God is in the Details.

I got the necklace I ordered, it says "God is in the details."

I absolutely love this phrase, because it perfectly sums up something that otherwise might be hard to explain. First, that God is everywhere! And second, that He is involved in everything! If we open our eyes and our hearts, we can see Him, and how involved He is in our life. Every! Single! Day!

Here is an excerpt from one of my journal entries that describes how I feel about God being everywhere.

"It's back! I have been so excited to get back here to my journal and write. I feel it again, God's power! It's more than a feeling, it's an understanding that He is in everything! I see Him in the sunrise each morning. I see Him as the light comes through my window. I hear Him in the chirping of the birds, the grass, the lake I drive over to get to the gym, the foods I eat, my amazing family, my healthy and able body, I literally see His power in everything! It's almost like if you pay attention to it, it's flowing all around us, just waiting for us to tap into it. I wish there were words to describe how tangible it feels. It reminds me of the movie Avatar where Grace (the head scientist ) is trying to explain to the military men about the neurons in the trees and how the Na'vi can access it.

Grace says, 'There is some kind of electrochemical communication between the roots of the trees, like the synapses between neurons. And each tree has ten-to-the-fourth connections to the trees around it. And there are ten-to-the-twelfth trees on pandora. It's more connections than the human brain. Get it? It's a network! It's a global network and Na'vi can access it.'"

Just like the Na'vi can access the their network, so too can we access God's power!

Our modern day Prophet told us, at least three times, if not more, in his October of 2019 general conference talk titled Spiritual Treasures, that we have access to this power!

"Every woman, and every man, who makes covenants, and who participates worthily in priesthood ordinances, has DIRECT ACCESS TO the power of God."

"You have the right to DRAW LIBERALLY UPON the Savior's power to help your family and others."

"Every time you worthily serve and worship in the temple, you leave ARMED WITH Gods power ..."

Did you catch the words I emphasized? We have direct access to His power. We can draw liberally upon His power. We can be armed with His power. That is so cool!

But what does that look like each day? That's going to be little different for each of us, but and I love the scripture in 2 Nephi 31:3 that tells us that God speaks to us according to our language and our understanding. But here are a few ways that I have noticed God in the details of my life, and how His power has blessed me.

In sharing these, I hope to show you that God truly is everywhere, and while we can draw close to Him through prayer and scripture study, those aren't the only ways! If we keep our eyes and hearts open, we will see, He is all around us.

Have you ever seen American Ninja Warrior? It's one of our families favorites. This particular show was a unique one because the people running the course were Hollywood stars. Each Hollywood star had been teamed up with an actual warrior to help them get through the course. For this race, Erica Christensen (from he TV show Parenthood) was teamed up with Flip Rodriguez (the American Ninja Warrior). At the time, this particular race struck me as special, since all the tactics Erica used to finish the course were one's I was trying to implement with my Savior! Take five minutes and watch it here!

At .43 seconds into the video, Erika realizes she has come upon something that is too hard for to physically handle on her own. So what does she do? She turns to her partner and she literally tags him in as she says "tag team, you got this."

Have you ever tagged God or your Savior? I have! There have been times where I have looked up and said, "Tag, you're it. I can't do this on my own." Sometimes those things have been really hard things, like letting go of hurt that someone else has placed on us, or repenting of sins. But other times, its been simple things! One time, I found out only 24 hours ahead of time that I would be going to my husbands work Law Prom. I was already stressed with life, and had a lot to do. Searching for a dress that would fit me, work with garments AND I could feel comfortable in felt daunting in the short amount of time I had. As the stress weighed down on me I looked up and told God, very sincerely, "Tag. You're it. Where should I go to find a dress?" I got in the car and as I did so, Nordstroms came to my mind. Sure enough, I saw this one as soon as I stepped off the escalator!

At 1:19, he tags her back in and Erica continues to run her own race. But, not without slip ups! You'll notice that at 1:31 she falls, and Flip reaches down to pull her up.

At one point, when I was feeling especially down on life and like nothing I was doing was good enough, and I was having a hard time feeling God close to me, I was beginning to get frustrated!! I wondered why, at this time, would He distant himself from me? This went on for some time, and then one night, as I drove my boys to their rock climbing practice, my younger son asked if we could put on his playlist. The first song that came on was Say Something by A Great Big World. The lyrics to the song could have been something I wrote for God, "Say something, I'm giving up on you, and I'm feeling so small." I half way sang along to the song and half way choked back tears as the lyrics so perfectly fit my plea to God to say something! The very next song that came on was one I had never heard before, it was called Proud by Marshmello. At any other time, under any other circumstances, I don't know that this song would have stuck out to me, but on this day, God used this song to sing right back to me, "Hold on, hear me out ... I just want to let you know I'm proud. Close your eyes, tune them out, you're right here with me now. I just want to let you know I'm proud." That night, through those songs, God reached down to lift me up, just like Flip did for Erika on her course.

As she continues on her race, Flip pushes her up and gives her strength as she pushes obstacles out of her way, but it's the very end of her race that really speaks true to what our Savior does for us, and for how we can best utilize His power in our lives. Knowing that there is no way she can ever make it to the end on her own, Flip goes before her, and she literally uses his body to get to the finish.

As we watched this video as a family, by this point, I was in tears. The symbolism here was so powerful. None of us can make it to the finish without our savior Jesus Christ. He has gone before us, paid the price, and now offers the most powerful thing anyone could ever offer us! And we can tap into that very thing! We can use that power, every! single! day!

Just like Erika uses Flip to get through her course, I know we can use our Father in Heaven and our Savior Jesus Christ. Whether it's tagging them to take over when we can't do it ourselves, or relying on them to pick us up when we fall, or taking full advantage of the sacrifices our Savior has done on our behalf, I promise you, they are already here with you now. If you open your eyes to all the good around you and take that precious time to be aware of God, His power will flow into your life!!

At one minute and twenty one seconds into Erika's race, one of the announcers says, "This is a team to be reckoned with." And the same can be said for you and I! When we team up with God and our Savior, Jesus Christ, we too are a team to be reckoned with!

God is in the details of YOUR life!