Families are like quilts—Beautiful in their variety

Slice and dice: it works when we're making a salad. But it doesn't work very well with family relationships. In fact, our Heavenly Father intended family relationships to be the very place where we learn to love our neighbor and to love God.

But how would we learn to truly “love our neighbor” if everyone in our family was easy to love, or if everyone was the same? You don't have to be afraid of the variety in your family. Families are meant to have variety, allowing us to expand our capacity to love like Jesus loves—right in the middle of our families.

Paul taught that Christlike love is not “easily provoked” and “endures” the harder times. It “suffereth long, and is kind” (1 Cor 13:4-5 KJV). How could “suffering long” and being “not easily provoked” help with your family? Or think about this: How could you increase your capacity to love like Jesus if you were never provoked or offended?

Tamara Runia teaches, “After Christ finished washing his apostles’ feet during the Last Supper, he taught them, ‘By this shall all men know that ye are my disciples, if ye have love one to another….” If Christ discerns His disciples by the quality of their love, then families must be the classroom where we put that love into practice” (Deseret News 6/10/2023).

Experiences together over many years, even awkward experiences, create understanding and connection. One very early morning during my first summer in Alaska, my sister-in-law was awakened suddenly by the boom, thump, boom against her bedroom wall as I tumbled down the stairs after tripping on my fishing waders and rain gear. We laughed about that in the afternoon; she was gracious as I interrupted her sleep.

“Do you know what an amazing mother my wife was?" my father-in-law asked me frequently. “One year she boiled a dead lynx and put that whole skeleton together for her son's science project. Can you imagine that?" he said, clearly impressed with his wife.

I was not as impressed as he was, since my children were babies and I had not considered doing a science project myself. But now that my kids are grown, I realize that the science projects I sponsored were things like “which milk goes sour first” or “which bread gets moldy the fastest? (The answers are: skim and wheat). But I never would have taken on the lynx. Well done to my mother-in-law. Today I can celebrate her amazing achievement with full appreciation.

In my early Alaska years, I visited often with my grandmother-in-law, “Gammee.” She was somewhat of a rogue, eloping in her late teens; a strong woman who provided for her two children when her husband left them in the 1930s. She played the guitar and sang for the radio, cooked for a busy ranch (she mixed bread dough every morning so it would be ready for dinner, and mixed bread dough every evening so it would be ready for breakfast). She met her husband of over forty years when he regularly came to the café where she worked, and one day took her to see the business he owned. And that was that. I knew her to be a lady of fashion and determination. I found her life story to be full of fortitude and grace. I wrote her stories down for my future children and other family members.

Several years ago, I was at a family gathering for my in-laws. All of the family came together from around the country. There they were, a patchwork quilt of people, each of whom I had grown to love. Each had their unique idiosyncrasies, talents, and perspectives. There was so much variety. And I love every one of them. As in every family, we have had misunderstandings, hurt feelings, and opportunities for offense. But we didn’t let those things cut off our relationships. We moved through them together. And what is left, over all these years, is like refined gold. Encompassing love. Multi-faceted friendships.

“People today won’t live with discomfort,” said an older cousin. He grew up on a ranch in the 1940’s with a widowed mom, an outhouse and a wood stove. He was talking about the physical hardships of life. But I think the same can be true with relationships today—that we are often unwilling to tolerate the discomforts of relationships. The “boundary” concept of our culture can be taken to such an extreme that if a relationship is not exactly what we want it to be, we deem it not worth having. Relationships require tolerating imperfections and working through them together. If we cut off every relationship that is not perfect, we may find ourselves isolated in a prison of sorts, that we created for ourselves.

This Thanksgiving season, I am thankful for all of the patchwork-quilt family that is mine. I love every one of them. A lifetime of love is deep, and I am blessed.

Beth Wright loves her family and loves Jesus. She is thankful to be a member of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.