Hope
I am happy to be with you during this devotional hour. I thank the University for this opportunity. I surely appreciate your presence here. The Lord declared: "as two or three are gathered in my name, there I will be also."[1] May the Master be with us as we share this occasion together.
Now, to those for whom life has passed them by and are now at the beginning stages of the Pathway Program. I want you to hold on. You keep going. You go ahead and shower those dear service missionaries of yours with all kinds of questions. You move forward. Some Pathway students have matriculated into my courses on campus. Now, matriculating on campus is not a necessity, but some have, and they have surprised me with their maturity and their dedication to succeed. The few art slides you will see today have been created by a student who has come to us through Pathway. So, I encourage you to keep going. You get this done. You get the certification or the degree you are seeking. I offer the same love and concern to our online students. You also keep going.
To those of you who struggle for multiple reasons, as students, as members of families, as individuals, whether it be because of mental illness, or addictions, or bad habits, or strenuous relationships, or some other way. You also keep going. You hold on. You reach out and get help. You also give help. We need you. The university needs you. The Church needs you. The Lord needs you. As Elder Jeffrey R. Holland often says: "Don't you quit. You keep walking. You keep trying. There is help and happiness ahead."[2]
Today, I will tell you about a story that will help us understand the word enmity. We will then explore misplaced enmity and its antidote. I will conclude with an invitation to let your voice be heard, using letters, to break down this misplaced enmity.
Master Cornille's Secret
The story I have chosen for you today comes from a selection of letters called "Letters from my Windmill."[3] In one of those letters, the author, Alphonse Daudet, speaks of a Master-and his secret. Master Cornille, as he is called, lives in a village in southern France where there are windmills. People from all around bring their wheat to be ground at those mills. You can see the windmill sails turning thanks to the wind. There are strings of tiny donkeys loaded with sacks of wheat going up and down those windmills.
Now the world is changing. Entrepreneurs from Paris decide to build steam-powered mill-plants in the area. Windmills fall out of favor with the locals. They now bring their wheat to the more performant machines. All the neighboring windmills shut down. All, that is, except for one. The one windmill continues to whirl courageously. The Master of the windmill, Master Cornille, who has spent more than 60 years perfecting his craft, does not like the new machines; in fact, he detests them. He believes the Mistral wind that powers his windmill is the breath of God. So he touts the praises of the windmill-but no one listens.
In resentment, he decides to shut himself up in the windmill, and leaves it on occasion to take walks with his granddaughter, Yvette. Often, he walks five kilometers, on foot, in bright sun light, just to see her at her place of work. He observes her working there, all day, with tears in his eyes. Many people in the village think the Master is stingy for not taking better care of her; her parents, you see, have died years ago. On Sundays, Master Cornille sits in the back of the church, with the poor folks, with no shoes of his own, and worn down clothes.
For a long time now, no one from the village has brought any kind of wheat to his windmill. The blades of his windmill, however, are turning just as before. Something is amiss. Something is not right. Something isn't quite clear. At times a village farmer comes around and asks him "Good evening Master Cornille, the work is going well, is it? And the master always responds, while the door behind him is shut, "Praise and Glory, I am not short of work". So the people get more curious. At times, when asked the same question, he replies: "I am into exports, please keep this quiet". Now rumors are spreading like wild fire. Everyone has an explanation for Master Cornille's secret. Perhaps he has more money in his bags than he has wheat.
One day, a villager attempts to enter the windmill to discuss wedding arrangements between his boy and Yvette, but Master Cornille does not open the door. He, instead, responds rudely. The villager, however, is able to keep calm. The villager returns to the couple bearing no good news. The couple decides to go up to the windmill by themselves. By the time they arrive, Master Cornille has left the place and, by a stroke of inattention, has forgotten to take away the ladder on the side of the structure. The young couple climbs up and enters the windmill.
