Are you ready for this?!?

Did it turn out like you planned- this ride you are on? Or no? Did you plan for every crevice and creek and edge and prepare sufficiently? OH! You did? Wait- if I am hearing correctly- What!?!? You mean there were still curveballs you had not even anticipated? Your new experiences brought understanding for repeat and similar cycles, you say..Why of course! Did you know that this would change your life in the way it did? Could you have ever even imagined?

I don't think you could. You could not have imagined, had you not experienced this...

So tell me, what happened when you didn't prepare, when you didn't seek.....

what.

It crumpled you!?!

You forgot how to use it to empower you...You forgot that it would end and you did what?!?!? How could you forget how temporary that part would be, no matter how many times, in how many ways, it hits! So direly, direly temporary.. But it kept beating you down? Perhaps this is but an extended lesson plan to better empower you..to empower you to impact lives without number and escalate the joy you are near to receive- unless you let it beat you down.

Don't tell me that. Think clearer now, you CAN escape- why, don't you know that you can escape everyday through Jesus Christ, to your Creator- to the Almighty God of Heaven and Earth, of galaxies without number. He knows you very, very, VERY, very well (VERY!!!!). You just need to do everything within your capacity to exercise faith in his power.. you WILL see the beauty of this life unfold for you. I do every day.

That's how you got here, where you are. That's how you ended up with more than you thought you bargained for, and yet WAY more than you hoped for also. Always remember that.

A shoe and best friends.

 You may all be wondering- why missionary, do you put up a picture of you pointing at a shoe, in shock?

Well, let me tell you.
This shoe..
Oh man.
This shoe.

Lets took a look quick, at why best friends are one of the most expensive gifts we've got going for us. A best friend falls into the qualification of 'best' because they see your potential and your beautiful nature. They are those who find glee, in you! Best friends are aware of your quirks, your ill behaviors and your imperfections- and yet, somehow, are consumed in neverending adoration of you! When conflict arises, the goal is always to return to peace, to unity- greater forgiveness, and love. Their desire is to make you happy, and help you with tiny matters in life that seem insignificant to all else, and maybe even to yourself. They rejoice when you rejoice, and they hurt for you when you hurt.

Therefore.. wanting to be like, and be with the Savior Jesus Christ- is EXTRAORDINARY!!! This Lord of Lord, and King of Kings is here to open every locked doorway, to add a blossomed rose to every stem, and to rescue YOU, every day. "I am the good shepherd, and know my sheep, and am known of mine. As the Father knoweth me, even so know I the Father: and I lay down my life for the sheep." St John 10:14-15 He is PERFECT because he is the best. When you cry- he is in absolute agony. When you rejoice, he is far happier than you can know happiness. When you are worried over a trivial matter- he is anxious, and he is planning ahead, plotting out every possible path to make it better, and helping you grow through your difficulties in the meantime. He, the perfect friend, exceeds all definitions of greatness. He is a testimony of Heavenly Father's love for you.

I know he loves me well. If I am devestated because someone I taught, died on me.. even if that someone is totally ok, thoroughly living it up on the other side.. he is aching to hold me. If I am grateful because I got to eat Indian food, he is eccentrically delighted for me. He is anticipating to bless me with other little trinkets and personal joys that only he knows will bring me excitement. My off key notes sung, are wonderful music to his ears, for my heart beats for him, and he craves it. My slow running pace means more to him than any degree of lightning speed. He knows me intimately, personally and that's how well he knows you. It is through him that you will conquer and succeed! He will provide your sweetest friends, your dearest relationships, your deepest joys.

When we don't come crawling to this ever loving God- we can't have this. We won't be as happy as we were meant to be, and become.

Allow me to tie this in to shoes. Yesterday, I lost my shoe. I was like 'what.' I had to exercise in the morning on bare feet. No. I did not like it. I can lose food, I've been ok losing my ID and keys and blankets- but NOT A SHOE!!!!  I workout on shoes. I need the shoe.

