HAPPY NEW YEAR!
To start off this new year, I was released from my Activities Committee Chair and called to be the Visiting Teaching Coordinator. I have to change my mind set completely! I guess you know you did your calling well, when you have a lot of people come up to you and tell you how sad they will be that I won't be planning the activities anymore. :) Makes me feel better about myself! Man that was a stressful calling, but totally worth it! I loved it and I'm excited for my new adventures in my new calling.
As it is a new year, the New Year Resolutions start coming out. Mom and Angie have asked me what my resolutions are, and I couldn't give an answer. I didn't really know, until I really started thinking about it. I have the usual: loose weight, don't eat as many sweets or drink soda, etc. You know the ones everybody has. But I have one more that I feel inclined to tell you, but I'll get to that in a minute. This past week, and more, I have noticed a sadness growing inside of me. I guess I've kind of always had this. I've been worse this past week-grumpy, annoyed with people, and not knowing what is going on. I've always knew deep down what was wrong and what I needed to do to change, but I've never done anything about it. Till now.
I just finished reading this book called Borrowed Light. The setting is in the 1900's and is about a girl from Salt Lake, a Mormon, moving to Wyoming for a job as a cook for a non-Mormon. In the story he asks this girl why she is a Mormon, or why she believes what she does. Her answer? "Because that is what I grew up in. It's all I know." He also asks her why she had to marry in the temple. "Because its what us Mormon's do." Was her answer. She has never had anyone ask her these questions, cause she has never really known anyone that wasn't a member. But it got her thinking that she should know better answers then those. She then realizes that she has never read the Book of Mormon. Bits and pieces yes, but the whole way through no. She has lived all her 26 years leaning on her family's "light". She knew the church was true, because that's what her parents taught her. She has never inquired it of herself.
This girl, Julia, is just like me. As I read this book, it got me to really think of all that I need to change to change my attitude. I have never read the Book of Mormon all they way through. I've never inquired of the Lord if it is true. I've never learned for myself. I've always just said that I believed and thought it was true because that was what I learned growing up. It's what I was taught by teachers and family. Yes, I probably can give better answers to some of the questions she was asked, but how can I be a witness to my Heavenly Father and Jesus Christ if I haven't learned it for myself? So as I tried to figure out why I've been so grumpy, I realized it was because I have been missing this most important piece in my life.
So this is my main and most important New Years Resolution: COME UNTO CHRIST! I've always made plans to read the Book of Mormon, but I get some of the way through and get out of habit of reading, or forget where I was and stop reading. Then I have to start over again. Not this time! I'm going the whole way through! I've found a fresh unmarked Book of Mormon and I have my notebook beside me, I'm ready to go. A good incentive to keep me focused is that my ward is doing a Book of Mormon challenge to read the book all the way through from now till April 8th. So I think that will help me keep motivated.
I needed to express this to someone and I especially wanted my family to know. Just so that you can be there to encourage me in all that I'm doing. I hope by April or sooner I will become a better person and a better example to my Savior.
I love you all and I'm so grateful for you! Thank you for letting me borrow your light. Now I'm off to find my own.
