Love is the answer

from http://sicklethruster.blogspot.com/2010/05/love-is-answer.html

Love is the Answer

Dear Missionaries,

I don’t always know what the question is. But I do know the answer. The answer is: LOVE.

The scriptures teach that God is love: “He that loveth not knoweth not God; for God is love,” (1 John 4:8). “And we have known and believed the love that God hath to us. God is love; and he that dwelleth in love dwelleth in God, and God in him,” (1 John 4:16).

If God is love, then love is an enabling power available to all of God’s children. It is a force for good. In fact, it is the force and source of the greatest good.

When we are filled with the love of God, everything changes. We see life differently. We respond to challenges in a new way. Our outlook on life changes. We change our minds about life! We transform! (See Romans 12:2.)

Joseph Smith taught: “A man filled with the love of God is not content with blessing his family alone, but ranges through the whole world, anxious to bless the whole human race.”

Love is the fuel by which those who come unto Christ live their lives. For this to be true, it must work in the best of times and the worst of times. Let me explain by telling you about World War II and an amazing man named Victor Frankl.

Some of your grandparents or great-grandparents fought in this war. It was a global military conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945 and involved most of the world’s nations, including all of the great powers. It was organized into two opposing military alliances: the Allies (the good guys, including America and England) and the Axis (the bad guys, including Nazi Germany and Japan). It was the most widespread war in history, with more than 100 million military personnel mobilized.

Marked by significant action against civilians, including the Holocaust and the only use of nuclear weapons in a war, it was the deadliest conflict in human history, with over 70 million deaths.

The Holocaust is the term used to describe the intentional murder of approximately six million European Jews during World War II by Nazi Germany. Jews were forced into concentration camps where they were tortured and then murdered. Only a few Jews survived the concentration camps. One of them was Victor Frankl.

Viktor Frankl (1905-1997) was an Austrian neurologist and psychiatrist. In 1942, at age 37, the Germans deported him, his wife, and his parents to the Theresienstadt concentration camp. In 1944, he was moved to Auschwitz concentration camp and was then to the Türkheim concentration camp. Meanwhile, his wife had been transferred to the Bergen-Belsen concentration camp where she was murdered, and his parents had been sent to Auschwitz where they were murdered.

On April 27, 1945, American soldiers took control of Auschwitz and liberated Frankl. To be liberated is to be set free. At last he was free!

Victor Frankl was blessed with a mind capable of learning important lessons even in the darkest of times. He found purpose and meaning in the worst of all situations. Read his account of an experience he had while working in the harsh conditions of the Auschwitz concentration camp:

“… We stumbled on in the darkness, over big stones and through large puddles, along the one road leading from the camp. The accompanying guards kept shouting at us and driving us with the butts of their rifles. Anyone with very sore feet supported himself on his neighbor’s arm. Hardly a word was spoken; the icy wind did not encourage talk. Hiding his mouth behind his upturned collar, the man marching next to me whispered suddenly: “If our wives could see us now! I do hope they are better off in their camps and don’t know what is happening to us.”

That brought thoughts of my own wife to mind. And as we stumbled on for miles, slipping on icy spots, supporting each other time and again, dragging one another up and onward, nothing was said, but we both knew: each of us was thinking of his wife. Occasionally I looked at the sky, where the stars were fading and the pink light of the morning was beginning to spread behind a dark bank of clouds. But my mind clung to my wife’s image, imagining it with an uncanny acuteness. I heard her answering me, saw her smile, her frank and encouraging look. Real or not, her look was then more luminous than the sun which was beginning to rise.

A thought transfixed me: for the first time in my life I saw the truth as it is set into song by so many poets, proclaimed as the final wisdom by so many thinkers. The truth — that love is the ultimate and the highest goal to which man can aspire. Then I grasped the meaning of the greatest secret that human poetry and human thought and belief have to impart: The salvation of man is through love and in love. I understood how a man who has nothing left in this world still may know bliss, be it only for a brief moment, in the contemplation of his beloved. In a position of utter desolation, when man cannot express himself in positive action, when his only achievement may consist in enduring his sufferings in the right way – an honorable way – in such a position man can, through loving contemplation of the image he carries of his beloved, achieve fulfillment. For the first time in my life I was able to understand the meaning of the words, “The angels are lost in perpetual contemplation of an infinite glory….”