Anyhow, Heavenly Father understood this. I looked EVERYWHERE!!! BAHH!!! My companion and I searched my bedsheets, our whole room, up and down!! I prayed in every prayer, all day, to find this shoe. I could feel the Savior laughing lovingly at me- he knew that I KNEW by now, that my shoe would be found. (Heavenly Father and I have a relationship with losing things and finding them that goes fairly.. eh.. daily.) (However he LOVES it- because it lets him show me how mighty he is in every issue, and it gives him oppurtunity to show me how much he loves me, on top of everything else he already does for me all the time)

So by the end of the day, I THREW my bedsheets off (which I had ALREADY done that morning) and all of the sudden-  my shoe popped into the air- and fell onto the floor.

My companion and I stood gawking at it.

These incidences have happened far more than once.. eh, weekly at least. So I took this picture, and wrote this blog, and tell you today.. keep the commandments. Get answers to your prayers. Keep your covenants, and become best friends with the Savior, and Heavenly Father NOW- if you want to live with them later. Learn why you want to live with them HERE.

I testify that Jesus IS the Christ. He will hear your every yearning. He will run to you and your Heavenly Father will burst with joy for and over you. Always, and forever.

His power will never fail

We enter life. We pursue things. We fall. We get back up. We fall. Does it matter then, that there IS one who cannot fail, this Jesus, this Savior of the world? Who overcame EVERYTHING (everything.), and cannot ever let anyone down? Ever? At all!?!?! OF COURSE IT DOES!! If he can do it, WE CAN, and because he did it-  it allows for us to have that chance as well. He gave his all- opening the door for us to give our all, and yet, to fall again and again, until we finally get it- and then grow even more, cycling ever upward in this life of spiritual, mental, physical and emotional interval training. We learn by scripture study of others' experience and day to day observations, or through our own suffering by our own experience, the route necessary to have happiness. One of the most instrumental factors to this comes down to not only allowing the Savior to enhance our personal abilities, our ambitions, and relieve us of our downfalls- but to enhance our very character, our very thoughts, and our very soul. It is in enhancing that part of us, that we can more wonderfully experience joy.

It may surprise you to know (actually, in my case, it probably won't surprise you that much ;) that we missionaries are quite human. Sometimes we don't want to do or be, sometimes we don't feel good enough- we are subject to the same temptations and stresses of life that every mortal that comes here, is subject to. So how do we stay so strong? How can we press forward with unflinching dedication? Because of the Savior. His power CANNOT fail, he cannot let us down when we ask Heavenly Father, THROUGH HIM, for what he WANTS to empower us with. He can't deny us progress. It is impossible. He came here for us to progress. His purpose is for us to progress. You. Me. Everybody.

When I tell God my bitter thoughts or wearinesses and plea for relief, I never, never feel cynicism, scoffing, constraint or compulsive need for control or condemnation, or derision. Never, not even in the hours of my life where such behavior deserved such correction.

I feel love. Pure, unconditional love, and peace, understanding and empathy. I remember the desires I have from the Lord from my mission- to learn to rely on him first, and I see that in many moments he is the only one to turn to. He tells me and begs me just to stay and press on. He emphasizes the promised blessings if I just but continue forward. He calms rage or discouragement with gentle care, soothes irritation with understanding, satiates loneliness with warmth and fills senses of worthlessness with a recognition of my identity and divinity; he washes my hopelessness with windows to a gleaming future I could not have even imagined, and lifts my sorrows by teaching me that everything I even experience now is preparatory to the next suffering man or woman I meet on the street. He subdues panic with peace, and slows rebellious emotion with open arms. Consequently- I become stronger, my inner being is stricken to greater life, greater perspective, greater utter and total bliss. My external actions follow.

I know he will do the same for YOU. I know it with every fiber of my being and that is why I am here. But we have to ask. We have to seek to know him.

God cares, and knowing he cares changes everything. Because we can fall, we WILL fall- but he never will. And because he never will, he will never leave us. This is the most precious, most grand reality that can be and I yearn with my soul, heart and mind for the world to have it. Learn of the Savior. Love him. For how dearly, how intimately, how deeply does he love you. He aches to bless you. Find out for yourself.