Whiners and Complainers

September 21, 2009

Whiners and Complainers

Memorable Monday Moments

Maddie, the old man, and Sariah

Technically, this was a seminary lesson, but it would make a great family home lesson as well. I'm sure we had at least one on this topic in the last 25 years! And it might even be more effective at home, because, after all, don't we complain the most to our family members?

The scripture block was 1 Nephi 5 - where Sariah is upset that her sons are taking longer to return to camp than she thought they should have. However, I started the lesson by sharing the first half of a story in the current Friend - "Maddies' Grumpy Afternoon" (click on the title to go to the link). We read another story told by Elder Wirthlin at a BYU Devotional about a complaining husband who switched chores for the day with his non-complaining wife. Go here to read it. And then we read Sariah's story (stopping in the middle of each of these to discuss what might happen next), before finishing Maddie's story.

How do you stop yourself from being a complainer? Elder Wirthlin's advice was to express gratitude. President Hinckley's advice (found in the July 2006 New Era) was to serve someone else. Lehi helped Sariah by bearing testimony to her and helping her see that God was really in charge. It's all about changing our attitude. Remember the sign on President Hinckley's shoe repair shop: "I complained because I had no shoes until I saw a man who had no feet."

To complain means to express dissatisfaction, pain, uneasiness, censure, resentment or grief; to find fault, grumble or whine. None of that is pleasant! The opposite is to rejoice. After discussing the stories, we each looked up scripture on rejoicing in the Topical Guide and shared them. The challenge is to think of that scripture (a lot of which dealt with expressing gratitude to God) whenever we feel like complaining about something. Hopefully that will help.

(It was interesting to hear the comments after I gave that assignment: "There are too many," "That's too hard," "I'm tired," "Why do I have to do that?" Do you think maybe this was a needed topic?)