The above quotation comes from Victor Frankl’s famous book, Man’s Search for Meaning. I encourage you to read this book when you get home from your mission.

In one of the darkest period’s of human history, with a front row seat, Frankl discovered something great: “love is the ultimate and the highest goal to which man can aspire.”

In a speech given at BYU in January 1996, Professor C. Terry Warner connects Victor Frankl’s observations about love with the core message of the Gospel of Jesus Christ. Professor Warner teaches how we can each turn love into a power for good:

“The Savior seems to say to us: “Come unto me, and I will give you such assurance and hope and strength that you cannot be taken hostage by anyone who seems to do you harm. I will liberate you into love. And then you will no longer give anyone cause to resent or fear you. Instead, they will respond to the love that I have bestowed upon you. By abiding in me, you will do much good, bear much fruit.”

How then shall we come unto Christ so that everything will be different from what it could possibly be otherwise?

By sacrificing all taking of offense. By giving up criticism, impatience, and contempt, for they accuse the sisters and brothers for whom Christ died. By forswearing vulgarity and pornography, which diminish both the user and the used. By putting aside, in short, every practice that bears the image of murder, obliteration of souls, discord, and death. By giving these practices their true name, violence, and abhorring even their first appearance. By renouncing war in every form and proclaiming peace (see D&C 98:16).”

As a missionary, you are far away from the comforts of home. But you can find a new home in the arms of God as you come unto Christ in your life! You can feel of His love for you. You can gain literal strength and power through this love, as did missionaries of long ago: “blessed be the name of my God, who has been mindful of us, wanderers in a strange land,” (Alma 26:36).

So many people are “running on empty”. They are empty of love. It is our job, our responsibility and our privilege to help fill them with love. Life’s most important questions all have the same answer: LOVE.

Powered by love,

Pres. Murray

 

Love is the Answer

….The top re-director for my views (which hit a new record of 70 yesterday): Either a gay-porn site or a domain name generator ( I googled it, didn’t go directly to the site ;D)

What the hey!?

Anyway….

I read this fantastic blog written by a mission President and his wife for their missionaries called ‘Sickle Thruster’.

Dear Missionaries,

I don’t always know what the question is. But I do know the answer. The answer is: LOVE.

The scriptures teach that God is love: “He that loveth not knoweth not God; for God is love,” (1 John 4:8). “And we have known and believed the love that God hath to us. God is love; and he that dwelleth in love dwelleth in God, and God in him,” (1 John 4:16).

If God is love, then love is an enabling power available to all of God’s children. It is a force for good. In fact, it is the force and source of the greatest good.

When we are filled with the love of God, everything changes. We see life differently. We respond to challenges in a new way. Our outlook on life changes. We change our minds about life! We transform! (See Romans 12:2.)

Joseph Smith taught: “A man filled with the love of God is not content with blessing his family alone, but ranges through the whole world, anxious to bless the whole human race.”

Love is the fuel by which those who come unto Christ live their lives. For this to be true, it must work in the best of times and the worst of times. Let me explain by telling you about World War II and an amazing man named Victor Frankl.

Some of your grandparents or great-grandparents fought in this war. It was a global military conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945 and involved most of the world’s nations, including all of the great powers. It was organized into two opposing military alliances: the Allies (the good guys, including America and England) and the Axis (the bad guys, including Nazi Germany and Japan). It was the most widespread war in history, with more than 100 million military personnel mobilized.

Marked by significant action against civilians, including the Holocaust and the only use of nuclear weapons in a war, it was the deadliest conflict in human history, with over 70 million deaths.

The Holocaust is the term used to describe the intentional murder of approximately six million European Jews during World War II by Nazi Germany. Jews were forced into concentration camps where they were tortured and then murdered. Only a few Jews survived the concentration camps. One of them was Victor Frankl.

