3/18/16
Fear isn't the right word. I am not afraid to post this. But I do have some hesitation. I hesitate that I will come off too "churchy". I hesitate that I will come off as proud or having ulterior motives. I hesitate because I know I have friends who do not share my beliefs... But I do have had this knocking inside... it's telling me that I should post it. The knocking tells me that I might have a friend out there who needs to hear it. Even if it is just one person who can feel the spirit of what I am trying to say, it is worth it. I love my Savior, Jesus Christ. I know I have a Father in Heaven who is aware of me. I have not always felt this way. I went through a time where I didn't know if anything I thought I knew was true. I never thought that would happen to me.
This is taken from a talk I gave in church last month. Thankfully, I have such a loving ward that as I looked around at their faces, I knew they would not judge me for showing my weaknesses. I was nervous to share this from the pulpit, but I knew if I were to say this to any one of them one-on-one, they would probably wrap me up in a hug.
I am thankful for my husband who sat with me many times as I expressed my concerns, and yet, never wavered in his faith. He is also the one who said to me, when my faith was most lacking, "Just keep doing what you are doing. Don't stop now. Don't turn your back on the church." (I've always known he was
my guide and my light!)
I am so thankful for my membership in the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints. I am glad it points me and my family in the direction of Christ. It leads me to the things that make me happy in life. And although my faith seed is still growing and may not be "proven" in this life, this is the path I choose to walk. I love my Savior, and I will not betray Him.
Maybe you know the person who I feel this "knocking" for. Please share with anyone, if you feel the "knocking" too.
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When I was a little girl, my mom used
to read picture books to me all of the time.
One of my favorite things she would do was substitute my name for the
name of the main character. Suddenly, instead of goldilocks tasting
three bowls of porridge, Crystal was.
Instead of Cinderella trying on a glass slipper, Crystal was. For me, it brought the stories to life. I would like to insert you into a story like
my mom used to do for me.
In the story, you get to take the
place of Jacob in 2 Nephi 2.
Once there was a boy named Jacob.
Jacob was born to goodly parents. In
fact, his father was a prophet. But his
life wasn’t easy. Jacob was born in the wilderness,
probably in a tent. Some of his brothers
were rude. His family didn’t always have
a lot of food and sometimes they didn’t know which direction to
travel.
At this point in the story, Jacob was
facing another trial. His father lay on
his deathbed. I imagine Jacob leaning in
closely to hear the final words his father will ever say to him. His father says,
And now, Jacob, I speak unto you: Thou art
my first born in the days of my tribulation in the wilderness. And behold,
in thy childhood thou hast suffered afflictions and much sorrow, because of the
rudeness of thy brethren.
2 Nevertheless,
Jacob, my firstborn in the wilderness, thou knowest the greatness of God; and
he shall consecrate thine afflictions for thy gain.
In this verse of scripture, the word consecrate means “to
set apart for a sacred purpose”.
To explain to Jacob how his trials could be for something
good, Lehi uses his last breaths to express the existence of God and Jesus
Christ. He describes Heavenly Father’s
plan.
25 Adam fell that
men might be; and men are, that they might have joy.
27 Wherefore, men are free according to the flesh;
and all things are given them which are expedient unto man. And
they are free to choose liberty and eternal life, through
the great Mediator of all men, or to choose captivity and death, according to
the captivity and power of the devil; for he seeketh that all men might
be miserable like unto himself.
In studying the counsel Lehi gave to his son this past week,
and praying about what I should talk about, has lead me to prepare a talk based
on my experiences over the past year.
This is difficult for me to do, and despite knowing inside what I needed
to talk about today, I had a resisted for much of the week. My greatest desire is to be a mouthpiece for
the Lord and hopefully allow an opportunity for the Spirit to speak to you…
whether you relate to my story or you know someone who is struggling. The adversary whispered to me throughout the
week that I shouldn’t tell my story because I will be judged and look weak, but
as mentioned in the last general conference, “
“The Church is like a big hospital, and we are all sick in our
own way. We come to church to be helped.”
