Chapter 34: Ministering Friendships
All women, ages eighteen to one hundred and eight, in the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints have automatic membership in Relief Society. This membership brings many perks, perhaps the greatest of which is to have millions of sisters.
Your sisters in the gospel can help you, teach you, and inspire you. They can cry and laugh with you. They can understand you because you share common values and aspirations. Some gospel sisters are as close and their friendship as precious as if you were born of the same mother.
George Eliot described such a friendship: “Oh, the comfort, the inexpressible comfort of feeling safe with a person; having neither to weigh thoughts nor measure words, but to pour them all out, just as they are, chaff and grain together, knowing that a faithful hand will take and sift them, keep what is worth keeping, and then, with a breath of kindness, blow the rest away.”
A newly married wife had fallen into a pattern of finding fault with her groom of a few months. One morning as she was getting ready for work, she looked in the bathroom mirror saw someone hand her a rose. She looked at its beauty and then noticed a thorn. In an instant she knew she was receiving a divine message. She could spend the rest of her marriage scorning the thorn or admiring the rose. Since every human has both prickly thorns and velvety petals, your focus becomes your reality.
The foundation of friendship, speaking of sisters in the gospel, is the common beliefs you share. Have you ever met a gospel sister from another state or country and within two or three sentences felt a bond? That’s the sisterhood that binds millions and millions of Relief Society sisters worldwide who unite under the banner of the gospel of Jesus Christ.
Up one layer is a much smaller group—the sisters in your ward. They teach your children in Primary. You minister to each other. You serve with them in various callings. They may be much older or much younger; but you know each other’s circumstances, greet each other in the grocery store, and trade dinners in times of need. In ratio, there are millions in the first group and perhaps one hundred or so in this second group.
At the top of the friendship pyramid are the few with whom you share a closeness that lasts even when you move from the ward. In these friendships you don’t have “to weigh thought nor measure words.” They encourage you to be your best you.
Artist David Linn painted, in blacks and whites, grays and browns, a work titled Ascent. It’s a visual representation of the Quaker proverb, “Me lift thee and thee lift me, and we both ascend together” (John Greenleaf Whittier). The painting shows people on different steps of a rugged concrete staircase. Each person is reaching down to lift the person on a stair below, and each is reaching up to take the hand of the person on a step above. Although He is not in the painting, it is the Savior who reaches down to every hand that reaches up, echoing the inspired phrase “reaches my reaching” (“Where Can I Turn for Peace?” Hymns, 129).
The name Relief Society emphasizes purpose: whoever needs relief; whatever brings relief; whenever and wherever relief is sensed or requested. Relief responds to physical needs—tending children, providing meals, responding to cleanup after disaster, giving rides, running errands. Relief responds to emotional needs—a timely visit, a phone call, email, or card to show compassion and offer support. You pray to understand through the Spirit another's pain to soothe hurt feelings, listen with love. You refrain from faultfinding or gossiping. Spiritual needs are also attended to as opportunity allows.
A few years ago, a new way of teaching youth in the Church was introduced: “Teaching in the Savior’s Way.” In General Conference, April 2018, another change was announced to help members become more like the Savior. The programs of home and visiting teaching received a name change and new emphasis. It is simply called “ministering,” but it could be called “Ministering in the Savior’s Way.” Ministering describes loving and serving. Sister Jean B. Bingham, Relief Society General President said: “Working together under the direction of the bishop, elders quorum and Relief Society presidencies can be inspired as they seek the best ways to watch over and care for each individual and family.” This new emphasis will upgrade relationships and more adequately fulfill the commandment to “watch over the church” (D&C 46:27).
"Watching over" starts at the top with God’s all-seeing eye as He shepherds His children, fulfilling His omniscient purposes through time and space, which only all-knowing, all seeing, ever-present Beings can do. He keeps at His glorious work twenty-four seven. Psalm 121:4 reads: "Behold, he that keepeth Israel shall neither slumber nor sleep." Felix Mendelssohn captured this significant truth in his oratorio, Elijah. The angels’ chorus exclaims: "He, watching over Israel, slumbers not, nor sleeps." We can have absolute assurance in His love and care because He is always watching over us. He never ever dozes off.