Once inside, they discover the secret. The milling room is empty. Not a bag of wheat, not the slightest trail of flour on the ground. No sweet smell of freshly ground grain. Everything is covered with dust. The couple now knows Master Cornille's secret. Master Cornille was hauling plaster on his donkey every day, to save his honor, to make people think he was still in business. But the steam powered plants had long ago taken away his last customers. The blades, you see, continue to turn, but the stone is grinding-nothing. The couple returns to the village in tears from the ordeal and tells the secret.
Once the secret is told, and without waiting so much as a minute, the villagers gather together and agree, right then and there, to take all of the grain that they can find in all of their homes and to bring it to Master Cornille's windmill.
A huge procession of donkeys comes up to the windmill, loaded with wheat. The Master, who is now back, sits on a bag of plaster, and greets them with tears in his eyes, praising God, and dissing the power of steam mills and their greedy owners, saying: "I knew you would come back, the steam mills people are too greedy aren't they?" The villagers desire to carry the Master around the village in a triumph procession; but he refuses. He wants to stay behind to feed his windmill, at last. And they all have tears in their eyes, looking at the old man working the mill masterfully.
Since that day, the villagers never let the old miller go without work. Then, one morning, Master Cornille passes away, and the wings of the windmill cease to turn. The breath of life has returned home.
Enmity
I wonder who you connected with in this story. Did you see yourself in the young maiden, or the entrepreneurs from Paris, or Master Cornille, or some other personage? No, I believe you saw yourself as the donkey, didn't you? Of course you did; you are feeling the weight of homework on your backs and people are telling you what to do and where to go, aren't they?
On a more serious note, I wonder how you and I would respond after hearing Master Cornille's secret. Would we mock him, believing he is a fool? We could have a good laugh, you and I, at his expense, you know. Would we stand by and do nothing, while pitying him in his sad state, believing he has brought this upon himself? Which he has. Would we be annoyed at the lack of care for his granddaughter? Would we crucify his character as no good and full of pride? Would we harbor resentment against this Master Cornille? Would we print a t-shirt that says: "Keep calm and don't be a Cornille?" Could this be the beginning of our feeling enmity towards him?
Enmity, you see, is a wedge that we sometimes place between people. Enmity is strongest when we choose to hate. Enmity is the end of goodwill towards others. In the Pearl of Great Price, the Lord teaches that He "will put enmity between thee and the woman, between thy seed and her seed; and he shall bruise thy head, and thou shalt bruise his heel."[4] So, I ask of you today, between whom is enmity placed? Is it between us, as children of God? Is it between us, as husbands and wives? Is it between us and other great religions? Is it between us and the non-religious people? Is it between us and refugees? Is it between us and political figures? Is it between us and our crazy roommates?
I propose to you today that the true enemy, the one for which and for whom we should feel enmity, is sin; that is, the sin within us, and the master of sin, or Lucifer, the one who rules in darkness in our world. "For we wrestle not against flesh and blood [in other words, the wrestle is not to be had between those of us who have bodies], but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places."[5] So, perhaps hating each other, or Master Cornille, or our enemies, or our political figures, and so on, is misplaced enmity. The father of deception is using this enmity to fool us and make us think we are each other's enemy. This way we may feel justified in hating others. A clever deception perhaps. A costly deception for sure when it comes to lives lost.
Let me tell you a short story about my Grandfather, Jean Marcel Joly, that happened during WWII. He was a tail gunner. He was placed in a crammed gunnery position behind the tail section of a B-26 Marauder Bomber. He was captured in 1941 by the German army and was assigned to be a cook for them. The German army took one of the best restaurants in the region in the city of Meau. The restaurant was called La Sirene. The German army made that place their headquarters. Yes, the German army still acknowledged the superiority of French cuisine.
