In The Master's Service

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OUR LIFE SHADE

Elder Louis Culver

Our life shade is being lowered, pulled down by the weight of time. As time hangs heavy upon us in our waning years, we realize that the screen which divides us from the world is slowly settling toward the bottom of our window upon life. We have always known this would take place "someday," but that day always seemed to be so very far into the future. Life is short. The day of our demise is fast approaching and the shade is now being lowered faster and faster.

When we were in our youth, the shade was raised all the way to the top. We were able to look at the future through our mind's eye and see very clearly so many desirable things which lay ahead for us. We could see a family, a home, a career. We were able to see the Church and all its beauty while we gazed upon the vista which lay before us. That Church was a refuge for us, protecting from the dangers of the world. It was a place of great beauty, love and peace. That same Church is today a place of comfort for us as we observe the time approaching when we shall depart at the time when the shade has been fully drawn. The shade is nearly down.

Once our life looked beautiful with all its promises; now life is beautiful because of all its blessings we have received along the way. Our life then and our life now is the same life, but we are now able to view it from two different angles: first, from the innocence of youth and secondly from the experience of having lived. Life, the living and the experiencing of it, has been what has kept us going through the years we have lived until now.

There have been times when we would have welcomed the complete lowering of the shade of life, at least for a while when life seemed to be so harsh, but then the light would suddenly break through the clouds and shine into our life and we would rejoice that the shade was not pulled all the way down.

Yes, we know that our life's shade will someday be pulled all the way down, completely obliterating our sight upon the things of this life, upon all those things we have found to be so joyous and pleasurable to us.

We are not sad, because we know when our shade of life will have been lowered, our shade of Life will have been raised. Amen!