Dave's Mother's Day Talk

Speaking on Mother’s Day is challenging. Why? It is difficult to express our love, adoration and honor for mothers without creating a fictional and mythical character for the women in the audience to compare themselves too. So, today, my mother’s day gift to all mothers is to blow up the pedestal on which this perfect and mythical mother stands. And tell a story about one of the greatest woman in my life. The story takes place in 1948. She is seven years old and it is the year my mother decided to take up RUM RUNNING. My mother grew up on the outskirts of Cardston, Alberta, Canada. Most of the kids at her school were "town kids" and grew up playing together, but my mom was a "country kid". There was a big distinction between these two groups and as a "country kid" my mom used the quarter she was given for lunch to buy the friendship of the "town kids". When the quarter revenue dried up so did her friends. She needed cash! It was rumored that Rose Kinnard, a variety store owner, gave an entire dollar to kids to run "an errand" for her. Some claimed that she was an alcoholic and that the errand was to go to the grocery store and buy vanilla that she would drink straight out of the bottle. One dollar would buy a lot more candy and friends than a quarter. She was scared stiff, BUT IF this clandestine operation were real, her drought of friends would be over. Now, mom wanted friends so bad that she once faked her own birthday party just to get kids to hang out with her. So for now she thought her integrity could wait, because she needed friends and the candy to buy them with. During school lunch, mom stood trembling in front of Rose Kinnard and nervously asked her if she could run "an errand". Rose smiled and said "Sure. All you have to do is take this note to the clerk at the Foodland. He will give you something in a brown paper bag. Bring it back to me and I will give you a dollar." Mom knew it was wrong. She could hardly breathe and could feel the warning pounding in her soul, "Don’t do it, don’t do it, don’t do it." Now, you are all probably thinking "This is the point in the story where she turns it around and makes the right decision". Nope, she did it. She wanted friends. It would be worth it, she thought. She gave Rose the brown paper bag and Rose handed her a dollar. Mom ran down the street to Ken’s Convenience Store where there was a staggering variety of candies. She spent so much time choosing the candy that when she started back to school she noticed lunch hour was over and there were no other students around. School had started and she was late. She couldn’t walk in tardy with a huge bag of candy and admit she had been on a "whiskey run". Mom determined that she would go to her Grandma Smith's home and pretend to be sick, after she had safely hidden her loot. The Cardston temple grounds were on the way and she thought would be the perfect place to hide all her unscrupulous loot. When she was satisfied that no one was watching, she hid all the candies in the bushes along the north side of the temple grounds. She practiced her sick charade and then went to Grandma Smith's house. The next day during lunch hour, mom went to retrieve her ill-gotten gains and reclaim her bought friends. To her absolute and total astonishment, she could not find one single piece of candy. No horseshoe suckers. No strawberry marshmallows. No root beer barrel candies. Not one single piece. She scoured the bushes repeatedly thinking they had to be there. No one had seen her, no one, she was sure of it. Nevertheless, she could not find a single piece of candy, not even a wrapper, or a sucker stick. She ran down the street to Grandpa’s lilac bush where she had stashed one more item. Her favorite root beer horseshoe sucker was also gone. She then rushed back to the temple grounds and frantically searched the hedges again only to come to the unbelievable realization that her total and complete hoard had disappeared! For weeks, she continued to search the bushes any chance she got. Finally, in her mind she resolved the whole affair by coming to the conclusion that the angels on the temple grounds had secretly confiscated all her ill-gotten gains to put an end to her life of crime. And, it worked, for the most part. My mother grew, got married and had ten children. She passed on some very good traits and some maybe not so good traits, either by nature or nurture. If you ever see Mark clawing at his head in frustration. That is from mom. If you have the chance of seeing me get fired up and on a rampage, this is from mom, too. In life, they say after 30 you are in many ways the way that you will be for the rest of your life. And while my mother did give up her life of crime she was a very fiery and often rebellious soul as she raised her ten children. Then in her 40’s she stopped being depressed about all her faults and imperfections and started to change. She also knew that there was little she herself could do to change her kid's rebellious little spirits, so she used a silver bullet. She taught her children the gospel and the mission of Jesus Christ. Above all, my mother taught us the Atonement. She has taught repentance, but much more powerfully she has demonstrated what can happen when the principles are applied to our own daily lives. I have watched as she has humbly reshaped, re-tooled, re-defined and, most importantly, relaxed though honest repentance. I am grateful for her rebellious little soul. I can relate better to a rebellious soul than one that is perfectly obedient, without questioning. Today, my first Mother’s Day wish is for all you mothers out there to know that we honor you. We love you. We are grateful to you for loving our children. Your love and charity is second only to God’s perfect love. Russell M Ballard said:

“I surely know that there is no role in life more essential and more eternal than that of motherhood. There is no one perfect way to be a good mother. Each situation is unique. Each mother has different challenges, different skills and abilities, and certainly different children. The choice is different and unique for each mother and each family. What matters is that a mother loves her children deeply.”

My second Mother's Day wish is for you all to know that a perfect mother is a myth a piece of fiction. The Atonement of Jesus Christ is the salve that is packed between all our imperfections as mothers, fathers and children. By repenting and relying on the power of the Atonement, we as families can together experience and know the Pure love of Jesus Christ. Alma 32:42 states, "And because of your diligence and your faith and your patience with the word in nourishing it, that it may take root in you, behold, by and by ye shall pluck the fruit thereof, which is most precious, which is sweet above all that is sweet, and which is white above all that is white, yea, and pure above all that is pure; and ye shall feast upon this fruit even until ye are filled, that ye hunger not, neither shall ye thirst." My mother “the Linda-hona of my childhood” taught me to take responsibility for myself and work it out directly with the LORD. There are times that I have forgotten this and also times when this knowledge has been life altering. As she would say, Repent! And LIVE. In the name of Jesus Christ, Amen.