During this period, Jean was married to my Grandma Rose. Soon, Jean became a father. Sadly, however, their first infant boy died. And my grandparents had neither money, nor possessions of their own. A German general was moved with compassion for my grandparents and provided the necessities for a proper burial. This family story surprises me. It surprises me because French history taught us as children that the German army was the bitter enemy. And enemies are not supposed to be nice. But the enemy had shown deep compassion for my family. I like to believe that in this context, the German general avoided misplaced enmity.
We have here with us, on the stand behind me, the son of one of the soldiers who freed the very city where my grandfather was held captive. This soldier was part of the 1st Infantry Division of the US Army. They called themselves "The Big Red One." We do not know whether they met, his father and my grandfather, but I do know they shared an important part of world history together. The name of this soldier was John Paul Bogetti. He received a purple heart for the battle in the Ardenes. His son, who is here with us today, is John William Bogetti, or Jack for short. It is an honor for me to be with him and to be with you at devotional today. Jack, you see, is my good neighbor. He is a self-appointed Jeep archeologist, including WWII Jeeps. He digs them. Thank you Jack for keeping the sacrifice of that great generation awake in our hearts and for loving the children of our neighborhood. Never once have I heard Jack project hatred for the enemy in that war. I am starting to believe it is war itself, and not the people who are engaged in it, that is the enemy. War surely prevents families from flourishing. I am also hearing this message through people like Captain Moroni, Mother Teresa, Victor Frankl, Gandhi, Tolstoy, Dostoevsky, Malala, Abraham Lincoln, John Adams, Lech Walesa, and many others.
Ancient prophets have been concerned with this misplaced enmity when it comes to the scriptures themselves. For example, in the Book of Mormon, the prophet Ether was afraid that we would look at his written account and mock it because the writing was weak. So we could potentially laugh it up, you and I, and scorn the writing style. The Lord, however, gave him comfort. "... and my grace is sufficient for the meek, that they shall take no advantage of your weakness."[6]
Let us be meek. Let us not take advantage of others because of their weakness. Cutting people down because of their weakness is a death job. Death to kindness. Death to the social feeling. Death to forgiveness. Death to relationships. Death to families. And death to love. The dark deception of misplaced enmity will ruin our lives.
The deception of misplaced enmity was put to rest by the Savior who taught us[7] to love our enemies, to bless them that curse us, to do good to them that hate us, and to pray for them which despitefully use us, and persecute us. Love is the antidote. Now, loving our enemies does not mean that we necessarily let them trample on our God-given liberty. But you will remember the army of Captain Moroni-who fought for their wives, and their children, and their liberty-did not feel hatred for their enemies. I will refer you to the devotional address given by Brother David Pulsipher on the 8th of March of this year, titled "Love Your Enemies," for a discussion on love as courage.
Now, if the father of deception wants to strike at the plan of salvation and engage his plan of misery using misplaced enmity, what will he do? I believe the answer is simple. He will have us turn nasty on each other. He will nurture hatred in our hearts. I like the words of the great president of the United States, Abraham Lincoln, who said: "A house divided against itself cannot stand."[8] It is hatred that divides; not the hatred others may feel for us, but the hatred we feel for them. We are it. We choose.
So, where will Lucifer strike? Where does it hurt most? In the Saturday morning session of General Conference in November of 2003, Elder M. Russell Ballard taught:
That the family is the main target of evil's attack and must therefore be the main point of our protection and defense. As I said once before, when you stop and think about it from a diabolically tactical point of view, fighting the family makes sense to Satan. When he wants to disrupt the work of the Lord, he doesn't poison the world's peanut butter supply, thus bringing the Church's missionary system to its collective knees. He doesn't send a plague of laryngitis to afflict the Mormon Tabernacle Choir. He doesn't legislate against green Jell-O and casseroles. When evil wants to strike out and disrupt the essence of God's work, it attacks the family.[9]
Love
A good way to attack the family is to have it turn against each other. Think about Cain and Abel. Cain chose to feel hatred for the Lord and blame Satan for the evil and greedy choice he had made to kill his brother. He tried to avoid responsibility at every turn by blaming others for what he chose to interpret as wrongdoings being done towards him. He was, in fact, covering up his sin. The way to blame others is easy. The way to misplaced enmity is easy because it takes away the need for us to change, and it allows us to point the finger at others instead.
