A few years ago, I was scraping by. I felt like an empty shell of a person. Two unexpected miscarriages have a way of knocking you down and out for awhile. It was incredibly hard hearing about other people's miracles because I still fully believe that could have been our story and it wasn't. Instead of building up my faith and hope, those stories made me question God more.
I still had an everlasting hope in Christ that I will be resurrected and if I do all that I can I will live with Him and our Heavenly Parents. I couldn't hope that all of my righteous desires would be met in this life though and obviously not in the way expected them.
I needed something more than the faith I already had or more hope. I needed something that could handle anything and everything, not just the life I wanted and planned for. I searched various subjects on lds.org to find anything that could help me. Last year, I came across an article by Elder David A. Bednar titled Accepting the Lord's Will and Timing. I encourage you to read it. The story that hit me the hardest was about a young couple he met that the husband was diagnosed with cancer within the first month of their marriage. The husband and wife throughout the experience had faith for him to be healed. When they asked Elder Bednar to give him a priesthood blessing, Elder Bednar asked him if he had the faith to not be healed. They discussed it and "we increasingly understood that if God’s will were for this good young man to be healed, then that blessing could be received only if this valiant couple first had the faith not to be healed. In other words, John and Heather needed to overcome, through the Atonement of the Lord Jesus Christ, the “natural man” (Mosiah 3:19) tendency in all of us to demand impatiently and insist incessantly on the blessings we want and believe we deserve."
I had never thought of it in that way before. We regularly talk about having faith to be healed in church, but not about having faith to not be healed. That's what I needed. I needed faith to endure whatever would come and that included not getting my miracle. That way I could honestly say Come what may and love it! I am still weak and occasionally indulge in thoughts and feelings that make it hard for me to be at peace with following the Lord's will. The thing is to keep pushing through the hard times and doing things that bring that peace back to my heart.
I still don't have all of the answers on what our life will look like. I do feel like the fog and haze are thinning. It's still there, but I know we can make it through with each other and the Lord guiding our steps.
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| I've often felt like I can see the ultimate goal, but the path is hazy. |
I still had an everlasting hope in Christ that I will be resurrected and if I do all that I can I will live with Him and our Heavenly Parents. I couldn't hope that all of my righteous desires would be met in this life though and obviously not in the way expected them.
I needed something more than the faith I already had or more hope. I needed something that could handle anything and everything, not just the life I wanted and planned for. I searched various subjects on lds.org to find anything that could help me. Last year, I came across an article by Elder David A. Bednar titled Accepting the Lord's Will and Timing. I encourage you to read it. The story that hit me the hardest was about a young couple he met that the husband was diagnosed with cancer within the first month of their marriage. The husband and wife throughout the experience had faith for him to be healed. When they asked Elder Bednar to give him a priesthood blessing, Elder Bednar asked him if he had the faith to not be healed. They discussed it and "we increasingly understood that if God’s will were for this good young man to be healed, then that blessing could be received only if this valiant couple first had the faith not to be healed. In other words, John and Heather needed to overcome, through the Atonement of the Lord Jesus Christ, the “natural man” (Mosiah 3:19) tendency in all of us to demand impatiently and insist incessantly on the blessings we want and believe we deserve."
I had never thought of it in that way before. We regularly talk about having faith to be healed in church, but not about having faith to not be healed. That's what I needed. I needed faith to endure whatever would come and that included not getting my miracle. That way I could honestly say Come what may and love it! I am still weak and occasionally indulge in thoughts and feelings that make it hard for me to be at peace with following the Lord's will. The thing is to keep pushing through the hard times and doing things that bring that peace back to my heart.
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| Taking my family to the temple helps me reset and remember who God sees when he looks at me. |
This has changed my perspective in other aspects of our life. Instead of praying that Jonathan gets the job he interviews for, I pray that he will do his best in the interview and that it will be a positive experience for him. I still want him to get the job, but I recognize that it might not take us down the path the Lord has in mind for us.
I still don't have all of the answers on what our life will look like. I do feel like the fog and haze are thinning. It's still there, but I know we can make it through with each other and the Lord guiding our steps.
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