1 Timothy 4 and 5

Paul prophecies about some of the things that will happen in the latter days, our time, that will affect not only those in the church, but all people. He speaks of the people falling away because they give heed to things that aren’t true. Of the things he prophesys, one that stands out to me is the forbidding of marriage. Today, a relationship is the preferred arrangement by many. I think relationships are preferred because they offer an easy out. They don’t require a commitment that is binding. Most often they are based on the physical which is mistakenly called love. The physical expression of love is important, but is woefully short of the true expression of love that comes from years of commitment and sacrifice. President Kimball once taught that he saw true love expressed He didn’t see expressed between a young couple newly fallen in love, but between an elderly man and his wife as he watched his friend take care of his invalid wife, bathing her, feeding her, and combing her hair for the twenty years before she died.

The earth was created for the express purpose of establishing families. The family is the most marvelous of all of God’s creations. A family is the one place where you belong without qualifications. It is the place where you are loved regardless of your shortcomings and failures. It is the one group of people that you can count on above all others. No one does everything right in a family. Sometime selfishness replaces love. Parents sometimes mess up some things raising their children. Children don’t always live up to the standards their parents hope they have instilled in them. A million and one things can go wrong in a family. But in the end, they still have each other. And in God’s end, the atonement will heal and make right what was wrong, and exalt those families in a union that is sealed together for eternity.

1 Timothy 5

Nearly a whole chapter is dedicated to taking care of the widows in their midst. It is so important that we revere and care for the elderly. Also important in this chapter is Paul’s counsel that a man must provide for his family otherwise he’s denying the faith. I have always had a difficult time with men who could never seem to find work and relied on their wives to bring in the income. Working at McDonalds would be better than nothing at all.