, being certain of the Lord’s direction.

This past year, there have been a few times, when I received an answer that didn’t seem to make sense at all with the circumstances of my life. I tried moving forward with faith, but discouragement was swift and brutal. It left cracks in my testimony that allowed the adversary to speak to my heart.

I was wrong about what the spirit was telling me. And if I was wrong this time, was I wrong in the past? Have I been acting as if I was being led by the spirit my whole life, while actually I was just making everything up as I went along? How can I possibly act in faith, now that I know that I do not know how to receive revelation. Where do I go from here?

But guess what? It’s not about me. By doubting my ability to receive revelation from the spirit, what I was really doubting was God’s ability to speak to me. I asked myself whether it was possible that If I was trying to receive revelation, and working to do so, was it possible that He was unable to reach me? The Lord, God Almighty… what? Had a broken phone line? The Holy Ghost called in sick? Ridiculous. He doesn’t even have a body.

What I was really doing is setting time limits. That revelation does not make sense today, so there must be something wrong with it…with me. Never put limits of the power of Jesus Christ and His atonement. Elder Holland taught, “Some blessings come soon, some come late, and some don’t come until heaven; but for those who embrace the gospel of Jesus Christ, they come.”

 

When we struggle with unanswered prayers or unrealized blessings, we’re assuming that anything God has not already done for us is something He is not going to do, or even not capable of doing. We’re like the Nephites saying that the “time for the sign” of the Savior’s coming is passed, not realizing that he’s “even at the doors.”

 

Healing from the horrors of life, and repentance is just another form of healing, often takes time. He has promised that “as often as my people repent I will forgive them.” He has not put limitations on you. Return the favor.

 

Before anyone starts thinking that Sister Hancock is preaching grace without works, let me say that it is important to recognize that Agency will always be respected and even as we sit down to feast at the Lord’s supper, it is completely on us to choose to pick up the fork. But it is vital to understand that our choice to eat or not does not in any way change the nutritional quality of the meal. Christ can speak to you. Christ can cleanse you. Christ can heal you.  Christ can save everyone you love. In fact, that’s His work. And He has promised us that he is able to do his own work. Without exceptions.

Then said Jesus unto them plainly, Lazarus is dead.

And I am glad for your sakes that I was not there, to the intent ye may believe;

… And when he thus had spoken, he cried with a loud voice, Lazarus, come forth. And he that was dead came forth.

 

Christ will also redeem you.

Audio

 

 

 

Perhaps the most important lesson we can learn is not only how to hear the Lord, but also to recognize that “all things testify of Christ.” This is apparently a mantra of mine, because it wasn’t very long ago when I noticed Sean reading on his Kindle during Sacrament meeting. In an angry whisper, I told him to put it away. I followed the order with, “I don’t think that book is teaching you about your Savior.” With a characteristic snarky face, followed by a gotcha smirk, he said, “But Mom, all things testify of Christ.” He won that round. 

Early 2021 was a really hard time for me. In February, Nathan moved to Lincoln, Nebraska. I was left to try to hold our family together while preparing to move them across the country.  I felt like I was losing everything that mattered to me. Our home would soon go on the market. But this was a drawn out process, so I had to go through the slow torture of remembering both memories and plans that I would soon lose altogether. And I was doing it without Nathan, who tried to come home monthly, but who was a visitor in our home, having already moved on. 

One day, in the early spring, I stopped to go stare at the beehives. I was aware that it was warming up and the bees should be venturing out. The beehives were completely inactive. It wasn’t really a jarring experience to realize that they were all dead. Of course they were. Wasn’t that the theme of the year? During one of Nathan’s short visits, I had him carry the empty hives into my kitchen. After he was gone, I began the sticky, dirty, time-consuming process of harvesting the honey. Most of the bees were piled in the bottom of the hive, but a few of them were stuck to the comb. I didn’t know what had killed them. Perhaps the Rexburg winter? It wasn’t the wasps this time. Wasps would have robbed the hive and carried off the bodies of the bees. 

The process of harvesting the honey was both sad and satisfying, It was nice to have a task other than cleaning and packing to take my attention. Every filtration made the honey clearer, cleaning out the imperfections. It was an immensely positive experience to place jars full of translucent, golden honey in front of the window and watch the sun light them up. But after days of the kitchen being a sticky mess, I was anxious to have the beehives out of the house, and so I placed them on the back patio, unsure what would happen to them when we moved. 

The next day, I looked out the window to see a thrilling and scary phenomenon. The hives were covered in bees. The entire porch was. Anyone who stepped out of my kitchen onto the back porch would have been surrounded by thousands of them, swirling around and swooping into and out of the open hives. I knew they were robbing them and I loved it. I figured that, perhaps, letting the bees rob those hives would help someone else's hives to survive. I also thought that, perhaps, if there were so many bees on my porch, we might just convince a scout to take up residence in one of my hives. So I donned the suit and put one of the hives together, leaving the other open, for easy access.

