I fell into restless sleep thinking about my need to acknowledge the abundance of blessings in my life. Apparently it was a time sensitive necessity (or maybe it was the pizza my awesome roommate made me right before bed. Either way, here I am awake at 4am)...
Number one, the overwhelming amount of love I feel. As surely as I know that God exists and is my father, I know that this love is a gift. It is my greatest source of gratitude right now. I recognize that it is from Christ. I know that it is a gift with a purpose of helping others. It is one I am frequently grateful for- to love both those I know and don't know, to varying degrees. It comes sometimes so out of the blue I don't know what I'm supposed to do with it. I have felt it a lot for friends and students lately. Maybe because I am leaving them... perhaps I feel the love they have for me. It's weird that it feels both explainable and unexplainable. Unexplainable perhaps in its quantity and quality, explainable in that if I think about the individual person I can say many of the reasons I love them. Unexplainable in that those reasons actually only make up a fraction of that love. The only answer I have to that is that the rest comes from Christ.
Number two, that as all these crazy changes take place in my life, which on the outside look tragic, I feel peace and gratitude and happiness. Another testimony that the best things in life do not come from getting what we want, or even our circumstances, but from the intangible. I am taking a leave of absence from my dream job and deeply missing my students, my health is not cooperating with life goals, I am leaving my life (and especially friends) and social opportunities, and a couple of other more personal things (as if those things aren't already personal)... and I feel trust in God. I trust that my students will be taken care of, that I will be able to return to doing what I love, that my health will in fact become better than it has been in years, that other long term 'self projects' will undergo a lot of progress in the near future, that dating and marriage and family will work itself out in the right timing as long as I am trying my best to do my part, that I will be able to spend invaluable time with my family, and that the other personal things will work themselves out in their time. As the path to this point has not been easy, I don't think it's necessarily going to be a cake walk, but I see very clearly right now the Lord's hand in my life. And I am grateful for this perspective.
Number three. My faith journey. I am grateful the road is not smooth, but rough. Otherwise, how would our own rough edges become polished? My beliefs do not come from naively being spoon fed the most palatable parts of LDS theology. I grew up in a family where beliefs ranged from Atheism to Catholicism to eastern spiritual practices to Mormonism. I chose to practice Mormonism as a result of spiritual experiences and study. My focus in my later teenage years was following Christ and becoming more grounded in Him and in my relationship with Him. I did this through reading the Book of Mormon and the Bible. I taught it for years as a missionary and teacher of missionaries in the Missionary Training Center. But the greatest test of my faith has come in the past two years, when I came to a place where the only thing I could say I knew was that God existed. I remember that moment, and thinking "I don't actually feel that He loves me anymore, and if I don't know that, then I don't know anything." I built up from there. And as I examined what I believed, and asked in prayer for confirmation of the foundation of my testimony of Christ's gospel as I believe it to be true, it was very much the fruits of the Spirit which testified of truth. I felt the love I hadn't felt from God. I felt peace, and a strange trust that everything would be ok (strange because I couldn't possibly see how logically it could be). I also felt illumination in my mind as I studied. My testimony has so much more polishing and refinement to undergo. And my spirit even more... but I feel confident in saying that the testimony I have is not one that is based on trust of what other people have told me. It is personally tried and tested.
One of the most beautiful things, I am finding, about this life, is the individual and unique journey we each must take in order to reach our potential. That looks like Buddhism to some. Calvinism to others. Independent or eclectic spiritual practices to others. Atheism. Judaism. Polytheism. Unbelief. A life of service. It looks like fame and fortune, poverty and hunger, life in a house with a white picket fence, abandonment, abuse, being surrounded by love, a life of loneliness... but I truly believe that is what binds us to Christ. Not one of us escapes the pain from sin and sorrow, and we all need Him. That He suffered it all is incomprehensible to me. If I could even come close to understanding the magnitude of it I would be overwhelmed with gratitude every moment of every day. Hopefully some day we will understand it fully. How incredible our relationship with Him will be!
So while our paths are unique and beautiful, I do also believe that when we are ready, we will all have the opportunity to accept His true teachings. And the paths we took to get to that place of readiness will provide us with the foundation and the truths and whatever we need in order to live and accept those doctrines. I don't think Mormons have a corner on the market on good people, or 'chosen' people... there are many people who are not LDS who are more spiritually evolved, or closer to Christ, or with a better relationship with God, or more serviceable, or less judgmental. I do believe that it is the fulness of Christ's gospel and that I have a responsibility to live my life the best I can to do His work to unify and bring people to Christ. I don't think that means baptize the whole world. I think that means love people, accept them, learn together, respect where they are in their journey, share with them what I believe if they want to know... and I am trying to learn what else that means. It's all a process. I am happy right now for where I am in that process. At this moment. At 5am with a night of wakefulness behind me and a beautiful day ahead of me.
