W-o-w! What an exhausting week! But not bad... just tiring.
Skittles thinks he's the boss of the warehouse...
Scott has been planning on moving the warehouse for over a month and the move happened this weekend. It was a lot of work, and it was successful and the space is amazing! Kiara and I were without husbands for most of the week as they left for work at 5:00 a.m. every day (including Saturday) and didn't get home until around 11:00 p.m. Despite the exhaustion, Scott is excited and happy about how it all "went down."
Working hard... with a smile.
S-P-A-C-E
"Grandpa's chair... and I stole it!"
Thursday I got this book in the mail:
It was AMAZING! I pulled an all-nighter reading it. I finished it in a little less than 20 hours. Suzanne Collins is truly a genius and arguably one of the best authors of our time. I couldn't stop reading. The story was compelling. And many questions from the original Hunger Games were answered. President Snow is still despicable and pure evil, but I "understand" him better now. I also believe completely the opposite of him. I believe that people are born with the Light of Christ inside them and that freedom is our God given right! Government does NOT need to control the population. With that said, I loved the book despite the dark subject.
I am definitely too old for all-nighters. I have been trying to play catch-up from my foray into "reading like a teenager again."
Today we were able to share our home-church with a few of the guys from Idaho that were here for the move. We also shared dinner with them. It was a nice change having more than just 4 of us - we had 8! I was assigned a talk...
I hope everyone has a great week! I'm looking forward to it because my sister is coming to visit and DeGooyer Day is next week! Have a great week!
I'll end with a copy of my talk:
Have you
ever noticed that converts to the Church love to tell their conversion
stories? I love to hear them! My favorite is my father’s conversion story
which, we are blessed to be able to read when ever we want – because of his
autobiographical novel. Most of these
stories explain how they discovered the truth, who helped them and how they
searched for the answer. Finally, they
share the moment they knew the gospel of Jesus Christ was true. In my father’s case, it came as he read the
Book of Mormon by a Coke machine while serving his country.
As much as I
love these conversion stories, sometimes, they lead me to think that conversion
is a once and done event. But testimony
is much more complicated than a one time event.
Questions and doubts and gaining further testimonies is a life-long
process. Sharing our initial stories can
help others better understand the role of faith in becoming a member of the
Church, but once we have our “beginning” we need to continue to grow and
nurture our testimonies.
When we talk
about testimony, we are not talking about blind obedience. We are taught that if we don’t understand or
believe something, we should find out for ourselves. As Glenn Beck says, “Do your own homework.” And I believe that spiritual homework is the
best (and most fun) kind of homework to do.
Alma also says that we need to continue to “experiment upon His words,
and exercise a particle of faith…”
Once we have
an answer from God, it’s no longer blind faith – it is believing. The exciting thing about all of this is that
if we ever hear something we aren’t sure about, we can continue to pray and get
a confirmation about it. We can trust
God and gain stronger testimonies that won’t just fall apart with a puff of
wind.
Doubt is
another aspect of testimony that I’ve struggled with. Having a doubt doesn’t mean we don’t have a
testimony. Doubts happen. But as Elder Uchtdorf said, “doubt your
doubts before you doubt your testimony.”
Most of us have faced moments when we have doubted or struggled. Since we’re not perfect, we don’t always
understand the bigger picture of the gospel.
This isn’t apostasy. This isn’t
bad. God anticipated this and it’s why
he taught us how to pray for a testimony.
Testimonies
emerge over time through life’s experiences.
Elder Robert D. Hales explains, “We can compare testimony to the process
of watching a photograph develop. Powerful
impressions of the Spirit come like flashes of light on receptive photographic
film. Like the chemicals needed in our
lives for our personal testimony to develop into a certain truth and
knowledge. And like a photograph, a
testimony, if not carefully preserved, will fade with time.”
Praying for
a testimony isn’t something we reserve for that first personal revelation. It’s something we can draw on always as a way
to keep our testimonies strong, and to cope with doubts and false information
and challenges that the world sends our way.
I’ve used
prayer to help me with different aspects of my testimony throughout my life. When I struggled with infertility and growing
our family, my testimony of the commandment to “multiply and replenish the
earth” really lacked. It took prayer,
continual study and many prayers on my behalf from my husband and daughters to
develop my testimony of my divinity as a Mother and Nurturer. But that testimony, because of the work and
struggle I had to go through to get it, is strong to it’s core.
Another way
to gain a testimony is to share it. One
of my favorite meetings at Church is the first of each month when other’s
testimonies help strengthen my own. Sharing
our testimonies of gospel principles also keeps our faith strong and helps us
to grow our testimonies.
Because of
the quarantine, I’m still grateful that we can share our testimonies in our
families. And I’ve realized the
blessings of sharing our testimonies through other means too. When a friend shares a quote by one of the
brethren on FB, my heart is brighter.
On a
tangent: I’ve also tried to use my blog
as a medium of keeping our families together but also sharing my testimony. And I’ve noticed than many other LDS bloggers
do the same. Our Church leaders have
instructed us to use technology as a means to share the gospel with
others. It’s sometimes scary to make
ourselves so vulnerable by sharing our personal feelings, but we can positively
influence others through out words.
Elder M. Russell Ballard counseled us to not give into what the Apostle
Paul calls the “spirit of fear”: “Do not be afraid to share with others your
experiences as a follower of the Lord Jesus Christ. We all have interesting stories that have
influenced our identity. Sharing those
stories is a nonthreatening way to talk to others.” Here are some ideas on how to share: 1. Share personal life experiences or insights
from your scripture study. 2. Share what
you learned in general conference or in a Sunday meeting; explain how you’re
applying these teaching to your life. 3.
Share what you’re passionate about in the gospel – whether it’s general
conference, FHE, temples, food storage, etc.
4. Share your conversion
story. 5. Ask questions and spark
discussions. And finally, be real! Don’t
pretend your life is perfect. Try to
show how the gospel helps us in our daily lives and how it brings us joy
despite trials.
Testimonies
help us grow in our understanding of gospel truths. It’s a beautiful and wonderful gift from a
loving Heavenly Father. Let’s make good
use of that gift – and make sure we let others in and out of the Church know it
is a desirable thing to receive a testimony.
Remember that even Nephi, as a teenager, went to God to find out for
himself if what his father had said was true.
He got his answer and stayed strong.
Praying for and sharing our testimonies is not a one time event. It’s something we get to do all our lives –
and that is something to celebrate
Amen