The bees continued to rob the hives, a little bit fewer each day. After a week or so, the bees could be counted in dozens, rather than thousands, I just left the hives where they were, killing the wasps that came near, but letting the bees take whatever they could from my poor, dead husks of hives.

Months passed. June came far too quickly and slowly. Our moving date was set for June 21st. We would pack the trucks on my 42nd birthday. I was, in my estimation, far too old to be starting over. It hurt. I had prayed over and over for Heavenly Father to help me, “sing as I walked.” As arrogant as the comparison is, I continually reflected on my pioneer ancestors and the number of times they had to abandon their homes. Yet, the children’s song says that they sang as they walked. I was disappointed that with the relatively small trials I was facing, I seemed unable to do it with a cheerful heart. I felt like I was mourning a life unlived, at least anywhere except my mind. I was mourning the pictures of my daughters in their wedding dresses that I intended to take with them sitting on the branch overhanging the river in our side yard. I had watched a group of retired ladies in my ward who spent their golden years going on outings and trips together. I was mourning the mounting list of friends I had made in Plano who I wanted to make my squad as our children grew and required less of our time. I was even mourning the peaceful, hillside cemetery I passed on the way to church, where I thought I’d quite like to be buried someday. I was mourning my forever home, as we had called it when we moved there and promised the children that our habit of moving every couple years was coming to an end. I was mourning smaller things. The loss of a calling that I loved. The sight of the temple from my backyard. The library. The kitchen shelves. The driveway puddles Nathan hated so much. Weekend trips to visit my family.

At the same time, I was mourning the loss of my young family that came with the long anticipated changes of my oldest graduating from high school, seminary, and receiving a mission call. I attended each of the rites of passage intended to honor him on my own, with my heart completely broken, feeling it was profoundly unfair that Nathan wasn’t with me to hold my hand while I cried. Every parent, if they’re very lucky, will experience the pain of this loss, but no one, I reasoned, should have to do it alone. 

On June 7th, fifty friends showed up at my house with tools and tractors, step stools, shovels and skid steers. They knew Nathan had been gone and our lawn mower was broken. They knew that I had not had the time or means to keep up my yard and they knew we were leaving in a couple weeks and would need to sell our house. They came without invitation or notice, to work in my yard. This was not the first and nowhere near the last experience like this, but it was agonizing. I knew I wasn’t saying goodbye to a community, but to a family who loved me as much as I did them. I went to bed with my heart ripped in pieces and woke up to celebrate my sweet Nathan’s birthday surrounded by so much love and feeling completely alone. 

It was two weeks before our move. 

I expected to spend another day wrapped in the monotony of my tasks, working to keep my mind from perseverating on the things that were bothering me. It’s always been my favorite technique for dealing with the unpleasant. My balm is time. I just have to avoid letting things grab hold of my heart long enough to heal. I started in the kitchen, and somewhere around midmorning, I glanced up to see something new happening on my porch. The hive I had set up was covered, on one side, with a blanket of bees. They weren’t swooping around the porch, like they had when robbing it. They were so close together that the hive was hardly visible beneath them. 

I went outside to take a closer look. The bees not only covered the side of the hive, they were also fanned out on the table, close to the entrance. The ones on the table stood upright, with their hindsides in the air, their wings beating quickly from their stationary bodies.

I’m no expert beekeeper. It’s always been Nate who studied them. I simply delighted in gleaning what I could when he would take the hives apart and show me the brood hatching or explain various behaviors. But I knew enough to know that this was a phenomenon called fanning. These bees had chosen a new home and positioned workers at the entrance to fan pheromones into the air, signaling to all their swarm where to come. It was amazing. We’d never caught bees before, only purchased them. 

Over the next couple days, I watched as the bees busied themselves in their new home. It wasn’t long before I could discern pollen on their legs, a sure sign that they were setting up to stay. I was busy too, preparing to leave. And at times I was absolutely overwhelmed. Nate would not be home until time to drive away. Sometimes the pressure got to me. Sometimes I handled it poorly. At those moments, I gave myself a time out. I would slip outside to the chair I had positioned right in front of the hive and watch the bees. 

Before there was time to blink, it was one week before our move. 

The bees were still robbing the open hive. Sometimes there would be hundreds of them on the frames, taking whatever was left. One evening I went out just before dusk. The frames of the open hive were covered with bees, thousands of them.

This struck me as very odd. Bees don’t like to be out at night. As twilight approaches, the activity in a hive will wind down slowly and it occurred to me that these bees should long since have decided to head for home. But they didn’t seem busy at all. Indeed, they seemed peaceful and at rest. The only explanation was that this was another swarm which, inexplicably, had moved into my open hive. Without wasting time, I went to find my bee suit. They weren’t going to like this. I put the hive together, with the bees inside, hoping they would stay. Over the next few days, I watched for pollen carriers and couldn’t believe my luck when they appeared. 

