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Speaker: Glenn Rawson
Hi, this is Glenn Rawson. One of the most powerful ways to share history and heritage is by the telling of stories. We began sharing inspiring stories nearly 30 years ago. Each of those stories is true and was intended to inspire and strengthen faith. Over the years, those stories have reached millions around the world. This podcast is for you to listen, learn and enjoy.
First Story: Hiding Under the Bed 00:34
Just how powerful, how influential are movies, and television and videos and all that stuff in all their different forms? Well, I want to tell you a story. I don’t believe I ever told this story in my whole life.
About two of my earliest childhood recollections. I mean, literally, this has to be this first one, my earliest recollection, as just a wee little boy, not much more than a toddler.
What I remember was living in a house, with just a tiny little boy, before we moved to the ranch up at Lemhi there in Dubois, Idaho. And I wasn’t even four years old, couldn’t have been. And my folks would sit down at night and watch the television. There was a show on the old black and white grainy television that my parents used to watch. The show was dark, and creepy. With swamps and fog and monsters and screaming people and the eeriest music I’ve ever heard that show. Maybe it was the Twilight Zone. I don’t know. I’m not an expert on that thing. But all I know is that show when it came on, it terrified me.
Every time it would come on, I would run to the other side of the house as far away from the awful sounds as I could get, I would crawl under my parents bed and put my hand over my ears like that. I cannot describe to you how much that show terrified me.
Now, by today’s cinematic standards, I’m sure that show was as lame as a three-legged pup, and it was pretty amateurish. But in my little boy’s heart, those images, and those events being depicted on screen and those monsters were real. And I was next on the monsters menu, they’re going to drag me in the swamp and eat me.
That was my memory. No, not too many years later, couldn’t have been too much later. My mother was one day watching a daytime soap opera. I don’t remember which one it might have been General Hospital or something like that. Well, I sat there watching this thing.
And I saw on the television, two adults, a man and a woman get into some kind of an argument or some kind of difficult discussion. I don’t remember what the topic was. The man stood up and turned to walk away. And the woman suddenly grabbed a pair of scissors and stabbed the man in the back. I had never seen such a thing. The scene and the music were vivid. It was terrible. I was so scared. I was so scarred. I knew nothing about award-winning performances. I couldn’t have cared a hill of beans about that stuff.
All I understood is that I watched that man get murdered before my very eyes. It was real. And it was terrifying to me. And here I am 60 years later, and I can still see it. Not sure what to make of that.
The Lord said, “The light of the body is the eye.” Those shows filled me with darkness and terror so acute that I can still see it and I can still feel it.
The temple is the holiest place on earth, the holiest edifice on Earth. We are to be the temple or edifice of the Holy Ghost. The word edify comes from the same root as edifice meaning “to build or raise up.”
Are we, you, me? Are we being built up by what we watch? Or demolished? How far into eternity do you think (we, you and I) are going to have to go to forget all of the inappropriate shows and images we have watched. You know this, just because something is entertaining, does not mean it is edifying.
Perhaps we would do better if our standard was edification, rather than entertainment.
Second Story: You Do Not Make Fun
05:39
Are you okay? I’ve recovered from that story. Right now? Are you okay? I have no idea how many of you are watching or even if I’m just talking to myself tonight. So I really hope you’re out there. And I hope that something I say will serve to edify and lift you up and leave you a little bit better off.
Now, just an observation. Every time I turn on a news report, usually I just read them now. I’m amazed, because it seems that well, I’ve never seen the world more uncivilized than it is right now. It’s crazy. The love of men waxes cold. Men’s hearts, (men and women’s hearts) now seem so hardened that they’re like, petrified.
Why is it so hard to learn that as we sow, so shall we reap? My kids know that as you sow, so shall you reap. As we treat others, so shall be treated. As we judge others, we’ll be judged. If we’re mean to others, they’re mean back to us.
In the last few years, I have never seen such unrestrained intolerance, bigotry, and incivility. I wonder who now will be strong enough to break the cycle of incivility.
John was ten (10) years old and living with his family in Provo, Utah. One day his mother sent him and asked him to go down the street and help his grandmother. Well, John invited a friend and they got on bicycles and started down the street to cut kindling for grandma.
As they were riding across the street, a man with a white collar and black coat approached them. Young John turned to his friend and said, “That guy must have escaped from the mental hospital on East Center.”
