Don't look back

I hope everyone of enjoying family and friends during this break from school. I have definitely felt great joy being around the ones I love and reflecting upon the amazing blessing I have received this past year. Now I look forward to a new year and it's a great time to make goals. We can all learn from this video as we ponder upon this last year and look forward to a beautiful new year ahead. Happy new year! :)

Follow this link:

http://m.youtube.com/watch?v=lrZij9MSTRI

Look to the Light

Merry Christmas to all! Short blog this week but the message is of great importance to the whole world!

No matter what age we are, this time of the year is a great time to reflect upon the greatest gift given to man. We have all made mistakes in life and sometimes our burdens are very hard to deal with. There is a way provided for us to be cleansed from the guilt of our errors and if we "Look to the Light" our burdens can be made light. This is one of my very favorite Christmas messages and I hope you all enjoy it. Feel free to comment and share your story as the people in this video do :)

Learning from the Little Drummer Boy

Hope you are having a wonderful holiday season! For this week's blog I will share the talk a gave today for the ward Christmas sacrament meeting program:

 I am grateful today to be able to share with you my humble testimony of the  Savior of the world. The One who has borne our grief and carried our sorrows even when he was stricken and despised. The One who was wounded for our transgressions and bruised for our iniquities. The very Son of God that suffered grave chastisement so that we can have peace in this troublesome world.

As I have been thinking of what message I can share today my heart was drawn to a classic Christmas story that most if us probably know called the Little Drummer Boy. I think my thoughts were drawn towards this tale because of the special message it can teach us all. I pray the spirit can lift each of us as I speak today.

In the beginning of the story of the little drummer boy we hear the inviting words, "Come they told me. A new born king to see." To me this represents the simple yet powerful invitation The Lord has given us all to come unto Christ. 

As the little drummer boy starts his journey to see the Savior he notices something that could have possibly brought some discouragement to his little heart. 

He realizes that everyone around him is bringing great gifts to lay before The Lord. He begins to think inside himself, "I have no gift to bring, that's fit to give the king." 

We may sometimes ask ourself similar questions such as, "How can I in my imperfections and weaknesses ever give something useful to my savior? I see those around me who seem to be carrying overflowing armfuls of precious gifts. What gift could I offer The Lord?" 

We see that Despite the discouragement the little drummer boy may have been experiencing at that time, he pressed on. He gave The Lord the only gift he had to give. He pulled out his drum and played. And in the story the little drummer boy proclaims, "I played my best for him." 

 To me, the drum in this tale represents love. The little drummer boy not only gave a gift of love to The Lord, but he loved The Lord to the best of his ability. So what can we learn from this? The truth is that dispite our imperfections and weaknesses, whatever they may be, we all have a very precious gift to give to The Savior. 

Love is the most precious gift we can give. As we keep the commandments, cling tightly to the iron rod and help others do the same, we are showing our love to Him who has given us everything. 

Let us strive to be more like the little drummer boy and all throughout our journey on our way to see The Lord let is play our loving drums with humility and gratitude. Let us Feast upon the words of Christ, always abound in good works, repent and be cleansed from sin, And most importantly, never give up.  For when we love The Lord we are stronger and more powerful than we can imagine. The Lord has promised that "all things work together for good to them that love God."

I testify that that little baby of Bethlehem grew up and saved the world. He came to us to let us know that it is ok to be broken because He can make us perfect if we will just love Him with all we have.  

For as Moroni says, "if we love god with all or might mind and strength, then is his grace sufficient for us so that by his grace we may be be perfect in Christ."

I bare personal testimony that as we offer our own gift of sincere love to The Lord, His atoning power binds up our wounds, enlightens our troubled minds, and heals our brokenness. 

As the scriptures say:

 Eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, neither have entered into the heart of man, the things which God hath prepared for them that love him.

Of this I testify, in the name of Jesus Christ. Amen.

A Christmas Miracle!

Through an experience I had this weekend I was reminded of the importance of persevering towards our goals even when the odds are slim!

So we planned a double date to go see a showing of the play Savior of the World in Salt Lake City this past Friday with hopes of getting four standby tickets because the show was sold out. We left a bit latter than expected and their was a bunch of traffic so we didn't get there until right before the show was going to start. We quickly made a plan to drop of my buddy and his date (who had crutches) in front of the conference center while my date and I searched for parking. When we finally found parking we were in such a hurry to run to the ticket offices that we both forgot our phones in the car and had no way of contacting the others. We decided to just keep going without our phones and hope to find them. Turns out that we arrived at the ticket office at the exact same time as my buddy and his date so we were able to find each other! We then asked the man outside if there were any standby tickets and he told us that there were none! We were about to leave when we decided to just go in anyways just to check for ourselves. When we entered the theatre our group was easily spotted thanks to our friend in crutches and out of the blue we were offered four free tickets! All the circumstances leading up to that point made for some perfect timing where we were right where we needed to be at the right time! We enjoyed an absolutely beautiful show and we marveled at the miracle that allowed us to get there! Through this experienced we learned that when we have a worthy goal we shouldn't be stopped just because others tell us we can't get there. With faith and The Lord's well timed, tender mercies miracles really do happen!

Wrong Roads

 

Sometimes we make mistakes. Even when we are trying our best to make the right choices nobody could get through this life without ever going down the wrong road and hitting a dead end every once in a while. Why does God allow this to happen? Why does God let us go down the wrong roads sometimes? I love this short message by Elder Holland that gives a response to this commonly asked question. Think about your own experiences as you watch and listen to your heart so that God can help you understand why certain things happen in life

 

 

I know too that God loves us. Everything that He does is focused us giving us an opportunity to come closer to Him. Its all about love. God knows better than us what is best for us. Many times in my life I have experienced this fact. Sometimes we have to go through certain trials or learn certain lesson so that we can get to where we are meant to be and become who we are meant to become. Sometimes it is hard to understand why we have to go through certain things, but it is a beautiful thing when we just continue to trust in The Lord and see His hand work miracles in our life. He never leaves us alone. He is always by our side leading us to our own promised land. Feel free to share your own experiences on how God has led you by the hand through darkness to get to where you were meant to go. :) Have a great week!