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Stories in this episode: Roger gets a big nudge from heaven when he sits down at the piano to compose a song for the Tabernacle Choir; Tammy's run-in with a broken oven sends her to her knees and then to Google for answers; new convert Nicole's commitment to pay tithing is tested by a broken exhaust pipe; A sick cat causes Mel to see how we can rely on God when everything feels out of our control. Show Notes: To see pictures and links for this episode, go to LDSLiving.com/thisisthegospel Transcript: KaRyn 0:03 Welcome to "This Is the Gospel," an LDS Living podcast where we feature real stories from real people who are practicing and living their faith every day. I'm your host, KaRyn Lay. I'm not much of a morning person. And my ideal morning routine consists of complete silence for the hour it takes me to get ready for work. I don't listen to music. I don't talk. I'm actually kind of grouchy. My husband knows this, and generally leaves me to my solitary morning activities. But a few days ago, I had this overpowering need to listen to something while I got ready. And as I headed towards Spotify and my "Good Songs" playlist, I noticed the Gospel Library app, which I had recently put in the same folder as Spotify next to Netflix, Hulu, and Amazon, in an attempt to choose Jesus over Hollywood. And this one time, it worked. I clicked on the scriptures, and I just hit some random button for 3 Nephi which I guess was where I should probably be for "Come, Follow Me." And as the robot scripture lady started to read the words of the Savior, it dawned on me that I had accidentally started listening to 3 Nephi chapter 13, where the Savior repeats the Sermon on the Mount to the Nephites. I was overwhelmed as I realized that this was exactly what I needed that morning to prepare for the theme of this episode. "Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow, they toil not, neither do they spend. And yet I say unto you, that even Solomon in all his glory, was not arrayed like one of these. Wherefore if God so clothe the grass of the field, even so will he clothed you." This little mourning moment was a perfect illustration of today's stories all about the times in our lives when God steps in to take care of our temporal needs. And we thought there could be no better way to introduce a theme like consider the lilies, than to talk to the man who composed the song by the same name that has become a staple in the repertoire of the Tabernacle Choir at Temple square. Our producer, Erika Free, brings us this story from Roger Hoffman. Erika 2:18 Hi, Roger, nice to meet you sort of in person. I'm Erika. Roger 2:22 Nice to meet you too. I'm Roger. Erika 2:24 Thanks for meeting with me today and— Roger 2:27 Well, I'm excited to do this. Erika 2:29 So I guess the first question I want to ask you is, how did you get into songwriting? And was it easy for you? Roger 2:36 I guess it was about 1982. I left my job so that we could do this full time because leaning on the scripture that says, "Seek ye," and I think the JST says, "Seek ye to build up the kingdom of God," you know, first as it were, "and the all these things," meaning the temporal things, "will be added unto you." So we did that. And it was kind of miraculous because when we needed he money, it was there. I had a friend of mine who I knew at BYU and he came up to me one day after having I hadn't seen him for years and he said, "Could you use a car?" And it was just on the day that ours had died. So we said, "Yes!" Thankfully, and we and we drove it for a couple of years, you know, so it literally was a godsend to us. So a lot of things happened like that. Erika 3:30 So Roger, is that how you got the idea for the song "Consider the Lilies"? What was it like for you to write that song? Roger 3:37 Our bishop had let me borrow a key because we couldn't afford a piano. So I went over there and did my working. And one day, I was just sitting at the piano, piano in the chapel, and playing along with little things. And then this melodic device came into my mind, "Dada, dada, dada, dadum, dadum, dadum, and I thought, "Oh my, that's better than what I write." But then words started to flow into my mind. And just about as quickly as I could write it, I probably, I think I wrote it on the back of an envelope, which is where a lot of things are written, "Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow, how they grow." And I said, "That's, that is the image. That is what we want to tell our friends," because you know what comes after, "He clothes the lilies of the field, He feeds the birds in the sky, and He will feed those who trust Him and guide them with His eye." Oh boy, that was perfect. That's what we wanted to say. And so more, more words came, "Consider the sheep of His fold, how they follow where He leads, though the past may wind across the mountains," and mountains are symbolic of difficulty for me. "He knows the meadows where they feed," He's not going to leave you hanging on the