Category: LDS

Training in the off season.

The Lord is strong towerI was reading about Captain Moroni (the youngest Chief commander mentioned in the Book of Mormon) this week in chapters 46-52 and was impressed with the thought of how we can never quit preparing for the “race”.  We are in the race of a lifetime here on Earth.  Battling against Satan at every turn.  And even when we feel like we are at the top of our game, or winning the race, we can’t stop “training”.

When the Nephites battled under Captain Moroni’s command they fought for faith, liberty, their families, their land and their peace.  If ever we have been in a fight like Moroni’s, it is today!

In verses 10-13 of chapter 48 it describes some of the characteristics Moroni had and what kind of person he was.  Mighty and strong (at 25 years old), smart, compassionate, had courage, was grateful, worked hard, he served the people, was faithful and full of integrity and he was obedient.  He was such a good man that in verse 17 it reads: Yea, verily, verily I say unto you, if all men had been, and were, and ever would be, like unto Moroni behold, the very powers of hell would have been shaken forever; Yea the devil would never have power over the hearts of the children of men. 

First of all it talks about the way that he taught them to never raise arms unless it was against an enemy to preserve their lives. Then they armed themselves with shields and helmets and breastplates to protect themselves from the enemy.  They put on all their armour.  Then he fortified the land.

But what stood out to me in all of these chapters as they fought their enemies, was that even after they had conquered their first conflict, he did not take a break.  After the people had praised and remembered the Lord and given all credit to Him, Moroni knew that he needed to continue to prepare the land and his people for when the wars would start again.

It says that he commanded the people that they should dig up heaps of earth around the city. Then on top of those ridges add timbers the height of a man. Then on top of those timbers a frame of pickets and they were strong and high. But not only that, he had them build towers so they could see when the enemy was approaching.  And also places of security to be built upon those towers.  They called all these “strongholds” which defined, is a well fortified place or fortress.  Moroni was teaching the people how to keep from being defeated.  And I believe that this means both temporally and spiritually.

So the question I have for you today, is how will you build up “strongholds” in your own life?  How will you continue training for the race of life?  Will you sit down once one race has been won or will you keep training even in the off season?

I have some recommendations here.  But ultimately you will have to decide for yourself what you will do to build your own “strongholds” against the enemy.  Because you/we are in this fight for our lives!

Have a great day!

XO Wendy

 

Come…

Last week I was able to listen to the wife of President Rhys A. Weaver, Pamela, speak. They are the Nashville Tennessee mission leaders.   I was deeply touched by the things that she talked about.  Most of her talk revolved around one word, “come”.  She talked about the sweetness of that word and how we use it so much on a daily basis.  “Come with me to lunch.”  “Come give mommy a hug.”  Come read me a story.” “Come and pray with me.” Come with me to visit grandma.”  Come and see what I have for you.”  “Come shopping with me.” Etc.

What a beautiful word that is, so inviting and so warm.  There are so many times in the scriptures that the Savior invites us to “Come”, Come follow me.  When we think of all the ways that word is used so lovingly, doesn’t it make that plea to come follow Him even more tender? In Matthew 19:21 we read: Jesus said unto him, If thou wilt be perfect, go and sell that thou hast, and give to the poor, and thou shalt have treasure in heaven: and come and follow me.

We had the missionaries from our church, over for dinner not too long ago and they shared a video with us that just has such feel good message that I decided to share it here, its pretty short but I love the message.

One thing that I love about the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints of which I am a member, is that we are so willing to serve.  We are a people full of faith and hope.  We are always some of the first responders whenever there is a natural disaster around the world.  And we are huge on helping refugees and the poor and needy.  It’s great to be a part of church that does it’s best to follow the Savior’s admonition to “Come follow me”.

We as members are far from perfect and are human just like everyone else.  So not everyone is as welcoming as some.  But we are trying to follow the Savior in all that we do.

As you know I share a lot of scriptures and talks here and I thought for those of you who aren’t familiar with our church, this would be a good place to share.

I would personally love to have you “come” and go to church or serve or go to an activity with me.  If you find yourself with no hope. Or if you have been away for a while like I had been. Come back! Come and Stay.

