MILLSTONES & MIRACLES

Knowing God’s will may be a difficult concept to grasp.  Some may ask, it is possible to know God’s will?  It feels like a mountain that is impossible to climb.  But even the highest, most impossible climbs have been accomplished.  

On a global scale, it’s not likely that we can know God’s will for the entire world.  On a personal scale, I believe it is possible to know His will for our lives.  It is my opinion that one of the hardest things we are meant to do in this life is to understand and know our Heavenly Father’s will for us personally.  The next, and possibly harder thing is to then do His will.

Is it important to know God’s will for our lives?  I think it’s not only important, but it’s essential.  This life is hard to maneuver through.  To maneuver involves action that requires skill, something that is deliberate or planned.  It may also involve a purposeful change of course in our lives.  The world is a confusing place to be right now.  We need guidance from heaven in order to find our way through the commotion. God sees and knows the big picture of life and its’ purposes, He holds the ultimate knowledge and skills to understand what we are going through.  We NEED to know His will and understand His purposes for our lives.  Making our own judgments about how to find our way in a messy world is just not enough.

I felt so lost as my trial began.  For me, turning to the Lord for answers and to know His will for my life was a natural outcome of my desperation to simply continue life, to survive the days.  I did not know what to do of my own accord, so I turned to my sweet Father in Heaven because I knew He would know what I should do even if I did not.  I wanted to do what He desired of me.  I yearned to know His will.  My desire to know what He wanted was born out of the despair of my heart.  I wanted His will to become my will.  I had no other desire because I knew that He was the only way that I could be delivered from this trial.  My desire to know the will of my Father in Heaven rose above all other desires in me.  Coming to that place of desiring and understanding His will came from the deepest, darkest condition of my soul that I had ever experienced.  My desire to know the Lord’s will became my greatest blessing of all the things I learned in my anguish. 

The Lord sent me answer after answer of what He wanted me to do.  Sometimes these answers would go against what someone else was telling me I should do, and that made it harder to stay focused on the Lord’s will.  But I found that as I listened, felt His will and did as the Lord guided, I was blessed with such peace.  Things that didn’t seem to have any way of working out did work out.  That isn’t to say that life was easy (it was not) as I took the path of following His will, but my children and I were blessed in ways that I couldn’t have imagined or expected.  Miracles rose out of the heartache of my life, and I was continually amazed at God’s grace and love for me and my children.  It was a line upon line, precept on precept journey, here a little and there a little.  I had to be patient and sometimes it was very hard to be patient.  I did not have the capacity to see the big picture then, but with eyes that can now look into the past and see how it has all come together, it was an amazing journey! 

I’d like to share specific things I learned in my journey to understand, know and do God’s will.

• How can we get to a place in our understanding to know what God’s will is for our lives?  It seems like a tall order to fill.  Our biggest roadblock to know His will is because of the limitations of our own human nature.  It’s not very comfortable to consult with someone else when making decisions for our lives – it takes vulnerability!  It is so hard for us to let go of our own desires and listen someone else’s advice.  It is not weakness in our characters to listen to advice from someone else who has experience and wisdom.  We can trust God to be the most trustworthy individual in our lives to guide us.  Letting go of our own desires and doing what God desires for us may be very difficult, yet it is the key to happiness and real peace if do just that.  We must be willing to let go of our wants and wishes so that the Lord can send us what He desires for our lives. 
• We might wonder…how can I know God’s will?  How can I let go of my own agenda?  It sounds simple, but it begins with personal communication with God.  Pray and ask for help.  Knowing God’s will can be accomplished through meaningful, personal prayer as we develop a spiritual connection with our Father in Heaven.  As we pray, we “talk” to God.  Our supplications must come from our hearts as we openly express our deepest feelings, desires and needs to God.  Our genuine prayers will be heard by Him, and when He answers He may not be speaking directly into our ears, but always straight to our hearts. Continual prayers are important – a “one time” prayer will be heard, but isn’t going to establish the relationship we need with Him in order to know His will on a consistent basis.
• In our prayers, we can ask that our desires become His desires.  I have done this at times when I knew my own desire was selfish and wasn’t right, and I didn’t how to change it.  So I prayed, asking Father to help me understand, and He actually changed my desire to be what He would want it to be.  I was having a difficult time feeling kindness toward some individuals I knew.  As I prayed, He sent me His desire, and my answer came, with the instruction, “Just love them”.  It changed the way I looked at these people and I was able to feel sincere love for them.  It was an important progression in my relationship with them, and it was also an important step in my relationship to God.  All I had to do was ask with a sincere heart, and the Lord actually changed me for the good.  Wouldn’t it be wonderful if we could see all things as Father sees them?  I believe we can, if we turn to Him and truly desire to know His will. 
• We also need to remember that His will isn’t always going to be a huge, one-time answer.  His will may be that we follow His many, small messages that end up having huge ramifications in our lives.  We can’t change our nature’s overnight, but small and regular changes in our behavior and attitudes can make changes in us, causing amazing things happen.!  Doing the Lord’s will and following His path will bring about great things in our lives.  We may wish there was an app that we could download that brought His messages directly to us each day.  But we won’t need it if we attempt to understand the ways of the Lord for ourselves.  He can send His messages to us through our minds and hearts. And we need to open our minds and hearts to Him so that we can “hear” what He will tell us. 
• The world teaches us to go out and get what we want, when we want it.  Though it is important to have confidence and courage in ourselves and work at making things happen in our lives, there is a greater lesson to be learned in trying to know God’s will for our lives.  I am not suggesting that we must totally give up who we are, because we are His creation and He loves us.  He’s given us certain qualities, strengths and weaknesses that teach us, talents and abilities that can bless us and others.   But I know that that in order to receive His will that we must give up some of our earthly desires, our worldly wanderings.  We must seek the Lord and try to live as Christ taught. 
• The scriptures teach us that in order to know God’s will for our lives, we must be meek, submissive, humble and teachable to receive His word.  So often we learn to know the Lord’s will best through trials.  Trials are allowed to come into our lives to teach us, we learn through them and from them.  As I’ve said before, I learned some of the most important things during my darkest hours.  That is the time we are the most teachable, because we are in very humbling circumstances.  Our own personalities may not be meek and humble, so we have things that happen in our lives that teach us these qualities.  Meek does not mean weak, it means that we are teachable.  And humble does not mean that we don’t have any feelings of self-worth.  We actually become stronger and more confident as we go through trials, asking the Lord for His help.  It may be improbable to think that we become stronger through our infirmities, but I know that it is true.  
• Sometimes we see the act of giving our will away to Father as a punishment or a loss of personal freedom.  We perceive that giving up our own will is going to be frightening and that we will lose some of ourselves in the process.  We may see the commandments as a list of restrictions that keep us from doing what we want to do.  God’s commandments are actually set of guidelines given from a loving Heavenly Father who desires that we return to Him.  Living the commandments and doing His will makes it possible for us to return to Him and to be in His presence.  By giving away our will to do His, we actually become more – more of what our eternal spirits have the possibility to become, thus growing into a more complete and holy being.  Heavenly Father’s plan would offer to us all that He has – an eternal life of love, happiness and joy.
• We need to understand that if we don’t give our will to God, we risk the danger of giving our will over to Satan instead.  Lucifer intends no goodness in his plan for us.  He may appear to promise us fame and fortune, the accolades of men, etc., yet he actually despises us and seeks to make us miserable by making us choose what he would choose for us.  Satan masquerades our personal choice as freedom, that if misdirected is actually taking us into his power, which then gives him control over our lives.  We lose all real freedom when we choose to follow Satan.  He is a liar and cheats us out of our eternal exaltation.  He wants us to doubt and fear, making us feel that we lose personal choice by doing Father’s will.  All Satan has to offer is an eternity of spiritual imprisonment.   
• We should never assume that we know more than God knows.  I don’t think the assumption of knowing “more” or knowing “better” than God knows is always recognized in ourselves, but often we think that our lives are totally in our hands, and we can and should make all our decisions on our own without turning to God.  We think we know best and God has no place in us or in the decisions we make.  If we stop and think about it, do we think that our plan is actually better than God’s plan for our lives?   God is exactly that – God.  He exists, He is omniscient, omnipresent, He is the supreme being of the universe, He created our world, He knows all things, loves us all unconditionally,  and comprehends all things.  Heavenly Father and Jesus Christ are two separate beings, but one in purpose and exalted station.  Christ represents his Father so they are often interchangeable in the scriptures.  They are referred to together, as one in heart and mind.  A friend of mine gave me a plaque one year for Christmas that listed many of the names used in the scriptures for Jesus Christ.  Jehovah, King of Kings, Lamb of God, Bread of Life, Emmanuel, Redeemer, Good Shepherd, Messiah, Mediator, Master, Lord of Lords, Light of the World, Savior, Wonderful Counselor, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace, Living Water, Advocate, Holy One of Israel and more!  All of these descriptive names of Christ describe His place in our lives.  He is our shepherd, our light, our counselor, our advocate.  Do we not realize what a gift we have in Christ?  We are meant to love and worship Him, because He loved us first.  We do not teach God “who knoweth all things”, but we are to seek His knowledge and perfect understanding to teach us and bless our lives. Why then are we so resistant to take His advice and do His will?
• Doing the Lord’s will is not always easy – it would be a lie to make such a statement.  But doing His will does make our trials and our crosses easier to bear. Submitting to the Lord’s will makes our inner desires more in line with His.  It means letting go of our pride, old traditions, the feelings that we have about who we are and letting the down the walls that we create to protect ourselves.  Those walls must come down to know the will of the Lord.  It takes patience, meekness and a willingness to be taught by the Master.  Submissiveness is not easy, but essential.  I found that the more I submitted to the Lord’s will during my trial, the more I was blessed with peace.  It’s quite a gift to feel peace among chaos. 

There is a blessing that often comes from our trials…being brought to a low point in our lives, so we turn to the Lord for guidance.  That is the blessing – a crash course as we are lost in this world and need to find guidance from one whose world we ultimately want to be a part of.   As we lose ourselves during times of trial, we find ourselves by coming to know our maker, Lord and Redeemer by giving ourselves and desires fully to Him.  Matthew 10:39 states it best, “He that findeth his life shall lose it: and he that loseth his life for my sake shall find it.”  Bending to His will is a victory for us!