Viktor Frankl (1905-1997) was an Austrian neurologist and psychiatrist. In 1942, at age 37, the Germans deported him, his wife, and his parents to the Theresienstadt concentration camp. In 1944, he was moved to Auschwitz concentration camp and was then to the Türkheim concentration camp. Meanwhile, his wife had been transferred to the Bergen-Belsen concentration camp where she was murdered, and his parents had been sent to Auschwitz where they were murdered.

On April 27, 1945, American soldiers took control of Auschwitz and liberated Frankl. To be liberated is to be set free. At last he was free!

Victor Frankl was blessed with a mind capable of learning important lessons even in the darkest of times. He found purpose and meaning in the worst of all situations. Read his account of an experience he had while working in the harsh conditions of the Auschwitz concentration camp:

“… We stumbled on in the darkness, over big stones and through large puddles, along the one road leading from the camp. The accompanying guards kept shouting at us and driving us with the butts of their rifles. Anyone with very sore feet supported himself on his neighbor’s arm. Hardly a word was spoken; the icy wind did not encourage talk. Hiding his mouth behind his upturned collar, the man marching next to me whispered suddenly: “If our wives could see us now! I do hope they are better off in their camps and don’t know what is happening to us.”

That brought thoughts of my own wife to mind. And as we stumbled on for miles, slipping on icy spots, supporting each other time and again, dragging one another up and onward, nothing was said, but we both knew: each of us was thinking of his wife. Occasionally I looked at the sky, where the stars were fading and the pink light of the morning was beginning to spread behind a dark bank of clouds. But my mind clung to my wife’s image, imagining it with an uncanny acuteness. I heard her answering me, saw her smile, her frank and encouraging look. Real or not, her look was then more luminous than the sun which was beginning to rise.

A thought transfixed me: for the first time in my life I saw the truth as it is set into song by so many poets, proclaimed as the final wisdom by so many thinkers. The truth — that love is the ultimate and the highest goal to which man can aspire. Then I grasped the meaning of the greatest secret that human poetry and human thought and belief have to impart: The salvation of man is through love and in love. I understood how a man who has nothing left in this world still may know bliss, be it only for a brief moment, in the contemplation of his beloved. In a position of utter desolation, when man cannot express himself in positive action, when his only achievement may consist in enduring his sufferings in the right way – an honorable way – in such a position man can, through loving contemplation of the image he carries of his beloved, achieve fulfillment. For the first time in my life I was able to understand the meaning of the words, “The angels are lost in perpetual contemplation of an infinite glory….”

The above quotation comes from Victor Frankl’s famous book, Man’s Search for Meaning. I encourage you to read this book when you get home from your mission.

In one of the darkest period’s of human history, with a front row seat, Frankl discovered something great: “love is the ultimate and the highest goal to which man can aspire.”

In a speech given at BYU in January 1996, Professor C. Terry Warner connects Victor Frankl’s observations about love with the core message of the Gospel of Jesus Christ. Professor Warner teaches how we can each turn love into a power for good:

“The Savior seems to say to us: “Come unto me, and I will give you such assurance and hope and strength that you cannot be taken hostage by anyone who seems to do you harm. I will liberate you into love. And then you will no longer give anyone cause to resent or fear you. Instead, they will respond to the love that I have bestowed upon you. By abiding in me, you will do much good, bear much fruit.”

How then shall we come unto Christ so that everything will be different from what it could possibly be otherwise?

By sacrificing all taking of offense. By giving up criticism, impatience, and contempt, for they accuse the sisters and brothers for whom Christ died. By forswearing vulgarity and pornography, which diminish both the user and the used. By putting aside, in short, every practice that bears the image of murder, obliteration of souls, discord, and death. By giving these practices their true name, violence, and abhorring even their first appearance. By renouncing war in every form and proclaiming peace (see D&C 98:16).”

As a missionary, you are far away from the comforts of home. But you can find a new home in the arms of God as you come unto Christ in your life! You can feel of His love for you. You can gain literal strength and power through this love, as did missionaries of long ago: “blessed be the name of my God, who has been mindful of us, wanderers in a strange land,” (Alma 26:36).