Well, it was a very unkind comment, John thought no more about it, crossed the street and went to park his bike. But evidently the high squeaky voice, the man evidently heard the comment. And he went straight for John. The man was a priest from a different religion. John said, “The priest was so upset at me, he spouted and spit all over me, and really gave me a hard time about this “Mormon business” and everything like that.
John said, “I hadn’t even gotten off my bike yet. He really shook me up.”
Well, that wasn’t enough. Grandma evidently heard the whole thing. And when John went inside the house, she sat him down and gave it to him again, another lecture, John remembered what she said, “You know, they killed my father. They killed my uncle. They killed everybody they could, Haun’s Mill massacre etc. We were driven out of the east and moved out here. We came here as a place to live, a place of peace. This is a beautiful place. I want you to understand right now and forever, that you do not make fun of anybody else’s religion.”
John never forgot. Because you see, grandma was Martha Ann Smith Harris – the youngest child of Hyrum and Mary Fielding Smith. She better than most understood The high cost of intolerance, bigotry, prejudice and hate.
When will we learn that all such expressions erode the very foundations of the society we are built on a part of. We may or may not hurt others by our incivility and unkindness, but we will always, always hurt ourselves.
Third Story: Articles of Confederation
10:30
I don’t know if this means anything to you or not. But for me, this coming Tuesday is a very significant day. It’s an anniversary that has meaning to me. And I share this story in hopes that maybe it will have some meaning to you. If you don’t mind, may I speak of a tiny little moment in American history that proved to be a monumental moment of courage that changed all of our lives.
May 25, 1787 the United States was free, but barely. So they were states. They were not united. They were in crisis. The states were deeply in debt. Driven by pride and greed.
The States of the Union fought among themselves and refused to cooperate. Moreover, (the United States) we were laughing stock abroad, in debt and virtually paralyzed, our treaties were ignored, our ships were pirated and seized. There were those of Europe who were just waiting for the great American experiment in democracy to implode and then they would glowingly step in, and monarchy won’t once more bear sway on the American continent.
There were even those within our own borders, who yearned and worked for the return of King and parliament in America. Seeing this, there were those among our populace, who sought to do something – James Madison and others.
Consequently, a convention was called in Philadelphia, in May of 1787, for the purpose of revising America’s constitution, known then as the Articles of Confederation – that convention.
Their problem was largely this. You see, today we say, the United States “IS”, but then it was said the United States “ARE” because in those days in 1787, the United States were a very loose confederation of Independent States, bound by a league of friendship that was quickly unraveling.
So, some 74 delegates were appointed to attend this “Grand Convention.”
Their instructions and ostensible purpose was to revise the Articles of Confederation meaning to tweak the system as it were, to solve the extent problems of the day. But it could not work. The system and organization were flawed on the face and could not address the exigencies of the day, it couldn’t fix the problem. And there were some wise enough to see it.
Tuesday, on May 29, 1787, Governor Edmund Randolph took the floor of Independence Hall in Philadelphia, and opened the main business of the convention. He enumerated the problems of America and brought them there and then proceeded to the remedy, the basis of which he said must be the Republican principle.
He then presented the Virginia Plan for a new system of government. The first resolution said that the Articles of Confederation ought to be corrected and enlarged. However, so bold and revolutionary were the resolutions that Randolph presented that quickly the debate followed around the delegates, they realized that they weren’t revising the Articles of Confederation as they’ve been instructed.
No, if they followed Randolph’s plan, they were abolishing them all together, notwithstanding the will of the people and their aversion to a strong central government, notwithstanding the instructions given by the respective leaders back home in their states, and notwithstanding the uncertainty of uncharted waters, “It was resolved that a national government ought to be established consisting of a supreme legislative, executive, and judiciary.”
The resolution carried and the business of the convention went on without a blink. Over the course of the next few months, those men would form a totally new, revolutionary new system of government unheard of in the day of kings and parliament’s, but one that would grow to become America’s greatest export.
I have thought back on that day, and celebrated this next week of that moment. What if those men had been more concerned with what people thought of them than of the plight of their nation? What if they were too timid to think outside the box? What if they cared more about their personal wealth than just principles? What if they had just been cowards to the cause? There would be no United States? How much different would our lives have been had those men not had the courage to live by their principles and adopt the United States Constitution?