I went through quite a long a period of time in my life when
I was not having personal scripture study.
When I was in seminary as a teenager I had like a three year streak of
reading my scriptures daily. I had a
little chart where I could mark off the days I had read.
College came and I moved out on my own. I fell out of the habit. I was so busy and my daily schedule was not
as consistent as it was when I had a curfew and lived with my parents. Not to say that I never read the scriptures,
I just wasn’t in them as consistently. I
did not feel like I was struggling spiritually.
Over the next ten years life continued and I have been very
blessed. Taylor and I were married in
the Mount Timpanogos Temple. We were
blessed with three adorable and funny kids, Gavin who is six, Josie who is
three, and Mason who is one. Despite the
business of life we have done our best to attend our meetings, serve in
callings, attend the temple, pray often, and keep the Sabbath Day holy. The one thing that I really let go of was
personal scripture study. My scriptures
opened time to time… its part of participating in church, serving in callings,
giving talks, and putting kids to bed.
Here is the problem though…
Road bumps came… and I was not spiritually prepared for them. I had been going through all of the
motions. I even had this image in my
head of me being a tree bearing this good fruit and doing all of these good
things, but I was not nourishing myself spiritually by reading the scriptures.
A couple of my road bumps, maybe some of you can relate to
this:
I had a couple of friends on facebook who would
lightheartedly mock the church and it’s members. I blocked their posts from my feed, but I sadly,
I did feel a little ashamed. I felt
kind of embarrassed like I fit this “Mormon mom cliché.”
I also had friends or friends of friends who were leaving
the church, some of which openly denied religion and it’s place in our day and
age and even the existence of God. In my
efforts to disprove them, I found myself lingering on words they had said. My curiosity in reading their comments and
points of view had done damage in my heart that I couldn’t seem to repair.
My testimony was shaken.
I started questioning everything.
My testimony was shaken so much that I wasn’t sure if I
believed in God or even Jesus Christ. This pains me so much to think about
now. This is not something I am proud
of. Thing two beings in all of the
universe that I should have the most reverence and love for, I shut out. I let the mocking, skepticism, and judgment
of man cloud my eternal perspective.
I wanted my knowledge back, but I just couldn’t with the
efforts I was making.
I knew there were
times in my past that I felt this way, and
I was clinging to those moments.
A lot of you have maybe even
read some of my moments on social media.
I like to share those things with people and I feel like I had had a lot
of them, so I just held onto them and that was all I had.
I kept fishing around with trusted friends and family. I
would ask them, “How do you know there is a God? How can you possibly say the word know?
I remember saying to my husband, “K.N.O.W. How can you say know?” I was so obsessed
with this concept that I had to know. And if you have someone who comes to you like that, Taylor is a good example. No matter what I said or what struggles I
told him at night before bed, he always would tell me, “Crystal, I know this is
true. I don’t care if you leave the church. I don’t care if you don’t believe in
God. I will never do that. I know this church is true and I know that
God lives.” And every time he gave me his
testimony, it was enough to get me by day to day and just kept me hoping that I
could feel that way again someday.
Despite all of this “talking” and efforts, I just felt numb.
It’s weird feeling like you don’t believe in anything. There is no need to pray. I just stopped.
Soon after that, my family went
on a vacation to Huntington Beach, California, with some friends. On the long drive over the desert, I
discouragingly wrote in my journal:
This has been a month of doubts.
I keep running over things that make me think and question. I don’t know if I will EVER be able to bare
testimony again. I don’t know if I will
EVER feel that way again.
As I wrote, I felt so low; yet, at the same time I was
trying to convince myself that I was on a journey to becoming a “truer” version
of myself. I didn’t want comfort, I
wanted truth.
We are told in the scripture I read earlier about captivity
and death that comes from heading to the devil, I thought that only applied to
the eternities, but for me, captivity and death had already begun. Not physical captivity, but mental and
spiritual captivity. My mind went in
circles all the time. I was often
paralyzed with fear about things that, with an eternal perspective, don’t seem
so scary. I hesitated to speak or teach
of Christ. Satan had a grip on me and I
am sure he was so proud.
