Today in my entrepreneurship class we had a guest lecturer. His name was Jeff Peterson. Jeff was there to teach us about using the web in business and the business side of his presentation was very good. I learned some very useful things from him that I am excited about trying to implement. However, there was one part of his lecture that really caught my attention for a different reason.
Jeff started out his lecture by telling the class about the time that Jesus Christ spent fasting in the wilderness, and how Satan came up to Him and tempted Him to turn stones into bread because He could and He was hungry. His point in this story was to illustrate how there are countless people on the internet trying to get others to pay for, in essence, nothing; that these people are turning stones into bread and that Jeff didn't believe in that. He said that he felt that God had guided him into his line of work and that everything he did in business was a deeply spiritual matter.
This so impressed me! Being a religious person I am very used to people who are of my same religion saying things like this. I am very used to talking with people of my religion about spiritual matters and trusting God in our lives. I am so not used to hearing people who are not of my religion speak of these things. I don't know why, but I'm not. Because of this, I feel that it is very easy to, as a member of any religion, fall into an attitude of “it's us against the world” and feel that only other members of your religion are doing things in life that are worthwhile, from a religious perspective. This is especially true if you are a member of a religion or belief that does things differently, or completely opposite, from what everybody else seems to do.
My lesson that I learned today is this: There are wonderful people in this world! It really is a very heartening and uplifting thing to learn. Of course, I “knew” this principle already, but I have never experienced it in this way. I am grateful for Jeff Peterson's testimony of God in his life, because it is true. God is a part of everyone's life, whether they admit it or not. It doesn't matter that we are members of different religions. We are both good people. So here is my challenge; it goes along with my lesson: to look at all the people I know who believe differently than me and start listing the qualities that make them good people, instead of feeling unsure or uneasy about things they do or say simply because we are different. I challenge anyone who reads this to do it too.
I'm glad you were able to have such an experience - although the cynic in me asks why such a religious point was made in an entrepreneur class - because it's something I've been trying to advocate for quite some time.
ReplyDeleteOne of my favorite quotes of all time comes from perhaps the second greatest Latter-Day Saint of all time, in terms of commitment to the Gospel and to his fellow human beings, Brigham Young. He said, "A good man is a good man, whether in this Church, or out of it." He was a firm believer that the Gospel was a blessing, a privilege, and a responsibility, not a plaque establishing a credential of superiority over everyone else.
One problem with groups - all groups, not just Mormondom - is that people start to feel afraid of those who think differently, even within their own ranks. There becomes an established view of what is "right" and what is "wrong" until eventually everything, whether it be a view of Heaven or a view on politics, has a "right" answer, and everything else is "wrong". Tied in to this becomes a view that only those who hold the "right" view are the "good" people, and everyone else becomes "of the world".
This last Sunday a man gave perhaps the greatest Sacrament meeting talk I've heard since I've been married about the Good Samaritan, and he raised a point not often raised: the men who passed by the beaten man in that story with contempt and disregard were members of the Church (when viewed in the context of that time)! The man who helped, the Samaritan, was not; and more than that, he was looked down upon and belittled for not being a member of the Church.
How much does that compare to our times today?
I wish more members of my own religion - and perhaps all religions - could recognize that.