Luck. Is there any such thing? 

My world became even crazier in the following few days. There was so much to do. But there were still a few moments, stolen from the chaos, when I found solace in sitting on the deck watching those bees. And it was in those moments when the spirit found the chance to speak to my broken heart. This world is full of loss. Nothing gold can stay. We are fallen. The world is fallen and everything we love will become dust, destroyed and dead, like my spring beehives, with only sweet (and perhaps sticky) memories left behind. 

“It’s a lie,” the spirit spoke to me. Nothing is ever lost beyond HIS ability to heal. Nothing is ever taken away. If we have patience both with ourselves and with God’s plan everything will be restored beyond our capacity to understand. Even if the Yellowstone Super Volcano erupted tomorrow and Rexburg was utterly and instantly destroyed, it would, in time, be returned to me, perfect and whole through the incomprehensive power and grace of my eternal Savior. 

Perhaps it seems the most inconsequential of things. I started with two hives. They were taken from me. Heavenly Father gave them back in the very moment where I felt lost just so I could understand that nothing and no one is ever lost. 

I don’t mean to say that I will return to that life, living in my old house and experiencing all of the things I had imagined up in my mind. I mean that we are linked, one in the body of Christ. We are part of the family of God, connected forever and working toward the same goals. We will have these connections in this life and extending into eternity and all of it is part of one gigantic, joyful story.  The sealing ordinances were never meant to be limited to linking individual families. They are to seal us together with God’s entire family, an unbreakable connection to everyone we love, and a restoration of all things through the grace and power of Jesus Christ.

There is no end to glory;

There is no end to love;

There is no end to being;

There is no death above.

 Dear Ryan,

Do you remember junior high orientation? I drove you over to the school, but parents weren’t supposed to come in. I asked if you were scared. You said, “no.” I told you, “I am,” and you replied, “I know, Mom.” It’s a story we’ve repeated dozens of times, but there always seemed to be more ahead. I always knew I needed to let you do things on your own, but you have no idea what I’ve gone through waiting for you at home each time. From your first day of preschool, to sending you to interviews and doctor appointments for your mission, it’s been so hard. Do you want to know why? It’s never been because I worried about what you could do. It’s been because I worried whether the rest of the world would see what I see when I look at you. I wanted so much for them to recognize who you are and treat you the way you deserve.

I know I’ve been hard on you. There are plenty of times I was a horrible mother. It comes down to the same problem, but a different audience. I wanted you to see what I see when I look at you. You are destined to be great. I have to be careful with those words. The world has perverted their meaning. Celestial greatness is not measured by the quantity of effect one has on the world. It’s measured by one's ability to do good things with the resources he has been given. God has given you so much. He expects you to be a powerful force for good in this world and he sees you even more clearly than I do. But I see plenty. 

I’m so proud of you. I always have been, but now it’s just overwhelming. 

I want to give you great advice; another lecture about what Heavenly Father expects of you. But I find that I don’t have one left. Although I will always be here, at home, waiting to hear how things went, I find that my anxiety about whether or not you’ll be okay is abating. You’re going to be just fine. And the whole world is going to be better because of you. Despite all of my mistakes, you have clearly grown into the man Heavenly Father expects you to be. Now take all your extraordinary gifts...and do something nice for someone else.

Love Always,

Mom

Adolf Hitler once said, “What good fortune for governments that the people do not think.” The implication is true for every tyranny throughout history. There’s a belief in the superiority of the state, a complete disdain for the people, and an assurance that self-government is a fantasy because people are incapable of using their own minds to engage their own will to act in their own best interest.

The great American experiment was something entirely different. It was a belief in humanity and an optimism that people, when given the chance to be great, will become it. Looking back at the history of this nation, I am left to wonder who in this argument is right. I know that sounds pessimistic and I’d like to consider myself an eternal believer in the good of my fellow human beings, but the patterns of history seem to reveal that people want to be ruled. Why else would we take the possibility of self-government, the first chance ever for it, and choose to manufacture a system of ruling elites?

I want you to take a minute and think of the person you most admire. It might be your gynecologist for his/her unfailing devotion to the care of the most vulnerable. It might be a farmer who you have seen work tirelessly for the good of family and community. It might be a mom who drives in your school carpool who volunteers every day to make local education better for your kids and hers. It could be your barber, grocer, or pastor. Now imagine what the world would be like if that person, the one who you love and admire, the one who understands your values and struggles, was your representative in Washington D.C.

