The Final Week

Being the stress-case that I am, I had another extremely stress-filled week to top off a very stress-filled semester. I’ve learned a lot about myself this semester. One, that I have not learned how to handle stress as well as I thought. (Not so good). Two, I have a lot still more to learn and work on. (Very good). I’ve discovered that trusting is so very hard for me. Now that I’ve recognized it, I can get started to working on it. Since the #lighttheworld movement, I was drawn to a scripture in Psalms 46:10 “Be still and know that I am God”. Reading that gave me so much peace. It was such a small reminder that God is totally in control. Sometimes in the midst of our running around and trying to get our lives figured out, we should be still and wait for that hand of the Lord. Or at least trust in his hand, that he will guide us to the best. I’ve started to try this out, and it’s comforting to know that someone knows what they are doing, cause that’s certainly not me.

Lessons from Ether

I have been struggling a lot this week with a lot of decision. It was one of those weeks where my entire life was played out in my head and I realized just how much I had to do. Thoughts of grad school, marriage, and jobs circled in my head and I just felt so overwhelmed by what was ahead of me. Sometimes I feel like I just don’t know what to do. What we talked about in Book of Mormon class really helped me. My professor talked about the ways that the brother of Jared received revelation in order to build the barges to cross the sea. He said there were three types of answers/guidance we receive from the Lord. The first type of answers we can get is like the answer he received about the steering. The Lord said he would guide them upon the waters, and they didn’t have to worry about that. The second type of answer we can receive was much like the answer he received about the air. He received step by step directions on what he should do to solve that problem. Sometimes I feel like I want that option more than anything.  The third type is the answer to the light. The Lord left it up to him and his agency to figure that one out. My professor pointed out that the older we get, the more God expects us to rely on agency and make decisions for ourselves. Which is so scary in one way, but that the same time it shows that God trusts us so much and that he won’t let us mess up on the big stuff.