President Henry B. Eyring taught:
“The spirit who led the rebellion in the world before still
opposes the plan and wants you to be miserable. He wants you never to find your
way home again. That enemy of your soul knows you and your goodness. He knows
that if he can turn you away from walking in the light, he can both capture you
and stop you from helping others along the journey. He knows how good you are
and your power to teach and influence hundreds of Heavenly Father’s children in
this life—and thousands over the generations that will follow your path. If he
can get you to wander away from the light on your journey, he can do harm and
bring misery to many.
I am so glad to tell you that this is not where my story
ends. Little did I know, but I was just
about to come upon a new beginning.
On our way home from California, I recorded this:
I keep having experiences that point me to the existence of God. I feel like sometimes it is easy in the good
times to forget or doubt him. There are
so many other things to occupy our minds.
Gavin got lost in Huntington Beach while thousands of people surrounded
us. Everyone in our party seemed to go
and search the water. I, too, went that
direction immediately, but in my heart I prayed, “Heavenly Father… if you are
there… please! Help me find my son! Please keep him safe.” In that moment my worries about my faith
ceased. I have faith. Why else would I be sincerely reaching for
Him in this moment? Why would I feel
something there? Immediately after
reaching the water, filled with breaking waves and many strangers, “something”
inside of me thought clearly, “He is not in the water.” I ran as fast as I could through a long
distance of hot/thick sand to the parking lot.
I couldn’t remember where we had parked, so I assumed Gavin wouldn’t
know either. I looked a bit and ran back
to the camp. I looked for Gavin’s shirt
and hat. I knew he would have taken
those off first if he had gotten in the water.
In my glance, they were nowhere to be found. Immediately, I RAN – even faster than before
back to the parking lot. I ran up to the
food stand and asked if they had seen him.
I stopped a jogger and asked him to look for a child fitting the
description as he ran down the boardwalk.
Soon after that, I saw Charlie (*a friend of ours who had been
searching) carrying little Gavin in his
arms from the parking lot to the camp. I
ran to them and when reunited with Gavin, I sobbed. I sobbed and I sobbed. I didn’t know if I would hold that little
body, alive and well, again. I knelt in
the sand as I hugged him, I quietly prayed with Him. I prayed to the God who was so merciful to me
when I had been so distant, “Thank you for keeping my son safe.”
I remember one day, as I came to church, walking through the
chapel and nobody was in here. The
sacrament had been cleaned up, but the white cloth was still laying there. So many times in my past I have looked up at
the sacrament table like it is now and I have heard you can think of it as
Christ laying in the tomb. When I walked
through the chapel and the tablecloth was just laying there empty, I had one of
those burning feelings like, “Christ is alive.
He was resurrected and He lives now.”
I also remember one Sunday Abbey and her sister,
April sang in church. They sang,
“Search, Ponder, and Pray. I remember
feeling the Spirit so strongly that I think I got up and had to leave because I
couldn’t stop crying.
Brant gave a talk and what I took from it was not
to listen to the voices on facebook or people who might be discouraging you
about the church. I remember feeling the
burn.
I want to read one more experience from my journal that
happened soon after that.
As
I walked up to the temple today, just entering the grounds, I felt peace. I felt Heavenly Father’s love and
assurance. He is not angry with me for
the way I have been feeling. He is glad
I am making efforts to regain my faith, just as I would feel if one of my
children came to me sad, sorrowful, and repentant.
During
the session, the word “organized” stood out to me. I thought about the organization of the earth
and our universe. I thought about the
planets orbiting, the constellations, the phases of the moon, the rotation of
the earth, the distance from the sun. It’s
not an accident. It is organized.
My
spirit is starving and in need of serious repair. I need to feast upon the scriptures.
After this temple experience, I started made a greater
effort to consistently have personal scripture study. I pulled out seminary study manuals. I set aside personal quiet time. I journaled whenever I had an inkling of the
Spirit. Instead of listening to Pandora
while folding laundry, I turned on conference talks.