Our Father, Savior, and Holy Ghost allow us to help Them accomplish Their work and glory. In ranks, the prophet, Apostles, seventies, stake presidents, bishops, elders quorum presidents, Relief Society presidents, ministering members, and parents all watch over smaller and smaller flocks of sheep and lambs. The problem with this earthly army is that we all need sleep. We all slumber. We can’t keep on task every moment of every day. We can only try our best to watch over those we are assigned to by blood or calling by teaching and ministering in the Savior’s way.
But I think we have been ministering since Emma Smith said the Relief Society was going to do "something extraordinary" on the day the Relief Society was organized. One example:
Twenty years ago as a Relief Society president I tried to visit every sister. One day, I got up my courage and knocked on the door of a woman whom I had never met. I knew from the records she was seventy two, a member, but at this time hostile to the Church. She opened the door a crack. "Hi," I said, "I'm your new Relief Society president." Her curt reply: "I don't want or need a Relief Society president." "Well, then maybe we can be friends," I said. She opened the door. "Do you know how to set a clock on a microwave," she asked. "I don't know, but I'll try," I responded. I was in the door and a little bit in her heart. I prayed intensely that I could set the clock, which prayer was answered. I then wrote my name and number on a sticky note and said goodbye. Every few weeks she would call and ask me to come help her with something--where the best place was in her yard to plant a tomato plant, how to replace a battery in a smoke alarm, etc. Then suddenly, she got her summons to the other side.
In Relief Society we minister—sister to sister. The purpose of ministering is to routinely meet needs and function as cushions when life happens. We minister in seemingly small ways with a text, a plate of cookies, or a name on temple prayer rolls. On occasion, we minister in major ways as when a Relief Society sister took another Relief Society sister who was dying of pancreatic cancer one thousand miles to see Nauvoo before she died.
That’s gospel sisterhood. Under the guidance of the Spirit, sisters respond lovingly to meet another sister’s individual needs. One moment you lift, and the next moment you are being lifted. I blow away your chaff and you ignore my thorns.
(c) Marilynne Todd Linford, 2018
Your sisters in the gospel can help you, teach you, and inspire you. They can cry and laugh with you. They can understand you because you share common values and aspirations. Some gospel sisters are as close and their friendship as precious as if you were born of the same mother.
George Eliot described such a friendship: “Oh, the comfort, the inexpressible comfort of feeling safe with a person; having neither to weigh thoughts nor measure words, but to pour them all out, just as they are, chaff and grain together, knowing that a faithful hand will take and sift them, keep what is worth keeping, and then, with a breath of kindness, blow the rest away.”
A newly married wife had fallen into a pattern of finding fault with her groom of a few months. One morning as she was getting ready for work, she looked in the bathroom mirror saw someone hand her a rose. She looked at its beauty and then noticed a thorn. In an instant she knew she was receiving a divine message. She could spend the rest of her marriage scorning the thorn or admiring the rose. Since every human has both prickly thorns and velvety petals, your focus becomes your reality.
The foundation of friendship, speaking of sisters in the gospel, is the common beliefs you share. Have you ever met a gospel sister from another state or country and within two or three sentences felt a bond? That’s the sisterhood that binds millions and millions of Relief Society sisters worldwide who unite under the banner of the gospel of Jesus Christ.
Up one layer is a much smaller group—the sisters in your ward. They teach your children in Primary. You minister to each other. You serve with them in various callings. They may be much older or much younger; but you know each other’s circumstances, greet each other in the grocery store, and trade dinners in times of need. In ratio, there are millions in the first group and perhaps one hundred or so in this second group.
At the top of the friendship pyramid are the few with whom you share a closeness that lasts even when you move from the ward. In these friendships you don’t have “to weigh thought nor measure words.” They encourage you to be your best you.