So many people are “running on empty”. They are empty of love. It is our job, our responsibility and our privilege to help fill them with love. Life’s most important questions all have the same answer: LOVE.

Powered by love,

Pres. Murray

http://sicklethruster.blogspot.com/

Have a good Sunday dearies ❤

What do Orcs, Worgen, The Cold War and Galaxy Class starships have in common? Well, nothing really, besides the fact that I just spent like 5 hours playing games with those in them at a friend’s house (and failed miserably at each LOL). I also experienced my first family home evening and beat someone with a snowbrush XD. Good times, good times!

I also came to a realization….Or a couple…First; they say blood is thicker than water, but I’d have to disagree; it completely depends on what type of water we’re speaking of ;D

And second; I seclude myself, for who knows what reason, I’m not actually as secluded as I think I am.

Anyways, good Sunday overall and fantastic night, made everything better 😀

Stake conference :DDDDDDDDDDDD

Every time President Dudley speaks I’m like ‘Dude….You’re talking to me!!!! How do you do that? I’ma go home and do that!’

And so today I locked myself in my room. Fantastic idea. And I napped in the sun. Nothing makes me happier than that. Last time he talked, I only prayed for 20 minutes instead of 40 and actually got to bed at a decent time (something I’m not doing now XD)

And then Gizette gave her talk and I was like “Omg, I’m actually gonna cry” (*Is crying again now*) and then she said one thing that I actually considered digging out my kleenexes for and Mrs.Crapo looked over and saw me kinda half-crying and started writing in her journal like mad and I was like “oh crap. Don’t you dare connect what she just said and my almost crying. Don’t need that. You’ll figure me out and then it’ll be weird.”

And then that one dude talked and I was like ‘Ok…Everything now for MISSION!!!YEAAAAAH!’

Anyways, as I said on FB, I’m one big rolling, exploding snowball thing of happy/happy crying today.

I think I’ll die at ward conference if it’s this awesome.

Mildly ironic

Blessed be Your name
In the land that is plentiful
Where your streams of abundance flow
Blessed be Your name

And blessed be Your name
When I’m found in the desert place
Though I walk through the wilderness
Blessed be Your name

[Pre-Chorus:]
Every blessing You pour out
I’ll turn back to praise
When the darkness closes in, Lord
Still I will say

[Chorus:]
Blessed be the name of the Lord
Blessed be Your name
Blessed be the name of the Lord
Blessed be Your glorious name

And blessed be Your name
When the sun’s shining down on me
When the world’s ‘all as it should be’
Blessed be Your name

And blessed be Your name
On the road marked with suffering
Though there’s pain in the offering
Blessed be Your name

[Pre-Chorus]

[Chorus]

[Bridge:]
You give and take away
You give and take away
My heart will choose to say
Lord blessed be Your name

I will bless Your name, Lord

[Solo]

[Pre-Chorus (Rebecca only)]

[Chorus (2x)]
Oh, You give and take away
You give and take away
But my heart will choose to say (oh Lord!)
Blessed be Your name
You give and take away
You give and take away
But my heart will choose to say (oh Lord!)
Blessed be Your name

Bolded my favourite verses for you.

I’ve found it mildly ironic; I’m losing (or maybe not, I dunno, time is still needed) something I swore I never would lose and yet, I am staying strong in something that’s pretty much new to me; my faith. Most intriguing.

Stake conference today.

And why are you so dang positive? I don’t get it.

‘Friendship, Courtship and physical relationship’ Awesome talk :D

I want to share some gospel perspectives on three “ships”: friendship, courtship, and physical relationship.

First, friendship is a gospel principle; it is necessary to our emotional and spiritual well-being. Second, friendship is the foundation upon which courtship and marriage should be built and can thrive. And third, a physical relationship before marriage can prevent the building of a strong friendship foundation, but after marriage it can enhance that friendship.

Friendship

How important is friendship to you? How does it bless your life? Have you ever felt friendless? It’s miserable to feel lonely and without friends. Friendship is necessary to our well-being—not just nice but necessary. We all hunger for it; it’s a universal need.

