Into the unknown.

This last week has been a little crazy! My sister had her wedding reception Thursday and then got married Friday, and so we spent all week finalizing preparations. The reception and wedding were both very beautiful. My sister made a beautiful bride and I am very happy for her and proud of her. 

This week is Thanksgiving, and I am very grateful for all of the blessings in my life. I am grateful for my Savior, and my Heavenly Parents. I am grateful for the love that I feel from Them, and for the blessings that They give me in my life. I am grateful for the opportunities that I had to attend college and increase my education. I am grateful for my job, and for the happiness that it brings me to work with my kiddos. I am grateful for my parents, and my siblings–new brother-in-law included. I am grateful for my friends, and for all of their love and support during my trials in the last several years. And I am grateful for my boyfriend, who is the sweetest and most thoughtful guy, and who is the best blessing in my life right now. 💜

My life hasn't always gone the way that I had hoped that it would, but I know that this is something that everyone struggles with. Life doesn't always go as planned. God has a bigger plan for us. And His timing is always perfect–even when it doesn't seem like it is. We don't always know why things happen when they do–or don't happen–but not knowing why can often help us increase our faith and trust in the Lord. As of right now, I don't know why God's timing is perfect for me right now.  Sometimes it's really hard to trust the Lord, especially when it doesn't feel like He is listening. But as we are praying in a way that means God can actually answer our prayers, we can come to better understand His plans for us. Sometimes His timing doesn't feel perfect, and sometimes it doesn't seem like I can hear Him answering me, but I know that eventually–whether in this life or the next–things will all make sense. 

As we step forward into the unknown (phrase courtesy of Frozen II and its soundtrack, which I conveniently saw yesterday evening and I HIGHLY recommend everyone sees! I recommend seeing it blindly but you can do what you want), we are facing our fears. We are trusting God and trusting ourselves, and standing tall and taking a step into the dark. The future is unknown, but as we strive to follow God's plan for us, we can come to take things one moment at a time and even though it might not always make sense, it will always be a lesson or a blessing–something to learn from, or something to grow from. 

A bit of a shorter post today, but if you're interested, on Friday I posted on my Facebook page about my sister's wedding and some tips on relationships from President and Sister Nelson. 

Hope everyone has a wonderful week preparing for Thanksgiving this week! Remember to count your blessings and be thankful. I know that I am going to be focusing on gratitude and my blessings this week, and for the rest of the holiday season this year. 

Xoxo

Mattie

We just need to follow Him.

Well, Christmas was two days ago! I had a wonderful day with my family. I hope you did, too. :)

Today in sacrament meeting, the topic was the Holy Ghost. The Holy Ghost is a companion to us–a gift from our Heavenly Father. He is there to comfort us, and to guide and direct us. He helps us know what is the right decision to do. He prompts us to say or do things that will bless others, or bless us, and that will answer people's prayers, even if we don't know that. 

In Gospel Doctrine, we talked about Revelation 6:6-11.
We talked about how the world is falling away from the Lord's laws. The world's definition of right and wrong is different from the Lord's–practically opposite: the Lord's right is the world's wrong and the Lord's wrong is the world's right. We talked about how Satan's plan–his plan in heaven–was to make everyone do the right thing. We would have no agency. Brother Shearer brought up the fact that the world is trying to make everything vanilla–take away all labels, and make everything and everyone the same. Satan is still trying to put his plan into action–except for now he's trying to make everyone do the wrong thing and go against God. He knows he cannot win, but he is going to try and take down as many people as he can.

We talked about how the opposite of faith is fear, and fear is not of God. Fear is from Satan. One of the ladies said that comparison is the thief of joy. When we compare ourselves to others, we usually compare our weaknesses to their strengths, which makes it so we never win. However, this is not a fair comparison! Weakness to strength is not a good comparison. And besides, you shouldn't compare yourself to others anyway, because we all go through different experiences. This is the reason why we have strengths and weaknesses: our experiences are all different, and they give us different results. 

We have to stand up for what is right. Someone (I think it was Brother Shearer again) said that people are becoming more afraid of offending others. Take this holiday season, for example. There is Christmas, Hanukah, Kwanza, etc. And people have taken to say "Happy Holidays" for fear of offending people. I'll tell you what: If someone says "Happy Hanukah" or Kwanza or whatever they celebrate to me, I will not be offended! I'll say "Thank you! You too" or "Thank you! Merry Christmas". The fact that they cared enough to wish me a happy (fill in the blank holiday) means a lot to me. I don't care what you celebrate. 

Someone else said that good will prevail. Good will prevail! God is going to win this war. You have to stand up for what is right. "Do what is right; let the consequence follow. Battle for freedom in spirit and might; and with stout hearts look ye forth till tomorrow. God will protect you; then do what is right!" (Do What Is Right, Hymn #237). God will bless you and protect you as you follow Him and listen to and follow His prophets and the Spirit. 

In Relief Society we talked about Christlike attributes, and how we need to think and be like Christ. My first thought was, "Perfect! This goes perfectly with the theme of my blog, Keeping Christ In Your Heart". 

We made a list of the attributes of Christ after watching a video that listed them. Christ is humble, obedient, courageous, kind, selfless, a teacher, submissive, full of love, a healer, a servant, and forgiving. Sister Nelson said that divine nature (like in the Young Women's theme) is the process of developing Christlike attributes. I loved that. We then read in 2 Peter 1:5-7, which added to our list of Christlike attributes:

"And beside this, giving all diligence, add to your faith virtue; and to virtue knowledge; And to knowledge temperance; and to temperance patience; and to patience godliness; And to godliness brotherly kindness; and to brotherly kindness charity." 

When we develop these Christlike attributes, we become more Christlike (I hope that was obvious) and we are closer to being able to live with God again. Christlike attributes help us become a better person. I'm not perfect, and there are some attributes that I need to work on more than others, but trying to be Christlike makes me a better person. These attributes make me more aware of other's needs, though I still need to work on some of them. For example, I need to work on being more patient. That's something that I struggle with, but I'm trying.

Guess what? You can always ask Him for help. :) We don't have to do anything on our own, because we're not alone. We can do it with His help. You can ask Him to help you not feel bad after you've repented. You can ask Him to help you think good thoughts about someone that you don't always get along with. Whatever you need, you can ask Him. Because when we are partners with Him, we can never fail. He is always there looking out for us, even when we stray. He wants us to be like Him, and He wants us to be able to return to Him. He's given us all that we need, and we just need to follow Him. :)