the Bridgekeeper

The Bridge Keeper There was once a bridge which spanned a large river. During most of the day the bridge sat with its length running up and down the river paralleled with the banks, allowing ships to pass thru freely on both sides of the bridge. But at certain times each day, a train would come along and the bridge would be turned sideways across the river, allowing a train to cross it.


A switchman sat in a small shack on one side of the river where he operated the controls to turn the bridge and lock it into place as the train crossed. One evening as the switchman was waiting for the last train of the day to come, he looked off into the distance thru the dimming twilight and caught sight of the trainlights. He stepped to the control and waited until the train was within a prescribed distance when he was to turn the bridge. He turned the bridge into position, but, to his horror, he found the locking control did not work. If the bridge was not securely in position it would wobble back and forth at the ends when the train came onto it, causing the train to jump the track and go crashing into the river.

This would be a passenger train with many people aboard. He left the bridge turned across the river, and hurried across the bridge to the other side of the river where there was a lever switch he could hold to operate the lock manually. He would have to hold the lever back firmly as the train crossed. He could hear the rumble of the train now, and he took hold of the lever and leaned backward to apply his weight to it, locking the bridge. He kept applying the pressure to keep the mechanism locked. Many lives depended on this man’s strength.

Then, coming across the bridge from the direction of his control shack, he heard a sound that made his blood run cold. “Daddy, where are you?” His four-year-old son was crossing the bridge to look for him. His first impulse was to cry out to the child, “Run! Run!” But the train was too close; the tiny legs would never make it across the bridge in time. The man almost left his lever to run and snatch up his son and carry him to safety. But he realized that he could not get back to the lever. Either the people on the train or his little son must die. He took a moment to make his decision. The train sped safely and swiftly on its way, and no one aboard was even aware of the tiny broken body thrown mercilessly into the river by the onrushing train. Nor were they aware of the pitiful figure of the sobbing man, still clinging tightly to the locking lever long after the train had passed.

They did not see him walking home more slowly than he had ever walked: to tell his wife how their son had brutally died. Now if you comprehend the emotions which went this man’s heart, you can begin to understand the feelings of our Father in Heaven when He sacrificed His Son to bridge the gap between us and eternal life. Can there be any wonder that He caused the earth to tremble and the skies to darken when His Son died? How does He feel when we speed along thru life without giving a thought to what was done for us thru Jesus Christ?


This story was made into a foreign film and broken up into 3 parts with english subtitles; most part 1 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tnq1FvnKc-k&feature=relmfu

most part 2 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KpJNkzT-wjc&feature=relmfu

most part 3 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=blD6rKv0JKs&feature=related

abbreviated version http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GhkpxpjHIRg

Abou Ben Adhem

Abou Ben Adhem BY LEIGH HUNT Abou Ben Adhem (may his tribe increase!) Awoke one night from a deep dream of peace, And saw, within the moonlight in his room, Making it rich, and like a lily in bloom,

An angel writing in a book of gold:— Exceeding peace had made Ben Adhem bold, And to the presence in the room he said, "What writest thou?"—The vision raised its head,

And with a look made of all sweet accord, Answered, "The names of those who love the Lord." "And is mine one?" said Abou. "Nay, not so," Replied the angel.

Abou spoke more low, But cheerly still; and said, "I pray thee, then, Write me as one that loves his fellow men."

The angel wrote, and vanished. The next night It came again with a great wakening light, And showed the names whom love of God had blest, And lo! Ben Adhem's name led all the rest.

This is an excerpt from A Place of Knowing by Emma Lou Thayne


When I was a little girl, my father took me to hear Helen Keller in
the Tabernacle (in the 1930’s). I must have been about eight or nine
and I’d read about Helen Keller in school, and my mother had told me
her story.

I remember sitting in the balcony at the back of that huge domed
building that was supposed to have the best acoustics in the world.
Helen—everybody called her that—walked in from behind a curtain under
the choir seats with her teacher, Annie Sullivan. Helen spoke at the
pulpit—without a microphone—but we could hear perfectly, her guttural,
slow, heavily pronounced speech. She spoke about her life and her
beliefs. Her eyes were closed and when it came time for questions from
the audience, she put her fingers on her teacher’s lips and then
repeated for us what the question had been. She answered questions
about being deaf and blind and learning to read and to type and, of
course, to talk. Hearing that voice making words was like hearing
words for the first time, as if language had only come into being—into
my being at least—that moment.
Someone asked her, “Do you feel colors?”