Have a good weekend everyone!

XO Wendy

Are you a hope maker or taker?

Have you ever had someone take your hope away simply by their words?  Have you ever been filled with despair because someone said something about you, or to you that was completely defeating?  Yeah, me too.  Words are very powerful! We can go from completely elated to simply defeated in the time it takes to say, “you can’t”, “you will never” or “that’s impossible for you”.

And even more important, is the way we talk to ourselves.  “It’s hopeless”,  I’m so stupid”, “I will never be….”, and my favorite, “I can’t…”  Why is it so easy for us to use words in such a negative way, especially to ourselves?  Well, I haven’t completely figured out the answer to that question.  But what I do know is that I have had my share of negative words thrown my way, spoken behind my back by others. As well as given to me through my own negative self-talk.  And I am positive that I am not so much different than anybody else.

So today I wanted to offer you some encouragement through the words of someone who had every right to lose hope, but somehow found it. This is well worth the 15 minutes out of your day to watch Nick Vujicic

Please use positive self talk and practice self love. Look for hope.  Find it. And live it!

XO Wendy

Joy and Spiritual Survival

Hi there, welcome back!

Continuing our discussion on Joy.  I came across this talk given by the prophet, President Russell M. Nelson, of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, in the October 2016 General Conference.  You can find the whole talk here.  Joy and spiritual survival, it’s AMMMazing.  So go read it!

The one statement that stuck out to me was this:

“The joy we feel has little to do with the circumstances of our lives and everything to do with the focus of our lives.”

I absolutely love that statement.  It’s so beautiful.  you see, we have the power within us to feel joy when we choose to focus on the Savior.  He is the one and only true source of light, love and true joy.  Granted, sometimes we can not change our circumstances but we can choose where our focus will be.  Even amidst the struggles and the trials of life, we can seek to feel joy in the little seemingly unnoticeable things.

I remember several times as a young mother when I was deep in the throngs of depression.  Every menial task seemed like it would overtake me.  It’s so hard to explain to someone who has never gone through depression.  But the feelings of doubt and inadequacy were so real and raw.  It was so hard just to get myself out of bed in the morning.  But I had 4 littles that needed their mama and that’s the only thing that kept me going. That, and my trust in the Lord that He had a bigger plan for me.

One morning everything seemed to be going wrong.  I felt I couldn’t even function normally.  As I reached up to grab a box of cereal, it came crashing down. Cereal scattered across the kitchen floor.  And all I could do was just sit down in the middle of the kitchen and cry.  “I can’t do this Lord”, “Please help me,” I pleaded.

As I opened my tear stained eyes and started to clean up the mess I hear pitter pattering across the floor.  “It’s ok mommy”.  All at once there it was an incredible, indescribable feeling of peace and joy that enveloped me as I scooped my daughter into my arms and just hugged her.  At that moment, I I felt the arms of the Savior around me like a warm blanket.  I know He was sending me a message that if I focused on Him and forgot the little unimportant things, in this case, cereal scattered on my floor, lol, that He would be there to pick up the pieces and help me get my life back.  That simple moment of joy, though brief, carried me through many moments as I learned how to battle my illness.

Life is not easy, all of us have things that we bear and struggle with, but if we can put our focus and trust in the Lord.  He will guide us…. always.  And we CAN have moments of joy scattered across our lives instead of cereal scattered across our floor.

Focus on the Savior.  He is the source of all joy!

XO Wendy

 

 

 

We All Matter|We Are Here to Love

 

I’ve been thinking a lot lately about all of the love and support that I have had over the years.  I am so, so grateful for it.  Let’s face it, this life can be difficult sometimes and it’s nice to have someone to talk to and lean on.  I believe that we are all here to help each other on this journey through life.  Whether it be by kind and simple acts of service or being a shoulder to cry on, or someone to hang out with.  Sometimes it is even through the roughest moments of our lives that someone comes along and is able to give us the push we need to move forward or says the exact right thing we need to hear.  I call that divine intervention and I don’t believe it is a coincidence at all.