This is what America was supposed to be. Local people, with real jobs, should be going off to represent their communities for a few short years. Then, when their turn is over, they are supposed to come home, return to their professions and friends while someone else takes on the burden of being your voice. Instead, we have created a group of career politicians who are so detached from what it means to be an American that they entrench themselves in corrupt business and twisted political deals in order to buy themselves a little more power, a few more years “representing” people who, in their minds, “do not think.”

Yesterday Mitt Romney, a senator representing Utah, voted against his party. In response, political pundit Laura Ingraham threatened to move to Utah and run against him. Both of these people are mucus-filled symptoms of the disease that is destroying our country. Romney was raised in Michigan and barely visited Utah before moving there because he knew it was his best chance to become a Senator. Whatever you think of his politics, he is not the representative the people of Utah deserve. He’s a politician who has never experienced the life that Utahans are fighting to preserve.

And Ms. Ingraham’s objection to him is clearly unrelated to the larger problem of our new kind of political oligarchy, because, rather than arguing that the people of Utah deserve a senator who is one of them, she suggests that she would be best equipped to represent a life she has never lived. The very idea allies itself with the philosophy that people are not capable of ruling themselves. According to these two, ordinary people need a group of entrenched political leeches for whom freedom doesn’t matter nearly as much as acquiescence to the swamp of lies, favors, and power-hungry rulers who devote their lives to showing that a representative is really a new king who doesn’t have any idea what you want. But that is okay, because he’s smarter than you anyway.

Personally, I’d much rather vote for my plumber.

We moved to El Paso in 2009. My husband had just finished medical school in Chicago and he matched to a residency program there. I shopped at the now infamous Wal-Mart. My husband trained at the hospital where most of the victims were taken. We did not choose El Paso. There were several other programs we thought we would have preferred. I had never been there; my husband had only flown in for a brief interview among visits to many other cities. 

We were both surprised by the fact that you could see the Mexican communities in Juarez while driving down the freeway. The way the houses were laid out, the style and colors, everything spoke to there being a foreign country across the river. The great Rio Grande, was a little less great than we expected. We weren’t thrilled with the weather. Whenever it rained, the streets filled up with water. Despite being constantly ranked as among the safest cities of its size, people put bars on their windows as a decorating decision. Despite all of that, I wanted to share today how we fell in love with El Paso because of her people.

We had four small children at the time and chose a Spanish Immersion school for the ones that were old enough. Once enrolled, we received a form letter that stated, “because of limited English proficiency, we are recommending that your child attend…” We got a good laugh out of that. It is not an exaggeration to say that my children were the only blonde-haired, blue-eyed students in the entire school. I remember standing with the other parents waiting for the kids to be released. I struck up a conversation with another mom and when the children came out of the school and ran toward us, she commented, “Oh, I see yours.” It was pretty obvious.

Living in those circumstances, I can tell you that ethnicity simply wasn’t a thing. No one cared. My family and I were embraced whole-heartedly and with open arms. There were, however, definite cultural differences between what I knew and my new home city. Let me share a few.

When my children were invited to a birthday party, which are a big deal, I would show up with the invited child. The host was always very confused by that. They knew I had several children and why hadn’t I brought all of them? They were expecting the family! More than once I was sent home to get the others.

I once got into a fender bender where I was at fault. I gave the woman my number and insurance information and drove away. An hour later I received a call from her son. She was still sitting beside the road, not knowing what to do. He asked when I was going to take her to get her car fixed. They are a very interpersonal relationship kind of people.

Speaking of cars, I frequently had tradespeople show up at my door. They noticed I had a dent in my car or a rock chip in the windshield. Could they fix it? Business was always done with a promise and a handshake.

There was a couple that dropped their granddaughter off at the same bus stop I took my daughter to. We chatted each day. Once I mentioned that the icemaker in my refrigerator was leaking. My husband was working long hours and I wasn’t sure when he would be around to fix it. The couple followed me home after the school bus left. The grandpa fixed my ice maker, which involved going up into a crawl space in the ceiling. They acted like it was exactly how anyone would have handled the situation. I didn’t even know their names.

One of my favorite eccentricities was how every woman, including some who were younger than me, called me “mija” which is translated as “my daughter.” It seems very appropriate upon reflection, because the people of El Paso accepted my family as if we were their family. 

I made a lot of friends during my time in that beautiful city. Some were Hispanic, some were not. Many were in the military. I can suppose that some were not citizens, although I don’t know. They did not all have the same political opinions. I had friends on every side of the spectrum. But they seemed to understand that disagreeing with your neighbor did not mean that you shouldn’t serve them. They are a community kind of community and everyone serves everyone. They are a people full of love. They are a family. 

God doesn't orchestrate tragedy or hatred, but he does use them to lead us closer to him. If you have never been to El Paso, please use the recent tragedy there to learn from her people. Consider it, as I do, a privilege.