mountains, you know. And "He clothes the lilies of the field, He feeds the birds in the sky, and He will feed those who trust Him and guide them with His eye," cementing that wonderful image and, really, that was all I had come to say. And so I thought, "Wow, that's great, I'm done." And so I got up. But there was almost a kind of a discernible little tug on me that says, "Sit back down, you're not done." All of this, of course, not happening in words, just impressions in your mind. And so I did. And this, this line came to me, which blew me away. "Consider the sweet, tender children who must suffer on this earth." And I thought, "Lord, you can't expect me to answer that huge problem in the next couple of lines, you know." And I got up again, and, I'm done. We could change the key of the chorus and have a nice song, you know. But then the thought came to my mind, "You're not writing this anyway." Oh. So I sat down, and I just listened. "Consider the sweet, tender children who must suffer on this earth. The pains of all of them He carried. Since the day of His birth, He clothed the lilies of the field." And here it changed. "He feeds the lambs in His fold, children, and He will heal those who trust Him and make their hearts as gold." Oh, my, when that entire passage of thinking came to me, I was just overwhelmed. It was so beautiful. It was so right. So loving of the Lord. So I was kind of a gone man for the rest of the day. Erika 6:39 Wow, I've always had a special place in my heart for this song, and hearing about how it was written, makes it that much more special. Thank you for sharing. So real quick, though, back to that moment when you have the line come in about the children and you said, "I can't do this." And you stood up, what, what did that feel like? What else was going through your mind? Roger 7:02 One of the things was I am not adequate. Wonder if anybody else in the world has ever thought that, you know? Here is this big, giant thing that you've dropped in my lap and I am not adequate to do this. Of course, the Lord knew that. He said, "I know, I know, but I am. So hold on, stay there, and I'll give you the rest of it," you know. And so anyway, that's, that was kind of what's going through my mind and in my heart at the time. Erika 7:35 What did you learn about our Heavenly Father or our Savior throughout this experience of writing this song? Roger 7:43 A thing that I have learned from the experience of "Consider the Lilies," and really our whole lives, is man's dependence on God and God's fruitful, generous answer to man's need. Moses said after he'd seen all the planets and the whole great plan of God, "Now I know that man is nothing, which thing I never before had supposed." And I almost think the sooner we realize how little we are, and I don't mean little, I mean, like, as an a child, little tiny, you know, developmental person, then the Lord is so willing to just pour into us what we need to grow, we've seen evidence of that. I guess it's been how long? Thirty-seven years we've been doing this. So that's probably the biggest thing I think I've taken from it. KaRyn 8:50 That was Roger Hoffman. I don't know if I'm supposed to call a composer adorable but I adore everything about Roger and the story of how the song came to be, from the borrowed key to the back of the envelope to the sweet pushiness of the Spirit telling him to sit back down on that bench he's not done. All of those things are a testament to the sermon that the words of the song teach every time it's sung, God's got this. And if we show up, He'll take whatever cloth we bring with us and spin it into gold. Our next storyteller is Tammy who learned that God can and will use whatever means necessary, including Google, to show us His power. Here's Tammy. Tammy 9:34 Well, my oven died—again. My oven has died so many times, and we replaced the main control board so many times. But this last time when the man came to replace it, he said to me that our oven is so old, we can't even order the part anymore. And I just knew what that meant. And I looked at him and he looked at me and he just said, "You're going to need to buy a new oven." Now, that might seem pretty easy, a new oven. But no, no, it's not going to be that simple because apparently I have to replace the entire wall unit, which means a microwave, a warmer, and an oven. So I have to replace this wall unit, and I know it's expensive. And I'm trying so hard not to completely lose it and freak out in front of this man who cannot repair my oven. So he left and I began talking to my husband about it, we do not have enough money to replace this. But I like have no other option. Without completely redoing my kitchen, I mean, you can't just take the oven out and replace it (because I tried), I thought that was an option. And it just wasn't because it's a wall unit. So I figured, you know what, it's summer, we don't even need an oven. We'll just, we'll cook outdoors all summer long. And so I'd say for a good two months, we barbecued everything, including