Last Story: Lord, I Believe
17:24
Last Story, for the night. This last week has brought into sharp focus (for me) some of the mountains that loom before me. And I have seen as I stared ahead of me, that I’m not good enough, I’m not strong enough to get where I want to be or be what I want to be.
If there are any of you, facing a mountain of misery, or just a struggle, that are in a similar situation to me, well, then this story is written for you.
Somewhere in the Galilee, while the Savior was on the Mount of Transfiguration with Peter, James and John, seeing visions, receiving keys and promises. His other apostles, the nine, waited down below in the valley. And as they waited, a crowd gathered about them. Among them, certain scribes, who were questioning them, it looks more like they were badgering them.
When Jesus came down, he approached the crowd, the crowd saw him and “were greatly amazed and running, saluted him.”
Perhaps that was because of his still transfigured appearance. Jesus asked the scribes, pointedly, “What question ye with them?”(meaning the apostles)
And in response, a man in the crowd came forward, fell at Jesus’s feet, and cried out, saying, “Master, I beseech thee look upon my son, for he is my only child, and oh, a spirit taketh him and he suddenly crieth out and it teareth him that he fometh and bruising him hardly departed from him. Matthew’s account then says, and I have brought him to thy disciples, and they could not cure him.”
Jesus commanded that the afflicted son be brought to him. Mark’s account says, “And when the man (meaning of the son), and when the man saw him, (Jesus) immediately he was torn by the Spirit, and he fell on the ground and he wallowed foaming.
The master asked the father, “How long has his son been like this?” And the father replied, “When a child, and oftentimes it has cast him into the fire and into the waters to destroy him. But if thou canst, I ask thee to have compassion on us, and help us.”
Stop right there. Can you hear the anguish in that father’s voice? Can you sense the desperation in his plea for help? Can you imagine how many years and how diligent and attentive this father has had to be for so long? To protect the life of his only son? Have you ever loved someone else enough to pray and plead for them with God with the same intensity? Have you ever served someone with that kind of attention for that long? I know this audience. And yes, you have.
No one understands that father, better than you do. Jesus said to the father, “Yes, if thou wilt believe all things I shall say unto you, this is possible to him that believeth.”
In other words, the son could receive the miracle if the father has sufficient faith to listen to the Savior and receive His message. Did the father have faith? Yes. He believed enough to seek the Savior out; he believed enough to brave a crowd and ask for a miracle. He believed enough to endure the failure of the apostles, and still wait for the Lord.
But did he have enough faith to do what was required now and receive what he counted as a great miracle? The father looked into his own heart and knew immediately what he was, “Immediately, the father of the child cried out and said, with tears , Lord, I believe, help though, my unbelief.”
Haven’t you ever felt those same words? How many times like that desperate dad have we needed a miracle? And knew we were not enough to merit it?
President Russell M. Nelson said in October 2021, “The Savior is never closer to you, than when you are facing or climbing a mountain with faith in the court. And so it was the case here. With compassion, Jesus rebuked the foul spirit saying unto him, I charged thee to come out of him and enter no more into him.”
That dumb and deaf spirit cried, and rent him sore and came out of him. And he was as one dead in so much that many said, he is dead. But Jesus took him by the hand and lifted him up and he arose, and Luke adds, “…and delivered him again to his father. And they were all amazed at the mighty power of God. “
Can you imagine that father’s joy, relief and profound gratitude? Can you see in your mind, the embrace of welcome recognition between father and son? Can you imagine? After all of this is said and done, the reunion with your family members beyond the veil, by the miracle, glory and power of the atonement of the Lord Jesus Christ and the mercy and grace of a loving father? Is there any prayer a loving Heavenly Father and Savior would be more inclined to hear and answer than that of a desperate pleading parent?
I want you to understand our faithful fathers and mothers on the other side of the veil. They exercise their faith and they pray and plead on our behalf on this side. They see us and they know better than we do, the significance of the mortal journey we are still undertaking. Are we and our children armed with prayers of faith and the power of Jesus Christ.
President Nelson said in that same talk, “Faith in Jesus Christ is the greatest power available to us in this life. All things he said, are possible to them that belief in.”
My friends, if your faith is not enough, if your power is weak, follow the prophets counsel and begin to move the mountains of misery in your life. Jesus is the compassionate deliverer – the all wise savior. Still.
Thank you for listening. Many of the stories you heard today have been published and are archived at glennrawsonstories.com. If you would like more information you can communicate with us there. We will be back again with another podcast next week.
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