Firts comes trial by faith, then comes your reward

      "There was no rain when Noah began to build the ark. There was no ram when Abraham got the sticks to sacrifice Isaac. There were not two personages when Joseph knelt to pray. First comes trial by faith, then your reward" (Thomas S. Monson). Just as these three prophets were all tried to see if they are faithfull, we are tried to see how faithfull we are. Just like Preident Monson said we are tried by faith, then comes our reward. We all have things that we have to deal with in our lives. This is our time for us to see how faithfull we are to our Father in Heaven.
        He places us in these situations for our benefit. Our job is to learn from them and in the proccess of learning from them we are drawing ourself closer to our Heavenly Father. We are to look to him for help. He has created this test for us, so he knows the right answeres to it. We are able to study for it through the scriptures. This is an open book test and we can even ask te teacher for help. But first we have to show him that we are willing to learn. We show him by exercising our faith. Because once we do that we can recieve our reward.



        There was a man who was about to retire from his job. He was the Chief Executive of his company. He still had a year until he was going to retire. He was debating on who he should apoint to the new Chief Executive of his company. After pondering on this he called in ten of his top employees. He explained his delema and then gave them all a small envelope with a seed in it. He told them that they are to take care of this seed and write down everything that they do to it, for one year. At the end of the year he will chose who is the new Chief Executive of the company according to how well they took care of the seed.
        As the time went on some of the employees were bragging about how big their plant is getting. But one of the employees wasn't saying anything. His seed has not even sprouted yet. Over the next year this man watered the seed and took great care of it. But still it never grew. When the year was up it was time for them to bring in their plants and their record books of what they did to help it grow. This man's friend told him to just go buy a plant and show that to his boss. But the man said that that would be dishonest.
        The day finally came and still the man's seed hasn't grew. When he arrived at his job he saw everyone else had great beautiful plants. He felt really bad for not being able to have it seed grow. When his boss came in he looked at everyone's record of what they did to take care of their seed. When he got to the one man, he asked what happen to his seed. The man staited that he did all he could , but the seed wouldn't grow. The boss asked him when the last time he watered it was. The man said he watered it this morning. Then the boss anounced to everyone that this man is the new Chief Executive of the company.
        All the other employees were so mad because his plant didn't even grow and theirs did. The boss then said that the seeds that he gave to all of them were unfertilized seeds. They were all bad. This man was the only one who had enough respect and dignity to say after all he did the seed never grew. This man stook with this one seed even though it never grew. He was there to help it and care for it. Then he had the respect and dignity to tell his boss that the seed didn't grow.
         When we set goals for ourselves we need to stick with them. Even if we don't accomplish them, there is a bigger picture that we can't see. Just like this man getting the job even though his seed never grew, we will get our reward later on if we hold true to ourselves and our fellow man. As long as we set our goals and keep true to them to the end, we  will have accomplished them.

What doesn't kill you will only make you stronger

     We all go through hard times in our life. Whether it be in school, at work, at home, around our friends, or anywhere. We all face difficult situations throughout our lives. My dad always told me "What doesn't kill you will only make you stronger." I never really understood what that meant. I now realize that that was his way of saying everything will work out. Some of us have problems that we have to deal with in our families. This is one of the hardest things to deal with, watching a family member fall and you can't help them. As much as we try they still just don't want to listen to our advice, even if we went through the same thing they are going through.
     What we can do is to be there for them when they do decide to come back. We can show our love to them by being there when they need us. We show them that we are here to help by talking to them and listening when they have something to say. I love this picture of this little girl and the quote that comes with it. That quote says it all. "The hard times [I] go through will lead to the good times [I will] have" (Henry).
     Even though it's not us going through the hard time. We still do suffer by watching a loved one go through it. But we both can learn from it. Our job is to see how we can better our lives and also our loved ones' as well. Don't ever give up on someone you love. Because hopefully you will be the one to bring them back.

I always loved the song "Daddy Never was the Cadillac Kind" by The Confederate Railroad. In the begining of the song it says:
   "We were poor when I was a youngun
       I don't remember ever going hungry
       Daddy made sure we didn't do without
       I went to school with some of these fellas
      They had money and I was jealous
      I didn't know then what I know now
      Daddy'd say you can't judge a book by looking at its cover
      It's what's inside that really matters"
This song applies to us all, because at some point in our lives we get alittle jelious of others. Just like in this section of the song when he says "I don't remember ever going hungry..." then, "I didn't know then what I know now..." How often do we not appriciate what we have, even if sometimes its not as great as someone else's? Looking back to when we were younger we can see the blessings that we had but didn't realize. This part of the song applies to me because we didn't have the best things growing up, but I can not remember ever going hungry. I am so gratefull now for what I had when I was a kid. then he goes on and says:
    "It took a while but now I'm grown
      I've settled down with kids of my own
      The more I give them
      The more they want"
Our Father in Heaven gave us everything we have. We need to be more gratefull for what he has given us instead of wanting the best of everything. The name of this song is Daddy Never was the Cadillac Kind. We don't need the best of everything, just be happy with what we have.
Daddy Never was the Cadillac Kind lyrics

Power Sourse

A power sourse only works when you plug it in and turn it on. If you are not plugged in, you cant get the power needed to run whatever you are useing. This is the same with our faith in our Father in Heaven. If we are not plugged/tuned in with the spirit, how are we going to get the full power that he has to offer us? Just like useing a land line telephone. It must be plugged in and turned on in order for us to recieve the message from the other side. The more we exercise our faith in Heavenly Father and is son Jesus Christ, the easier it will be to recieve and understand the message that they have for us.

What is a Strippling Warrior?

The strippling warriors are a group of young men from the Book of Morman that go out to fight for their religion and their God. Their parents made an oath that they would not shed another man's blood. But war continued and the sons of those people formed an army. They did not make the same oath that their parents had made. They were led by a man named Heleman. They had the power of God with them as they went out to defend what they believed in. That is what we as missionaries of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints are doing every day. We are led by our prophet, President Thomas S. Monson, and we have the spirit of the Lord with us to protect us as well. Our job is to be like a Strippling Warrior and teach all of Gods children about his gospel. They left everything to go do what they believed in. This is exactly what I have done. I have left my family and friends to go out and teach God's children about his gospel. I know how hard it was for them to leave home and I also know how much they have been blessed for what they have done. I know their testimony was strenghthened just as mine has been.