Christian churches often dispute the idea that God speaks to mankind in our day – to us that live on the earth right now.  Some believe He spoke to the people in ancient Bible times, but He will not reach out to us now – that is something just in the past and God does not do the same for His children any longer.  I’ve often wondered where that logic or ill-logical thought originated.  We are God’s children just as those in the Bible were God’s children, so why would He leave us on our own and not want to help guide our lives as He guided theirs?   It makes no sense to me, logically or otherwise.

Who of us in this life that believes in a loving Father in Heaven doesn’t want more help as we navigate this earthly experience?  Who of us doesn’t have some challenges that require soul stretching and extra heavenly help as we try and heal from sadness, depression or disappointment?   We have each other which is a gift in itself, but sometimes we need more than our family or friends can provide.  We need our God, who loves and cares about us and who has the ability to see the big picture of our lives.

I am a believer that God will “speak” to us individually…to give us answers to our prayers and to cause new thoughts and ideas to come into our minds that guide and help us.  I believe His love for us causes Him to be mindful of us every day.  Sometimes He waits for us to ask for His help, and He wants us to speak with Him and ask Him.  I also believe God prompts us to do certain things and at times sends messages to protect us from harm.  I guess I shouldn’t say I believe it, I should say that I know it to be true because it has happened personally for me. 

The definition of Revelation in Webster’s Dictionary is:  “The act of revealing; to make known.  Something revealed, especially a striking or surprising disclosure.” 

This definition brings clarity about what it means to have revelation for our own lives, in other words to receive “personal” revelation.  It doesn’t mean that God will give me information or revelation for the entire human race, but it means that we can receive a personal response or guidance from the Lord for our own lives.  We may receive direction or get an answer to a question.  The Lord makes known to our heart or our mind something He wants us to know.  He can and does reveal His will for us.  The information we receive might be striking or surprising as the definition implies, or it might come as a silent feeling inside us (the information of which may still be surprising).  We may receive an impression, a prompting or hear a voice that quietly speaks to our minds, or a voice that thunders though our souls.  But what we receive are messages that are very personal and meant particularly for us.  

I believe that revelation is truth coming from God.  If we stay close to God in our lives, believing in Him and trusting Him, it will be easier for us to hear the personal messages He sends to us. 

When we receive personal revelation, it is often because we are praying for an answer to a prayer.  We desire for the Lord make known what we should do or provide us with an answer about what we should choose, how we can help someone else in need and thousands of other things.  Personal revelation does not always have to come to us as an answer to prayer.  It can come independent of any seeking on our part, and may come as a special message from the Lord at a time when He knows we need His assistance.   If we are trying to know and do the will of God, personal revelation will come to us all along this journey in mortality.  The Lord has messages He wants us to have, and He sends them to us each day.  We must open our hearts and minds to receive them.

As I go through my days, I have many thoughts about my daily responsibilities and the tasks that need doing, and how I can accomplish them.  Which ones do I put first?  There are times I may think of moving toward accomplishing one thing, and a little thought in my head says, “No.  Don’t do that right now. Do ____ instead”.  I’ve realized that those small promptings are for my good. They are my own bits of personal revelation, that if heeded, my days go much better.  Sometimes I receive a prompting to do something and I dismiss it.  In my heart I know I’ve dismissed it, and I’ve learned that if I don’t follow the prompting, I am always sorry.  Even in small things the Lord desires to help us.  We need to listen and take notice of those little messages, because He is trying to help us every step of the way.

I can think of several times in my life when I have not recognized the promptings from the Spirit, or when I have ignored it.  I received a thought, a nudge, or an idea of something I should do.  Then because of a shortage of time or a desire to continue on with my own agenda, I ignore it and sluff it off as nothing, unimportant, or “I’ll get to that later”, and later never comes.  As time passes, I have seen the results of my refusal to listen and follow the guidance.  I may have been guided to call a friend and didn’t follow through, only to learn later that friend really needed someone at the time.  Once I had a feeling that I should delay my arrival at my chosen destination, but I didn’t listen.  I continued with my agenda and when I arrived at my destination I was confronted with a very difficult situation that could have been avoided all together if only I had headed the prompting. 

Mistakes can teach us to behave differently in the future.  There are a couple of good things that my carelessness and lack of listening to God’s voice has taught me. One is that the next time I had better listen, because the Lord was trying to use me as His instrument to help someone else.  The second one is that He was trying to protect me from harm. 

Fortunately I can think of occasions when I have listened to the promptings and followed through with the instruction I was given.  So many times during my trial I was guided by Heavenly Father and blessed because I chose to listen and act upon what He sent.  One day after taking my aged father to an appointment, the message I received was to go and visit a beloved teacher that was in an assisted living center.  I asked my dad if he would like to go with me, and he eagerly agreed.  Our visit with my dear teacher was sweet, and I had the chance to share my love for him, and him for me.  It was a tender time, never to be forgotten and forever cherished.  This visit would turn out to be a great gift and blessing, because it would be our last meeting on this earth.  He passed away three days later.  The Lord knew I would not have feelings of peace if I had not seen my dear teacher one more time before he parted from this earth.  Listening and obeying the Lord’s beaconing voice far surpasses the ignorance of our possible reply. 

Listening to and acting upon the personal revelation God sends to us often takes courage.  Many of us want personal guidance from the Lord, but sometimes when it is sent we do not want to hear the answer.  We may forget where the message originates, and lose sight of the value that the message contains.  Our own stubbornness may keep us from completely receiving His divine guidance.   If we are slow to harken to the revelations He sends or don’t act upon what has been sent, then we may put ourselves in a position where the Lord may be hesitant to send us more answers, more guidance. If we don’t truly want to know His will, He will stop sending it.  The thought of that frightens me, because I need my Heavenly Father every day. 

In my church, we all believe in revelation.  Accepting revelation isn’t always easy, whether it comes through our leaders or directly to us.  It is up to us to receive or reject it.  Whether it is something personal for us, or a message from our church leaders, we need to know for ourselves that the message given is true.  We are encouraged to think for ourselves and receive a confirmation that was has been spoken or felt is truly a message from our Father.  We should seek our own, very personal direction from our Father in Heaven.  We can do that by being obedient.  Obedience makes it possible for the spirit to feel welcome to communicate with us, thus allowing Heavenly Father to feel confident that the message He sends will be heard.  We teach children that if they want something, they need to behave in such a way as to receive the reward.  The same applies to us.  If we want the Lord’s guidance, then we must be obedient to His commandments in preparation for receiving and accepting His word.  Heavenly Father can’t send us spiritual messages if we are not prepared to hear them.  As we are obedient, then listening to and heeding His word, The Lord sends us more revelation.  We prove ourselves to Him – that we can be trusted to listen and act upon His guidance.  Obedience is a preparatory state to gaining knowledge, thus revelation. 

God will not have us do anything contrary to the teachings of the gospel, because the gospel is His word and His truth.  Satan however, also exists, and works in opposition to the Lords’ truths.  He can also send messages, even things that may appear to be miraculous.  Satan is the great pretender and imitator.  He can mimic good things, so we must be careful that the guidance we receive is coming from the right source.  If we are seeking an answer to a prayer and our answer feels full of light, then the Lord is in the answer.  If it rings truth to our hearts and our minds, then we can trust that it has come from the Lord.  Satan may send a message that is something we want to hear, so we must fine tune our discerning skills so that we will know the difference between an answer from the light, and an answer from the dark.  Sometimes we want an answer so badly that we will take whatever comes into our minds without taking the time to think it through.  Learning to listen with the heart takes patience and humility. 

It is humbling to know that we can ask for guidance on our journey in life, and the “map” of instruction He sends is actually a message from “on high”.  Do we think of personal revelation that way – that the guidance we receive is a holy message, sent from the highest realm?   It is personal information, passed from heaven to all of us.  It’s like the sun breaking through spaces in the clouds, showering down on us His rays of light and love. 

Personal revelation is a gift from God.  It’s not something He has to give us, but if we desire to have it, He will send His messages to us.  Next to the importance of coming to this earth to gain a body, I believe one of the main reasons we were sent to earth was to learn to do Heavenly Fathers will.  His will, not ours.  We will be able to go back into His presence by doing His will.  Seeking personal revelation is the key to our return to Him.  Revelation can come to us every day if we are seeking for it.  We are not alone in our trials.  God is waiting to be our companion and walk with us through our trials and tribulations.  Personal revelation is to know the Lord’s will, and then it is up to us to do it.

We can hear and know and see the divine guidance and blessings of our Heavenly Father in our personal lives. Recently I was in a church house seeking for an answer to my prayer, a problem that I needed the Lord’s help to solve.  Life is never without its’ trials, no matter what stage of life we are in at the time.  As I sat there, I was taught by the spirit and given specific guidance, and I received a sweet, simple message, my personal revelation from the Lord.  While pondering about my concerns, a quiet but strong answer came in three simple words, “all is well”.  My fears were calmed and I was reminded that the Lord is in charge, and I need not worry.  I may not fully understand what that means, but what message can be better than that?  All is well if we put our trust in the Lord.

When we pray for something, can we accept an answer to prayer that doesn’t coincide with the thing we were asking?  Are we patient enough to “wait on the Lord”, let Him determine the timing of when He sends an answer, and still believe that He is mindful of us?  Do we have faith the Lord will send an answer for each of our prayers? 

When discussing the matter of prayer, I believe that it’s important to include a dialog about the Lord’s timing in answering our prayers.  I’ve learned so much about what I call “The Law of Timing” in connection with prayer.  In my mind, those two ideas – prayer and timing, are conjoined and can’t be separated, even though we might like them to be.

  As mortals we are not necessarily comfortable with the concept time, because time as we know it isn’t an eternal principle.  Our days on this earth are measured in various segments of time – seconds, minutes, hours, days, weeks, years.  In this mortal state these elements of time are what we are used to.  Because of the veil that separates us from the remembrance of our previous life, we become confused about time.  On the other hand, organizing, planning and creating are eternal principles that we learn about in the scriptures.  The world was created, under the direction of our Heavenly Father using those principles.  I think we confuse earthly time with our instinctive eternal understanding of how we progress through organizing, planning and creating.  Time as we know it, twenty-four hours a day, the sixty minutes in an hour kind of time is something that accompanies earth life, not eternal life.  Progression is eternal. Time is not.