This was brought home to me by one of my Young Women general board members who took some personal trips this past summer. In her travels, she visited with young women in Idaho, Brazil, Mongolia, and Russia. In each place, she asked them questions about their lives and compiled their answers. Here are the questions she asked, along with the most frequent response she received to each question.

Question: What makes you happy? Answer: Friends.

What are your greatest worries? Friends.

What do you like to do in your free time? Be with friends.

What do you spend most of your time thinking about? Friends.

Why don’t young women come to Mutual? No friends.

Why do young women become less active? Pressure of friends.

Isn’t that amazing! Friends are of paramount importance for young women all over the world. And I believe young men would give similar answers. So too would many adults. We all need friends.

Prophets have taught that friendship is an integral part of keeping the covenants we have made. Consider the example of the people of Alma at the Waters of Mormon. There, they expressed their desire to come into the fold of God. Alma asked them if they were willing to bear one another’s burdens, to mourn with those that mourn, and to comfort those who stand in need of comfort. That is, he asked them if they were willing to covenant to act as friends. They clapped their hands for joy to enter into such a covenant. And their hearts were knit together in unity and love. This is a great scriptural example of friendship. (See Mosiah 18.)

We can look to Jesus Christ for the greatest example of friendship. “Friend” was the highest compliment He could pay His disciples. He said:

“This is my commandment, That ye love one another, as I have loved you.

“Greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends.

“Ye are my friends. …

“I call you not servants; for the servant knoweth not what his lord doeth: but I have called you friends; for all things that I have heard of my Father I have made known unto you” (John 15:12–15).

If friendship is so important in the teachings of our prophets and our Savior,shouldn’t we be striving to be great, covenant-keeping friends? To be such a friend is Christlike; to have such friends is heavenly. As Latter-day Saints, we know that exaltation involves the privilege of spending eternity where our true Friend, the Savior, and others who have become like Him are. The scriptures give us this glorious promise: “That same sociality which exists among us here will exist among us there, only it will be coupled with eternal glory” (D&C 130:2).

Courtship

This brings me to my second “ship,” or relationship: courtship. Friendship should play a key role in courtship and marriage. I see friendship as the foundation in the courtship pyramid. A little story will help to illustrate this point.

It is the story of Isaac and Rebecca. This is not the biblical account, however. It is about our daughter Rebecca and her suitor Isaac. Our Rebecca was not persuaded to marry her Isaac nearly as easily as was the Old Testament Rebekah. Nor was she readily willing to give up her lifestyle and immediately leave her family to be part of another’s life.

Our Becky was 21. She had signed up to do a summer internship through Brigham Young University in Mozambique, Africa. She wasn’t sure if she should serve a mission, but she had at least started the paperwork by getting dental and doctor appointments. She was also thinking about applying for a master’s program in her field. In short, she was trying to decide what to do with the next phase of her life. We all wondered which would win out of the three Ms—Mozambique, mission, or master’s.

Meanwhile, Isaac came along in pursuit and soon offered a choice of a fourth M—marriage. He was headed for medical school in a few months, and he did not want to go without Becky. He later told us that he had his own three Ms that he hoped she would choose—marriage, medical school, and eventually motherhood. “If she did not,” he said, “I knew I would be the fourth M—miserable.”

Becky was a woman of the 21st century. The world and its many glamorous opportunities were available to her, and it was hard for her to set aside some of her dreams. What finally won her over were Isaac’s intrinsic goodness and his kindness to her. He did the romantic things too, like sending beautiful bouquets of flowers, taking her on nice dates, and so on.

But those things would not have won her over on their own. What was most winning to her was how he continually put her feelings and her needs above his own. He did little thoughtful things, the kind that one friend would do for another. For example, when he learned that her watch was too big for her wrist, he removed a couple of links from it and made it perfect for her. Another time she found her car spotless and sparkling inside and out because he had washed it, a deed unsolicited by her. Another time she found a little list he had made of ways to improve himself; many of his goals were service oriented. These kindnesses promised an enduring friendship; they expressed qualities of character that would last even when physical beauties eventually faded.

