Garnish

Let thy bowels also be full of charity towards all men, and to the household of faith,
and let virtue garnish thy thoughts unceasingly;
then shall thy confidence wax strong in the presence of God;
and the doctrine of the priesthood shall distil upon thy soul as the dews from heaven.
Doctrine & Covenants 121:45

This is one of my favorite verses of scripture. It is so full of meaning, counsel, and promise. Recently I spent time pondering the part about virtue being a garnish.

What is a garnish? Every time I hear the word I think of the line in You’ve Got Mail (1998) about the caviar garnish.

When my dad was in college, he and his roommates collected all the parsley from the cafeteria during dinner once to make corsages for their dates. They had real corsages in the cars waiting for them.

Garnish must be more than a decorative addition to a dinner plate. Especially if it is virtue that should be garnishing my thoughts. Virtue should have a larger role than a decorative addition to my life.

The word “garnish” comes from Old French where it meant provide, furnish, defend. Before that it came from a pre-Germanic language and meant to be cautious or guard.

Virtue doesn’t just make your thoughts look good, it protects them. It defends them. With virtuously guarded thoughts my faith and trust, my confidence in my God can grow strong, my understanding can increase.

I may never look at parsley the same again.