Steppingstones to Stumbling Blocks; Ways to Step a Little Higher

My heart is always touched by the spirit the musical numbers and hymns bring to devotionals. This has been beautiful, and more special still since one of my students was singing.

I am humbled to be able to share with you today. I remember attending devotional in September of my first year at Ricks College in the Hart Building when President Henry B. Eyring spoke about how rapidly-moving water remains pure and that we will not stagnate if we are ever moving, repenting, learning, growing, and staying at the center of that fast-moving stream, the center of the Kingdom of God. ^[1] At least, that was the message I heard in his words—the message that I wrote home about. This man actually cared about me. Me! Imagine that! He stood in the registration area and shook all 5,000 of the students’ hands.

I am blessed to be here now with another President Eyring who cares deeply about you college students. ^[2]

The idea for the message I will share today began germinating as I listened to an inspiring talk given by Elder Lynn G. Robbins in the Saturday morning conference session. He taught:

 “’Success,’ it has been said, ‘isn’t the absence of failure, but going from failure to failure without any loss of enthusiasm.’^[3]

"With his invention of the light bulb, Thomas Edison purportedly said, ‘I didn’t fail 1,000 times. The light bulb was an invention with 1,000 steps.’ ^[4] Charles F. Kettering called failures ‘finger posts on the road to achievement.’ ^[5]Hopefully each mistake we make becomes a lesson in wisdom, turning stumbling blocks into stepping-stones.

"Nephi’s unwavering faith helped him go from failure to failure until he finally obtained the brass plates. It took Moses 10 attempts before he finally found success in fleeing Egypt with the Israelites.

"We may wonder—if both Nephi and Moses were on the Lord’s errand, why didn’t the Lord intervene and help them achieve success on their first try? Why did He allow them—and why does He allow us—to flounder and fail in our attempts to succeed? Among many important answers to that question, here are a few:

• First, the Lord knows that ‘these things shall give [us] experience, and shall be for [our] good.’ ^[6]
• Second, to allow us to ‘taste the bitter, that [we] may know to prize the good.’ ^[7]
• Third, to prove that ‘the battle is the Lord’s,’ ^[8]and it is only by His grace that we can accomplish His work and become like Him. ^[9]
• Fourth, to help us develop and hone scores of Christlike attributes that cannot be refined except through opposition ^[10]and ‘in the furnace of affliction.’ ^[11]

"So, amid a life full of stumbling blocks and imperfection, we all are grateful for second chances.“ [12]

On the heels of this talk, a young woman’s class devotional thought the following Monday broadened my perspective and taught me further. Cortnee Bair shared, “The difference between a stepping stone and a stumbling block is how high you lift your foot.” Her spiritual thought coupled with her example of how she dealt with health challenges during the semester humbled me and made me stop and think about being more grateful for difficulties. Yes, I said grateful—grateful for difficulties, for failures, or challenges, and to work harder to be worthy of the lessons I was being taught.

Here are four I have been contemplating since hearing Cortnee’s thought about lifting my foot higher to turn mistakes and difficulties into stepping stones:

1. We must put in some extra effort to step higher.
2. We must be humble enough to allow others to help us.
3. We should look for opportunities to help others step higher.
4. Christ will lift and guide us, often through the deeds of others, and make it possible for us to reach from that stumbling block up to the stepping stone.

The posts on the discussion board truly made me think about how you are ministering to one another.

I’d like to share some examples of each of these lessons from some of my heroes: you, George Washington, my father, Syd Withers, and my Savior.

Lesson 1: We must put in some extra effort to step higher.

One of my all-time heroes is George Washington, the first president, the Father of the United States of America. His effort and excellence has inspired me since I learned about him from my kindergarten teacher.

In a BYU devotional, Elder Rex D. Pinegar taught how Washington was educated and chose to lift his foot higher even as a boy. ^[13] Brother Pinegar shared that George was tutored by his father, August, in many areas. He gave his son responsibilities of significance early in his youth, because there was not much time for frivolous behavior on a Virginia farm in those days. His mother would follow up to see that assignments in penmanship, arithmetic, and so forth were carefully recorded by George in his notebooks. They had to be done just right; his father would expect excellence from his son. We too have a Father who expects the very best from us.

In one section of his notebook, George Washington meticulously copied rules of conduct. The Bible provided the foundation for general living, but these rules provided practical guidelines for behavior in everyday life experiences. This part of his education must have been based on sound principles, for George Washington was known throughout his life for the strength of his personal demeanor.

