Reflection

My intentions with this blog was just to do it because I had to. I have a personal blog and I love to go on there and spill my mind. But this blog was different, this was hard for me. Altogether, this class has been hard for me. I am having a hard time with the church lately so I struggled to do the reading, much less have a response to the reading. Doing this blog has been exceptionally hard for me. I’ll get on, begin to write, and then question what I just read and what we’re talking about in class and my faith in the church. Some of the readings really hit me and I was able to connect to, other readings passed right over my head and I could care less about. A lot of this semester I have spent angry at our Heavenly Father and I stopped going to church. With that, the last place I felt like I belonged was in a class where we were reading from people who believed in the church and in miracles. I’m missing that part of my life again. I wish I would have taken this class when I was at a different point of my life, I wish I could have written this blog when I was in a different place. Right now i’m full of uncertainties, i’m full of doubts and i’m not sure how to get away from in. I think there are moments in this blog where I can see my old self, I love those moments.

My goals are to find that person that I use to be, or the faith that I use to have. My goal is to one day come back to this blog and share my testimony and share this with other people. My goal is to one day learn how to appreciate these readings and see what I could have learned from them. My goal is not give up on this church and the blessings it has given my family. I am regretful that I didn’t give this class a chance and that I had a hard time making myself come. I am regretful that I wasted this opportunity.

Little Happy Secrets

This story really hit home. I don't personally know anyone that is homosexual and a member of the church but I couldn't stop thinking about this video BYU students made a few years ago.

It just goes to show that just because the church doesn't agree with pursuing homosexual relationships doesn't mean that we are against homosexuals as people. 

Doubts.

A Christian by Yearning - Levi Peterson

I have never felt like someone was in my brain and putting my thoughts on paper until I read this story.
Wow.

I moved to Utah with the hope that my testimony and faith in the church would be strengthened, I am afraid this has not happened to me. Now, I am not blaming this on anyone or the Provo culture. I take full responsibility for my lack of faith, but I will say that this place is not what I thought it would be.

My oldest two siblings are returned missionaries.
My younger brother is preparing for a mission.
I often worry what if i'm not good enough, what if when we're all resurrected I am not with them because of the choices I made? What if all my life they thought I was okay and strong in the church when really I am filled with doubt?

I watched my best friend get married in the Temple.
I know I SHOULD want that, I know I should feel the need to go down that same road.
I felt happiness, but I didn't feel the yearning to go in that building.
I didn't even feel like I belonged in the Visitors center.

But I will never bad mouth the church.
Its a great place, and it has gotten me and my family through a lot these past few years and I will never be able to thank the members and our Heavenly Father enough for that.
But, I fear that I will never get to the same place as my siblings, that I won't get married in the temple, that I will be separated from them in the afterlife.

Elder Oaks

I went to see Elder Oaks speak at Utah Valley a few weeks ago with my brother. I was surprised at the things we choose to speak about. His main point was that freedom of religion and freedom of speech are supposed to be free. And religious people let their beliefs affect what they say and what they choose to do. But when people start putting restrictions on what religion and what they want to hear that is essentially putting restrictions on the freedom of speech. Many people either want things 100% their way or not their way at all. For instance, they either want things to be 100% religious, or not religious at all. They don’t want anything in between and they certainly don’t want to compromise. His point was that compromise is important and it is what we need to start doing. It shouldn’t be anything or nothing, it should be some of both. I believe him and have always believed that compromise is the best way to go about things. Everyone gets part of what they want, and everyone is happy. We just need to get to a point where we are okay with some give and take with people who don’t necessarily share our same viewpoints.

What Is Your Tomb?

I had a lot of cool experiences this past Easter.
I was able to go and visit my sister in Austin, Texas and join her in Young Womens. (She is in the presidency.)
A lot of the girls in their ward come to church alone, or are looking to get baptized so they don't know a lot about the Gospel, this means that their lessons are brought down to such a simple level.

We talked about the Atonement and the cruisifictisn and how when people went to our Heavenly Fathers tomb they didn't find him there. He had risen.

My sister shared this example.
"I often think back to times in my life where I thought I would never recover from something, that it would be the end of me, it would be my tomb. Now if I travel back to those times I am no longer there, I made it out, it wasn't those things that ended me. Everyone has their own tombs. Heavenly Father made it out of his and he helps us make it out of ours."

Some of my tombs are:
-Depression.
-My dads illness.
-Anxiety.
-Bullying.

Heavenly Father felt all of our pain in the garden. But he didn't feel a generalized pain for everyone. He knows what MY depression feels like, he knows what MY broken heart feels like, he knows MY worries and MY struggles and MY anxiety. He knows ME.

Heavenly Fathers friends and family didn't find him in his tomb because that wasn't the end of him, he lives. My friends won't find me in my tomb of depression or anxiety because that isn't the end of me, I live.

Saratov Approach

I saw the Saratov Approach earlier in the semester while it was playing in the dollar theater. It put a lot of things in perspective for me. I hold grudges over the smallest things, I never love my enemy, and i’m a complainer. While watching this movie I realized how minuscule my problems were. These two young men were serving The Lord and this still happened to them. Once they got past their initial anger they began to try to love their enemy. They prayed for them, with them, and tried to get to know them. They took an interest in the life of their captors, even if they didn’t take an interest back. They had an opportunity to escape, they set up for it, they were prepared, and at the last second they backed out because it wasn’t what was best. Instead they risked their own life instead of taking another. In the end, it was getting to know their captors that helped save the missionaries. They didn’t go home, they served the rest of their two years like they had originally agreed to and not once did they hold a grudge against Heavenly Father. I left this movie feeling heavy. How could I be so angry at Heavenly Father for the trials in my life when these two men were almost killed and still had the courage and faith to complete their missions? It softened my heart to my own problems and made me realize the bigger picture.