As humans we try to control time…to be somewhere or someplace at specific times, schedule things to happen at precise times, have deadlines for things.  Our plans are important to us, and if something comes in our path to disturb our plans and personal agendas, it can be very upsetting to us.  We want things to happen on our terms and our timing.  We think that our plans are much more important than what anyone else could plan for us.  It may be ok to be a part of someone else’s timing temporarily, but we want to be in charge of our lives.  Eventually we must all learn that the Lord’s timing is not our timing, and His will is different than our will.  His timing is full of wisdom as He sees the big picture of our lives, while our timing is limited to our present earthly understanding.   If we can let go and be less stubborn about holding on to what WE want and truly ask in prayer with a sincere heart for Heavenly Father’s will to be done, then we will see His timing in the answers He sends and will be astounded at what can happen in our lives.  Answers to prayers will always come, in His time.

        After asking The Lord for blessings we desire through humble prayer, it is hard to understand why He doesn’t send the requested blessing when we feel we need it.  It is easy to look around and compare ourselves to others, sometimes coveting what someone else has that we wish to have.  The concepts we are taught in the scriptures about patience and long suffering are some of the most difficult traits to attain.  Gaining patience is often painful, and those words – “long suffering” is exactly as it is stated.  The time seems to tick by so slowly when we’re waiting for the Lord to deliver us from whatever is unbearable in our lives or grant us something we desire, and the suffering we experience while waiting is long sometimes.  The waiting for what we desire may be a lifetime long, yet I still believe that Heavenly Father’s blessings for us will be realized.  If not in this life, what a joyous reward waits for us in the next.  But we must trust in our loving Father and believe that He will give to us what is best for us – He has our eternal welfare in mind and knows perfectly what we need.

I believe our honorable desires are good, but may not always be in harmony with what the Lord has planned for us.  Early on in my trial, I wanted to find a companion and be married again and have a real father for my children and a loving husband for myself.  I wanted it right then – I didn’t want to wait for this blessing.  Part of me feared I would never have the blessing of marriage again, and I wanted that blessing.  Knowing many wonderful women who have gone through a divorce, women who have never been married or had children, I knew the odds of finding a good companion at my age and with my life circumstances were slim.  In my mind I reasoned, “What would be so wrong to ask for a husband and father that could help me raise my children and be a truly good father?”  During all that hoping, I had the feeling that if I married again it wouldn’t be soon.  And it wasn’t…it didn’t happen for sixteen years.  I dated different men from time to time, but none of the relationships felt right.  When the blessing of a companion finally came into my life, I knew without a doubt that I was being given the right man.  He was just what I needed, in ways only the Lord’s mercy could have known. This man had the kindness and capacity to love me.  He was loyal, kind, loving and had a good heart – the total opposite of what Phil had become.  I was grateful that The Lord sent me a man with such a good heart and integrity of soul, for which I am thankful every day.  Now after several years of marriage, I am still amazed by this gift God bestowed upon me.  I had to wait a long time for this gift, because John was busy at the time having children and raising a family, and he loved his wife.  Sadly, she passed away and he was left in despair.  His pain became my blessing, and would become our blessing as we found each other.  I know that Heavenly Father did answer my prayer, but the timing had to be right, the person had to be right and I had to learn patience and wait on the Lord.  Looking back, I’m grateful that I didn’t jump into a relationship early on that would have been wrong for me and my children.  John and I both gained additional blessings as we joined our lives – me by adding John’s children into my life, and he adding my children into his.  And I gained instant grandchildren to add to the joy!  John (and company) was worth every bit of the wait, and we feel that the Lord’s hand was in our union.  A loving Heavenly Father had taken two people that had been through terrible trials and put us together, knowing that we would be perfect for one another.  I can’t put into words what this miracle has meant in my life.  Waiting for the Lord’s timing was a great blessing and brought me joy!

I can’t say that things in my life always feel like they are going to work out.  Sometimes it feels that some things never will, and maybe they won’t.  But waiting has also taught me patience and helped me to realize that there are things I desire that may not happen.  Our timing or desires may not work out.  The prayers we wish to have answered may not be in accordance with God’s will at all and our answers may be very different than what we had hoped for and planned.  There are times in life when we feel desperate for specific blessings, knowing that we, our families or someone we know have immediate needs that may not be met.  Once again, it goes back to that idea of “fairness”.   Not having our earnest prayers granted may seem like a punishment, and we feel that the Lord does not love us.  I believe if we can be patient, long suffering, endure our current trials and continue in faith, we will ultimately be blessed by He who is the giver of all the best blessings!  Waiting on the Lord’s timing and receiving His answers will turn out to be a blessing and will bring much joy.

Until recently in my life, I did not know that certain kinds of pine trees would yield flowers.  Where I grew up by the mountains, there were an abundance of pine trees but they never produced flowers.  It was a new discovery for me when I was walking in the mountains of California one day – a wonderful surprise.  Seeing the flower on the tree (in the picture above) made me think about God’s timing… good things may be happening and we may be growing as our lives progress, but at other times life may be full of prickly needles and sometimes they hurt!   If we persist in trying our best and keep the conversation open between us and our maker, eventually growth and beauty spring forth in our lives just as it did on this pine tree.  Beauty will be found among the needles in our lives. 

Have you ever sat by a lake or the ocean, connecting with nature and staring off into the distance wondering, what does God have in store for me?  How can I know what to do with my life?  How can I heal from the deep wounds inside of me?  When can a difficult trial end?  How can I hang on for one more day?   The solution to so many questions that don’t seem to have answers right when we need them is prayer.  Prayer is our lifeline to God, the thing that will keep us going when nothing else can.

Prayer has not always come easy for me.  I’ve always known that it is important to pray, and though I prayed often during my life time, the act of kneeling down and formally praying was something I struggled with.  Maybe it was because I felt that if I was going before the Lord in prayer and supplication, asking Him for help and answers, that my prayer better have a deep meaning and be very important.  The problem was that for a long time I didn’t feel that I was anyone special in the eyes of God.  As I grew up I was fully submerged in gospel teachings and singing the songs that would instill the truth that I am a child of God.  But somehow, deep down, I didn’t consistently think and feel that I was that important to Father in Heaven, so unconsciously I deduced that listening to my prayer may not be all that imperative to Him.  I admit that I struggled with my own feelings of self-worth, and didn’t comprehend that even I, little Sophia could mean something to my creator.  There were also times when I was lazy and didn’t want to kneel down to pray, and thinking that kneeling was the only acceptable way to pray, I often didn’t. 

As I grew from childhood to young adult, the idea of praying took on more meaning.  I had some wonderful experiences feeling things of the spirit, and I was drawn to good things, but my spiritual experiences were not something that had been generated through prayer.  My life had been relatively easy, and the need for petitioning the Lord didn’t come about too often.   When I started making big life changing decisions and then began having children, the need for more consistent supplication came.

When life started to change in a drastic way, my prayers changed.  They became “begging” sessions with the Lord, to help find my way out of a situation where I felt trapped.  I needed to connect with my Father in Heaven in a new way, a very personal way I hadn’t felt before.  Instead of wondering if Father was listening to me, I knew He was listening and hearing me as I pleaded with Him for help.

There are many reasons to pray and an unlimited number of things we can pray about.  People of all faiths consider prayer an important part of their daily routine.  Whatever the reasons for praying, we are looking to make a connection – between us and God.  Prayer and God may be insignificant until we come to an impasse in our lives and we need something that cannot be provided by an earthly source.  That’s when our prayers become real, true communication to our Father in Heaven.  Then we don’t just desire His help when it’s convenient for Him, we need His help, and we are desperate for it.  This is another good thing that trials do for us, they can connect us with our creator in ways nothing else can.

There are situations in life that are unbearable, so we pray – for ourselves and for others.  We see loved ones or friends having trials, and aside from listening to them, making meals, taking gifts or flowers to help them feel better, I think we often feel helpless and think there is nothing of real value that we can do for them.  But there is!  We can always pray for others and invite the Lord’s spirit and His light to descend upon them and surround them.  We can ask for angels to buoy them up.  Prayers are always helpful, even if we never see the results or know if our prayers made any difference.  Prayers are always beneficial – they are never expressed in vain. 

I believe that the prayers we utter for others are the strongest prayers, because we’re asking Father to help someone else.  I have found myself praying frequently for my children and my family members.  A mother’s prayers have power beyond our ability to understand.  There are times when I’ve been praying for my children that I have felt an unseen conduit of light.  It begins at the point where I am kneeling, and extends up to heaven.  In my mind it looks like a strong search light that extends up beyond where I can see.  I have visualized my prayers ascending up through that powerful beam of light to the higher power of Father in Heaven.  I know Father has received my plea, and sends me confirmation that my prayer has been accepted and heard. 

Prayer is more than the act of kneeling and praying.  It happens first in our hearts, becoming a personal exchange between us and the Lord – that is something we need every day!  The scriptures tell us to never stop praying, to pray every day, morning, noon and night and all times in between.  We are taught to pray aloud and to offer silent prayers in our closets.  There isn’t a limit on what physical position we take to pray – it can be on our knees, sitting down, standing up, or lying down.  That means we can pray anytime, anywhere in whatever way we are able.  We can always have a prayer in our hearts.  Prayer helps us to stay close to our Father in Heaven and increases our desire to stay close to him, keeping us from temptation.  As the world that we live in seems to go further and further away from Christ’s teachings, prayer helps us to cling to that which is lasting and eternal.  The constantly changing moral codes and opposing forces pull on us from every side, and there is no way that we can hope to return to our Father in Heaven if we don’t continue a constant dialog of prayer between us and Him.  We can’t slacken off in our communication and we can’t take a vacation from the connection between Father and us.  Talking to Heavenly Father every day and expressing our gratitude to Him for our blessings and all the miracles He sends to us is key to our happiness, even giving thanks for the blessings we haven’t recognized as miracles yet.  What a blessing it is to ask Him for the good desires of our heart, and to be able to ask Him to change our hearts if it is not in keeping with what He desires for us.