To avoid this ruin, families look to the Savior's love and the bonds of covenant. Sister Christine Gilbert, in a devotional address given with her husband in January of this year titled "Happiness in Family Life," taught: "Happiness in marriage comes when we are attuned to the needs of our companion and serve our spouse in Christlike ways."[10] Sister Gilbert's statement got me thinking about those Christlike ways. Are those ways different types of languages to be assigned and used at will? Are those ways a type of training I can certify in? Are those ways to be used to get the love I believe I deserve?
We sometimes believe love is something we should have, as if it were a possession, or a good catch, especially when she or he is a 10. So, we look for a mate or a friend who will give us what we want to have. We make good and sound measurements of a potential partner's qualities, with positive attributes on the left side of the page, and negative attributes on the right side of the page.
If the balance is in the positive, then we may regard this person as a potential mate or friend. If it's negative, however, we dismiss them. We don't hang out with such people. They are, perhaps, very much like the Lamanites who were a scattered, dirty, and filthy people. These guys definitely were on the negative balance. We don't attach our lives with these kinds of people. They just don't give us the love that we need, expect, or deserve. We, after all, are the measure of all things good; we know what's up. We do, however, search for a partner who will be found in the positive and who will carry the relationship as a team effort where both partners put in 100 percent.
And believe me, I will keep track whether you do keep that effort. I will keep track of the things you said you would be doing. I will keep track of you doing the dishes, vacuuming the floor, preparing my meals, being quiet when I study, and showing that you are pulling your weight in this relationship. But what if you don't give it your 100 percent, or your 50 percent as I give my 50 percent, then what? I will feel like I have been had. That I deserve better. That you are slowing me down on my progression. I may start looking elsewhere for fulfillment. I may start looking to others for a better ratio. I will start misplacing enmity by putting it between you and me.
With this way of thinking, I have given up my ability to choose to love. It is now my self-oriented perception of the balance of efforts put out by the other person that chooses for me. I am now acted upon by a perceived behavioral or attitudinal ratio of effort put out by, in this case, my spouse. So when things go down, and I perceive my effort to be good or I want to hide my own weakness by exposing what I believe is a greater weakness in others, I can now blame my spouse; I can throw the first stone.
In the social sciences, this model is called the social exchange theory. The social exchange is transactional. You give me this, I give you that. You don't give me this, I am not happy. I feel enmity. You should be the instrument that provides me the happiness and love I deserve. I, of course, can replace the instrument. It needs to be a win-win. If there is a win-lose, however, one of us is getting out. Now I ask of you: Is this how we love our spouse, or our friends, or our enemies? Is this how the Lord loves? Are those the Christlike ways Sister Gilbert was talking about?
In the book, titled "Standing for Something,"[11] President Gordon B. Hinckley speaks of love as the only force that can erase differences between people or bridge the chasms of bitterness:
In our youth, we sometimes acquire faulty ideas of love, believing that it can be imposed or simply created for convenience. I noted the following in a newspaper:
"One of the grand errors we tend to make when we are young is supposing that a person is a bundle of qualities, and we add up the individual good and bad qualities, like a bookkeeper working in debits and credits. If the balance is favorable, we may decide to take the jump [into marriage]...The world is full of unhappy men and women who married because they believed it...to be a good investment. Love, however, is not an investment; it is an adventure. And when marriage turns out to be as dull and comfortable as a sound investment, the disgruntled party soon turns elsewhere...Ignorant people are always saying, "I wonder what he sees in her," not realizing that what he sees in her (and what no none else can see) is the secret essence of love."