Conversion

Last night my ward had a fireside for our joint FHE.
This man came and talked to us and told us his conversion story and how he found the church.
He had lived on the same street in Orem for 20+ years and all his neighbors had befriended him and his wife, even though they weren't members.
One day a blood clot was found right about his knee and in an effort to save his life they had to amputate his leg.

He told us how the local church members reached out to him.
Mainly, this women who also had lost her leg.
They were strangers, but she went and visited him at the hospital and held his hand.
They cried together, and they talked about the struggles he was going to face.
Eventually she challenged him to pray.

He asked God why he took his leg and God told him he took it to get his attention. He knew that is what he had to do to bring this man closer to the gospel and the church.

His leg was taken to bring him closer to the church.

It really made me question why my dad got sick.
Did Heavenly Father give my dad this disease to bring our family closer to the church?
Am I making my dad suffer because this illness of his has pushed me away from the church?

This man now volunteers his time to teach elementary school kids how to paint.
He has taken this trial as his and let it bring him closer to God.

It put my life into perspective.
Why is my heart so hard?

Trek

When I was about 14 my stake went on a Trek through the Virginia mountains.
I hated it.
It was hot, sticky, hard, and everyone smelled SO bad.

During the trek all I can remember is how hungry I was.
We're talking starving - i'm an eater.
One night we each got an individual packet of tuna, and four crackers.
After the trek I had trouble eating apples and peanut butter crackers...since that is what we lived off of.

I've never been so happy to take a shower.
Or not live out of a bucket.
And use a real bathroom.
And have a real bed.
And eat fried chicken.

I. Am. Selfish.

In class we read Death Strikes the Handcart Company by Parley P. Pratt and it really made me realize how easy my trek was in comparison.
Really, how easy my life is.

No one in my family died - no one died at all, I didn't go through frozen rivers, I didn't have to kill my food, when my three days was over I got in the van and drove back home.

I am a firm believer that our Heavenly Father gives us things we can handle, which is why I was born in this century. I can deal with the drugs, sex, and corruption going on in our world - but ask me to trek across the United States? No thanks.

I have so much appreciation and love for the people who were able to do this so that we can now be free and be spread throughout the United States.
It takes special kind of people to be able to make it through that, bad attitude or not.
Death, hazardous weather, war, and constantly being worried.
They made it.
We made it.

Opening Day

We're reading a story about a young man who had gone on his mission in Germany and while in Germany he say so many people killed that he decided he would never go hunting again.
Except, he had planned a hunting trip with his dad right after he returned from his mission.
Hunting was what he did with his dad, it was their boding experience.

It made me think of what bonding experiences I have with my parents, and do these things agree with what we're taught through the church?

We use to go on the boat with our friends on Sundays and just ride around the lake and talk as a family and as friends. Is that not keeping the Sabbath Day Holy? We're spending family time together, we're enjoying nature. Is that bad? Its things like these that are these gray areas about the church.

Whipple's - They Did Go Forth

We had to read this story They Did Go Forth by Maurine Whipple.

Real easy read, real good story.

Its about this wife, Tildy, is struggling to provide for her family and her sick baby. 

She doesn't have a lot of food, or warmth, but she tries her best to do what shes supposed to.

Her husband is also serving a mission in England.

In part of the story she questions whether or not it was good for her husband to go on a mission because she is pregnant with another child. She had a hint of bitterness in her heart but she tried to not let it take over. 

She is reading to her children out of the Book Of Mormon when a man appears in her house. 

Her baby is healed and she goes to get a fresh loaf of bread to feed her child.

Her bread has disappeared, along with the man. She figures that he has taken the bread along with the napkin it was wrapped in and she searches around outside to thank him.

She never finds him.

Meanwhile, in England, her husband kneels down in prayer and asks Heavenly Father to please send them some food because they are starving. As soon as he gets up and walks forward he kicks something on the ground. It is a loaf of bread wrapped in a beautiful napkin. 

Our Heavenly Father works miracles.

I've had some trouble connecting with anything we've read in class thus far, until this piece.

Heavenly Father has personally appeared in my house and blessed a family member with full health but I have seen his hand in other ways.

This past October my dad was diagnosed with an auto immune disease called, Transverse Myelitis. It causes his own body to attack his spinal cord. It all started with some back pain and within 72 hours he could no longer walk, he couldn't use to bathroom, and he couldn't feel anything below his hips. There is no medication for this except to pump him full of steroids and hope for the best. Since everything happened so fast the Doctors didn't expect him to really make any kind of progress healing wise. My dad, who a week before was carrying a tree through a forest and rock climbing, could no longer walk or stand on his own.  He was luckily accepted to try treatment at a rehab center specifically for people with spinal cord injuries, they expected him to stay there for a month at the least. He was out of there in eleven days. 

This was a miracle. We had a lot of fasting and praying from out families, our wards, relatives, people we didn't even know. My dads name was put of countless temple prayer lists, employees from his work even joined in and helped me family with whatever they could. My dads recovery was truly a miracle, just like Tildy's baby being healed and her husband being fed was. 

Miracles can happen.

ENGL 3780

I'm taking a Mormon Literature class this semester, I'm not sure how I feel about it yet.
For our final project we either have to write and keep up with a blog all semester about the things that we read, or write a final paper and submit it to a Mormon magazine.
So heres my blog.
Enjoy.