There can be pitfalls to the way we pray.  Sometimes before we begin to pray, we have already decided in our minds how we would like our prayer to be answered.  We create scenarios of what would be best for us or a loved one, asking that our prayer be answered in a certain way.  We request our will.  If our prayer is not answered in the way we think it should be, then we think God has not heard us and our prayer was not answered at all.  We assume He didn’t listen and He doesn’t care.  That is one of Satan’s lies, and we need to recognize that. 

In my prayers, I have asked for specific help and specific answers, pleading my case before my Heavenly Father.  I don’t think it’s wrong to pray for specific help, because as we ask in faith, it’s right to be communicating our desires to the Lord.  Sometimes my prayers are answered just as I hoped they would be.  Other times my answers weren’t even close to what my wishes were.  For me, some of the best answers to my prayer have come in ways that I didn’t ask.  Many times my prayers are answered in different ways than I thought they would be and not even close to what I had requested.  Instead, they have been answered in the most amazing ways, beyond anything I would have considered.  I’ve noticed a pattern in the answers the Lord sends – His answers are so much better than whatever I could have asked for, better than what I would have imagined.  I praise the Lord for His goodness, for giving me the answers that He knows are best for me, answers that will bless my life fully.  The Lord’s responses have brought me joy and happiness.  If my own requests had always been granted, I would have fallen short of the blessings the Lord had in store for me.

There are different ideas about the best way to pray, and how to get answers to our prayers.  One way is to make a plan and decide what we think is best, then go to our Father in Heaven in prayer, asking if it be right.  The spirit can confirm that our decision is right by giving us a peaceful, confident feeling, or maybe a burning inside our hearts of the correctness of our choice.  Or we may feel confused and wonder if we have asked amiss, or have a feeling that we are lacking direction if it is not right.  This is a wonderful way to pray, by using our minds and intelligence to make a decision, then asking the Lord if it is right.  Father wants us to choose.  He sacrificed His Son so that we could choose.  It is also very important that as we choose our plan, we remain open to hearing His voice, listening with our hearts and our minds for further heavenly guidance. 

During my trial, that form of prayer was difficult to do.  I found that I didn’t know what to pray for.  That may sound odd, but it was true.  I did pray for my children to be blessed and to be healed, for my family and myself to have some peace as we went through this trial, but the rest of my hopes and dreams for my life had been shattered.  I didn’t know what to pray for any more.  Because I had been forced to change much of the direction I had planned for my life, all I could think to pray for was whatever the Lord thought was best, to send me His direction.  At times I couldn’t even think anymore, so I put my trust in Him and left the door wide open, asking Him to send whatever it was that He knew we needed.  This form of prayer was an amazing lesson to me.  As I prayed, His guidance came… I received a thought or an idea that I hadn’t come up with, and knew what I should do without any question.  I liked this method of praying, it served me and my family well.  I learned to love going to the Lord and asking Him to provide the next step for me, and when the next step was given, it was remarkable.  These answers came from God, my own personal revelation.  I became like putty in His hands, and He could mold my life in His ways as He pulled me out of the darkness and into His light. 

Some think that going to God in prayer without a plan already in place isn’t a good way to pray, that we should always come up with what we feel is best, and then ask if the answer is right or wrong.  They cannot understand the concept of opening your mind without any preconceived notions or decisive choices about what to do.  But I love praying for Father’s will to be done in my life without making up my own mind first.  It has brought me such happiness and joy to follow His guidance and His will rather than always coming up with it on my own.  Praying this way brings me such peace and I know I am in His hands.  I know His ways are better than my ways.

Kneeling to pray is a respectful way to communicate with God.  Although kneeling in prayer is very important, it is not the only way to pray, nor the only way He will accept our prayer. I don’t believe that God will withhold anything from us that He knows will be for our best interest and growth. I find myself praying throughout the day.  Sometimes they are just short prayers, for something or someone that has just come into my mind and I want to pray at the very moment I think of it.  I think I pray more with my eyes open going through my day than when I’m on my knees, because I pray when I think of things that need prayerful attention, which is often.  When I’m at work or riding in the car, kneeling down isn’t an option, but praying wherever I am is always possible.  I can’t always stop and make a list of important things that I want to pray for during the day, and I know I may forget something later on when I have the opportunity to kneel down.  So I pray everywhere and whenever the thought occurs to me. 

It doesn’t matter if we feel worthy to pray or where we are when we pray.  The important thing is…just pray!  He’s waiting to hear from you.           

When we hear the word “trial”, the emotion that accompanies it is usually negative.  Trials are difficult and unwelcomed.  We don’t willingly invite them into our lives. Whatever the trial may be, trials often bring grief, sadness and hopelessness into our heart and soul.  We are never the same after a trial.  We are not meant to be the same after a trial. 

Whether our trials are short lived, last a long time or even continue for a life time, I believe they are meant to help us and teach us.  When you are going through a trial, it certainly doesn’t feel that way, but a trial will either teach us or destroy us.  I did not want my trial destroy me, my children or my family.  So I chose to be taught.

As this trial began, I was in shock, despondent and unable to function.  It was not just my trial.  It had hurt many others in so many ways – my children, the children of people I loved and the adults that loved them.  The things that happened to these children were so terrible.  I will always weep for the evil that they experienced.  Yet in the devastation I felt from all that had happened, I looked for ways to heal.  I longed to heal, and I yearned for all the children to be healed that Phil had hurt.  I began reading books that would help me find answers and understand what I could learn from my trial, and the valuable lessons resulting from my trials that could make a difference in my life. 

Trials have a tendency to make you feel worthless.  They can make you feel unloved and of no value.  We may feel abandoned by God because we have a trial, but I think we misinterpret our trials and the reasons for them.  In the many inspirational books that I read during this time, a message kept recurring that lifted my spirits and helped me feel like I was valued by the Lord.  The message was this:  God tutors those whom He loves.  We are being blessed by being tested, because He trusts us enough to make the choices that will turn our hearts and minds to Him, and in the painful processes we become His dedicated sons and daughters.  His love for us cannot be matched, not anywhere on this earth and He will never stop loving us.  These statements may be hard for us to process, but I feel that they are true.  This understanding helped me so much, because I knew that He loved me enough to teach me. 

In my counseling sessions, Mark would use his wealth of earthly knowledge to teach me about the psychological effects of abuse.  But his teaching became much more as he added gospel principles to his counsel.  I came to understand the impact of what had happened to my children, and what had happened to me.  I understood things better from a professional point of view, but he also taught me how to make sense of all of it by using the gospel.  He shared gospel insights and personal spiritual experiences that helped me to understand and process my trial.  Both Mark and the inspirational books I read were pivotal in helping me begin my path to healing.  I would like to share their insights that became my understanding. 

I understand that my trial was not meant as a punishment, but an experience I was allowed to have  to teach me and to help turn me towards my Heavenly Father.  It gave me the desire to know what God would have me do in my life.  As mortal beings, I don’t think we can learn the great lessons in life without experiencing some tough things.  We can go along in life and be happy or sad, but to progress and learn we must go through trials.  We must actually go through the pain – mentally, emotionally and spiritually to understand the deep and abiding importance of things in both life and eternity.  How can we learn if we’re not faced with having to learn?  We can certainly learn many things without experiencing everything, but in order for the learning to sink deep into our hearts and souls, we must experience trials firsthand.  We can’t have a deep understanding of the purposes of life unless we have to go through something hard.  Physical and emotional pain teaches us things that go deep into our hearts.  It can make us into something better than we are.

Our individual trials can teach us what we individually need to know.  It will be different for everyone, and no two trials may be the same, but the Lord desires that we learn from our trials.  We came to earth to learn, to progress and grow.  We came to learn wisdom, which is most often learned by going through a trial.  In the scriptures we are taught that our trials refine us.  In Webster’s Dictionary, the word “refine” means:  “1. To bring, to come to a pure state; purify.”  A Bible Dictionary describes a “Refiner” as, “A man who separates the precious metals from the dross with which in nature they are usually found mixed.  Part of the process consists in the application of great heat, in order to bring the mass into a fluid state, hence the term ‘refiner’s fire’”.  Isn’t it interesting that precious metals and dross are mixed in nature?  We need a “refiner” to help us separate those two things in ourselves, someone that can bring us to a precious and pure state that we are meant to be, and pull the dross away.  In that refining process, our trials feel like “heat”, making us uncomfortable and seeking for refuge in the cool of the day.  The end of the Bible Dictionary description states, “Christ is the great Refiner.”   Christ is the only one that can bring us out of the heat and into the calm and cool of his presence. 

It is not a question whether or not the refining process is needed for each one of us, it is imperative.  The Lord knows it’s essential and wants us to be refined, and desires that we are purified through the refining process.  This can only happen with the application of great heat, great trials in our lives that teach us, change us and expand our knowledge and understanding.  The refinement we experience is a cleansing of our souls.  We are cleansed through the fires of adversity so that we can enter into a higher realm of understanding and be acceptable to dwell in the presence of God.  It is a necessary step in our progression towards Him.

There are some very specific lessons that came for me as a result of my trial, my refiner’s fire.  I see these things as gifts that changed the way I understand life, and learning them made my refiners fire worth the heat.  My gifts were not physical gifts, but spiritually tangible gifts that changed my soul.

