Answering Our Prayers

Oh wow. So it's been over a month since I last wrote. Well to get y'all caught up. A few days after my last post, my family and I left for California to see my sister Megan get married to her best friend, Garett. It was fun experience and I'm glad to see my sister be so happy. It also made me excited because... It means Wendy and I are next! Yay!!!

After the wedding, we came back home to Utah. Since being back, I've done my best to keep busy and get needed stuff done. Well and I've done my best not to think about how much I miss Wendy. While being home I've been to a fair in Bountiful that had a some fun dance groups and one of them was French! It was fun to see a French dance group and made me miss the country even more. My darling Wendy got to visit it which made me a bit jealous. Well, I hope to one day visit it with my darling Wendy. I should also say that during this break we've been able to grow closer to one another.

I've got to hang out with my family and get caught up with them. It's been really nice to be able to hang out with them. I love being around my family; it always makes me feel like I'm spoiled. I've also been able to play with my little nephew Nikolai. He's adorable and he's crawling like crazy. For the most part he's really happy and really fun. Last week, my sister Catherine helped me make (more like helped her) a really cool t-shirt. It's a copy of a shirt from the Heroes of Olympus series that I read earlier; that series is a continuation of the Percy Jackson series. Anyways, I'm happy and excited to wear the shirt around campus.

I've also got caught up on watching some movies that I've wanted to see. I got to see the new Batman movie which was really good. I also got to talk to my dad about the French Revolution parallels in it. For me, it was really fun to be able to do that with him. I also got to watch a movie recommended by one of my French teachers called "Joyeux Noël" or Merry Christmas. If you watch it, you probably want to put English subtitles on. The movie has English, French and German all spoken in it. It's based on a true story from WWI. Around the Christmas season, a German tenor came and sung for some German soldiers in the trenches. He sung a hymn for them and a Scottish priest recognized the hymn and started accompanying the tenor on his bagpipes. From there three battalions, one German, one Scottish and one French rapidly become friends and stopped fighting. It was really cool and for me showed how the spirit of Christmas can unite people. It was really good.

So a few weeks before Megan and Garett's wedding, Catherine (my other sister) and Jesse's car broke down. It was horrible timing on many levels. I watched as they struggled with this trial. I know that they prayed a lot about it. I know that my parents and I prayed a lot about it. I will admit that I was impressed by both Catherine and Jesse's strength during this trial. A couple weeks ago, they were able to purchase a very good used car. It reminded me that the Lord does indeed hear and answer our prayers, even if our answers to our prayers are not immediately forthcoming. It also reminded of another prayer that was answered. I got home from my LDS mission in March of 2009. My plan was to date around for about a year and then find my special someone and get married. The Lord though, had a different plan for me. For three years, I went on flirted, went on dates, and did the whole dating game at BYU-Idaho. It was long and tiring . At times it was heartbreaking but I continued my search and continued praying. I'm glad that the Lord didn't get annoyed at my incessant prayers about finding my wife. Well three years to the day (or pretty close) that I got home from my mission, I got engaged to my best friend, Miss Wendy. I'll try not to brag about her too much... I just want to say that she really is my best friend in the whole world, like no else has been. To be honest, when I think about Wendy, I can just see so many of my prayers answered about how I wanted my wife to be, plus so many more awesome quirks and traits! I can honestly see that the Lord really did answer my prayers by giving me her.

I want to testify that the Lord really does hear and answer our prayers, even when we don't yet see it. Oftentimes we have to work hard, pray hard, and be patient to see our prayers answered but the Lord will answer them in His time. I have a quote that I shared with a friend of mine earlier that relates to working towards the Lord's answers to our prayers. Elder Holland said “Take advantage of every opportunity to learn and grow. Dream dreams and see visions. Work toward their realization. Wait patiently when you have no other choice. Lean on your sword and rest a while, but get up and fight again.” I testify that the Lord hears and answers our prayers. Oftentimes we have to work diligently towards their realization. I testify that the heartache, tears, and sacrifice that we have to go through will always be worth it. May the Lord bless you with the patience to see the answers to your prayers! Have a good week!

The Power of Prayer and a Loving Heavenly Father

I'd like to start by apologizing to my readers for having not written in a while but to be honest I haven't felt like to doing much of anything for a while.

I know that many of my readers will be wondering what happened with my girlfriend. I will not put the details on here. I will simply say however, that I am writing a poem about it entitled "I Am Not A Boat". If you'd like details call, text me, or message me and I'll do my best to respond and give you the details. I apologize to those who have done so and I haven't responded.

The last few weeks have been long and hard. I will say that I know that our Heavenly Father answers prayers. I have felt that more as of late. The week of my breakup was hard for me emotionally. I was blessed to have one of my good friends in town, my old roommate Victor. I will admit that it was a great blessing to have him listen to me every night of this hard week. Having him there was an answer to a prayer.

This weekend I went "home" to Utah to visit my family and to be a part of a baby blessing of my nephew Nikolai. He is really cute.

It was nice to be around my family and have them support me through this rough period of life. I feel like the love that they have shown for me is reminder of how much my Heavenly Father love me. A few weeks ago, I listened to a devotional by Brother Walquist given at school some time ago. It was called "Lord, is it I?". If you click on the link, it will take you to a page that should have a different forms of the talk. It was a really good talk and it made reflect on what I was doing. One thing of which it reminded is that we, as Latter-day Saints, have commandment to pray vocally. I will admit that I have been pretty bad at keeping this one. Within the last few weeks, I have done my best to obey this commandment more. I will say that these prayers have made it easier to focus and to see the answers to my prayers. I would like to invite you my readers to try praying vocally. I promise that you'll more readily see the blessings that our Heavenly Father pours out upon you. I hope y'all have a good week!