Love It!

I love the prophet Nephi's simplicity. I mentioned in an earlier post (July 8) about how hard and yet simple it is to be obedient and do what we are supposed to do. I wanted to post this as a follow up to that, a scriptural follow-up.

"And we did observe to keep the judgments, and the statutes, and the commandments of the Lord in all things, according to the law of Moses." 2 Nephi 5:10

Does he say they were perfect? No. Does he say they never made mistakes, never sinned, never committed a transgression? No. He just says they "did observe to keep" all the commandments. Did they make mistakes? Yes, I'm sure they did. But at this time in my life, the point of the verse, to me, is that they simply did it. They were focused on keeping the commandments; they tried to live how they were supposed to live; they wanted to be righteous and so did what it took to be righteous. It's all about choice! We choose whether we turn that corner and run towards the light, towards the Savior, or whether we turn the other way and go into darkness. Think about that as you re-read Elder Bednar's talk about the Parable of the Pickle. Also re-read Elder Porter's talk about A Broken Heart and a Contrite Spirit.

And what was the end result? Verse 11: "And the Lord was with us; and we did prosper exceedingly;"

The Weekend

So, this was an up and down weekend. I helped Christina clean out her grandmother's garage, clean it out and organize it. It looks great now and I'll try to put a picture at the end of the post so you can see. Unfortunately we don't have a before picture, so you can't see how it was before, but it was a lot of stuff. So yesterday I was sore and that continues today a little bit. It still feels good to not only get a good workout but to, in the process, help someone do something that they couldn't do for themselves. Service! It's great.

In football this weekend there was a lot of up and down. Two of my top three teams won, so I'm happy about that, but my number one team, BYU, lost badly. They got spanked by TCU. I think they should have at least been able to make it a good game if not even win, but it seems like they didn't show up to play. I know TCU's defense is good and very fast, but BYU always seemed to make some stupid mistake that resulted in a turnover and points, a sack, a three and out series, a punt, etc. They are better than that! But Texas won and even FSU won on Thursday (not quite the weekend, but close (to the weekend and a very close game)).

Anyway, I'm left with waiting, again, this week to see if I get any job offers. I have two jobs that I interviewed for last week. One, with Capelouto (the pest control company) was a 2nd round interview, so when they call at the end of this week it will be with a job offer. The second, with Target, will call and offer me a 2nd round interview. I hope I will then be able to have two great jobs to have to chose between. That's what Christina and I keep praying for and we would appreciate any prayers from you all. Prayer really works.

Doesn't that garage look beautiful!??! Before you could barely walk through the middle. Yes, we took a truck load of stuff to the dump too.

Post Blog-Post Comment

I would highly recommend this to everyone. It goes along nicely with my last post and I just love the way Elder Maxwell would write/speak.

Notwithstanding My Weakness Elder Neal A. Maxwell, Nov. 1976

Truth & Lies

I read an interesting article in the Ensign yesterday and so have named this post after the title of said article, Truth & Lies. If you haven't read it, I recommend you do so, mostly because I think it will speak to you as it spoke to me. It focuses on the lies that Satan tries to tell us in order to separate our hearts and minds from focusing on the truth. The prophet and president Ezra Taft Benson taught that in the latter days Satan would specifically use "despair, discouragement, despondency, and depression" to overcome the Saints. How true that is!!

Now, you may say that this particularly struck a cord with me because, after 6 months of trying to find a job in today's economy it is natural to be despaired or get discouraged. I'll admit, that is true to a degree. It has been really hard for me (for whatever reason, most likely our culture, your self-worth seems to hinge, however incorrectly, on your ability to work/find a job). However I found that reading the article focused on so many other things that I thought it worthwhile to mention to everyone who may read my blog. I did not realize how insidious Satan is in the lies he tells. He has slowly pulled the whole world down towards hell, and therefore we see examples all around us of those lies. I promise that the Lord's love and mercy is so much greater than we realize! His divine love is not putting us on a rating scale; we are all loved as His children even though we have made mistakes and He does not love nor accept our sins.

The article fulfilled it's purpose. It reminded me of our Heavenly Father's and our Savior's divine love for me! It provided me hope and joy and peace by reminding me of the Lord's mercy and redemption.

A Reminder

I was reminded today of one of the miracle's in my life. I love how our Heavenly Father provides opportunities for us to remember the good things in our life. I have been involved in a couple car accidents (both as driver and passenger) and of course there was the major head trauma/accident that I went through (see my very first posts) so my neck has to occasionally be adjusted by a chiropractor. With our recent move to Tallahassee I had to find a new chiropractor, and luckily my sister-in-law knew someone. I met with him last week and told him a little of what had happened to me, not going much in depth about everything, but just how it happened and being momentarily paralyzed the first few days after I woke up. The doctor did a bunch of tests on me and we met again today to analyze the results and look at the x-rays and discuss the exercises I should do. What struck me, and drove me to blog after such a long time of not posting, was how amazed this doctor was with me. Everything he showed me proves that I am completely fine after my accident. Not just that I am ok with residual effects of my accident, nor that I am ok with signs that I had the accident, but that I am completely fine. His tests show that my bones are fine, my muscles are fine, my neurological tests came back fine, my reflexes are fine, etc. He repeated a couple of times how blessed I am. That is why I wanted to post. I am reminded of how blessed I am. The Lord shows us His tender mercies all the time. We need to have open eyes and a humble heart to see them, but when we do how grateful we become. I am grateful for the Lord's power that healed me and that today reminded me of it!