• I learned how to be kinder, how to be more sensitive to others feelings and needs.
• I learned that I shouldn’t judge others, because we never really know what someone else is feeling or fully understand the things they have gone through.  I thought my experiences would make me judgmental of people who make choices that damage their lives, but it actually had the opposite effect.  I learned compassion for others pain and for their unique situations in life. 
• I learned to stop and listen and care more about what other people are going through.  I learned to look beyond what they are saying and see what their hearts are trying to express. 
• I learned how to stand strong in the face of adversity.  I learned that it’s ok and necessary to stand up for what is right and true, and we should not allow ourselves be taken advantage of. 
• I learned that I didn’t need to be manipulated by someone in order to be kind to them.   We may think that “keeping the peace” is more important than dis-harmony, but allowing manipulation to remain ultimately causes more contention and heartache.
• I learned to be genuinely happy for others’ successes and good fortune, even when it appeared that my own didn’t measure up.
• I learned not to compare myself to others, because it was just a trap for self-doubt and depression, messages sent from the adversary. 
• I learned how to love others that may be difficult to love, and show forth more love. 
• I learned that I could have joy and happiness even when I was going through a trial, if I continued to turn to my Father in Heaven in prayer and concentrate on gratitude for what I did have. 
• I learned that the Lord knows me and knows all his children personally and perfectly.  I had always been taught that the Lord loves all His children, but now, when I was begging for His guidance and help, I KNEW of His love for me.  I understood that He heard me specifically and knew me well. I felt His concern and abiding love for me.  I know He still hears me and my present concerns.
• I learned that His love is the same for all. 
• I learned without a doubt in my mind that my Father in Heaven is real, that Jesus Christ is His Son and I am a part of them.  They are always with us.

Though I have gained understanding of all these things and many more, I am still not perfect in the application of my knowledge.  But I am trying to live up to all that I have learned through my trial.

I have often asked myself this question… would I have ever learned all these things so deeply, so personally without the trial?  My answer… I don’t think so.  And what if I had chosen not to learn from these trials?  What if I had just given up and given in to the darkness and Satan’s influence?   Where would I be, how would I be living, and what would have become of my children?  The answers to those questions seem rather ominous and dark.

In the midst of a trial it may be a natural desire to pray our trials away.  I think that the more important thing to pray about is how to get through our trials.  They are there for us to learn from.  None of us wants to struggle through life because the struggle makes us feel like we are not succeeding in life.  Struggling doesn’t have to be a negative thing if we are learning through it.  It teaches us to be strong.  We can struggle through something and still be succeeding. 

I can’t say that I am totally grateful for this trial, because it hurt so many people.  But I can say I’m so grateful for all that I have learned through this trial.  I don’t know what my life would be without the knowledge that I have gained from having to go through it.  I know I was given an opportunity, however difficult, to learn to know my Father in Heaven and my Savior in a whole new way.  My life will never be the same, and I praise the Lord for that.  Knowing what I know now about how sweet and how important the gospel and the Savior are in my life, I would have hated to miss the learning that my trial provided for me. 

For me, I see the experiences of life as waves coming to shore, one experience after another.  Sometimes the waves come in with such strength and crash fiercely, knocking us down.  Sometimes they come in with medium strength and are felt, but we remain standing.  Other times they come gently and leave a calming effect upon us.  Whichever way, as the water recedes, the waves leave ripples in the sand that are stunning.   There is form and beauty as the ripples leave their mark on the sand, just as our experiences leave their mark upon us.  These marks can bring even more splendor to the overall beauty of our lives, and looking back we can see their remarkable influence in us.

I began writing these experiences down several years ago and since then I have had to deal with new trials in my life.  New trials bring new healing that needs to take place.  The same primary answers apply to my current trials as they did to my previous trials, and the pattern of turning to the Lord for my healing remains the same.  The gospel contains all the necessary elements that we need in order to heal from whatever trial comes in our path.  Each time a new trial presents itself, I have to reach upward to my Savior as I find myself sinking once again.  And the ultimate lesson about experiencing trials is this… great and marvelous gifts result from great and terrible trials.   Instead of becoming less because of my trials, I believe I have actually become more.

When we experience trials, our first inclination may be that we feel abandoned by Deity.  We may question, “if they love me, why do I have to go through such difficult experiences?”  Learning about the atonement will help us to understand the answer to this question.  We are not forgotten or forsaken by our Heavenly Father and Jesus Christ, but saved by Christ through His atoning sacrifice.  The Atonement is a gift from a loving Father to all His children.

In the dictionary, the word Atonement is described this way,  “1) amends for a wrong or injury.  2) the reconciliation of God and humankind through Christ’s death.”  That’s an interesting though incomplete meaning of the atonement, but it’s nice that even the world acknowledges that the word “atonement” has to do with Jesus Christ. 

As a child I learned about the atonement.  I understood what the atonement meant…that if I committed any wrong or sin, that Christ had paid the price for that wrong doing, and I could repent and be forgiven of my sins.  I logically accepted that.  I knew Christ had “covered” for me and had made it possible that I could say that I was sorry for any wrong doing, repent of my indiscretion and then be forgiven.  I could be forgiven of all my wrong behavior if my repentance was sincere, and ultimately return to live with Christ and my Father in Heaven someday.  During my sufferings as an adult, I found there were things about the atonement that I hadn’t learned as a child, and I was learning them now. 

My experiences have taught me more about the atonement than I had ever understood before.  I think you can’t fully appreciate the majesty of the Atonement unless you’ve personally had to use it and needed to use it – we all need this perfect gift!  As he prayed in Gethsemane, Christ not only felt the sorrow we feel when making our own personal mistakes, He felt every sorrow we would ever know.  He felt the anguish that we would feel when bad things happened to us, even when it wasn’t because of our own wrong doing.  He felt all of our pains – physical as well as emotional, and our sicknesses, all that we suffer in this human experience.  The atonement wasn’t just for our sins, which may have been enough, but He suffered for and felt all our sorrows of any kind.  I know of no other person who would do this for all people who would ever live on this earth.  Though His atonement was for all mankind, it is the most personal sacrifice and gift we can receive.  Can you imagine receiving a gift like this from anyone else you know?  A gift so intimately personal that Christ knows exactly how to succor and help you because he felt YOUR pains?  He is our brother, He is our mediator with the Father and our Savior.  Christ is the one who saves us from an eternal death and offers us eternal life.  The thought that He took upon Him all our sufferings and felt every single one of our pains is staggering and I am unable to comprehend the magnitude of that! 

I know that Christ suffered as He felt my pain – not pain I brought on myself, but He suffered the pain and sadness I felt that were brought on by someone else.  He knows my sadness, my disappointments, my sorrow over personal mistakes.  As I wept during my trial, prayed and asked for His help, I felt a spiritual warmth wash over me.  I felt His love and His understanding of what I was going through.  I felt His compassion and His desire to comfort me.  I felt Him console my soul and His encouragement that I didn’t have to carry this burden with me every day, and I didn’t have to carry it alone!  He was carrying it for me.  I could give it away to Him.  He filled the emotional “holes” created in me by my trials and made me whole again through His love and his comforting spirit.   I came to understand that He is REAL – He doesn’t just exist in the stories of the scriptures, but He is a real and resurrected being that still lives to love us and succor us.  I felt His support and love every day.  Some say that “feeling” isn’t enough, that feelings aren’t tangible.  And I say “why not?”   Why isn’t feeling something as real as touching something?  The feelings of receiving His peace were more real to me than my physical surroundings because the peace I felt brought a remembrance of my eternal self.  We are eternal beings separated from our real, heavenly home.  Feeling is the gift we have that reminds us of who we really are, sons and daughters of God.  

Sometimes the atonement is a hard concept for people to understand.  They cannot understand why a sacrifice had to be made, an intercession for our sins.  In our earthly state, maybe we can’t fully understand the depth of the atonement, or the depth of love that Christ and our Father have for us.  But we can appreciate that it has a place in our lives on a daily basis if we seek Him.  Understanding the Atonement is an individual journey for each of us, but we can and we must come to know that the atonement is integrally a part of who we are, and through it, what we can become. What I’ve come to realize is that the idea of the atonement cannot be processed with your mind and intellect alone.  To fully grasp the concepts of the atonement, we must seek to understand it in our mind and heart by using the spirit.  What may not make sense to our mortal minds will only be comprehended with our spiritual senses.  Our spirits will know – it will be familiar to us.  The root word in the name “Savior” is the word “saved”.  That’s what Christ did – He saved all of our lives from eternal extinction.   No matter what we achieve in this life, we cannot make it back to live with our Heavenly Father without making use of the atonement of Jesus Christ.  We are not holy enough to be in Father’s presence without it.  We need Christ and we need His sacrifice, because we cannot do it on our own.    

In my sorrow, I was learning to have hope in Christ.  I was learning to trust Him.  I watched other people going through trials that made them angry at God, and I thought, “How could I be mad at God?  It was Phil who made the wrong choices, not God.  He is waiting to help save me from trauma, how could I be mad at the one who could save me from this?”  People sometimes imagine God as unreachable and untouchable.  They feel that He is distant because they can’t actually see Him in person.  In my heart I know that He is not some all-powerful God that sits in heaven, waiting to push His way around and make people do His bidding.  He is all powerful and all knowing, but He’s far from unreachable.  He is OUR Heavenly Father, our eternal progenitor and we are His eternal posterity.  In that relationship, there is love and concern for us, more love than we can possibly understand.  It’s a love a parent has for their child, and He is a caring parent.  I believe that one of the reasons we are meant to become parents is so that we can know what it is to love a child, thus knowing how He loves us.  Through parenthood we come to understand how our own Father (who happens to dwell in heaven at the time), feels about us.  He loves us, without conditions.  He understands the eternal nature of us and our relationship to Him.  He knows us in an eternal way that we do not know ourselves.  If we use only our earthly perceptions of God, we cannot grasp this eternal relationship between the Father and us, my spirit tells me that.  There is so much more to understand than our earthly knowledge will allow.

By gaining a greater understanding of the atonement, I have learned that I do not look to others for confirmation or validation of who I am.  Christ atoned for me because He loves me.  I understand that I am truly a child of God, and my brother Jesus Christ loves me.  He went through His sufferings so that I could return to be with Him, healed from my infirmities and whole again.  It no longer mattered to me what other people’s opinions were of me, because God’s love was the most important love of all.  If I could connect with God and feel my eternal relationship with Him, then no one else mattered.  By understanding this concept, I received a bonus lesson – it gave me the knowledge that our earthly relationships fall into place when our hearts are set on God.