Becky realized that he had the qualities that would endure through good and bad times, the very qualities she would seek out in a good friend. So she did marry Isaac. And now she reflects that she was right about his great strengths being a wonderful asset to their relationship. She feels she is married to her best friend. And this is what marriage should be.

Friendship, then, should form the foundation of romantic love—the love that leads to courtship and marriage. Likewise, both friendship and romantic love can become what God intends them to be only when they are founded on charity, “the pure love of Christ” (Moro. 7:47). As we learn in Moroni and 1 Corinthians, charity is patient, long-suffering, kind, free from envy, and unselfish. Charity leads couples to rejoice in truth, to believe, to hope, and to endure. Couples whose love is based on charity want the best for each other. Their love is infused with the pure love of Christ. These are the qualities we should seek for in courtship and marriage. (See 1 Cor. 13:4–7; Moro. 7:45.)

One of the ways to develop a strong, loving relationship is with sound communication. Communication is the way a good relationship begins and also endures. My unmarried children ask me constantly how it is that anyone ever gets together. It seems like such a mysterious puzzle. I know that everyone’s falling-in-love story is different. But there seems to be at least one commonality among most stories. This is a spontaneity in conversation. So many couples say things like, “We just talked and talked; I lost track of time when we were talking; it was so comfortable to talk; we share the same sense of humor; we loved talking about our similar interests and values.”

It was like that on my first date with my husband. All evening we were surrounded by people, but I felt like it was just the two of us. John and I talked to each other nonstop.

I’ve heard it said that “love is a long conversation.” I believe it. In fact I often joke with our children that if I ever run out of things to say to Dad, then the marriage will be over. I’m pretty safe saying that, because we love to talk to one another about everything.

This communication that is so fun in a friendship is also essential as you really get to know someone’s deeper self. A relationship may never develop into a courtship because it can’t get beyond inch-deep generalities.

We sometimes look for happiness in exotic places and for romance in mystique, money, or charm. Instead, we need to look for friends who embody Christlike character. As you date, seek friendships that have enduring strength and that can provide a firm foundation for a marriage. After you have established a solid, virtuous base in your relationship, there is a place for physical intimacy—in marriage.

Physical Relationship

The physical relationship between a man and a woman can be wonderful and good—a beautiful blessing. However, if the physical part of romance comes too early or too fast in a relationship, it can take over. Then it can become the tail that wags the dog. Our physical emotions are powerful and exciting. This is how they are meant to be.But this is precisely why they need to be kept in check until after marriage—when other fundamental parts of the relationship are developed.

We have taught our children some principles that we hope have provided protection for them. We tried to create some catchy phrases so they would remember them easily in times of danger and decision. Let me share just four principles that will protect you if you remember them and abide by them.

1. 1.Avoid the dangers of the dark. Stay in well-lit places—literally and figuratively. There’s wisdom to leaving the lights on—on the porch, in the living room, at the dance. And there’s safety in shunning places that feel dark in spirit.
2. 2.Beware the hazard of the horizontal. Don’t lie down together with a date. Just don’t do it—not to watch a movie or to read a book or to rest at a picnic.
3. 3.Remember the perils of privacy. Find public places to be alone. Learn to have your intimate talks where others are. There is great safety in being together where you can easily be interrupted.
4. 4.Modesty is a must. Everything about your appearance, your speech, and your demeanor should bespeak that you are a literal spirit son or daughter of Heavenly Father. If we truly understand the significance of our bodies in our Father’s plan, we will show great honor for our bodies. When you dress and act modestly, others will treat you with respect.

You will protect yourself if you choose to be with others who are also trying to make good choices. Someone with whom you will want to share the rest of your life will want only the very best for you. It says in For the Strength of Youth, “Choose friends who share your values so you can strengthen and encourage each other in living high standards. A true friend will encourage you to be your best self” ([2001], 12).

The Lord planned for us to become one in every way. The physical relationship in marriage can help cement our spiritual union. We are made for each other.