cookies. I tried to make cookies on a barbecue (FYI, doesn't really work). After weeks and weeks of not having an oven, now we're into the months of not having an oven. And I can't even do my normal things, like, I can't do normal dinner time, I can't do normal family meals. So we go ahead and bite the bullet. My husband, Jim, and I we sit down, we work through the budget, we come up with the amount that we can pay for after some scrimping and saving to make this work—without having to sell one of our children. But even with that amount of money, like we know replacing this whole wall unit, it just can't possibly happen with the budget we have. The most inexpensive wall unit that I could find started around twice my whole budget. And I'm like that is this, no, I can't even, I don't even have a place for that kind of money. So then I started doing more research. And my mom worked for a man who happened to actually sell ovens and he said, "We'll give her the employee price discount," which I thought was so generous. And I went online to look up their ovens and those ovens, they were around four times the price that we were able to pay for a new oven. And yeah, that's not gonna happen either. And so I was super frustrated and sad. And I finally decided, you know what, I'm going to, I'm going to pray about this because I don't know any other way to get an oven within my budget. And I knew I could ask Heavenly Father for help. I've just always known that, I've had that experience many times in my life, where I could just go to Him with something. Like, anytime I lose something, I always pray to find it and I do. And so I thought, "You know what? I didn't really lose anything, but I do need to find something. So maybe Heavenly Father can help me find a decent wall unit that's within my budget." And so I did, I got on my knees that night for my nightly prayers and I just said, "Heavenly Father, hi. Listen, I know there's a lot going on in this world, but help a sister out because I need a new oven." And I'm like, "And here's my budget, like real, real small. And so if you could just help me find a wall unit within my price range, I would really, really, really, really appreciate it. But if not, help me find a way to buy an oven, I don't know what we're going to do. We're kind of at an impasse." And that was the end of my prayer. And I just trusted that Heavenly Father was going to help me out and I just left it at that. I didn't know what to do. I didn't know where I was going to go. I had no idea. And so I just let it sit with me for a couple of days. And I'll be, three days later, as I had a chance to just sit down and be quiet for a minute, because I had been so busy for three days, the minute I sat down, the thought popped into my head, "Google where to find wall oven units in Utah." That's where I live. So I Googled it and up popped an ad for this store in Utah that is very expensive. Like completely out of my league. I've been in the store maybe two times only to go in and turn around saying, "I can't afford anything in here." So the thought that I would even click on this is absurd, but I did. And, boom, there is the wall oven unit that is the exact same make and model as the one that I need replaced and it's a newer version, so things can be repaired. And when I looked at the price that this company was selling this wall oven unit for, I didn't believe it. So I had to show my husband, and he didn't believe it. I mean, it was just such a funny moment because we kept looking at each other like, "Wait, is this for real? I can't believe it. Did I just find what I needed on my first click? Is God really that good?" I mean, I'm just, my husband's even thinking this cannot be true. We got to make a phone call. So we called them and we found out it is true. It's still in stock. And my husband said, "We'll be there in 15 minutes." We've never moved quicker. We got in the car, we drove down to that store, we ran inside. And it just happened to be a wall oven unit that they had been using in their showroom, which had never been used. It was just purely for show. And it was not only within my budget, it came in like 300% under my budget, I think. Listen, I'm not good at the public math, but maybe 3,000% under my budget? All I know is that it came so far in under budget I actually had money left over. I mean it was ridiculous how under my budget it came in. So we bought the oven. After about two or three more weeks, we finally got it in and we celebrated. The first thing we did was we made cookies. We were so excited. And then every day since, we probably use the oven for all sorts of fun things. Having heavenly father helped me find this oven was just once again a testimony to me from Him, that He loves me. And I will remember, I will remember this story The next time I pray about something that doesn't go the way I'd hoped. I have so many stories in my life where God didn't give me what I asked for. In fact, for 18 years I prayed daily that I…
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