This last week has been so wonderful, it got up to like 70 degrees! It'll be back down to the 30s this week, but it was nice while it lasted.
We had dinner this week with this awesome family in the ward but only the mom and a couple kids are members, and she told us her conversion story and it was the best I've ever heard. Basically, she hit an elder with her car and totaled his bike and she felt so bad and was freaking out and offering to buy him a new bike and stuff but he was completely calm about it and told her it was fine and then he asked, "If I gave you a book, would you read it?" And of course she said yes because she felt so bad and she said she would do anything they asked, and the story of Ammon kept popping into my head along with the phrases, "wise, yet harmless" and "thus she was caught with guile." I love the scriptures.
"You dedicated to Him what you perhaps saw as the most valuable part, the most meaningful facet of you. And what happens? He throws a wrench in the whole consecrating process—or so it might seem. But He knows us. He loves us more than we can even imagine. He is never far away from us, especially when we are suffering. And we can rely on that love and support to sustain us no matter what. Though all else fails, though our fondest hopes and plans be dashed, though we be rejected or refused by the world or any who inhabit it, He is there. Though we feel devastated, He sees the lovable, beautiful, perfect facet at our core that is worthy of His sustenance and supportive grace. If we can sense His love, His concern, His attentive presence, then we can be at peace just putting one foot in front of another, attempting to walk uprightly before Him, willing to submit to all that He asks, being quick to set our path aright when we come to our senses and realize we have strayed, willing to sacrifice our talents or intentions or desires or position or a friendship or a son or . . . or . . . or, all because we know that everything will work to our best good in the end, that all loose ends will find reconciliation in Him.
Perhaps this is not just a two-week or two-year trial period for you. Perhaps you never will sing again, which would be difficult for many of us to understand. But perhaps this is a rough and irritating grain of sand that has been placed into that most tender, sensitive, essential part of you. Perhaps this is a struggle in your life that will continue to cause you a heavy heart and many sorrowful tears. If this all be the case, I would challenge you to use your bright mind, enormous energy, and vivid imagination to make your suffering fruitful. You can seize the opportunity to learn to be very sensitive and receptive to the Comforter and all the ministering angels that Father in Heaven puts into our paths.
You can use the experience to discover what the Lord wants you to know about yourself, and the full measure of your creation. Then you can learn to get more outside yourself to a greater appreciation of others, especially their dignity in the face of their own struggles and heartaches. And because of your own suffering, you can be a mortal “ministering angel” to their needs. Because of your suffering, you will know what to do and how to do it. And through such positive fruits of your sorrow, and by the atoning grace of the Savior, that painful, hard grain inside you can be coated again and again by your righteous efforts until the day you can place a beautiful, precious pearl into His sacred hand, all in appreciation for His atoning sacrifice and all He has taught you."
It's from this talk, if you want to read the whole thing: https://speeches.byu.edu/
~Sister Temp
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