Through all his education, Washington benefited from one of his rules: accept correction with thankfulness. George’s father taught him with love, patience, personal leadership, but also with strict expectation of obedience. Elder Pinegar explained:

Assignments given were expected not only to be completed, but to be done perfectly. Well, anyone can do things halfway, or almost anyone can bring in an assignment partly finished, partly fulfilled, partly followed through. But the mark of greatness, as shown by Washington, was to expect from oneself perfection in performance. His father told George that, when one receives correction regarding assignments, it is not merely enough to obey, but it must be done with cheerfulness. Under those conditions, the attitude becomes more important than mere obedience.^xiii

Lift your foot higher to move from stumbling block to stepping stone. Expect excellence, and keep working toward it even if that excellence is not reached immediately.

Lesson 2: We must be humble enough to allow others to help us step higher.

My father, my hero, taught me this lesson. When something is difficult, even terrifying, you meet it head-on and practice it over and over until it is no longer terrifying or difficult. As a novice driver, I was terrified of driving over railroad tracks. I would purposely take a longer route to get places where there was a bridge over the railroad tracks, rather than taking the shorter route. I did not want help to get over this fear, because there were bridges! Why did I need to improve? On top of this was my lack of competence with standard transmission. It happened that when it was time to take my driver’s test, the family vehicle with automatic transmission was out of commission and all that was left was our old, red, rust-spotted, standard-transmission, ugly Volkswagen bug. I was bemoaning the fact to my young women’s leader, who offered to allow me to drive her Karmann Ghia for my driver’s test—a sporty little car with the desired automatic transmission. Hesitantly, my father agreed to let me borrow her car. He also decided I needed more experience not only handling the little sports car but also with maneuvering railroad tracks, so he devised a training run. The first set of tracks was my undoing. Crossing lights started flashing as I slowly approached. I stopped, regrettably, just past the line where I should have stopped, and the guard arm came down on the roof of the car. Of course, I started bawling. My father got out, held the guard arm up and told me to back up. I did so, bawling, and with a little too much adrenaline in my foot action, stopping as the Karmann Ghia’s bumper tapped the bumper of the car behind me. I looked at the rear-view mirror through tears, and seeing the man from the car behind get out and approach, I put my head down on my arms on the steering wheel and howled. The voice of the man from the car behind didn’t scream at me but comforted, “Don’t cry, Deanna.” Who would expect that in a town with that few LDS people, I would have bumped into, literally, Keith Miller, who was in our stake presidency in Redding, California, and a family friend? Like my dad, he was also a driver’s education teacher at one of the high schools, so he’d probably dealt with a few meltdowns with new drivers. While the single train engine moved slowly past us, my dad inspected the Karmann Ghia’s roof and President Miller’s car bumper for damage. I don’t even know if there was damage! My father must have taken care of it. Dad still expected me to drive home even though he could have taken the wheel for me. He made me drive around and around over the railroad tracks. Humbled, the next day after my 16th birthday, I drove the old VW bug with standard transmission for my driver’s test, passing by the skin of my teeth, making it over the railroad tracks without incident during the driving test.

I felt like my dad was forcing me to lift my foot higher than I was capable by making me go around and around the railroad tracks, but I knew in my head it was for my good. I needed to be humbled and accept the help, advice, and required practice from my father.

President Eyring explained in our last April devotional, “[There] is no better way to develop natural leadership ability than by lifting a fellow student, especially someone who seems  resistant to being lifted.” ^[14] We might feel a bit like this, resistant at times when someone is offering to help us up from a stumbling block to a stepping stone, but when we humble ourselves and graciously accept it, we later realize how we’ve grown because of it. This could come in the form of a family member, a bishop, the counseling center, tutors, a roommate, or classmate. Be humble enough to accept help.

Lesson 3: We should look for opportunities to help others step higher.

Some heroes live in my Idaho Falls stake, like Syd and Jeanette Withers. Brother Withers has spent many years of his life offering service to the young women and young men, and part of it has been taking them on hikes for girl’s camp and scout camp. I was several pounds lighter and my heart was twenty years younger when I went with the young women on the Table Rock hike led by men from our stake, among them, Syd Withers.

The scenery was incredible, and the company was great. I thought I had prepared well enough for the hike, but it was a difficult one for me, and sometimes it seemed I couldn’t catch my breath, and I dropped further behind on the trail. Brother Withers noticed and tactfully checked to see if I was okay. Huffing and puffing, I was a bit embarrassed, but when he held out the end of his walking stick to me, I gratefully grasped it. I’m not sure how far he pulled me, but it was over the steepest area of the trail. Because Brother Withers listened to a prompting, I was able to reach a goal. Be humble enough to allow others to help us step higher.

So, what happens if you observe that someone close to you needs a little help lifting a foot higher?

