Monday, September 29, 2014

Homecoming

Hello all! Danielle here, formerly known as Sora Adams. It's hard to believe that I've been home for almost two month now. Time really is a curious thing. Upon my return home I was asked to speak in my home ward. I was able to choose my topic, and I chose hope as it is through our Savior, Jesus Christ, and the merciful plan of our Heavenly Father that we can live lives full of hope despite the trials we may face. I've decided to share that message with you. Keep reading! Here's the written text of my talk. It was slightly different when I actually gave it as at the last minute I added some little thing or left something out, but this is the original text I prepared:

One of my favorite gospel topics is that of hope. As part of the plan of salvation and our time here on earth we all have trials we must face. I have seen the difference in the lives of people weighed down by their trails or by fear and sadness from viewing the world around them, those who face life without hope, versus those that despite all that life throws at them their faces are bright with smiles and their hearts are full of peace. I want to assure you that you can have that same peace in your hearts despite the hardships you may face or the evils you may see in the world around you.

We read in the scriptures where our source of hope comes from. In Ether we read: “Whoso believeth in God might with surety hope for a better world, yea, even a place at the right hand of God, which hope cometh of faith, maketh an anchor to the souls of men, which would make them sure and steadfast, always abounding in good works, being led to glorify God” (Ether 12:4).

We read in Moroni: “What is it that ye shall hope for? Behold I say unto you that ye shall have hope through the atonement of Christ and the power of his resurrection, to be raised unto life eternal, and this because of your faith in him according to the promise” (Moroni 7:41).

We learn from these two verses that hope must be founded upon faith and trust in our Heavenly Father and in His son, even our savior, Jesus Christ. As we work to increase our faith and strengthen our relationship with our Father and our Savior we come to realize that we do have something to hope for. Because Heavenly Father has a plan and the Savior accepted His role in that plan both death and Hell have been overcome. Each one of us will be resurrected with perfect bodies, never to die again. Eternal life is made available to us through the atonement. We must do our part, striving to live in accordance with the gospel, but also remembering that the price has been paid for our mistakes. If we will utilize the atonement, we will be strengthened and cleansed from sin. Because our Savior suffered for us we may gain eternal life. We may life with our Father in Heaven and with our loved ones. The path has been laid before us. We’re even given maps so to speak through the scriptures, personal revelation, and the words of living prophets.

The path isn’t an easy one. In the scriptures the Lord’s path is described as straight and narrow while Satan’s is described as wide and broad. Satan tries to make his path seem easier and more desirable. But truthfully, his is the path without hope. Hope, as we’ve read, comes through our Savior and our trust in Him—trust that He will keep His promises, that He will not lead us astray, and that He will strengthen us.

So how do we strengthen our hope even when faced with trial? To strengthen our hope we must first strengthen our faith, and in order to do that we must learn of Him. The best way to do that is to read the scriptures and to apply His teachings. This sometimes means that we will be asked to do things that we’re not sure why we were asked to do them in the first place. But we can take courage knowing that He knows better than we do and that He will never ask us to do something that isn’t for our benefit. As we live the principles of the gospel even when we don’t understand them, we will gain testimony of those things, and we will be blessed for our faith.

Let me share a couple examples where I saw great and inspiring faith on my mission. Romania has seen its fair share of trial. 25 years ago they had a revolution against their communist government. They’ve made a lot of progress since then, but it seems that the effects of that era still touch them in some way. They consider themselves a poor people. Work is hard to come by, and most opportunities don’t pay enough to live on, so it is common for both parents to work long hours, many times daily. In other cases, a spouse may leave to another country where they can earn more money and send it back home to their family.