Our model is in the very first love story. The Lord said that it was not good that Adam should be alone. So the Lord created Eve to be “an help meet for him” (Gen. 2:18). The meaning of this scripture is that Eve was created to be a help “meet” for Adam. Meet means fit or suitable. So Eve was a helper who was “suited to, worthy of, or corresponding to him” (Gen. 2:18, footnote b). After that, Adam was taught that they should “cleave unto” one another, “and they shall be one flesh” (Gen. 2:24). So here are all of the elements—being suited for each other first and then adding the physical relationship after marriage.

I know what it is to have such a friend. My husband, John, was kind and thoughtful and romantic in our courtship. Then even when he was going to school full time, working full time, and we had three children under the age of four, he continued to be kind and thoughtful and romantic with me. He has shown this by helping me in my busy roles. He bathed the children every night. He scrubbed the kitchen floor. He was also my window to the world—keeping me abreast to what was happening out there. He provided for us. He encouraged me as a mother. He supported the children in plays, concerts, athletic events, and papers they had to write. He would give me moments of rest—on walks or weekend getaways, taking me to the temple or occasionally on his travels. When I come home tired at night, he makes cheese toast and other such delicacies, so I don’t have to cook. He is my muse and my editor in my writing and talks. He prays for me and gives me priesthood blessings. He is a help suited for me in every way.

I hope that each of us will find such joy in our lives through our relationships with friends, family, and God. We must remember that deep friendships are built on Christlike virtues. Such friendships form a sound base upon which to build a courtship. And finally, very carefully, the physical relationship will enhance that holy friendship in marriage. I testify that these principles are true. May we find joy in the holy socialities that the Lord has provided for us.

Ok, after reading this 1) Mormonism rocks. Why? Because it completely attacks my hopeless romantic side. This whole thing is so full of cute-win, I love it ^^.

2) Those rules: COREY! YOUR DIMLY LIT ROOM THEORY HAS BEEN PROVEN!

Anyways, for rules1 & 2…Whoooops.  It’s not that I use those two for ‘alternative purposes’. I think my issue is I easily trust people. Perhaps too easily, which I’ve discovered, I kind of do. As well, oblivious Cass is, as always, oblivious XD.

Anyways, I’ve spent the past two hours ranting, no more rants for tonight. Just read. I’m going to hunt for my bed in my messy room. Will clean tomorrow.

From one of my girlies

“You are good. But it is not enough just to be good. You must be good for something. You must contribute good to the world. The world must be a better place for your presence.And that good in you must spread to others.” (BYU speeches year 1996) Playwright Maxwell Anderson put these words into the mouth of the French pesant girl Joan of Arc.” Every women gives er life for what she belives. Sometimes people belive in little or nothing, nevertheless they give up their lives for that little or nothing. One life is all we have, and we live it as we belive in living it and then it’s gone.” ( Joan of Lorraine, act2 ) I have felt grief. You have felt grief. but i can’t imagine pain greater than stepping across the veil and realizing that I had not done what I had come here to do-or realizing that I had given up my life to little or nothing, only to find it gone.

 

We are women who seek to hear the voice of the lord. we are women dedicated to strengthening or marriges, families and homes; women whose covenants and influence span generations; women who are not easily deceived; women of faith, divine nature, individual worth, knowledge, choice and accountibility, goodworks, integrity and virtue.. We are women who understand fully that to qualify for eternal life, we must deal with a full range of diffuculty and dissappointment here. We are free to choose how we live , where we apend our temporal, emotional, and spiritual resources, and to what and whom we devote ourselves. Of course our faith will be tried. Of course we will have tests of our will, of our endurance, of our desires, and of our determination and conviction.

 

It is in moments of disapointment, heartache, and loneliness that we often make decisions that forge our faith, mold our character, and fortify our convictions about the only source of lasting srength and solace that satisfies. and that is jesus christ. How can we know if we are honest, unless our honestly is put to the test? how do we know that we are filled with virtue, unless there are opportunites to choose a nonvirtuous path that we then resist? How do we know if we can bear up under challenge and trial, unless we have faced challenge and trial? and how can we expect to feel and tast the pure sweetness of the gospel of jesus christ ,unless there are times in our lives when we desperatly need and seek peace and strength to over come obsticales? Weekly we partake of the sacaremnt to renew our conenant to ” always remember” the lord ( Moroni 4:3, 5:2). Imagine how our perspective and behaviour would change if we truely always remembered Him, because remembering the Lord and remembering who we are, seem to be inseparably connected.

