Salt Leaven and Light

Earlier this week I found myself wishing I had access to free logs so that I might increase the number of hugelkultur garden beds in my yard. Hugelkultur is a type of gardening where you create raised hill beds made of compostable materials atop large logs. This creates a nutrient-rich mound that you can sow plants into. Since the mounds create nutrients and retain moisture, it’s an efficient, low-labor, and sustainable gardening method. Saturday morning, much to my delight, someone posted that they had free logs available for anyone who might be interested. Three hours later, thanks to my son, my backyard had a stack of logs in it, waiting to be made into hugelkultur gardens. As I looked at the pile of logs, I felt so grateful!

Last night my daughter and I spent an hour discussing the impact that “raising the bar” would have in our personal lives, in our homes, in our churches, and in our communities. “Raising the bar” means to set high expectations for oneself, and to continue to strive to meet those expectations, even if everyone else around you is comfortable with status quo. Imagine my delight when, this morning, at our Stake Youth Covenant Training Center Activity, the stake leaders announced their desire to “raise the bar” for our youth and stake. As I reflected on the announcement to “raise the bar”, I felt so grateful!

As I considered these two separate experiences, I realized that they have much in common. True, they both reference the word “raise”. But it goes deeper than that. In a similar way that hugelkultur gardening creates nutrient-rich mounds that produce healthy plants, so, too, does “raising the bar” increase the amount of positive consequences and blessings one receives (think personal peace, increased confidence, more personal revelation), thus producing a better, richer, happier outcome on one’s journey through life.

“Raising the bar” in one’s life, in one’s home, in one’s church, in one’s communty is akin to planting seeds for a better tomorrow.

It is time for us to rise and become that “city that is set on a hill [that] can not be hid”. (Matthew 5:14)

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A major fault of the Pharisees of Jesus’ time was their ‘acceptable level of righteousness”. “It wasn’t so much that they were actually righteous according to the law–or even trying to be–but that they found their own ‘acceptable level of righteousness’ and despised those who did not follow suit.

Today, when a Christian seriously strives for perfection, other churchmen do not encourage him but rather slander him as self-righteous or pharisaical. Mediocrity is even too high a standard as many churches virtually trample one another in the dash to become ‘relevant’ to all members. What they actually mean is to lower the standard until ANYONE can meet it–the World War II ‘convoy method’ of moving at the speed of the slowest ship.” ~ Paul deParrie

“It is…time to do what is right regardless of the consequences that might follow.” ~ President Gordon B. Hinckley

“Arise and shine forth, that thy light may be a standard for the nations” (D&C 115:5)

Art Credit:

Vitus Staudacher,

(1850 1925), German painter