I’ll never forget her answer, the exact sound of it—“Some-times
. .. . I feel . . . blue.” Her voice went up slightly at the end, which
meant she was smiling. The audience didn’t know whether to laugh or cry.


After quite a lot of questions, she said, “I would . . .. like to ask
. . . a fa-vor of you.” Of course, the audience was all alert. “Is
your Mormon prophet here?” she asked. There was a flurry of getting up
from the front row, and President Grant walked up the stairs to the
stand. She reached out her hand and he took it. All I could think was,
“Oh, I wish I were taking pictures of that.”


“I .. . . would like . . . ,” she said, “to hear your organ . . . play
.. . your fa-mous song—about your pio-neers. I . . . would like . . .
to re-mem-ber hear-ing it here.” All the time she was speaking she was
holding his hand he had given her to shake. I liked them together,
very much.


I remember thinking, “I am only a little girl (probably others know)
but how in the world will she hear the organ?” But she turned toward
President Grant and he motioned to Alexander Schreiner, the Tabernacle
organist who was sitting near the loft. At the same time, President
Grant led her up a few steps to the back of the enormous organ—with
its five manuals and eight thousand pipes. We were all spellbound. He
placed her hand on the grained oak of the console, and she stood all
alone facing us in her long, black velvet dress with her right arm
extended, leaning slightly forward and touching the organ, with her
head bowed.


Brother Schreiner played “Come, Come, Ye Saints,” each verse a
different arrangement, the organ pealing and throbbing—the bass pedals
like foghorns—as only he could make happen. Helen Keller stood
there—hearing through her hand and sobbing.

'
Probably a lot more than just me—probably lots of us in the audience
were mouthing the words to ourselves—
“Gird up your loins; fresh courage take. / Our God will never us
forsake; / And soon we’ll have this tale to tell— / All is well! / All
is well!” I could see my great-grandparents, converts from England,
Wales, France, and Denmark, in that circle of their covered wagons,
singing over their fires in the cold nights crossing the plains. Three
of them had babies die; my great-grandmother was buried in Wyoming.
“And should we die before our journey’s through, / Happy day! / All is
well! / We then are free from toil and sorrow, too; / With the just we
shall dwell! / But if our lives are spared again / To see the Saints
their rest obtain, / Oh, how we’ll make this chorus swell— / All is
well! / All is well!”


So then—that tabernacle, that singing, my ancestors welling in me, my
father beside me, that magnificent woman, all combined with the organ
and the man who played it and the man who had led her to it—whatever
passed between the organ and her passed on to me.


I believed. I believed it all—the seeing without seeing, the hearing
without hearing, the going by feel toward something holy, something
that could make her cry, something that could move me, alter me,
something as unexplainable as a vision or a mystic connection,
something entering the pulse of a little girl, something that no
matter what would never go away —all I know to this day is that I
believe.

Two Seas in Palestine

Here is one of my favorite stories: Two Seas in Palestine There are two seas in Palestine—one is fresh and fish are in it. Splashes of green adorn its banks. Trees spread their branches over it, and stretch out their thirsty roots to sip of its healing water. Along its shores the children play as children played when He was there. He loved it. He could look across its silver surface when He spoke His parables, and on a rolling plain not far away He fed five thousand people.

The River Jordan makes this sea with sparkling water from the hills so it laughs in the sunshine, and men build their houses near to it, and the birds build their nests. Every kind of life is happier because it is there. The River Jordan flows on south into another sea. Here is no splash of fish, no fluttering leaf, no songs of birds, no children’s laughter. Travelers choose another route, unless on urgent business. The air hangs heavy above its waters, and neither man nor beast nor fowl will drink.


What makes this mighty difference in these neighbor seas? Not the River Jordan. It empties the same good water into both. Not the soil in which they lie. Not the country roundabout. This is the difference. The Sea of Galilee receives, but does not keep the Jordan; for every drop that flows into it, another drop flows out. The giving and receiving go on in equal measure. The other sea is shrewder, hoarding its income jealously. It will not be tempted into generous impulse. Every drop it gets it keeps. The Sea of Galilee gives and lives. The other sea gives nothing; it is named “The Dead Sea”. There are two kinds of people in the world. There are two seas in Palestine. From Especially for Mormons, 1:334-35.