President Hinckley goes on to say:
I think of two friends from my high school and university years. He was a boy from a country town, plain in appearance, without money or apparent promise. He had grown up on a farm, and if he had any quality that was attractive, it was the capacity to work. He carried bologna sandwiches in a brown paper bag for his lunch, and swept the school floor to pay his tuition...She was a city girl who had come out of a comfortable home. She was wholesome in her decency and integrity...Something wonderful took place between them. They fell in love. Some whispered that there were far more promising boys for her, and a gossip or two noted that perhaps other girls might have interested him...Now many years have passed. Their children are grown, a lasting credit to them, and to the communities in which they live...Forty years earlier, people without understanding had asked what they saw in each other...But these two found in each other love, loyalty, peace, and faith in the future. There was a flowering in them of something divine, planted there by that Father who is our God.
Our dear Lord has given us the following charge in Ephesians 5:25: "Husbands, love your wives, even as Christ also loved the church, and gave himself for it."[12] How did Christ love the Church? He gave his life for her. That's how we love, selflessly. I believe we too often forget the new commandant given in John 13:34: "A new commandment I give unto you, That ye love one another; as I have loved you, that ye also love one another."[13] This is very different from loving others as ourselves, isn't it? We are not the center of that love anymore. Christ is the center of that love.
A great Christian from Northern Europe, named Søren Kierkegaard, said: "With respect to love we speak continually about perfection and the perfect person. With respect to love Christianity also speaks continually about perfection and the perfect person. Alas, but we men talk about finding the perfect person [who will love us]. Christianity speaks about being the perfect person who limitlessly loves the person he sees."[14]
Now, let's make our relationship with the Lord transactional for a moment and try the experiment. Give the Lord back the 50 percent you know he deserves for what he has given you. In fact, give him all you got, 100 percent. You will realize there is a problem. You will realize something is amiss. You will realize that something is not quite right. You will realize the transactional system does not work in this case. You will realize that "if ye should serve him who has created you from the beginning, and is preserving you from day to day, by lending you breath, that ye may live and move and do according to your own will, and even supporting you from one moment to another-I say, if ye should serve him with all your whole souls yet ye would be unprofitable servants."[15] You will realize that his love is infinitely favoring us despite our weakness. And this is how he wants us to love our spouse and to love each other.
Love is not about measuring what we give or get or what others give or get. Love is about serving and loving, continually, infinitely, and selflessly, despite imperfections, and because of imperceptions. Love is a person. It is not a technique, nor a book, nor a ratio. It is infinite, and beyond count. Love is not about fairness. I do not believe the Atonement was fair to the Lord; I think it was hugely to our advantage that he performed the Atonement. We cannot repay, nor count all the ways in which He sustains you from breath to breath. In fact, if we were to count our blessings, and name them one by one, we would find ourselves in a constant state of genuine gratitude, without end.
We love him. We take his name upon us because He first loved us. I know that the Lord, when performing the Atonement, did not ask: "What's in it for me?" Instead, He chose to love God and He chose to love you, in spite of your faults. You and I are only beggars at the mercy seat. Let us love our spouse, our families, as the Lord loves. Let us love others, despite of their faults. Let us get rid of the egocentric, selfish, ratio-like, and finite kinds of deceptive loves; the kinds of deceptive loves that are self-serving and that have an end. Said President Dieter F. Uchtdorf:
Those who are selfish seek their own interests and pleasure above all else. The central question for the selfish person is "What's in it for me?"...I am sure you can see that this attitude is clearly contrary to the spirit required to build God's kingdom...Those who wholeheartedly turn their lives over to our Savior and serve God and fellowman discover a richness and fullness to life that the selfish or egotistic will never experience.[16]
In the face of the Atonement, the "I deserve" and the "you owe me" or "you failed me" mentality is simply bankrupt. If you find yourself having this mentality, I simply ask that you stop. Stop it. Stop it now. Stop. And instead, let us take counsel from Sister Gilbert who taught that part of the answer to loving others is in our ability to sacrifice and serve others.
