Back in 1850, the Paiutes called the Southern Ute Tribe "The people who talk fancy" because the Utes had such poetic expressions.
I wonder what the Paiutes called the Mormon settlers in the area.
Maybe, "The people who measure everything."
The Mormon pioneers measured the land, measured the rain and probably measured the Paiutes themselves. ("Size 36 long, here!")
Mormons love to measure. We always have. We measure attendance, contributions and the number of visits we make to each other.
We measure baptisms, marriages and deaths.
We measure the year by the number of lessons we give.
Good measurements can make for sturdy buildings and for sturdy, efficient organizations. But when they "go too far," they can make for shaky relationships and shaky lives.
And they "go too far" when we start measuring the motives, behavior and worthiness of other people.
Not until we get to the other side, wrote Elder Neal A. Maxwell, will we see "our lives have been full and fairly measured."
In this life, it's better just to put away the tape.
I like a quote by Henri Nouwen:
"We spend an enormous amount of energy making up our minds about other people. … We hear a lot, see a lot and know a lot. The feeling that we have to sort it all out in our minds and make judgments about it can be quite oppressive."
Most bad behavior in the Bible — in fact, most sin — can probably be summed up in a phrase like: "Measuring others leads to comparisons. And making comparisons leads to pride, envy, covetousness and greed."
"Which of you with taking thought can add to his stature one cubit?" asked the Savior.
Measure not that ye be not measured.
Oswald Chambers said, "We must drop our measuring rods for God and our fellowmen."
Sound advice, that.
Still, for a measure-minded culture like ours, knowing when to back away is not always easy. But a good rule of thumb, I think, would be to back away when the heart comes into play.
We can measure another person's hat size. But we can never measure his heart size.
Hearts are meant to be embraced, not measured.
Mormons aren't the only ones struggling with all this, of course. "Taking someone's measure" was an expression long before we came along. And today, the world spends countless hours asking us to measure and compare. Are we better off than so-and-so? Or slimmer than, tanner than, happier than so-and-so?
When we do that, we need to keep in mind God never worries about portion sizes. When it comes to matters of the heart, he never asks: "Are there enough loaves and fishes to go around? Enough water in that well? Enough oil in that cruse?"
He's never worried about "coming up short." He knows there's an infinite supply. Spiritually, there's enough for everybody, everywhere, all the time.
One size fits all.
We need to keep that in mind, I think, when we catch ourselves behaving like "spiritual tailors."
E-mail: jerjohn@desnews.com