Some people may not believe that there is a divine being that cares about us more than we can ever imagine, and that’s ok.  We are all different and have different paths and journeys that we take in this life. As I always say, I can only speak from own experience.  But there are so many other people’s experiences in this life that we can learn and grow from.  And if we shut people out because they don’t believe exactly as we do, we are literally passing judgement on them.  Does not Jesus Christ (whom I believe is that supreme being for me and all of us), say in Matthew 7:1-2?

1 Judge not, that ye be not judged. 2 For with what judgment ye judge, ye shall be judged: and with what measure ye mete, it shall be measured to you again.

I have spoken of this subject before. But I firmly and so totally believe that we are going to speak at some point for how we judge our fellow men.  I believe that is a question that we will be asked, “How did you treat others? How did you think of others?  Were you your brother’s keeper?”  No matter the situation that we came to this world in, all people including ourselves, are deserving of unconditional true love and charity in it’s deepest form.

In this world, unfortunately, we are so completely bombarded with judgement and selfishness and harshness from those we love the most and those who don’t know us at all.   There is so much negativity in this world as we know it.

Fortunately for us there is an opposite side to that negativity.  However there must always be a push and pull, or good and bad.  In the Book of Mormon, another testament of Jesus Christ, we read in 2 Nephi 2:11

11 For it must needs be, that there is an opposition in all things. If not so, righteousness could not be brought to pass, neither wickedness, neither holiness nor misery, neither good nor bad.

With that being said, we must embrace positivity with all that we are.  And upon on doing that we must grow in acceptance and love, pure and unconditional, that reaches out and fills the cups of others.  Can we not accept the fact that we are and always will each be individuals in this the human race?  We are all human beings!  That doesn’t make us any better or worse than the person sitting next us.  We are each deserving and worthy of love and light! Our responsibility is to see the divinity in others, no matter what situations they may be in.  We need to be better , we need to do better in that treatment of each and every one we come into contact with.

I’m certainly not saying that I’m am perfect at this in any way!  In fact quite the opposite.  I am such a work in progress.  That is why I write what I do.  It is usually because of some experience that I have had that inspires me to speak about something like this.

Jesus taught us so much in parables about the way we are to love and treat each other.  Did he not teach the parable of the good Samaritan?  And the prodigal son?  Those who labored in the vineyard, some that came in the morning and some that came in the evening to work, yet all were payed the same? Do these parables not teach us that we are equal in His eyes?  That we need to treat each other with respect and divinity, no matter how differently we may think or act or look? Are we not all deserving of this great love that Jesus so spoke of?  The answer is a resounding YES!  We are all deserving, all worthy and we are all worth it!

Elder Dieter F. Uchtdorf of the Quorum of the twelve apostles said, “God sees you not only as a mortal being on a small planet who lives for a brief season—He sees you as His child. He sees you as the being you are capable and  designed to become. He wants you to know that you matter to Him.”

Yes we are worthy of and worth His love.  Which in turn means that we are worthy and worth the love of others, no matter the circumstances or the choices that have been made on our individual journeys.  Remember we have our journey and other people have their journey.  We all respond and learn differently.  But we are asked to love others without condition. speaking of the two great commandants in  Mark 12:31 we read:

31 And the second is like, namely this, Thou shalt lovethy neighbour as thyself. There is none other commandment greater than these.

I will completely and wholeheartedly take responsibility for my own shortcomings in this  area.  I have so much to learn and so many people to accept and love. And I’m am so grateful to the supreme being who loves me and knows my shortcomings and doesn’t expect me to be completely perfect.  He knows that I am going to fall short and yet loves me anyway.  He loves each of us anyway!  No matter how broken or  wronged or battered you feel, you do have one who loves you so greatly and so completely that He died that you might live!  You are important, you are loved, you are enough! You are the you that you were meant to be!  Embrace that.  Embrace others for the diversity that surrounds us.

We are SO blessed to live and love and have this great adventure that we call life!  My challenge is for myself and for you to go out today and love on someone who needs your love.  Love so hard that you forget that they are different and think different than you do.  Love them unconditionally and perfectly.  As that is how our maker loves us.  “As I have loved you, LOVE one another!”

34 A new commandment I give unto you, That ye love one another; as I have loved you, that ye also love one another. John 13:34-35