The Lord is consistent, He does not change.  Just as the waves on the beach constantly and consistently roll towards the shore, He will consistently be there for us.  He is our “constant” and if we can put our “spiritual feet” in the water and feel the heavenly waves wash over our feet where we stand, we can feel His warmth and love penetrate our souls.  I believe He waits eagerly and longingly for us to know Him.  He knows that our lives are very hard at times.  He knows us and has felt our pain.  He can ease our burdens and heal our hearts if we will accept His sacrifice in our behalf.  It seems like such a simple thing to just accept His sacrifice, but we struggle to understand what He offers to us.  He knows us intimately because of His sufferings.  No one else knows you so intimately as to know the heart of your sufferings.  Let His love wash over you!

I’ve often felt that having just a “feeling” about something is harder for people to believe than believing in something we can see. It is easier to trust and rely on something that we can physically see, because it has actual substance.  As human beings, sometimes we don’t trust what we can’t see. 

I’ve asked myself, if I believe in an eternal life, which I can’t currently see with my own eyes right now, then why do I believe it?  I believe it because I’ve had “feelings” deep down inside me that at times seem more real and longer lasting than my physical surroundings.  My “not seeing” and just “feeling” makes the idea of living in eternity feel much more real than the proof we seem to require with our physical eyes while on this earth.  So why do we give ourselves these physical limitations?  Why can’t we see beyond our current sphere of existence?  What makes us all wise and all knowing that we think we have all the answers?

During a weekend getaway, we rode through a very small town.  As with many small towns, the idea of removing old buildings to make way for new development is just not necessary.  I like this about small towns, because you get to see pieces of the past intermixed with progress.  In wide open spaces, there is no need to remove a structure to make way for the new – there is plenty of room for it all. I spotted an old building (pictured above) and within it I saw the past, someone’s home where they had lived an interesting life.  Because I love history and stories of the past, I imagined a family living in a small but functional home surrounded by land they farmed.  This place had once been a brand new home and I’m sure that family never pictured that their home would become a dilapidated shack. 

I see faith in this picture.  Even though the building is currently not in its’ prime, at one time it was.  I can see the remains of what was once something more and I believe that though it looks rundown and useless now, that it once stood proud as the central location of people’s lives.  In other words, I have faith in something I can’t see.

What does it mean to have faith?  That question has been asked time and time again through the ages, as if it’s some kind of mystery.  To me, faith means believing in something that you can’t see with your physical senses, but your spiritual senses tell you that it’s true.  Faith feels tangible if you can see things with spiritual eyes, and there is no mystery about it. 

The dictionary describes faith as, “Confidence or trust in a person or thing.  Belief in God.”  That is one good explanation, but seems incomplete.  Belief in God is a necessary component of faith, but I think faith can be better described in the scriptures.  In Hebrews 11:1 it describes faith this way,  “Faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen.”  In another version of the Bible, this same scripture passage has even more clarification, “Faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen.”  Assurance takes the mystery out of faith and adds the element of hope that is the fundamental element of faith.  Other ideas about Faith are things which we hope for but can’t see, or believing in something that can’t be seen with the eye.

Faith is an essential element to have in our lives. Faith is not a stagnant condition, but an action word.  Our works and attitudes show that we are not just waiting for God to bless us, but we are preparing to receive His influence and guidance and asking Him to be a part of our lives.  We exercise faith by showing a belief in Him and desiring to make a connection to God.  We make an effort by praying, fasting and reading His words in the scriptures.  Just as physical exercise makes our bodies and minds stronger, by exercising our faith we become emotionally and spiritually stronger.  We increase our faith by practicing hope and trust in the Lord.  Our faith cannot be strengthened without doing those things that will increase it.

Many places in the New Testament there are examples of Christ healing believers, who have come to Him having full faith that He can and will heal them.  Whether it’s the blind man who gains his sight, the leper who is healed of his disease or the woman that touches the hem of His garment, Christ tells them all, “Go thy way, thy faith have made thee whole.”  But in Mark 5:34, He takes it a step farther by saying, “Daughter, thy faith hath made thee whole; go in peace, and be whole of thy plague.”  Do we consider that our faith can make us whole?  My experience tells me that faith can make us whole from whatever “plague” affects our spirits.  Can we see why it is so important to have faith during our trials?  By having faith and exercising it, we become witnesses to the power and majesty of God as He teaches us and heals us through our hope and belief in Him. 

As I went from day to day enduring my trial, I noticed that I was feeling so much peace in a very un-peaceful time.  I have read that after the trial of our faith, then comes the gift.  I think the gift of having faith is being blessed with peace.  I found that I could get through my days, my burdens being easier to carry because of the peace I felt.  That peace became everything to me and without it I couldn’t have endured the trials.  One day I spoke with an old friend that was having her own troubles.  She asked me how I got through my trials, and I told her it was because I felt peace.  I was surprised when she asked me, “is that all?”  I responded to her that it just wasn’t “all”, to me having peace to carry me through was everything. 

There are many descriptions of faith.  Some say that faith is: believing something in your heart when your logic tells you not to.  Another description is that faith is the confidence that what we hope for will actually happen.  I believe that when we turn our desires totally over to Christ and desire His will above ours that we are exercising the purest form of faith.  We can’t have more faith than to totally trust God. 

Many people do not have enough faith in themselves.  People that have been abused in one form or another have had faith in themselves ”beaten out of them” in a sense, striped temporarily from their souls, maybe not literally but figuratively.  Finding faith in oneself after losing it can come back by having faith in Christ.  Having faith in the Savior, our brother that was willing to die for you and me and save us from an eternal death, will help us to understand that His love and sacrifice for us, means that we are worth loving.  He knows we are worth loving!  Coming to know Christ helps us learn to know ourselves, our true, eternal selves that were created by a loving Heavenly Father…not the earthly view that we have of ourselves, but the heavenly view that He sees.  We are more than we can comprehend. 

The world as a whole is often unaware of the purpose of life.  The idea of faith is overlooked as people seek for other things that take its’ place.  But having faith and belief in Jesus Christ is the biggest point and purpose of our life’s mission.  People in Christ’s day often refused to see His mission and His miracles because they refused to see the purpose of His mission.  They talked around it, found fault with Him because of their own traditions, and just could not see the magnificence of Christ because He wasn’t exactly what they were looking for.  They expected their “king” to be sitting on a throne, not lying in a manger and walking the dirty streets of Jerusalem.  They missed the whole point of His being, because they were quibbling over semantics.  Christ was and is the main point of our existence, the center of our faith and our Savior.  That is the point.

I believe that I have been blessed with the gift of faith.  It has never been difficult for me to understand the gospel.  I’ve always viewed it as the greatest gift in my life.  I know it’s not that easy for others to have faith, but I know that we can all develop faith.  I believe the most important faith we need to have is “Faith in the Lord Jesus Christ.”  Faith in something or someone or situations is also important, but having faith in Jesus Christ covers so much more of our lives. I have pondered on this idea probably more than any other gospel principal because I think that statement is profound.  We hear in lessons or conversations that we should have faith that something will work out, that someone will be blessed in their infirmities, that our prayers will be answered, etc.  But true faith IS faith in Jesus Christ – that’s the kind of faith that matters, putting our whole trust in Him, believing that He will help us out of our misery.  Having faith IN Christ means that we put our belief directly in Him, that what He’s taught us is true and that we can put our very lives in His most capable and loving hands.  We can have faith that He knows our sufferings, He knows the big picture of our lives and we can allow Him to guide us through anything.  If we can turn our desires to Him and allow His guidance in our lives every day, then we won’t need to worry about what happens to us.  All we will need to do is to turn to Him, pray and ask that we will be aware of the direction He would like us to go and notice the miracles that He will send specifically to us. 

There were times that doubt and fear tried to creep into my heart.  Fear of what the future held was a huge roadblock for me at times.  When we can’t see what the end result of a trial might be, it is easy to get wrapped in the “now” of what we are going through instead of believing in the possibilities of “what might be” in the future.  Staying in the “now” of a trial too much may keep us from having the faith that is needed to keep moving forward.  When doubt surfaces to the top of our trial heap, we need to give the Lord equal time in believing in Him, and having faith in His purposes and His power to heal us.  And as we give way to belief and faith, we give faith the power to grow.  Maybe like the old broken down house, we used to be something much more than what we see now.  I have faith that we can rise above our current extremities and be so much more.  My faith tells me that I must not doubt it!

This last section or part of my story holds the most value for me – the healing.  Looking at the content of my story I see something that surprises me.  There were 8 chapters to explain my trial, but there were double that – 16 chapters where I describe the significant lessons I learned from this experience!  That in itself is noteworthy, because it shows that there is life after pain.  Those lessons learned have led to the final stage of my understanding and progression, which was to heal.  Healing is the best stage after a trial, and proves that the bad things that happen in our lives may begin badly but they don’t end there.  The healing completes us.

One of my favorite movie lines comes from a wonderful movie, The Sound of Music.  During time of Marie Von Trapp’s despair, the Reverend Mother tells her this, “when the Lord closes a door, somewhere He opens a window.”  That sentiment may be hard for some to believe, but it has always been true in my life.  There are times when the dark clouds have gathered, sending a violent storm.  Just when you think the storm will never end, the sun peaks through the clouds with a brilliant glow, sending down rays of light bringing hope that the destructive part of the storm is ending and we are showered with the light.  I love to see that image in the sky and clouds bathed in light after a storm.  Through imageries time and time again, nature reminds us of vital lessons to be learned in our own lives.

I have recognized through the years that it’s what comes after the storm, ie: our trials, that is the most important.  The trial itself may be short lived or ongoing, but how we respond to the trauma is more important than what happened to us. 

I will paraphrase, but a wise man told my oldest child this, “Your yesterdays do not have to ruin your tomorrows”. 

I love to go to the ocean.  Being by the ocean is healing and somehow the sound of the waves brings calm and peace to my soul.  When I’m there, my brain doesn’t do its’ usual hopping around from thought to thought or subject to subject.  In fact, it’s hard to me to think about anything.  It’s the one place where by brain seems to rest.  It’s such a welcome relief!

One thing that I love about the ocean is not only the beauty of the sand and water, but I love the consistency of the ocean waves.  Though they are not always the same size, shape or strength, they keep rolling in.  They will not disappoint.  Some are farther away from the shore, some come right up to the edge of the beach.  They are always there, one wave at a time.  Sometimes on the shore, the waves create ripples in the sand, reminding us that beauty can be shaped anywhere and that the water can leave a mark to show that the waves have been there, still consistent. 

