Syracuse Utah Temple at blue hour beneath a setting first-quarter moon. I lingered long; the nudge lingered longer. In Him, the night—and I—held together.
Intro I lingered at the Syracuse Utah Temple until the first-quarter moon slid above the spire and the stars came on. The nudge I felt there was the longest I’ve ever carried from any temple—it stayed even while I was shooting. Elder Neal A. Maxwell’s cadence kept pacing me:
“In Christ all things hold together.” (Colossians 1:17)
And he widened the frame of my night with this:
“I wish to talk about your unfinished journey. It is the journey of journeys… The trek awaits—whether one is rich or poor… married or single, a prodigal or an ever faithful. Compared to this journey, all other treks are but a brief walk in a mortal park or are merely time on a telestial treadmill.” —Elder Neal A. Maxwell
The temple path made that “journey of journeys” feel less abstract and more immediate—boots on stone, heart in hand.
The straight line Perishable skills expire; portable virtues don’t. The Lord is shaping “men and women of Christ”—meek, patient, full of love (Mosiah 3:19). When life frays, covenants are the stitching; Christ is the seam that actually holds me together.
Final Reflection (Maxwell, in his own words)
“These attributes are eternal and portable… Being portable, to the degree developed, they will go with us through the veil of death.” “Since He is risen from the grave, let us not be dead as to the things of the Spirit… In him all things hold together.”
Standing beside the flower bed and the pale stone, I felt why: if I let Him order my heart, He will also order my steps.
Another line the night underlined Elder Maxwell ties the sky to our discipleship:
“At Christmastime we celebrate a special star… placed in its precise orbit long before it shone so precisely… ‘All things must come to pass in their time’ (D&C 64:32). His overseeing precision pertains not only to astrophysical orbits but to human orbits as well… our obligation to shine as lights within our own orbits.” —Elder Neal A. Maxwell (see Philippians 2:15)
Insight: The moon over Syracuse wasn’t an accident; neither is where God has set me. If I stay in my covenant orbit—quiet, steady, on time—He’ll handle the timing and the alignment.
What I hear now
Let Christ carry what’s flying apart. Pray first: “Hold this together in Thee.”
Choose portable over perishable. Practice a trait before a technique.
Shine in your current orbit. Steward the people and places already set around you; heaven runs on precision and timing.
Serve quietly. Authority of example > argument.
Take the yoke & learn (Matt. 11:29). Small obediences teach His large qualities.
Return, then refine. Revisit the same place (and person) until the light matches the message—the nudge at Syracuse taught me that.
“Meeting the Challenges of Today” — Elder Neal A. Maxwell
Intro
Driving to the Syracuse Temple, I queued up Elder Neal A. Maxwell’s 1978 devotional “Meeting the Challenges of Today.” One line kept burning: God’s foreknowledge and foreordination “underline how very long and how perfectly God has loved us and known us with our individual needs and capacities.” That changes how I face pushback—not with heat, but with holy steadiness.
Listening loop: I’ve listened/read this message 30+ times since Thursday—car to Jordan River, then to Syracuse. Each pass peeled back another layer.
Selected lines (to read slowly)
“In the months and years ahead, events will require of each member that he or she decide whether…to follow the First Presidency.”
“A new irreligion seeks to make itself the state religion…using preserved freedoms to shrink freedom.”
“Be principled but pleasant…perceptive without being pompous.”
“We were measured before and found equal to our tasks…God will not overprogram us.”
Doctrine Note: Foreordination ≠ Predestination
Foreordination is a conditional stewardship, not a guarantee. God can foresee outcomes without forcing them; agency remains intact.
David: God foresaw David’s fall but did not cause it. David chose Bathsheba; agency—and accountability—were David’s.
Martin Harris (116 pages): God foresaw the loss and prepared a remedy centuries earlier (see D&C 10; Words of Mormon).
