My Lucky Day

My companion, Sister Marble, and I pray every day (many times each day) that we will be able to touch someone's heart through the help of the Holy Ghost.  Most of the time we don't know who that person will be or how, but we do our best each day to keep the Spirit with us so that when the opportunity arises, we will be ready.

One day we were walking down the street and saw a man trimming his fruit tree and started to make simple small-talk with him and eventually started teaching him about prophets and the Book of Mormon.  After a while, he came down off his ladder and said, "look ladies, I need to get back to work so do you have some kind of pamphlet or book you are handing out or something?"  We looked at each other smiling and pulled out one of our many Book of Mormons and said, "Definitely. We're actually handing out free Book of Mormons today" and handed it to him.  He took it and jokingly said, "Well, it must be my lucky day!"

With that declaration, Sister Marble and I felt the Spirit testify so strongly to our hearts that it was his lucky day. This man had no idea what he was holding in his hand.  He had know clue that those pages held the key to exaltation and eternal happiness.  And that made me wonder, do I?  Do I really understand the enormity of what I'm handing out and testifying of.  I obviously don't have a complete knowledge of what the Book of Mormon entails, but I do know and testify that it is the Word of God.  That it was He who inspired the prophets of old to write what they did so that we could come closer to Christ.  I know this with my whole heart!

That morning when we prayed for a heart to be touched, I had no idea it would be mine.  I will be forever grateful that the Spirit was able to guide us to a man pruning his tree, and through him, strengthen my ever-growing testimony of the Book of Mormon: Another Testament of Jesus Christ.

"No thanks, I choose life!"

 Sid the Sloth's sarcastic statement encompassing his lack of faith in the plan before him is funny and cute, but can (if you try really hard) teach us an important lesson.  We have so many choices before us everyday and sometimes we can get distracted by what we think we deserve.  We have ample opportunity to sit down and feel sorry for ourselves, to get upset when things don't turn out right, or to believe ourselves to be all alone in our trials. As hard as some of the circumstances we may find ourselves in may be, we have the ability to look at them and say, "No thanks, I choose life!" Choose to live a life full of happiness, peace, joy, and laughter! That option is up to you!  

One of my greatest heroes, President Dieter F. Uchdtorf said, "There will always be things to complain about—things that don’t seem to go quite right. You can spend your days feeling sad, alone, misunderstood, or unwanted. But that isn’t the journey you had hoped for, and it’s not the journey Heavenly Father sent you to take. Remember, you are truly a daughter/ son of God!"  

We can take that understanding of who we are and apply it in our lives to live up to our potential. We are children of God! We have the divine power to choose to be happy in this life!  If we look to Jesus Christ as our example, the path to true happiness is unfolded before us and all we have to do is take that first step and follow it.

Chased By An Elephant?

In the LDS church, children have the opportunity to learn from a very young age the morals and values we cherish in our homes and families. One of the ways we encourage this is by memorizing the 13 Articles of Faith. Which, as some might guess, tend to get a little muddled up when a large group of primary children recite them together. The line, "chaste, benevolent..." in the 13th Article can be mistaken for "chased by an elephant". It is silly and fun, but ultimately the message gets across. To hear little kids say that they believe in being "honest, true, chaste, benevolent, virtuous, and in doing good to all men" is a humbling and inspiring experience I have been blessed to witness.