This beauty, this entire world was created for us by a loving God.  The ripples in the sand remind of His hand in our lives.  If He created all this for us, then of course He will be a consistent presence in our lives. As the waves, He will not stop rolling forward in our lives and He will not leave us.  He is watching over us and if we turn to Him, He can leave His “ripples” in our hearts and His mark on our souls.  As the waves leave a mark in the sand, so can God leave His mark in us.

There is an idea I read many years ago about how God watches over us.  He doesn’t appear before our eyes (probably because as mortals we couldn’t bear His glory), but He does send others to help us and to answer our prayers.  That idea was central to my healing.  He is noticing us, watching over us and prompting our friends, family and maybe even strangers to connect with us in perfect ways that will help us.  As we pray to our Heavenly Father for guidance, we can be assured that He is aware of us each of us, watching over us.  And He’s not just watching, He is actively involved in helping us.  He sends people to us, to be an answer to our prayers.  He may also use us to be the answer for someone else’s prayers.   The caution is this…God does answer our prayers, but sometimes in different ways than we would expect.

What does “watching over” mean to us?  As a visual learner, I use my own experiences to connect with what this means.  As a parent if I am watching over my child, I make sure to take care of their needs – to see that they are fed, clothed, safe, happy and loved.  I participate in preparing sustenance, providing shelter from the storms and teaching them the things that they need to know in order to be safe, happy and live a full life.  Can we see that our Heavenly Father is doing the same for us?  As our eternal, heavenly parent, He is watching over us.  He desires us to be safe and happy, so He’s given us spiritual sustenance through scriptures.  He gives us shelter from the storms of life by providing the gospel, prayer and His love.  He teaches us the most important things that we need know to return to him through the example of His son, Jesus Christ.  I know our Heavenly Father does watch over us, and loves us beyond our ability to comprehend. 

God inspires us to serve others, and others are inspired to serve us.  His sends us, his messengers to do His bidding and encourage his children.  Many times we are the recipients of service performed by someone else.  We are served in various ways – in ways that Father knows we need the most.  It may be a friend that happens to stop by when we need physical help or a spiritual lift.  Another time it might be something that someone says in passing that gives an answer to our prayers or a speaker in a church meeting that makes a comment, inspiring us to go in a certain direction.  My needs have been met in countless ways through other people.  Answers to my prayers have also been met by unseen spirits not of this world. 

Several years ago a friend shared this saying with me, a quote from Pierre Teilhard de Chardin…“We are not human beings having a spiritual experience; we are spiritual beings having a human experience.”  Those words helped put things in perspective for me.  We are currently mortals, but we don’t have to be mortals hoping for a few exceptional moments in life where we feel connected to something more than our earthly existence.  We are spirits, coming from an eternal existence.  Our spirits have been sent to this earth to get a body, learn, grow and hopefully return to live with our father, our Heavenly Father!  We are first and foremost spirits, children of God that are here on earth for a short period of time when compared to eternity.  We are subject to this mortal experience right now, with all the limitations of a mortal body.  But we are still spirits first.  If we can get in touch with our true selves, our spirits, then I think we could experience this earth life in a totally different way than we do. 

Through all of my lessons and my healing, my counselor Mark was an important resource.  He helped me work through my pain by sharing with me the lessons that a counselor would normally share with a patient, but so much more.  He shared spiritual wisdom with me, for which I will be forever grateful.  I know that not all counselors can speak with the spirit, but he was one that could. 

When I was in counseling, my counselor Mark shared with me his personal near death experience.  He was in a hospital, having surgery and he died while on the operating table.  As his spirit left his body, he observed his mortal body on the operating table.  He saw doctors and nurses rushing about, trying to revive him.  He also saw other non-earthly spirits in the room with him and throughout the hospital, and he noticed that those spirits were observing, learning from the things that were going on around them.  His spirit eventually reunited with his body, but the lesson he taught me from sharing this experience was two-fold. 

1.  Mark knows that there are spirits all around us on this earth.  He saw spirits from both sides – some were good spirits that were trying to help him, and help and support all of us, and at the same time they are learning from us. I have felt a similar thing through the years, feeling supported by the light spirits from God.  Mark also saw evil spirits that are Satan’s followers, trying to tempt us and hoping that we will falter and become miserable like they are.  I have also felt dark spirits, trying to influence me for ill.  The thoughts the dark spirits inflict upon us are not who we are, and we must be careful not to believe the messages they try to plant in our minds. 

2.  Due to the presence of all these different spirits watching our lives, Mark had a strong confirmation that everything we go through has purpose.  We do not experience anything, good or ill for no reason.  All that happens in our lives has great purpose.  As Mark shared these things with me, I felt the spirit testify of their truths.  Knowing that everything we experience has purpose has helped me beyond measure.  I came away from that counseling session knowing that all the things I was experiencing, good and bad were all purposeful.  This doesn’t mean that the abuse should have happened.  It means that even the worst situations in our lives can have purpose.  I don’t see life as just happenstance any longer.  People have their agency to inflict pain on others, but if we are the ones that have experienced the pain, we can find purpose in the process as we recover.  In that recovery process, I believe there are no coincidences.  The things we may see as amazing coincidences are not that at all.  They are miracles from a loving Father in Heaven orchestrated perfectly to help us.  We must turn to Heavenly Father so that we recognize the gifts He sends to us.  We choose whether or not to accept or reject those gifts.  He will often help us even if we haven’t asked for His assistance. 

From that time on in my life, everything that I experienced changed for me.  I began to see the purpose in my trials.  Prior to this counseling session, I had felt that my life had been wasted.  I felt that someone else, Phil had the ability to step into my life and totally change it and ruin it for the remainder of my days on the earth.  That was wrong.  My life had not been totally ruined.  My life had changed to be sure, but I could decide from this point on if I was going to give in to the darkness of what had happened, or turn and seek for the light that would save me and my family.

Some people get mad when bad things happen to them.  They are angry at God for allowing the travesties of life to happen to them and those they love.  The anger comes from being hurt, from hurting so bad that you don’t know what else to do.  I don’t feel judgment toward people for feeling this way for a time, because their anger is a result of the hurt they feel.  But I do know that none of us have to stay stuck in that angry place and continually carry that hurt.  I don’t know why anyone would want to stay in such a miserable place in their hearts.  Though anger is a part of the grieving process, anger does not bring the ultimate needed healing.

Our Father in Heaven loves us.  He wants us to have happiness and joy.  That happiness and joy is often interrupted by sadness and trials.  But the only way to get us out of the trials that are weighing us down is to turn to God, not away from Him.  I don’t exactly know why, but my tests and trials turned me toward God.  I was hurting as I’d never hurt before, but I knew that if I turned my back on God that I would be giving up the very thing that would save me from this trial.  I knew that if I turned to my Heavenly Father and to my savior Jesus Christ, they would help me.  I learned to trust God’s purposes. I knew it was my only real hope of ever rising above my current problems and I knew I couldn’t do it without them.

As the years have gone by, I’ve watched people that can’t or won’t heal over difficult trials.  Somehow it is easier for them to stay stuck, to blame someone else for their problems.  Serious, life altering problems occur when we focus on blaming others for our circumstances.  I felt that I had every reason to blame my ex-husband for the turn of events in my familys’ lives.  There were times when I wanted to blame him, and it was logical to blame him for our current struggles.  I hated him for what he had done.  I hated that he had taken innocent childhood away from my children.  I also knew that if I stayed in that attitude, that those dark feelings invited Satan to have place in me.  Hatred only cankers the soul.  I didn’t want the hatred and hurt to change me, to lead me away from the One I knew could save me and save my heart from eternal destruction.  Blame doesn’t allow us to trust in God.  Blame doesn’t allow us to make personal progression in our lives, but rather it stops us in our tracks and we are unable to move forward and progress.  Forward momentum and personal progression come as we seek for the Lord’s guidance and His light.  He wants us to “press on”!

Stubbornness – it’s a word that seems to have more negative connotations than positive.    I have always been a bit stubborn, hopefully not to excess, but I definitely have had my moments.  I always thought it was one of my worst qualities.  But I learned something new about being stubborn – it can actually be your friend during the times when you need to press on.  The positive part about stubbornness is not giving up.  My stubbornness ended up being part of my salvation when used for a positive reason, such as survival of the soul.   I determined that I was not about to let Phil’s choices ruin the rest of my life and the lives of my children.  I could choose to continue to feel the sorrow, pain and anger or I could trust in “Heaven’s embrace”.  I stubbornly chose to be wrapped in the comfort of my Savior. 

As I chose to trust in Christ, I received the capacity, ability and spiritual/emotional strength much stronger than my own to cope with this new life.  The Lord carried me through my trials.  As I looked to Him for desperate guidance, it was given.  My trial was not taken away, but the Lord strengthened me in my extremities.  I felt peace and was able to continue on, even to press forward with faith. 

Often our own ideas and perceptions of spiritual matters hold us back from further understanding.  Often the answers to our prayers are not usual and may be unusual.  We need to be open to the Spirit that He will send us, open to receiving messages that may seem unconventional, and think “outside the box” of our present understanding.  The scriptures often mention the “mysteries of God” as something to seek for.  I believe the mysteries are only mysteries because we haven’t set aside our own preconceived notions about what things mean.  In order to understand the mysteries, we must open our hearts and minds fully to the Spirit while setting aside our predetermined limitations.  We need to trust in God and believe that He has a plan for us.  Our present concepts are not enough.  As the world changes, our present concepts will not be enough.  We will need to trust in God more and more, believe there is a purpose to our suffering and always remember that He IS watching over us!

It was difficult for me to have a positive attitude during those first few months after learning the truth.  I couldn’t find it within myself to have a positive attitude about most anything.  I was so weighed down with the demands of this new life I was having to face.  As I struggled with the stresses of everyday life, I also started thinking about the kind of person I wanted to be, trials or not.  Did I want to be bitter, angry and mean?  Did I want to wake up every morning overcome with hopelessness, fear and despair?  Did I want to remain emotionally trapped by the burden that this situation had created?  The answer was a definite no!  My mother and father had not raised me to want those types of things.  They taught me love, kindness, service and sacrifice for others.  I determined that I wanted to be what my mother and father had taught me to be and feel joy once again.  I wanted to be the “me” I had begun life with. 