In one of the areas I served in, the relief society president shared an experience which demonstrates her great faith and courage. Although her husband and children were all baptized together, she is the only one who remains active. She worked very hard to help earn money to provide for her family. This sister was scrimping and saving every penny so that she would be able to return to the temple. When she had finally managed to save enough money, one of her daughters approached her parents asking for help to pay tuition in order to continue her schooling. The family knew that their mother had some extra money set aside. This sister had to make what she called the hardest decision of her life. She loves her family, and of course she would do anything to help them, but if she gave up that money, that meant giving up this opportunity to go to the temple, which is a hard thing to accomplish in and of itself. The members of Romania have to travel to either Germany or Ukraine to attend the temple, an expensive journey. In the end, this sister decided to use the money for her temple trip. Her family didn’t understand and were angry with her because of her decision. I can only imagine what she must have felt. Still, she went to the temple. When she arrived and stepped into that sacred building, all doubt was gone. She was filled with the spirit and knew that she had made the right decision.

Another sister also saved every penny with the hopes of returning to the temple. This woman was always overflowing with hope and optimism. She recognized how blessed she had been, and she told me more than once that she would never go back to her old life from before she was baptized. It wasn’t worth it. Despite financial hardships, this sister never had a problem with paying her tithing. I was touched as she explained to me that every time she pays her tithing she imagines that it’s her small little brick that she adds in the building up of the kingdom of God.

Because these two sisters remained faithful despite their trials, they were able to continue to enjoy the blessings promised to the faithful. They rejoiced in the fact that they were still able to attend church meetings, and they were able to continue on with strength and hope because they recognized the blessings of the gospel and that Heavenly Father was aware of them and their trials.

Another way that we strengthen our faith and therefore our hope is by daily personal prayer. The more we speak to our Father in Heaven the more we will be open to the spirit. We will be more open to His love and direction. He will help us to see that He does have a plan for us. He will help to strengthen our hope and our faith if we ask Him.

Another way to live a life more full of hope is to develop an attitude of gratitude. There is something in every day that we can be grateful for. Every night on my mission, I would ask my companions to tell me three things they were thankful for that day. They would tell me three things and then I would tell them three things. By doing this it made it so much easier to have a spirit of optimism. It helped direct our focus on the good things and all the little blessings we’d seen in the day. It was something which helped me to recognize the Lord’s hand in my life. Every night in my journal I would conclude by writing what I was thankful for and how I had seen the hand of the Lord in my life that day. That constant reminder helped me maintain hope from day to day and to fight off discouragement because I knew that I wasn’t alone.

I remember one woman in my fourth transfer who was recommended to us by a member. We arranged to meet with her, and after talking with her for a while, I’m sorry to say that I didn’t see any potential with her. She had some great trails in her life in that moment, and she couldn’t seem to focus on anything else. She seemed to scoff at the things we were saying and the encouragement we offered. At one point my companion tried to help her realize that there was still good in her life, that she still had things to be grateful for. My companion pointed out that this woman had a daughter. Certainly that was a great blessing. The woman responded by saying, “And what if I didn’t have her?” I was surprised and thought this woman would never be able to see anything but the bad unless she herself chose to find the good. I was more surprised still when she agreed to meet with us again. My companion urged her to think of what she was grateful for daily. An arrangement was made where my companion would call her up and ask her what those things were. At first, this woman had a very hard time with it. Over time, it became easier. There was even a time when my companion forgot to give her a call. When we called the next day, this woman said, “You forgot to call me. This is what I’m thankful for.” Although her hardships remained, she began to see a bit of light in her life, and I even saw her take some steps to get her out of the troubles she was in.

In contrast, I saw another woman in a different area who was so focused on all the hardships she’d faced during the revolution and the events that followed that she couldn’t progress at that time. Having hope allows us to progress because we know what we’re working towards and we know that we can make it there.

As we strive to live in accordance with the gospel we radiate the hope and love that can only come through the gospel. One woman I taught who was a faithful Christian of another denomination, once told me and my companion that she could tell that we were followers of Christ because our faces shone. This same woman offered us a room in her home so that we could save money on rent. I would say that her light also shone.