As a cautionary note, you and I may find ourselves in an abusive or oppressive relationship. I believe that nurturing such relationships is nurturing darkness. Something has to change. It is perhaps a sign of great love or great courage for an abused person to step out of such a relationship to help the oppressor work his way to kindness with the help of ecclesiastical, professional, and judicial authorities.
Letter
As you have felt the love of our Savior through the Atonement, I would like to invite you to let your voice be heard. Let it be heard through the letters you could write for the sake of that love you have felt. Letters have a powerful effect on people. Letters can do much do dissipate enmity. Letters can do much to sustain liberty. For example, the New Testament is full of letters written from Apostles. You will also find great letters within the Book of Mormon. You have enjoyed a letter today from Alphonse Daudet's "Letters from my windmill," where villagers did not choose misplaced enmity; they, instead, chose to love.
And this is my invitation for you today. I hope that you will have the courage to write an old-school letter, a throwback letter, the kind which requires a stamp. Let it be a kind letter. Let it be a thoughtful letter. Let it be a simple letter to someone that has blessed your life or the lives of the children of God. It may be the first time you write such a letter. This sincere letter will do much to bless the lives of those who will receive it. Be sure to make it personal by presenting your name and your background, and by addressing the letter to the person directly, by name.
The students I teach have had the courage to write such letters, and have sent them to all kinds of people, including heads of corporations that are doing good humanitarian work in the world. On occasion, they get a response back, a very positive letter of sincere gratitude. We need to be active in supporting the Christ-impulse that so many other people, so many other organizations, so many other cultures, and so many other religions have. Let us crowd out the voice of filth and of misplaced enmity with the voice of God-your voice. Let us work against the dividing of this world.
On a different occasion, a BYU-I student went back to her home in Texas for the summer a few years ago. She was looking forward to seeing conference on her local cable TV. To her chagrin, the conference proceedings were canceled by the carrier and replaced with another program. Now, this student is just like you, a young person navigating the waters of higher education. She, however, had learned to let her voice be heard, so she wrote to the service company and addressed the decision maker in a kind but graciously firm way. To her surprise, the conference proceedings were put back on the schedule. What a blessing this was to her, and to whomever happened to venture on that channel during conference time.
Now the letter of the Declaration of Independence was dated July 4th, and sent with a cover letter on July 6th, from Philadelphia, and addressed to the British Authorities. That is a two day span. Today is May 24th, perhaps you send your first letter on May 26th.
I hope you have heard the voice of the Lord at this devotional today. His voice may not have come through anything I may have said. But if His voice came to you today, I plead with you to follow it. I plead with you to rise, as women and men of God, and do it. Remember this, it is through weakness that we find the space to serve one another, let us not use this space to create misplaced enmity.
In the name of Jesus Christ. Amen.
Notes
[1] Mathew 18:20
[2] Jeffrey R. Holland, "A High Priest of Good Things to Come", Ensign, November 1999
[3] Alphonse Daudet, Lettres de mon moulin, 1975, 39
[4] Moses 4:21
[5] Ephesians 6:12
[6] Ether 12: 25-26
[7] Matthew 5: 43-48
[8] Abraham Lincoln, "House Divided Speech", Collected Works of Abraham Lincoln, edited by Roy P. Basler et al.
[9] M. Russell Ballard, "Let Our Voices Be Heard", Ensign, November 2003, 16
[10] Clark and Christine Gilbert, "Happiness in Family Life", BYU-I devotional, January 2016
[11] Gordon B. Hinckley, "Standing for Something", 2000, 3
[12] Ephesians 5: 25
[13] John 13: 34
[14] Søren Kierkegaard, Works of Love
[15] Mosiah 2:21
[16] Dieter F. Uchtdorf, "Are You Sleeping through the Restoration?", Ensign, April 2014, 58