Dave Mission College

 Susan Brough taught Sunday School today.  She shared this experience of her husband's.  Growing up his family wasn't active.  When it was time for him to go to college, he went for one year to BYU.  Then he returned home to Wyoming to go to the local college because he couldn't afford to continue at BYU.  He got accepted to the University of Utah for medical school and he was so excited. One night he was at the church, playing basketball, when his stake president asked if he could talk to Dave.  His stake president asked if he had considered serving a mission.  He really hadn't.  He didn't have the money, he'd made it into medical school, he hadn't been raised as an active member of the church.  It didn't seem possible or feasible for him.  His stake president told him to go home and pray about it. He did.  He wrestled with the decision.  But ultimately he decided to go.  Shortly after he found out that he was being offered a full ride scholarship to BYU which would allow him to continue his education after he returned from his mission.  His mission was the foundation to his testimony of the gospel and the foundation to their family.  

LESSONS LEARNED:

If we pray about what to do, the Lord will guide us or at least warn us if we are heading in the wrong direction.

Leaders can have a big impact when they counsel and invite others to make choices that help them get on and stay on the covenant path.

Grandpa Broccoli Try

 My grandpa Reed Bills hated broccoli.  He didn't seem to complain about much, but we all knew he disliked broccoli.  Yet at least once a year, he would eat broccoli in front of us and tell us (as near as I remember...this is definitely not a direct quote!)  "I don't like broccoli.  But I keep trying it once a year.  Maybe some day my taste buds will change.  But this is not the year that happens."  And he would grin and chuckle.  He always seemed to handle things with a sense of humor.

LESSONS LEARNED:

It's kind of a silly thing and definitely a simple thing.  But it taught me a few valuable lessons.  First, we should keep trying things because something we dislike now may eventually become something we enjoy.  Tastes change as our experiences change.

Second, I learned that it is okay if we have different interests, likes, and dislikes from those we love.  I love broccoli, especially roasted broccoli.  

Handle things with a smile and if possible a sense of humor.  (I don't feel like humor comes naturally to me as it did to him but how I appreciate those who do have a sense of humor!)

Don't complain.

Jenny Desire Love

 I am grateful for the words in D&C 137: 9 For I, the Lord, will judge all men according to their works, according to the desire of their hearts.

I also love the words of D&C 11:8:  "Verily, verily, I say unto you, even as you desire of me so it shall be done unto you; and, if you desire, you shall be the means of doing much good in this generation."

So often my desires are better than my actual actions.  

I see this often in my relationships with my family (and others as well).  I want to be patient and kind and loving.  I want to respond with love when my children make mistakes or when they say or do hurtful things.  I want to put my marriage and family first.  But, especially when I am tired or stressed, I often respond in less than ideal ways.    I get pouty or become silent when I'm hurt.  I respond angrily to mistakes or to less than perfect behavior.  I take offense when none was meant.  

In 2017, I was struck by Sister Neill F. Marriott's words:  "It is now, with our mortal limitations, that the Father asks us to love when loving is most difficult, to serve when serving is inconvenient, to forgive when forgiving is soul stretching."

I was struck by this experience she shared:

One memorable night a relative and I disagreed about a political issue. She briskly and thoroughly took my comments apart, proving me wrong within earshot of family members. I felt foolish and uninformed—and I probably was. That night as I knelt to pray, I hurried to explain to Heavenly Father how difficult this relative was! I talked on and on. Perhaps I paused in my complaining and the Holy Ghost had a chance to get my attention, because, to my surprise, I next heard myself say, “You probably want me to love her.” Love her? I prayed on, saying something like, “How can I love her? I don’t think I even like her. My heart is hard; my feelings are hurt. I can’t do it.”

Then, surely with help from the Spirit, I had a new thought as I said, “But You love her, Heavenly Father. Would You give me a portion of Your love for her—so I can love her too?” My hard feelings softened, my heart started to change, and I began to see this person differently. I began to sense her real value that Heavenly Father saw. Isaiah writes, “The Lord bindeth up the breach of his people, and healeth the stroke of their wound.”¹⁰

Over time the gap between us sweetly closed. But even if she had not accepted my changed heart, I had learned that Heavenly Father will help us love even those we may think are unlovable, if we plead for His aid. The Savior’s Atonement is a conduit for the constant flow of charity from our Father in Heaven. We must choose to abide in this love in order to have charity for all.

