4-H = Happy

I'm a mentor at Cedar Middle School.

I LOVE IT!

At the beginning of the semester a paper went around my institute class asking for people to sign up.

I needed something to fill my time and help me to feel like I had a purpose,

So I signed up.

The first time I went I walked in and I felt a little awkward,

I didn't know anyone there and I had no idea what to talk about with 6th graders.

But every time I went I got more and more comfortable and I began to build friendships with the kids and with my fellow mentors.

And now 4-H is the highlight of my week.

I get to talk to these kids and see their wonderful senses of humor and wonderful personalities and then I get to help them with their homework and encourage them to do their best.

Homework time is a struggle but it's my favorite because I know they can do it even when they say they can't!

Seeing them succeed makes me so happy!

Last time at mentoring I was working with this girl that wouldn't do her homework for anything and so I sang her a song about how her homework missed her because she wouldn't give it enough attention.

After my splendid song she did her homework.

Unfortunately my song wasn't that amazing motivational song that moves people to action, rather my voice is so bad anyone would do anything to get me to stop, my lil' bro Nate can attest to this.

I've tortured him many times in this manner when I want him to put his dishes away.

My singing is done in the name of fun tho, so it's ok :)

These kids have so much potential and I have learned to love them SO much!

They make me laugh so hard and I'm always happy when I am with them.

We goof off but we also get things done.

Some of my favorite memories include:

Making soft pretzels,

ALWAYS winning the cooking competitions,

Making T-shirts,

Arm wrestling contests,

Wheelbarrow races,

Hands up stands up games,

Playing tag,

Creating things with our mad wood working skills,

and just simply laughing together.

I'm so glad that I signed up and there are many more fun times ahead :)

 

Something Miraculous

Something truly and utterly miraculous happened when I made the choice to give my all to the Lord.

I want my family that is far away from me to know how much I love the gospel of Jesus Christ.

It is true and it brings so much happiness and light into this lost and fallen world.

I want my mamma to know that she raised me right and taught me the ways of God and I know it and I will never depart from it.

My mother is the most wonderful woman on all of planet Earth and I know she has a testimony.

When I told her I wanted to go on a mission back in October and I asked her how we would pay for it she told me "the money will be there. God always makes sure the money is there."

I have heard stories about my Granddad and every time he was supporting a missionary his farm would thrive and the money was always there.

This testimony has been passed on from my graddad to my mom and now it strengthens my faith.

Back in October when I prayed about going on a mission I received no specific answer.

I decided that God would be pleased with any righteous choice that I made.

I decided that I would continue to pursue my dream and move to Nashville to finish my schooling.

I had my life planned out and it was perfect.

Until nothing was working.

I was pursuing many righteous things in my life but I was being denied them.

I was trying so hard to apply to Belmont but things kept getting lost in the mail.

I struggled with this process for about four months.

Exhausted and confused I broke down.

One night while I was kneeling beside my bed I told God that I would do whatever He wanted me to do. If He didn't want me to go to Belmont then I wouldn't go. I would give up my dream if He had another plan for me. I told Him I would give Him everything if He would just let me finish my application to Belmont. At this point all I wanted was to finish what I'd started and at least find out if Belmont wanted me to come to their school.

Looking back I can see that God was trying to humble me to see how willing I was to follow His plan for me.

He knew I'd been praying for direction but He didn't want to give me answers I wasn't ready to follow.

So he prepared my heart for what was to come.

One weekend on a drive back to Cedar City I was talking to my wonderful friend Kenzie Sant and I kept asking her why things were so hard in my life and why nothing was working.

My application to Belmont was still up in the air, and I was still struggling with that tremendously.

Then Kenzie said the thing I feared the most.

She said "maybe you're supposed to go on a mission."

The moment she said that a peace came into my heart and I think that was the moment I knew.

I wasn't quite ready to know though and I just laughed and jokingly said "don't say that, that's not funny, if I end up going on a mission I blame you!"

But even though my heart still wanted to go to Belmont more than anything I remembered my prayer to God that I told Him that I would go where He wanted me to go and I would do what He wanted me to do.

This SCARED me!

I decided I wouldn't pray about it because I knew the answer and I wasn't ready to face it.

But then a few days later I saw a post on Facebook (of all things.... Facebook... it's quite silly I know) and this post was made by a girl that said she would put her life in God's hands and follow the prompting she had to serve a mission.

Again I was scared and I wondered if I had that kind of faith.

Could I do what I knew was right, could I give up the one thing, my dream, that has kept me holding on for so many years.

It was so close, I could almost taste it.

Could I trust the Lord enough to give up what I could have made of myself in exchange for what He could make of me.

Would I or would I not trust the God that gave me life, the God that gave me that dream in the first place.

I laid awake in my bed arguing with myself.

I was trying to decided if I should say the prayer that would change the direction of my life forever.

The hour got later and I realized that if I didn't do it then I would end up doing it later.

I realized I wanted to follow the path that God had for my life, I would no longer put off the inevitable.

I said the life altering prayer and I asked God if He wanted me to serve a mission.

At the end of the prayer I noticed I was smiling.

I felt true happiness in my heart and I knew what I had to do.

You may have noticed a trend of me not quite being ready to accept everything all at once.

And yet again I struggled with accepting all the knowledge I had been given.

I was scared of the new path I had ahead of me and I decided I wouldn't tell anyone about my decision quite yet.

But this only led to doubt.

I prayed again "am I supposed to go on a mission."

This time the feeling was not there.

I learned a valuable lesson from this particular experience and I wish never to forget it.

God will give you all the answers to your prayers BUT THEN He expects you to do something with those answers.

He does not want you to keep nagging Him about the same thing He has already revealed to you.

At least this is true for me in this particular instance.

Before God would give me any more knowledge He needed me to exercise faith in Him and act upon my answer.

The next Sunday's stake conference was focused heavily on missionary work.

The whole time I just kept thinking to myself "I need to go on a mission."

I told myself I would wait a bit to act on the prompting and see if I still felt the same in a few weeks.

It was then that reality came crashing down on me and I knew I could not delay the promptings of the Spirit.
The time to act was in the present and I could let no more time pass by.

With shaking fingers I texted the executive secretary to make an appointment to meet with the bishop.

I was still a little unsure but I knew that if I acted God would give me more answers and I would know what to do.

The appointment was made for Tuesday at 5:00

Naturally I showed up at 4:30 just to realized that everyone was still working so of course they wouldn't be there yet.

I sat in my car trying to calm my heart and keep myself from peeing my pants (I was nervous).

The time came and the building was unlocked and the bishops office door opened up to me.

I sat across from my bishop and I told him I was surprised to be there, this wasn't exactly part of my plan, I was just trying to exercise my faith in Chirst.

He asked me if I had a desire to serve.

I realized that I did and I told Him so.

He asked me to read D&C 4.

That scripture has never meant so much to me, I felt the spirit so strong.

By the end of our meeting my decision was sure.

I knew in my heart that I wanted to serve the Lord with all my heart and I wanted to give Him my everything for 18 months.

Ever since I made this final decision I have felt extreme peace in my life and overwhelming happiness.

I know that God knows what He is doing and anything I give up to serve Him He will bless me with so much more.

I need my family at home to know that this is the best decision I have ever made and I am very sure that this is what I want to do.
I have never felt so much peace and happiness in my life.

I hope to be able to look back on my life and read this and know that God's hand was definitely directing my life and I hope that when future generations read this my testimony can strengthen theirs.

After all that is why I write.

I love my family and I want to be with them forever.

I'm going to serve the Lord so that other people can be with theirs for eternity too.