In the movie “The Lion King”, the lion cub SSimba forsakes his heritage and turns to riotous living after the death of his father Mufasa. But when that lifestyle fails to satisfy his inner self, Simba turns to the heavens in a moment of desperation. His father responds by appearing to him, and after listening to Simba’s attempts to justify his behaviour, Mufasa delivers profound parting words ” you have forgotten who you are, because you have forgotten me. You have become less than who you are.”

Like the lion cub Simba, we live in a complex world, one filled with choices and opportunities and also with confusion and conflicting voices. It is a world that increasingly doesn’t know God and certainy doesn’t know how ( or even belive it is possible) to communicate with God: In our world there are ongoing debates on national and international stage about topics that would have seemed ludicrous a decade or two ago, topics such as what is and is not moral, what is and what is not honest-and wether or not morality and integrity even matter. Our elected officals disappoint and even lie to us, and a proliferation of loud and conflicting voices are bent on getting our money, our support, our vote, or even our virtue. Many, perhaps most, of these voices are motivated largely by self intrest and ave no concern for us or about what is right and wrong.

” though we have rightly applauded our ancestors for their achievement… those of us who prevail today  will have done no small thing. The special spirits who have been reserved to live in this time of challenges and who overcome will one day be praised for their stamina by those who pulled handcarts.” ( Notwithstanding My Weakness,18)

So what are we to do? Life is filled with moments of joy, but life isalso hard. It is an unmistakable privilege to be her in mortality, but the burdans we carry are heavy, relentless and laden with great importance.

There are many things about mortality that I do not yet-and may not in this lfe-understand. but there are some truths about which i no longer have anydoubt, truts that i believe are keys to successfully negotiating life.

I know that the light of the truth of Jesus Christ is stronger than any kind of darkness we face here; that we each have a purpose; that understanding who we are and who we have always been is centeral to our mortal success and eternal progression; that family and the church family are where we can find safety and refuge; that while life is a test, we have magnificient spiritual privileges as members of the church to help us meet that test.

I know that, as diffucult a challenge as mortality is we are not ever here alone, because among our privileges as convenanted members of the Church  are the gift of the Holy Ghost, the power of the priesthood, ordinaces that bind us together for all time and eternity to each other and the Lord, and to a living prophet, and i know that every single one of us is vital to builidng up the kindgom of god. Of this i am certain about this i have no doubt(-sheri dew)

 

( from a book written by Sheri Dew called no doubt about it with a bit of my imput and i already belive and agree with everything said here even before reading it myself ) about her http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sheri_L._Dew

 

(ps : sorry for any spelling mistake s i had to type it out by hand )”

I don’t feel I say this often enough, but I love my Young Women so much. It killed me to have to miss it today, because I don’t see them often and they’re as close, if not closer, to me as sisters. I love being involved with them and being able to help them in any way I can. The fact that this was posted demonstrates to me God’s power to change our lives for the better, if we let Him.

I love you my girlies, and I am honored to be able to call myself your YW’s president ♥

 

Church=:D

As usual!

We have another YW’s leader, but before she was the primary leader. I don’t even know her and I love her already :D.

Also, listening to this one guy’s talk today, I realized I spend so much time on loads of other stuff. Some of it is important, but it can’t be solved currently and it just takes up time. All that thought space and time could be dedicated to furthering my relationship with God. So, every time I worry about it, I’m now just going to throw myself into something God-related (don’t go getting philosophical on me now, I mean stuff like scripture study, personal progress, reading Church talks/magazines, not just anything and everything :P).

I also got attacked just a few minutes ago. My mom has a friend who currently has stage 4 cancer and it’s unlikely she’ll survive past Christmas. What attacked me was the sudden desire to help this woman, in any way possible. So I think I will muster my Churchy friends to go sing her carols or something. We’ll see.

My grad ring is super pretty :). And I am utterly exhausted…Gonna go try to barter some nap time.