Because of Phil’s manipulation, I did not see the small changes in myself over the course of the time we were married.  I had allowed self-doubt to creep in.  I had lost much of my faith and belief in myself as I began to believe Phil’s opinions about how silly I was over feelings I had.  It was a slow process over a few years and I didn’t see it happening in myself.  But once Phil was out of my life, I recognized that I had lost much of who I was – I had lost Sophia.  Maybe not totally lost, but the old Sophia was hiding somewhere underneath the bitter pain.  I wanted to be myself again, and so it started.  Through many personal choices and attitudes, I started to find myself again.  It was a wonderful journey to find me and remember who I was. 

I started making choices for myself, I wanted to feel more positive and look for the good in people and in life.  Having gratitude was a first big step to begin healing and I wanted to be a “glass half full” kind of person instead of a “glass half empty” person.  So very conscientiously I pulled myself away from negative thoughts and tried not to live in the painful past.  I tried to deal with the truth, but I also didn’t want my every day actions to be a reaction to what I’d been through, or a reliving of painful events.  I wanted to create a new life for me and my children.  I wanted to make happy memories and build upon those.  We started some small traditions that became tangible things to hold on to and look forward to.  I learned that when you’re going through a trial, thinking positively takes a huge amount effort, but it is worth every effort.  I could take a negative thought about something and replace it with a positive thought instead.  It took creativity, prayer and a decision to practice positive thinking.  It was not easy, but working toward and choosing optimism made me happier and made my home a place of increased contentment. Choosing to think positively helped to heal my soul.

I found that people who think positively have happier lives, often healthier bodies and better relationships.  I’ve read stories about people with tremendous physical trials – their lives are not easy, but somehow they’ve made the choice to be happy even if they can’t move their bodies or do things with ease.  Positive thinking is imperative to our emotional recovery.  It welcomes light from our Heavenly Father, and will allow His messages of guidance and love to be felt in our hearts.  It opens up the conduit between us and heavenly powers, allowing personal revelation to get through to us.  Positive attitudes are magnetic and bring more positive things into our lives. 

On the flip side of positive thinking is of course negative thinking.  Focusing on negative things brings unhappiness, I believe more physical illness and a sense of unease.  Finding things to complain about and focusing on bad things too often brings more sadness and emotional discontent.  Just as positive thinking is a magnet for more positives to come into our lives, too much negative thinking will also produce more negatives in our lives.  We give Satan more power over our thoughts and actions if we continue with a pessimistic outlook.  He then gains control over who we are, which may change our ability to choose positive and happy thoughts.  If we constantly live with a negative state of mind, that’s how it will stay.  And it will only go downhill from there.

I know there are dark circumstances that come into our lives.  If we are honest with ourselves, there is much that can bring us down in life.  I understand that very well!  I’m not suggesting that we all act like life is wonderful all the time.  We can’t ignore hard things and truths in life by living with our heads in the sand, but staying in a dark place in our hearts will not improve our lives.  Satan would like us to stay in his darkness, and he desires to bring us to his level of unhappiness.  He would like to keep us in emotional bondage, always having doubts about who we are and questioning if we are worthy of any higher thoughts than the ones he and his angels of darkness deliver to our minds.  He would like to claim our souls as his.  But we can’t give in!  We must fight him, and it is a very real fight.  In many cases it may be a personal war that must be fought over and over.  In spite of the fight, the Lord is always on our side, pulling for us to win.  In the Old Testament, 2 Kings, chapter 6 is the story of an Asyrian army that has come to attack the Israelites.  The Israelites are surrounded by the enemy, but the prophet Elisha tells a worried servant who fears the attacking army, “Fear not: for they that be with us are more that they that be with them.”  Elisha has the spiritual eyes to see a “mountain full of horses and chariots of fire round about” them to protect them, knowing that God is mindful of their situation and with His power is protecting them on every side.  We can also have spirits of light at our side, supporting us as we battle to win this war with Satan.  The spirits that follow Satan are pulling us one way – they do come, but the spirits of light in the Lord’s army are beaconing us an opposite direction because they also come, but  with more power.  I have felt Satan’s pull, and sometimes I’ve almost let him win.  But I knew ultimately I didn’t want the kind of life Satan has to offer.  I wanted the Light of Christ to be my life choice. 

We all have problems, troubles and sometimes extreme challenges to live with.  We are here on this earth to live this life, good and bad, so why not make it as happy as possible?  Why not believe the scriptures that tell us that “men are that they might have joy”?  Why not believe that the Lord loves and cares for us?  Because I know He does.  If we will focus on our blessings, then we can have happiness even in sad times. 

If we want to feel more positive in our lives, we can start by asking ourselves a few questions.  Do you believe that you are a child of God?  Do you believe that He wants happiness for you?  Do you believe that He wants you to feel joy?  If in doubt, ask Him, and He will tell you who you are and what He feels about you.  You’ll feel it in your heart – it will feel joyful! Our Heavenly Father can help to bring us a remembrance of who we are.  We are His children and He loves us beyond our ability to understand or comprehend. 

After learning that Phil had abused our children and other children, the simple fact that he had broken the commandments of God stood out like a flashing neon sign.   I thought a lot about his broken covenants, broken promises and how that all stemmed from his disregard for obedience and his subsequent ease in breaking the commandments.  The things I had always learned regarding the importance of keeping the commandments of God were in the forefront of my thoughts.  If Phil had only obeyed the commandments, none of this would ever have happened.  My family and I would not have been so hurt if he’d chosen to obey the Lord’s commands.  He knew what they were – he knew what was right and what was wrong.  He made a devastating choice for all of us. 

I know that the Lord’s commandments are given to us for our good and for the good of others.  Some see commandments as restrictions that keep us from making our own personal choices.  I see them as gifts, given to bless our lives and to keep us and others safe from spiritual harm.  They are given as protection against Satan’s temptations.  If we choose to obey them, we will be blessed.  If we break the commandments, it often starts a chain of events that lead to heartache and grief. 

Sometimes the choices we have to make aren’t just between right and wrong, but they are between two or more good things. This makes our choosing quite a bit harder.  What do we choose when it appears that there are two good answers?  

As a single parent I needed to be in the work force, and I was blessed to find employment where the hours allowed me to arrive home at the same time my children came home from school.  When I began working outside the home again, I got a job working at a good place and made some wonderful friends.  I worked there for several months, and I was happy in my job.  Then suddenly I was transferred to another building in the same line of work, but with all new people.  My comfort zone had been shaken.  The new job was ok, but I it wasn’t my favorite place to be.  As this new job went along however, I saw the Lord’s hand in what had happened.  One day in conversation with a coworker, I found out that she had been abused by her father and was struggling with the emotions it produced, and she was trying to heal over the abuse.  As she got older, she had a child out of wedlock.  She loved this daughter more than anything, and she wanted to make her daughter’s life better than what she had.  Prior to our conversation, she had not known about the trial I had been through, but I was able to listen to her and relate to some of the things she was feeling and what she’d been through.  We struck up a friendship, one that the Lord had provided for both of us.  I think my experience helped her to understand and heal, and helping her was helping me to heal as well.  I found that by using my trial to help someone else, it blessed my life.  After our initial conversation, I left the room and found a quiet place to cry, tears of gratitude to my Heavenly Father for putting me in the place He wanted me to be.  Even though I had not appreciated being transferred, I knew I was supposed to be there, and I was so grateful for this tender mercy. 

I was finally happy in this job, knowing that Father had a hand in it.  I was actually excited about the prospect of not knowing where I would work from year to year, because I would be where Heavenly Father wanted me to be.  He could shuffle me around from place to place and I would be happy.  Then I received a call from my previous employment telling me a job opening had come up and they wanted me back at their location, no transfers necessary for this job.  Accepting this job would mean that I would no longer be shuffled around, but would have job I could depend on.  Finally some security!  But I was torn.  I had finally come to accept that I wanted the Lord to place me wherever He wanted me to be and I would be happy to do His bidding.  Now I was being offered a permanent job with people that I adored.  What should I choose?   I didn’t know.

I called a dear friend and asked if I could come and talk to her.  I went to her house and told her of my dilemma.  She asked me a simple question, “Which thing makes you feel more light?  Which one doesn’t feel as light?”  We talked about the differences between feeling light and dark, but this decision was different.  I felt quite good about both situations.  Her advice to me was to choose the job which made me feel more light.  I realized that the thing of more light would be the one that Heavenly Father would want me to choose.  So I pondered and prayed and made the decision to accept the permanent job offer.  That choice felt peaceful and good.  I was able to return to good friends at my previous workplace, and doing this job would prepare me to qualify for other employment in the future that would make me very happy and bless my life.  I will always be grateful to my dear friend who helped show me how to make important choices in my life by using Christ’s light. 

A few thoughts about choice:

• When faced with two good choices, maybe it’s not important which good thing we choose, as long as we choose to follow Christ.  If both choices will lead us in a good direction and bring us to a place of more light, then we have chosen well.  It is easier to keep a positive attitude if we have followed the Lord’s light. 
• We make choices everyday about the things in our lives – when we wake up, what we will wear, what we will eat, what music or entertainment we will watch, and many others things throughout the day.  But we don’t just have choices over things.  We make choices over our attitudes and how we will act toward others.
• When we are confronted with a problem, the only time we will ever be totally down and out is if we choose to stay down and don’t get back up and continue on.  We can stay down and refuse to carry on and let something or someone else ruin our lives, or we can choose to rise above the darkness and carry on with confidence and faith in ourselves and in the Lord. 
• We are God’s children and we were born to be glorious beings, not inconsequential nothings.  We can choose light, or we can choose dark.  The grey areas of choice are not an option for the heavenly beings we are meant to become. 
• No matter when or if bad things happen to us, we still have a choice.  Our minds may be confused by events and circumstances, but personal choice remains consistent with God’s plan for us.  No one can take that away.  It is a gift from our Savior.  We choose – it is OUR choice if we follow the light or the dark.  We can and must choose to follow and stay in the light of Christ.  It makes all the difference.