I recognized a relationship of mine that was in need of some healing.  I recognized the ways that I had contributed to that breach.  I began to pray daily for healing and forgiveness.  I pray OFTEN to respond to others with love even when my feelings are hurt or when it feels "soul-stretching" to do so.  And I have made progress.  Sometimes when something hurtful is said, I am able to almost immediately stop what I'm doing, pray and respond calmly and politely.  But far too often I respond by saying something snarky or by drawing away from the person or ocassionally by gossiping about the experience.  My desires are good...but my actions often aren't!  I will keep trying and I believe that over time my actions can become better aligned with my desires.  And I will continue to try to refine my desires as well.

I love these quotes by Elder Maxwell: 

"Desire denotes a real longing or craving. Hence righteous desires are much more than passive preferences or fleeting feelings....Therefore, what we insistently desire, over time, is what we will eventually become and what we will receive in eternity."

"Whenever spiritually significant things are under way, righteous desires are present."

Lessons Learned:
The Savior will judge us based on our actions AND desires.

Our desires can lead us to be the means of doing much good.

We can become more loving and forgiving and Christlike IF we desire to do so and seek the Lord's help.

Becoming truly charitable and developing love for others is an ongoing process and requires time and repentance and growth and learning and becoming.

 

Jenny Skip School

 When I was in junior high, there was a lot of peer pressure.  Like insane amounts.  I probably should write another whole post about that.  

At one point, some friends encouraged me to skip class.  I don't remember why or what they said, but they talked me into it and I said I would the next day.  At the end of the day we had a study hall where we could do homework or read a book.  It was shorter than a regular period, maybe 30 minutes?   I decided to skip that.  I was scared to go anywhere or do anything...and my grandma picked me up after school because we lived at their house and it was too far away to walk.   So I just went into the girls' bathroom and hung out in a stall.  I felt so nervous that I was going to get in trouble.  I felt so worried all that evening that my mom would get a phone call that I wasn't in study hall.  It was an absolutely miserable experience.  I decided then and there to never repeat the experience and basically never did.  (I did take one class in college that I regularly skipped because it was taught by grad students and they literally just read to us from the textbook...so I just read the textbook and skipped class. And I think I occasionally missed other classes in college and I, of course, missed days throughout school when I was sick.)

LESSONS LEARNED:  Be where you are supposed to be.

Poor choices often lead to feelings of worry, guilt, and disappointment in yourself.  They are rarely worth it!!

Emily Freeman Yoke Hiker

 Emily Freeman in Even This:

"One experience with God's goodness doesn't tie us to Him forever."  (13)

A group of 7 gather each week one summer to talk about scripture.  Every one in the group is in high school, except Emily.  They gather and talk about what they have learned and they ask questions.  One young man has been studying and discussing what it means to yoke yourself to the Lord.

On one particular night, he doesn't read a verse of scripture.  Instead he talks of a high adventure camp he had just gone to.  They'd gone on a hike and he had reached the top first.  He sat down to recover and catch his breath.  A leader invited those who were already at the top to head down again and help those who were farther behind and struggling.    But he felt tired.  And others got up to go.  So he justified staying at the top.

The next morning, he felt guilt.  He'd been learning and studying the yoke.  The sharing of the burden with the Lord.  And he'd had an opportunity to lighten someone else's burden--to share their yoke--and he had refused.  He told them there, in Emily's backyard, that he had done the learning of it but not the living of it.

On the third day of the high adventure camp, a new opportunity to share burdens came.  An opportunity to go and help a straggler.  He went all the way back to the boy who was the farthest behind and took his pack.  He told the group that he didn't even feel the weight...and he said that maybe that is what the yoke is like.  Sharing the burden makes it lighter.

LESSONS LEARNED:  

How often do I do the learning but not the living?   

The words to Blake Gillette's song "I'll Be What I Believe":
"I'll have faith like brother Joseph and the strength of the pioneers

I'll be brave as a stripling warrior and like Nephi persevere

I will spread God's love to all I know and serve

I will plead with my Father on my knees, I will be what I believe"

If I share another's burden, it becomes lighter.  If I share my burdens (with the Lord or with others), they become lighter.

Guilt often leads us to change.  It's an important part of the repentance process.

Emily Freeman Greg Sick

 Emily tells this story in her book Even This.  It's four days before her wedding.  Greg is sick.  The doctor asks if they can postpone the wedding.  They won't.  So they schedule an appointment with an oncologist for right after their honeymoon.  Greg might have thyroid cancer.  Right after their honeymoon, there was a biopsy, then surgery and then three months of recovery without work.  