There was a period of my mission when I was in the country of Moldova, which is a small country sandwiched in between Romania and Ukraine. Both Romanian and Russian are widely used there. Because of that fact, church was sometimes in Russian, sometimes in Romanian, and sometimes half and half. Some of the members knew both languages or even some English. However, there were some that only spoke Russian. I wished that I could communicate with them, but the only Russian I had figured out was pretty much “spaciba” “pa jausta” and “das vadanya,” meaning please, thank you, and goodbye (you should know that those aren't spelled correctly, but are just in a format where I could remember how to say them). But a wonderful thing happened. We began to communicate very simply through smiles and hand gestures. I was amazed at these women who would come up to me on any given Sunday, smile, and give my hand a squeeze. I could feel their love so strongly, and I was just so amazed at that love. When I left that area, one of these women struggled to put together a few Romanian words just so she could say goodbye to me. I will never forget these small but very significant acts of love.

In that same area, there was a woman who was physically disabled. Because of her disability she couldn’t always make it to church. She was also the only member in her family. We visited her once a week if we could arrange it, and I was always so pleased to see how happy she was and how strong her testimony was even though she couldn’t always attend church. Towards the end of my time there, we began to get very busy. I think it’s safe to say that it was the busiest time of my mission. We had said that we would get a hold of this sister to meet with her that week, but it hadn’t happened and the week was going quickly. We had one time open that we knew for sure that we could meet with her. It was the following morning. We didn’t like to set up appointments with so little time in advance, but I decided that we needed to at least call her, and if she couldn’t meet she would at least know that we hadn’t forgotten about her. I didn’t realize at that moment that the thought to make that call was a prompting. She was able to meet and we had a nice long visit with her. During that visit she told me how she had been hoping that we would come and visit. She longed for that, but she didn’t want to call us because she knew we were busy and she didn’t want to bother us. I was so incredibly grateful that I had made that call. Not only that, I was able to see a great act of faith in this woman.

Part of the hardship of going to church was that our building had stairs. She could make it into the room we used for sacrament meeting, but to attend her other meetings, she would have to go up a flight of stairs. She told me, I think in that same visit, that she had begun doing exercises to strengthen her arms so that she would be able to make it up the stairs using her crutches. She hoped she would be able to make it to church the following Sunday. I prayed for her the remainder of the week, hoping that she would be given the strength to fulfill her righteous desire of coming to church. I was so happy that Sunday when I saw her walk in, and she stayed for all three meetings, slowly but surely making her way up and down the stairs.

From these women I learned that we can become more aware of the love of our Heavenly Father as we associate with other followers of Christ, and as we strive to serve others. I also learned that exercising the faith and hope that we have through Christ gives us strength, allowing us to overcome our trials, physical as well as spiritual. And one other thing is that fact that often times Heavenly Father blesses His children and demonstrates His love for them by using other people around them.

Christ once told His disciples, “These things I have spoken unto you, that in me ye might have peace. In the world ye shall have tribulation: but be of good cheer; I have overcome the world.” Christ knows everything that we have felt and must endure. We can find peace through Him and His atonement. One of the things that was a strength to me in times of struggle on my mission was to imagine my savior beside me, holding my hand. Just as He has been a strength to me, I know that He can and will be a strength for each of us if we allow Him to help us. If we continue to build our faith and trust in Him we will be able to maintain that sense of hope. We will be lifted out of the darkness of our trails into the light of His love. Our lives will become a reflection of that faith and hope, and just as I could feel the love of those Russian women, those around you will feel of your love and will be brought closer to the love of our Savior and our Father in Heaven.


In closing, I’d like to share my testimony with you in Romanian. I know you won’t be able to understand what I say, but I hope that you will be able to feel the spirit.

And I did share my testimony in Romanian! You won't be able to know what it sounds like, but just so you can see what it looks like (without the added symbols because I'm not sure how to add those at present...) I'll give you a written one. Hopefully when you go to stick it into google translate out of curiosity it won't be too far off!

Stiu ca Tatal Ceresc intr-adevar este tatal nostru si ca ne iubeste atat de mult. El are un plan perfect pentru fiecare dintre noi. Viata nu e usoara, dar nu suntem singuri. Putem avea tarie prin ispisirea lui Isus Hristos. Prin El putem fim vindecati si putem sa fim cu El, Tatal nostru, si cu iubitorii nostri pentru intotdeauna. Stiu ca aceast biserica este adevarata. Fiecare dintre noi putem sa stim asta. Trebuie doar sa-L cerem.

In numele lui Isus Hristos, amin.

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