if we are to meet our Heavenly Father's high expectations.

It is this:

willingly to accept and even seek corrections.

Elder Hugh B. Brown told of purchasing a rundown farm in Canada many years ago.

As he went about cleaning up and repairing his property

he came across a currant bush

that had grown over six feet high

and was yielding no berries.

So he pruned it back drastically

leaving only small stumps.

Then he saw a drop, like a tear, on the top of each of these little stumps

as if the currant bush were crying

and thought he heard it say,

"How could you do this to me?

I was making such wonderful growth, and now you've cut me down.

Every plant in the garden will look down on me.

How could you do this to me?

I thought you were the gardener here."

"Look, little currant bush, I am the gardener here,

and I know what I want you to be.

I don't intend you to be a fruit tree or a shade tree. I want you to be a currant bush.

And someday, little currant bush, when you're laden with fruit,

you're going to say, "Thank you, mister gardener,

for loving me enough to cut me down."

Years later Elder Brown was in line to be promoted to general,

but even though he was fully qualified for the promotion

it was denied him because he was a Mormon.

Continuing his story Elder Brown remembered,

I got on the train and started back with a broken heart,

with bitterness in my soul.

When I got to my tent I threw my cap on the cot.

I clenched my fists and I shook them at heaven.

I said, "How could you do this to me, God?

I've done everything I could to measure up.

How could you do this to me?"

And then I heard a voice. It was my own voice.

And the voice said, "I am the gardener here.

I know what I want you to do."

The bitterness went out of my soul,

and I fell on my knees by the cot to ask forgiveness

for my ungratefulness.

And now almost fifty years later I look up to God and say,

"Thank you, Mister Gardener,

for cutting me down,

for loving me enough to hurt me."

All of us

can meet God's high expectations,

however great or small our capacity and talent may be.

Let us pray for His

love-inspired correction.

In the name of Jesus Christ, amen.