Last week Brother Castro reminded us:

In our spiritual progression, it’s not uncommon to experience cyclical ups and downs. There are days when it’s easier to be faithful and there are days when it’s hard. At one point or another, we all stumble upon temptations, transgressions, trials and tribulations. The key, when these challenges come, is to keep focus, to stay the course, to not give up or give in, but as true disciples, “having put the hand to the plough,” we do not “[look] back,” down or around, but we “look to God and live. ^[15]

Persist in being tactful and loving as we offer our walking sticks to help others up over a stumbling block until it can become a stepping stone.

Brother Nathan Meeker, who taught us about the purpose and blessing of failure at the beginning of the semester cautioned:

Anger, disgust, and criticism are very poor motivators for life-long and eternal change. We can inspire, we can uplift, we can say, “Just keep going. You’ll get there.” Although the road is long and there are stumbling blocks all along your path, you can do it! There will be blessings at some point along the way as you experience success in your failure. ^[16]

Be tactful and loving as you extend the walking stick or your hand and give them strength to step higher.

Lesson 4: Christ will lift and guide us, often through the deeds of others, and make it possible for us to turn that stumbling block into a stepping stone.

I have long been inspired by the Greg Olsen painting entitled “Be Not Afraid.” To me it expresses how the Savior knows me and has the ability to provide the aid that I need. He often provides that help through our brothers and sisters. The Savior knew my need for strength to get up the mountain, and Brother Withers and his walking stick were literally in my path to help. When we have mountains in our lives or streams too deep to cross that present stumbling blocks, our Savior is there to help us along the way. His grace is sufficient to help us.

We might worry that the need we have is too small and of no consequence so why would the Lord be mindful of it? We might have difficult classes or textbooks that are challenging to comprehend as stumbling blocks.

We might have difficult classes or text books that are challenging. In that first devotional by President Henry B. Eyring when I was a student, he told the story of his own learning experience reading a text on thermodynamics when he was a young physics student. He joked a bit about having that hazy-eyed experience of reading something that was tough to comprehend, but he stayed at it. He began to doubt, thinking, why would his need to understand matter to God? He knew God loved him, so he prayed for help. President Eyring said he remembered the building and the place where he was studying that the Spirit confirmed that what he was learning was true, and he began to understand clearly. Hearing this story inspired me in my freshman year that I could take my challenges with classes to the Lord and receive a similar experience when I applied myself to study as President Eyring had. You may also receive this help, inspiration, and guidance as you are finishing up with projects and exams this semester. You will be lifted and given strength to step just a little higher to finish well.

Brothers and sisters, it is my testimony that the Lord is mindful of us. You can change a stumbling block into a stepping stone by lifting your foot higher. This is possible because there is help around us when we are humble and willing to accept it. In turn, we must be willing to look for others’ needs, to minister, and to act as the Lord’s hands to help our brothers and sisters to lift their feet just a little higher. The Lord will strengthen and sustain us. In the name of Jesus Christ, amen.

Notes

[1] Henry B. Eyring, “Untitled,” Ricks College devotional, Sept. 10, 1974; byui.edu/devotionals.

[2] Power to Become 2017, 3:37-4:21; video.byui.edu/media/p2b+2017+-+President+Henry+J.+Eyring/0_1z1j2a2a.

[3] This quote has been attributed to various authors, including Abraham Lincoln and Winston Churchill.

[4] Thomas Edison, in Zorian Rotenberg, “To Succeed, You Must Fail, and Fail More,” Nov. 13, 2013, insightsquared.com.

[5] Charles F. Kettering, in Thomas Alvin Boyd,  Charles F. Kettering: A Biography (1957), 40. This quotation has also often been attributed to C. S. Lewis.

[6] Doctrine and Covenants 122:7. Even the Savior “learned … obedience by the things which he suffered” (Hebrews 5:8). While these scriptures are referring to tribulation and suffering because of our environment or unfavorable conditions, the mistakes we make are also for our good if we learn from them.

[7] Moses 6:55.

[8] 1 Samuel 17:47; see also 1 Nephi 3:29.

[9] Jacob 4:7.

[10] 2 Nephi 2:11.

[11] Isaiah 48:10; 1 Nephi 20:10.

[12] Lynn G. Robbins, “Until Seventy Times Seven,” Ensign, May 2018.

[13] Rex D. Pinegar, “Experience, Excellence, and Obedience = Character,” Brigham Young University speech, Sept. 6, 1981; speeches.byu.edu.

[14] Henry J. Eyring, “Preparing to Lead,” BYU-Idaho devotional, Apr. 4, 2018; byui.edu/devotionals.

[15] Fernando Castro, “Repentance: A Disciple’s Pattern for Eternal Progression,” BYU-Idaho devotional, June 26, 2018; byui.edu/devotionals.

[16] Nathan Meeker, “The Purpose and Blessings of Failure,” BYU-Idaho devotional, May 1, 2018; byui.edu/devotionals.