Do you feel like you are looking for happiness in all the wrong places? God has given us a timeless recipe for happiness in a three-letter Hebrew word - Hesed.
Science tells us that what people most want and need for happiness is relationships. We want relationships where we can trust others and can depend on them. We want warmth, forgiveness and communication. We want someone who will support us and who is interested in helping us to become the best that we can become. This is at a time when unkindness is epidemic and commitment is viewed as an inconvenience.
How can we find the security, the warmth and the closeness that our soul needs? We can find it in hesed.
Hesed is the term that describes a covenant relationship in which both parties are bound to be loyal and faithful to each other. In this type of relationship we yoke our imperfect selves with God, promising to serve and to help him in certain ways and in return he promises us his mercy, love, safety, constancy, commitment and divine help. As other sources fail, we can find security in a covenant relationship with Jesus Christ. This relationship is changing me and has become a continual source of joy.
I have a dear relative who has experienced the pain of singleness for a lifetime. Lately I have noticed a radiance, peace and joy that she never had before. I knew that she had been attending the temple more often and recently she told me that she had been attending once a day. This was incredible to me considering her busy work schedule and life’s many demands. However, she said that she cannot not attend the temple this often. She has found a serenity and peaceful calm in her relationship with Jesus Christ.
As a teenage girl I found similar peace and joy. Although often lonely, I never felt alone. As I reached out to others in service and lived a bit peculiarly as I chose to follow God and His standards I felt an inner peace and calm. I now know that this feeling of inner peace and security was hesed, the feeling that God had not and would not ever abandon me as I tried imperfectly to stay close to him.
I love this quote: “While the world insists that power, possessions, popularity and pleasures of the flesh bring happiness, they do not. They cannot! What they do produce is nothing but a hollow substitute for ‘the blessed and happy state of those [who] keep the commandments of God…The truth is that it is much more exhausting to seek happiness where you can never find it.’” (Russell M. Nelson. Overcome the World and Find Rest)
So start looking for happiness in all the right places. Try hesed.
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