January institute rambles.

Knowledge written down is knowledge remembered. A testimony shared is a testimony gained. The pen is an antenna to the spirit. This is for me. Writing these things down here is for me. But you can read it too, if you please.

January has been a more trying month than I planned it to be. But it has also been a month for spiritual growth. I don’t think that our loving Heavenly Parents give us challenges, but I do think they are masters of turning bad situations into learning experiences. They also know that we are best at paying attention when we are humble, whether it’s through challenges or through choosing to try to align our will with theirs. January has been a little bit of both for me. I am trying to look at the positives and focus on the good. Here are a few really good things I have come to understand better these last few weeks.

                God doesn’t get angry the way we do. The scriptures teach that He is emotional. He is sad when we reject Him and His love. Have you ever been in a situation where a family member or close friend disappoints you over and over and over again? When you forgive them and choose to trust them, and they just do the same dumb thing again and again? You feel hurt. You feel unimportant. You feel like they don’t care about you enough to take the forgiveness and trust you have given them and try to change. God is the same way with each of us. When we don’t repent or try to become better, He becomes frustrated with us. The same way we get frustrated with each other. That doesn’t mean we stop loving each other or that He stops loving us. It just means that we are dealing with imperfect people.

                Much like History is easiest to understand when it is presented in a linear timeline, so is the Plan of Salvation. However, the truth resists simplicity. (also, so does history.) First came the ancient lands, Egypt, China and Mesopotamia. First came pre-mortal life. Then came Europe (trying to simplify here.) where historians often get carried away and do a bad job of explaining. Next came “now” and then comes the future. We are here on earth now, next will come paradise or prison, then comes lots of things that all seem to happen at once and teachers do a bad job of explaining, and then the 3 kingdoms of glory. The parts that are hardest for me to understand are the parts where it feels like everything is happening at once. (I’m looking at you Europe.)

                I have decided that woops, maybe I was wrong and linear equations are not all that easy to understand. (Me from Jr. High and High school is wondering how I ever got the idea that linear equations or anything of the like is easy to understand.) So, I’ve decided to look at it more like a puzzle. Our lives, our plans and our personal and global history do not move in straight even lines. But they do all fit together. Each puzzle piece is something we need to get back to our Heavenly Parents and we can’t have the full picture if any part of it is missing. The best part is, none of our puzzles, or our lives will look the same. They will all have things in common, but we each have our own individual Plan of Happiness. We will each meet people and have experiences that shape who we become. We must each be born and we must each die. We all need ordinances and covenants and the atonement. But the rest is individually tailored. How wonderfully exciting and also terrifying it is to know that my picture doesn’t look exactly the same as anyone else’s picture.

Patience.

Patience is not and has never been my strongest attribute. God feels it necessary to remind me of this often. But also, to give me opportunities to work at it often. Such is the very definition of a blessing and a curse. I am impatiently waiting for the day my braces come off and I can submit my mission papers. Waiting and going to college for a year was NOT my plan. It was His. Sometimes His plans frustrate me. Not because I don’t know that His plan is better than mine, but because sometimes I want Him to like my ideas. Sometimes I want to feel like my plan is good enough. Going on a mission is a GOOD thing, right? Why doesn’t he want me to go? Why doesn’t he trust me? Sometimes I feel like He is upset at me. It’s Satan. Satan tries to drag me down and make me feel unworthy and unloved.

I know in my heart that this year I am waiting is not only good for me, but eternally small in the messy timeline of my life. This time spent learning patience will do more to bless me than I can possibly know. So why is it so hard to wait? Why is it so difficult to put my plans on pause?

I can imagine myself in the premortal life being the exact same way. I can imagine myself looking down at this wonderful earth full of experiences to learn and grow and serve and wanting it sooo bad. I probably very impatiently awaited the opportunity to come get a body and experience all that He has to offer me here on earth just like I am currently impatiently awaiting my turn to serve. I watched others come down here and experience happiness and sadness and good things and bad things and I was frustrated then that others seemed to get the blessings I desperately wanted but I didn’t. I chose God’s plan too? I chose Jesus Christ. I wasn’t one of the followers of Satan, so why was I feeling like I had been cast off and forgotten?  Where was my moment in time? Here I am on earth, desperately hoping for the opportunities that come with going on a mission, feeling forgotten.

Be patient he tells me, for there is much to learn.

We, here, now, are God’s children of the latter days. The last dispensation. We were foreordained to come here at this time. All of us. You. Me. All across this globe, both those who know Christ and those who will never hear his name in this life, we were all chosen for now. It is not a coin toss or a straw draw. This is when we were meant to be here. Not because we were forgotten, not because we were an afterthought, but because we are always remembered. Because we are children of loving Heavenly Parents who want the best for us. This whole life is my moment. Not just a mission, not just getting married, not just the typical Mia Maid class 10-year checklist. My whole life. All of my pre-earth dreams are already coming true. I am already so much more than my unborn spirit thought I could be. Lately I’ve been feeling like I have no real control over my own life. People come and go. Illnesses and circumstances throw kinks in my plans all the time. I’m learning that even though the answers aren’t up to me, even though it doesn’t go my way and God will never like my ideas as much as His own, I am still becoming the best of me.

We don’t understand. We don’t know yet. Recently Elder Uchtdorf taught us that you can not connect the dots looking forward, only backward. Focusing on finding the dots you cannot see only brings frustration. Everything has a season. In Doctrine and Covenants Section 11 God spoke to Hyrum Smith saying

“15 Behold, I command you that you need not suppose that you are called to preach until you are called.

16 Wait a little longer, until you shall have my word, my rock, my church, and my gospel, that you may know of a surety my doctrine.

17 And then, behold, according to your desires, yea, even according to your faith shall it be done unto you.”

                The Book of Mormon had not even been completely translated when these words were given. God knows my name just as well as He knows Hyrum’s. He knows my desires as well. But it isn’t time yet. It probably is not something as life altering as the Book of Mormon, but there is a reason I am still here. I don’t know what it is yet, but it isn’t random. Even though I would love nothing more than to already be on a mission, I will be so grateful later that it didn’t go my way. Just like I am almost every time these things don’t go my way.