It's a little later in the morning than when I usually sit down to journal because I went on a walk with Meagan this morning. And since it's summer in Texas it gets hot pretty early so we met at the park at 6:30 to get a walk in before it got too hot!
We went to the cabin over the weekend with the Fish and we had a great time! To me it feels like that is what summer weekend days are supposed to be like, hot and on the lake or at the cable park! Plus, it was nice for me to be doing something social and fun, and not something social and heavy!
Last night as I said my prayers I just cried, a lot! There are so many hard things going on in the world right now and I wonder when will life go back to normal. And I wonder if it ever will. Will we ever be able to meet in large groups again, groups over 50? Will we ever be able to meet without masks? Can we ever congregate as a ward again? I miss it! I miss singing the hymns! I miss listening to the speakers! I want to be able to have young women's again! I want to get together with the girls! And as I prayed I realized that the reason I want all of these things is because I want to connect with them. So I'm going to have to think outside the box on ways to connect with the girls.
Last week I bought the girls in the 17 year old class each a zebra plant succulent. I am taking them to the girls this week. I am using them not only as a gift but as a way to remind them to work on their goals. Polly has one at my parents house and it is so beautiful! It started out so small but has grown quite a bit and the dark green leaves with the white on them are so pretty! So I want them to remember their goals as they see their succulent each day, and remember that just like their succulent, they may not be able to see that they're growing in these four areas on a day-to-day basis, but over time they'll be able to look back and see that their daily efforts have paid off and that they have indeed grown!
I'm excited to deliver them! I'm excited to visit with the girls! I hope I can be bold in my testimony and bold in the questions I want to ask them. I often think of Alma the younger in the Book of Mormon, he's my favorite person in the Book of Mormon, and what his goal was, and I find that it's what my goal is as well! I want to bring others unto Christ! That really is my goal and my wish and my desire! And it's going to take being bold! And asking thought provoking questions! And I'm not super good at that. I don't know how to be natural in that area. So I am going to have to rely on God for help. I know he can take weak things and make them strong, I have seen that in my own life in other areas. So I know He can help me in this area if I will rely on Him.
In fact, as I typed that it's got me thinking about what it means to rely on Him. It means to ask for help! It means to get down on my knees and ask! Faith is an action word.Faith is "the assurance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen" (Hebrews 11:1). So if I have an assurance of something I am hoping for in this case, how do I get that? How can I be sure that I can get the help I am seeking? On my own, I can't be sure! Thus, I have to turn to God for help! Faith means doing, because we can't have an assurance without His hand in our life! Think about all the people in the Bible who come to Christ to be healed, they had a hope, their hope was to be healed! Did they know for sure that Christ would heal them? No! How could they? They had only heard stories, they had not seen for themselves. Their faith came through action! How could they be healed if they just hoped for it? They couldn't! They had to physically come to Christ before He could heal them. So therefore, Christ IS THE ASSURANCE! When faith says that it's an assurance of something hoped for, the only was we can have that assurance is through Christ! In my case, right now, where wanting to be better at this skill of being bold and loving all at the same time, means that me acting in faith is getting down on my knees and humbly asking for His help. I can't just expect and hope for Him to help me without asking for it. And just because I know He has helped me in the past doesn't mean I should rely on the knowledge and have that knowledge be my faith this time. No! That's more like a testimony. Testimony is evidence or proof provided by the existence or appearance of something. So when we I have a testimony that He has helped me in the past, that's a beautiful thing, and something to cling to and cherish, as well as a motivator to do it again this time, but faith ... faith is action! And each time we are met with something new in life, a challenge, a trial, a hardship ... anything, we need to exercise faith all over again. We need to turn to Him in all of our trials. That is faith! Faith is action! Faith is turning to Christ in our actions so that we can have the assurance of what we hope for.
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