Her most vivid memory from the first months of their marriage took place in the hospital after the surgery to remove the tumor.  Greg had been given pain meds.  Greg's parents had gone home.  The doctors had left.  She sat next to Greg and held his hand.  She felt scared and alone and unprepared.  She saw a light flooding in under the door and she focused on that light, "on the truth that all is not dark".  She begins to pray.  A feeling of love settled over her and words to scriptures came to mind.  She grabs a paperback book and finds a pen to write the words down.

She wrote this:  

"Early morning, January 1990

  I can't describe this moment.  ...Sometimes it has to hurt to make you strong, to make you realize how much you need God.  I don't want to forget this.  These words.  His words.  Draw near unto me and I will draw near unto you.  My peace I give unto you.  Be still, and know that I am God."

She writes that this is the first time she realized that God can be trusted, that He is a personal God, that she can turn to Him in her hard.

She writes, "It was the first time I had let myself be vulnerable with Him.  The rawness led me to experience His realness.  In that moment I felt His goodness."

LESSONS LEARNED:  

God is there.  We can turn to Him with our HARD...no matter what it is.

We are never alone.

God is good.  He can be trusted.

We can find peace even in the midst of hard. 

 D&C 88: 63, "Draw near unto me and I will draw near unto you."

D&C 101:16  "Be still and know that I am God."

John 14: 26  "27 ^aPeace I leave with you, my ^bpeace I give unto you: not as the world giveth, give I unto you. Let not your heart be ^ctroubled, neither let it be afraid."

Parents Divorce Eternal

Just a couple of weeks before my 14th birthday, my dad came for a visit.  (I've likely written about this elsewhere on my blog and definitely wrote a lot about it in my journal back then.)  He'd moved to Texas "for a job" and as far as we kids knew, we would be moving to Texas that summer to join him. Over the weekend we went and got family pictures taken.  We spent time together.  It was great.  Then Monday morning when we woke up, our parents weren't home.  I asked my grandparents where they were and they just said they would be back in a while.  They got home and said they were taking us out for lunch.  We almost never went out to eat back then so that felt special.  After lunch, they took us to a park, sat us down and told us they had gotten divorced that morning.  I don't remember most of what they said...they said they still loved each other and maybe things would work out for them to get back together and none of it was our fault and I don't even know what else.  I felt numb.

When we got back to my paternal grandparents' home (where my mom and my sisters and I were living), my cousins Amy and Laura were there.  Their parents had divorced so I think it was meant to comfort and help us.  And of my paternal cousins, they were my only older cousins and I looked up to them. But I don't think it was much comfort to have them there.

Eighth grade was a hard year...before and after the divorce.  My best friend had moved and didn't live nearby anymore.  (To my mom's credit, she drove me to Peoria fairly often to see Tacia.)  There was a lot of peer pressure and that is a hard age any way.  And now, completely unexpectedly, my parents were divorced.  

I struggled.  I remember crying a lot.  I remember having a lot of questions.  You see, it suddenly hurt like crazy to sing "I have a family here on Earth.  They are so good to me.  I want to share my life with them thru all eternity.  Families can be together forever, through Heavenly Father's plan.  I always want to be with my own family and the Lord has showed me how I can."  Was that true for me anymore?  If my parents were divorced, then how could my family be eternal?   My questions and fears intensified when my mom decided to remarry Mike about a year and a half later.  She applied to have her sealing to my dad broken and I didn't know what that meant for me.  Who was I sealed to?  Would I have to choose between my parents?  What did that mean for my dad?  And by then, I knew a lot more about the reasons behind my parents' divorce and the big mistakes my dad had made.  So I also had questions about why he would do the things he did.  And did I want to be with him?  And how could I ever consider getting married when it could turn out so awfully and cause me and especially my future children so much pain?  I had a lot of questions.  I didn't get all the answers right away.  I'm not sure that I 100% understand know and understand exactly what eternity will be like.  But over time I got many answers and most importantly, I gained peace.  I came to understand that families can be eternal and that God is good and that though my family was imperfect and I was imperfect, there was still hope.  And our family situations will be sorted out and we will get more than we deserve.  

LESSONS LEARNED:

Mortality is messy and complicated and sometimes heart-breaking.  And yet, peace can be found even in the midst of the mess and the heart-break.  Sometimes it takes time for the peace to come, but if we are on the covenant path, it will come.

Families CAN be together forever.  And if your family isn't the "ideal" (most families aren't!!) you can trust that God will work things out and it will be for your good.

God is good.  

It's okay to ask questions.  In fact, it is good!   But try to approach them with an eye of faith.  

Maintain hope.