Artist David Linn painted, in blacks and whites, grays and browns, a work titled Ascent. It’s a visual representation of the Quaker proverb, “Me lift thee and thee lift me, and we both ascend together” (John Greenleaf Whittier). The painting shows people on different steps of a rugged concrete staircase. Each person is reaching down to lift the person on a stair below, and each is reaching up to take the hand of the person on a step above. Although He is not in the painting, it is the Savior who reaches down to every hand that reaches up, echoing the inspired phrase “reaches my reaching” (“Where Can I Turn for Peace?” Hymns, 129).
The name Relief Society emphasizes purpose: whoever needs relief; whatever brings relief; whenever and wherever relief is sensed or requested. Relief responds to physical needs—tending children, providing meals, responding to cleanup after disaster, giving rides, running errands. Relief responds to emotional needs—a timely visit, a phone call, email, or card to show compassion and offer support. You pray to understand through the Spirit another's pain to soothe hurt feelings, listen with love. You refrain from faultfinding or gossiping. Spiritual needs are also attended to as opportunity allows.
A few years ago, a new way of teaching youth in the Church was introduced: “Teaching in the Savior’s Way.” In General Conference, April 2018, another change was announced to help members become more like the Savior. The programs of home and visiting teaching received a name change and new emphasis. It is simply called “ministering,” but it could be called “Ministering in the Savior’s Way.” Ministering describes loving and serving. Sister Jean B. Bingham, Relief Society General President said: “Working together under the direction of the bishop, elders quorum and Relief Society presidencies can be inspired as they seek the best ways to watch over and care for each individual and family.” This new emphasis will upgrade relationships and more adequately fulfill the commandment to “watch over the church” (D&C 46:27).
"Watching over" starts at the top with God’s all-seeing eye as He shepherds His children, fulfilling His omniscient purposes through time and space, which only all-knowing, all seeing, ever-present Beings can do. He keeps at His glorious work twenty-four seven. Psalm 121:4 reads: "Behold, he that keepeth Israel shall neither slumber nor sleep." Felix Mendelssohn captured this significant truth in his oratorio, Elijah. The angels’ chorus exclaims: "He, watching over Israel, slumbers not, nor sleeps." We can have absolute assurance in His love and care because He is always watching over us. He never ever dozes off.
Our Father, Savior, and Holy Ghost allow us to help Them accomplish Their work and glory. In ranks, the prophet, Apostles, seventies, stake presidents, bishops, elders quorum presidents, Relief Society presidents, ministering members, and parents all watch over smaller and smaller flocks of sheep and lambs. The problem with this earthly army is that we all need sleep. We all slumber. We can’t keep on task every moment of every day. We can only try our best to watch over those we are assigned to by blood or calling by teaching and ministering in the Savior’s way.
But I think we have been ministering since Emma Smith said the Relief Society was going to do "something extraordinary" on the day the Relief Society was organized. One example:
Twenty years ago as a Relief Society president I tried to visit every sister. One day, I got up my courage and knocked on the door of a woman whom I had never met. I knew from the records she was seventy two, a member, but at this time hostile to the Church. She opened the door a crack. "Hi," I said, "I'm your new Relief Society president." Her curt reply: "I don't want or need a Relief Society president." "Well, then maybe we can be friends," I said. She opened the door. "Do you know how to set a clock on a microwave," she asked. "I don't know, but I'll try," I responded. I was in the door and a little bit in her heart. I prayed intensely that I could set the clock, which prayer was answered. I then wrote my name and number on a sticky note and said goodbye. Every few weeks she would call and ask me to come help her with something--where the best place was in her yard to plant a tomato plant, how to replace a battery in a smoke alarm, etc. Then suddenly, she got her summons to the other side.
In Relief Society we minister—sister to sister. The purpose of ministering is to routinely meet needs and function as cushions when life happens. We minister in seemingly small ways with a text, a plate of cookies, or a name on temple prayer rolls. On occasion, we minister in major ways as when a Relief Society sister took another Relief Society sister who was dying of pancreatic cancer one thousand miles to see Nauvoo before she died.
That’s gospel sisterhood. Under the guidance of the Spirit, sisters respond lovingly to meet another sister’s individual needs. One moment you lift, and the next moment you are being lifted. I blow away your chaff and you ignore my thorns.
(c) Marilynne Todd Linford, 2018
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