Number one, the overwhelming amount of love I feel. As surely as I know that God exists and is my father, I know that this love is a gift. It is my greatest source of gratitude right now. I recognize that it is from Christ. I know that it is a gift with a purpose of helping others. It is one I am frequently grateful for- to love both those I know and don't know, to varying degrees. It comes sometimes so out of the blue I don't know what I'm supposed to do with it. I have felt it a lot for friends and students lately. Maybe because I am leaving them... perhaps I feel the love they have for me. It's weird that it feels both explainable and unexplainable. Unexplainable perhaps in its quantity and quality, explainable in that if I think about the individual person I can say many of the reasons I love them. Unexplainable in that those reasons actually only make up a fraction of that love. The only answer I have to that is that the rest comes from Christ.
Number two, that as all these crazy changes take place in my life, which on the outside look tragic, I feel peace and gratitude and happiness. Another testimony that the best things in life do not come from getting what we want, or even our circumstances, but from the intangible. I am taking a leave of absence from my dream job and deeply missing my students, my health is not cooperating with life goals, I am leaving my life (and especially friends) and social opportunities, and a couple of other more personal things (as if those things aren't already personal)... and I feel trust in God. I trust that my students will be taken care of, that I will be able to return to doing what I love, that my health will in fact become better than it has been in years, that other long term 'self projects' will undergo a lot of progress in the near future, that dating and marriage and family will work itself out in the right timing as long as I am trying my best to do my part, that I will be able to spend invaluable time with my family, and that the other personal things will work themselves out in their time. As the path to this point has not been easy, I don't think it's necessarily going to be a cake walk, but I see very clearly right now the Lord's hand in my life. And I am grateful for this perspective.
Number three. My faith journey. I am grateful the road is not smooth, but rough. Otherwise, how would our own rough edges become polished? My beliefs do not come from naively being spoon fed the most palatable parts of LDS theology. I grew up in a family where beliefs ranged from Atheism to Catholicism to eastern spiritual practices to Mormonism. I chose to practice Mormonism as a result of spiritual experiences and study. My focus in my later teenage years was following Christ and becoming more grounded in Him and in my relationship with Him. I did this through reading the Book of Mormon and the Bible. I taught it for years as a missionary and teacher of missionaries in the Missionary Training Center. But the greatest test of my faith has come in the past two years, when I came to a place where the only thing I could say I knew was that God existed. I remember that moment, and thinking "I don't actually feel that He loves me anymore, and if I don't know that, then I don't know anything." I built up from there. And as I examined what I believed, and asked in prayer for confirmation of the foundation of my testimony of Christ's gospel as I believe it to be true, it was very much the fruits of the Spirit which testified of truth. I felt the love I hadn't felt from God. I felt peace, and a strange trust that everything would be ok (strange because I couldn't possibly see how logically it could be). I also felt illumination in my mind as I studied. My testimony has so much more polishing and refinement to undergo. And my spirit even more... but I feel confident in saying that the testimony I have is not one that is based on trust of what other people have told me. It is personally tried and tested.
One of the most beautiful things, I am finding, about this life, is the individual and unique journey we each must take in order to reach our potential. That looks like Buddhism to some. Calvinism to others. Independent or eclectic spiritual practices to others. Atheism. Judaism. Polytheism. Unbelief. A life of service. It looks like fame and fortune, poverty and hunger, life in a house with a white picket fence, abandonment, abuse, being surrounded by love, a life of loneliness... but I truly believe that is what binds us to Christ. Not one of us escapes the pain from sin and sorrow, and we all need Him. That He suffered it all is incomprehensible to me. If I could even come close to understanding the magnitude of it I would be overwhelmed with gratitude every moment of every day. Hopefully some day we will understand it fully. How incredible our relationship with Him will be!
So while our paths are unique and beautiful, I do also believe that when we are ready, we will all have the opportunity to accept His true teachings. And the paths we took to get to that place of readiness will provide us with the foundation and the truths and whatever we need in order to live and accept those doctrines. I don't think Mormons have a corner on the market on good people, or 'chosen' people... there are many people who are not LDS who are more spiritually evolved, or closer to Christ, or with a better relationship with God, or more serviceable, or less judgmental. I do believe that it is the fulness of Christ's gospel and that I have a responsibility to live my life the best I can to do His work to unify and bring people to Christ. I don't think that means baptize the whole world. I think that means love people, accept them, learn together, respect where they are in their journey, share with them what I believe if they want to know... and I am trying to learn what else that means. It's all a process. I am happy right now for where I am in that process. At this moment. At 5am with a night of wakefulness behind me and a beautiful day ahead of me.