Conclusion: God is never surprised; we are never compelled. Foreordination calls us to faithfulness, not fatalism.
When minor defeats loom
“There will also be times, happily, when a minor defeat seems probable, that others will step forward, having been rallied to righteousness by what we do.” — Elder Neal A. Maxwell
How I’ve seen this: when I was knocked down at work, unexpected help appeared—quiet encouragements, timely messages, and small mercies that kept me moving. God’s compensating provisions are often people.
Practice today:Who can I quietly rally by how I show up? Act first; announce later.
My working understanding now
God doesn’t live inside my clock. He sees past–present–future at once.
Agency is real. He allowed me to choose Utah and walk hard roads; He wasn’t the cause of every sorrow, nor surprised by any of it.
Compensating provisions exist. He prepares remedies far ahead of my missteps.
**We are not foreordained to fail, but called to succeed—**and to become.
Becoming, Not Just Describing
Maxwell doesn’t invite us to argue; he invites us to become. Utah’s quiet—sometimes lonely—became the classroom where I finally studied harder, worshiped more steadily, and let the doctrine soak until it changed my reflexes.
How I’ll practice becoming (small and daily):
Act > announce: do the next right thing before I say the next right thing.
Covenant rhythm: weekly temple worship, even when feelings lag.
Charity first: measure responses by love, not by likes or score-keeping.
Ask once, then release: honor others’ agency as God honors mine.
Working creed:God foresees; I choose. If I stay on the covenant path, I’m not “stuck”—I’m becoming what my blessing already pointed to.
“Foreordination is like any other blessing—it is a conditional bestowal subject to our faithfulness… Prophecies foreshadow events without determining the outcomes… God foresaw the fall of David, but was not the cause of it… God foresaw, but did not cause, Martin Harris’s loss… and made plans to cope with that failure over fifteen hundred years before it was to occur.”
Premortal memory (often called the “council in heaven”) — Joseph F. Smith:
“In coming here, we forget all, that our agency might be free indeed… by the power of the Spirit… we often catch a spark from the awakened memories of the immortal soul, which lights up our whole being as with the glory of our former home.” (Gospel Doctrine, pp. 13–14)
Why this belongs here: Foreordination honors agency; mortal forgetting protects it. The Spirit’s “spark” is what turns doctrine into direction—reminding me who I’m to become, not scripting how I’m forced to get there.
When minor defeats loom (for this week’s online heat)
“There will also be times, happily, when a minor defeat seems probable, that others will step forward, having been rallied to righteousness by what we do.”
Application: in the FB pile-on, unexpected help appeared. God’s compensating provisions are often people. Charity begets courage in others.
Tone to keep (even online):
“Be principled but pleasant… perceptive without being pompous… have integrity and not write checks with our tongues which our conduct cannot cash.”
We cannot judge who will come (God’s sight ≠ our verdicts)
“The Lord… said, ‘Cast the net on the right side’… If he knew beforehand the whereabouts of fishes in the Sea of Tiberias, should it offend us that he knows beforehand which mortals will come into the gospel net?”
Application: He knows who will soften, when, and how. My job is faith and kindness—not forecasting souls.
A living (not retired) God
“One dimension of worshipping a living God is to know that he is alive and seeing and acting. He is not a retired God… He is, at once, in all the dimensions of time—past, present, and future—while we labor within time’s limits.”
Takeaway: He foresees without forcing, prepares without pampering, and lives to help—now.
Final Reflection
If God truly knew us and trusted us with these exact days, then opposition isn’t proof He abandoned us; it’s evidence He appointed us. Foreordination isn’t status—it’s stewardship; not a guarantee—but a charge to be faithful.
What I hear now
Choose loyalty early; live it quietly.
Be firm without sharpness—principled but pleasant.
Treat foreordination as fuel for service, not status.
When weary, remember: we were measured before, and God won’t press more than we can bear.
Let pushback refine your discipleship, not redefine it.
