BLESSINGS THAT COME FROM BEING A MEMBER OF THE CHURCH OF JESUS CHRIST OF LATTER-DAY SAINTS

Today  in Sacrament, I was asked to speak on blessings of being a member of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints. When I think of blessings, I normally think of the basic blessings such as family, food and water, clothes, and shelter, those sort of everyday things. But this week as I have thought about other blessings that I don’t recognize on a daily bases, I was reminded of personal stories that have happened to me that gave me a stronger testimony these blessings and that is what I would like to share today.

 The first blessing I thought of is the blessing of tithing. When Joseph and I were talking about getting married, my mom told me that to get married in the temple, I had to be a full tith payer. At the time I was working at the Wave Pool, and as a high school kid, money was very important if I wanted to drive my car instead of taking the bus, and eat out for lunch instead of eating school lunch. Of course I paid my tithing, but there definitely were times when I forgot, and just told myself that I would pay it off my next paycheck and didn’t. I really did want to marry Joseph in the temple, and knew that she was right. So from that day, I have never skipped out on paying my tithing. We as a family, we have seen the blessings of finances be in our favor from being full tith payers. Im sure at some point in life, everyone has or will have doubts about paying tithing. There have been times when I have started to get worried that we wouldn’t be able to pay for grocery, or pay rent, but then I am reminded of a story that a young women’s leader told us once during a Sunday lesson. She had to decide wether she was going to pay tithing or a bill that was due the next day. At that time they didn’t have enough money to pay both. She faithfully decided to pay her tithing. The next day she had checked her bank account and to her surprise there was the exact amount of money in her checkings to pay the bill. She reminded us as young women that paying our tithing does bring blessings. Ever since truly becoming a full tith payer, I have personally seen many income blessings that I don’t think we would have received otherwise.

The next blessing I thought of is the blessing of the Holy Ghost. Joseph and I had decided to go up north shopping for the day. We had just finished up at the outlet mall, and Joseph has wanted to go to cabalas, and I sure didn’t. So being the good husband he is, he is agreed to not going. So we decided we would head to Orem instead. As we were driving. Joseph had the impression to slow down. He was going a little over the speed limit, and questioned himself on why he should slow down, but ignored the prompting. Within seconds we were side swiped by a semi and lost control of our car. I was pretty good at remember to put on my seatbelt, but this time I didn’t have it on. As we swerved through all the lanes of traffic back and forth until we slide to a stop, I remember vigorously trying to put my seatbelt on, but the seatbelt had locked. We had somehow managed to not hit one single car. We had pulled our car to the side of the freeway, and I remember calling my mom to let her know what had happened. She answered the phone, and I just remember hearing her voice not being able to breath or talk. She said my name again, and I managed to get out the words “we were hit”. instantly I could here the concern in her voice. She asked if I was okay, and the only words I could get out was, I think so. She asked if Joseph was okay, and I said I think so.  And the only other thing I remember her saying after that was “I’m coming to get you”. Sometimes in our earthly life, we may feel discouraged, lonely, or scared. We may feel that no one understands us, or that people judge us. We may feel overwhelmed and burdened with trials that we experience. But as we look to the lord in our hardest times, and even times that aren’t hard. I know He is there for us, and is coming to save us as my mom did that day. I was scared, and alone (with Joseph of course) in a place that wasn’t my home, but I felt the comfort of the holy ghost, and knowing my mom was coming to save me, as Heavenly Father and Jesus will one day come to save us. After getting of the phone with her I instantly broke down in tears. The police arrived and asked if we needed medical attention, but somehow I had only a few bruises and whip lash. We honestly must have been watched over that day, because I don’t know how we didn’t flip our car. Though this was one of the most stressful and scariest situations I had ever been through, I felt so much love and compassion for the semi driver. I remember one random day being hit with this love and forgiveness towards him. That was our only car at the time, and it was completely totaled. He had lied to his insurance about not hitting us so we basically lost out on our car and any money. I let go of all the anger I had towards him that day months after the accident. ( I’m a very much a grudge holder). I felt so much weight lift off of my shoulders. The Holy Ghost really does work in mysterious ways. And it is such a privilege to have as member of the church.

The next blessing that I have benefited from is priesthood blessings. I received my patriarchal blessing last May a couple weeks after going through an early miscarriage. A section in my blessing states that we will have the opportunity to bring children into this world. I felt my heart instantly dropped with so much relief knowing that I would be able to have my own children, and all the pain, anger, and worries went away. 

We can receive priesthood blessings for just about everything. Throughout the duration of our marriage, I  have asked Joseph for multiple blessings, which has brought more love into our home. As wives and as mothers, it is important for our families to have husbands and fathers who are worthy to have the priesthood. It has blessed me in many ways growing up and now, as I am sure all of us, if not most of us have experienced. I want to encourage all of the men, and young men to make it a priority in their life to be  priesthood holders. Coming from a wife, a mother, and even a daughter, it will bless your life, your families lives, and many other lives that you might not even know. Blessings can be given when we have big struggles, and even when we have small struggles. We should never feel that something is not important enough to ask for a priesthood blessing because we feel it is insignificant compared to other things. And sometimes if we do not ask for priesthood blessings, not only are we robbing ourselves of those blessings and comfort from the holy ghost that we desire at that time, but maybe we are also robbing the priesthood holder from receiving the blessings of using their priesthood.

The last blessing I thought about is the blessing of repentance. My dad grew up catholic, but is now a convert to the church. We were having a conversation a couple weeks ago about repentance. We had talked about the difference in the repentance process between our church and the Catholic Church, and how repentance is more than just confessing we did something wrong, but how repentance is about bettering ourselves, and truly asking for forgiveness. I remember forever ago, someone had told us either is in young women’s or seminary, that everyone at some point in their life is going to repent, wether is is repenting through prayer, or repenting through a bishop. And I remember thinking that wouldn’t be me. But sure enough Satan caught up to me. Soon after, My attitude towards everything changed. Not having the spirit as a constant companion is a horrible feeling and it was even worse because I had recognized that I had changed, but I was to scared and embarrassed to talk to the bishop. I went on for months like that, and eventually everyone was noticing that I had changed. I quit hanging out with friends, I locked myself in my room and quit spending time with my family, and I started ditching church. My young women leader had noticed, probably from my lack of attendance in young women's, and decided she wanted to take me out to get ice cream. As she was dropping me back off at home, she asked me what was wrong. And of course l started bawling. I didn’t tell her what exactly had happened, but she knew exactly how to help me. She told me “the bishop is like the garbage man, he just takes the trash out”. We should never feel that we will be judged, criticized, or ridiculed by the bishop. There isn’t a better feeling than knowing that you are forgiven, and I can personally tell you that. Repentance is humiliating and it is scary. But it is there for us to use when we feel godly sorrow from sin. Repentance is such a beautiful blessing that we have been given, and I am so grateful that I was able to experience it because it has given me such a strong testimony of it.

To end, I want to quickly share the most important lesson my mom as ever taught me about being a member of the church. I was fed up with prom dress shopping, because I just wanted a sleeveless dress and i knew my mom wouldn't buy me one. I remember telling my mom “sometimes I wish I wasn’t LDS.” Her instant reply to me was “but imagine how hard your life would be if you weren’t”. I know that this is true. Being a member of this church has brought so many blessings into my life, and many of those blessings through trials. We don’t always notice the blessings we have been given until we look back at life and recognize that they were there.

I know that we have been given trials to know our blessings. I know that we are blessed for being members of this church. I am so grateful for all of these blessings and I say these things in the name of Jesus Christ amen.