I made sure not to miss any meetings, sacrament meetings,
stake conference, adult sessions, regional conference, general conference, the
Christmas Devotional. I took notes on
any talks I heard. Many of them were
given by people who are here today.
I made a greater effort to keep the Sabbath Day holy. Instead of allowing my kids to watch their
normal cartoons on Sunday morning, we turned on Meet the Mormons, Mormon Messages,
or For Little Friends. As for myself, I
felt like I had been keeping the Sabbath Day holy, but I tried to look for ways
that I could improve. One thing that I
would always do on Sunday was check my email and find the new ad for
Target. I kind of looked forward to
seeing the sales and if there was anything I should buy this week. It wasn’t that I would shop online on Sunday,
but that was kind of my normal thing. I
even did that as a kid on Sunday, we would look through the ads in the Sunday
paper. I realized that for me
personally, I need to stop doing that because when I do that, I am showing
heavenly Father a sign that I am not using the Sabbath Day to focus on Him or
our relationship.
I wanted to show Heavenly Father that I was willing to make sacrifices
and efforts in order to feel his peace and holiness through the spirit. I didn’t want to be numb anymore, I wanted to
feel.
Harrold B. Lee said,
“Now, remember that your testimony won’t come in a dramatic way,
but when it comes, the tears of gladness will water your pillow by night.
You’ll know, my beloved friend, when that testimony comes.
Day by day, I started to become healed. I started having moments. I started feeling the Spirit again. My prayers for more holiness and a testimony
were being answered. I didn’t have to
wait until the eternities to start feeling liberty. I was already feeling it in my life. I could already see how this adversity was
being made sacred. I was studying more
and learning more than I ever had in my life.
With these new eyes, I found a new enthusiasm for the gospel. I wanted to share my successes and
discoveries with others. I finally found
the courage to talk to friends and even strangers about the Book of Mormon
because I didn’t want anyone else to have to go without the word of God.
My personal scripture study was literally answering my
prayers. One night, I flipped my
scripture pages out of turn and stumbled upon Alma 32. The Spirit warmed my soul as I read verse 21:
21 And now as I said
concerning faith—faith is not to have a perfect knowledge of things;
therefore if ye have faith ye hope for things which
are not seen, which are true.
Faith doesn’t mean I have to have a perfect knowledge. Faith means that I hope these things are
true. Maybe I had my testimony all
along. Maybe I was stronger than I
thought I was.
President Eyring also said this,
“It is by faith that you
can lay hold upon every good thing. I pray with all my heart that your faith
will be increased that you are a (child) of a loving God. I testify to you that
you have been one of the valiant ones to reach the point where you now are in
this journey of life. Just as you are marked as a target by the enemy of
righteousness, you have been protected and watched over by your Heavenly Father
and the Lord Jesus Christ. They know you. They know all of the forces and
individuals around you. They know what is ahead of you. And so They know which
of the choices you make, which of the desires you decide to satisfy, and which
of the circumstances around you will make the most difference in keeping you
walking in the light. I testify that by the Spirit of Christ and by the Holy
Ghost, you may walk confidently in whatever difficulties will come. Because you
are so valuable, some of your trials may be severe. You need never be
discouraged or afraid. The way through difficulties has always been prepared
for you, and you will find it if you exercise faith.
You must have faith to
pray. You must have faith to ponder the word of God. You must have faith to do
those things and go to those places which invite the Spirit of Christ and the
Holy Ghost.”
The lesson I would hope that you can take away from my talk
today is this: The primary answers work. Pray.
Read your scriptures. Attend your
meetings. Keep the Sabbath Day
holy. They are not abstract things that
help other people, but won’t help you.
Those things really do help.
Don’t be like me and just pick three of them that you like or are used
to. Do all of them so you don’t wither
away spiritually and then when a road bump comes, you fall. I was only missing one of those things and it
was enough to allow me stumble.
I believe the reason all of these primary “tricks” work
because they give us consistent reminders of who we truly are. Knowing that makes life easier and more
joyful… just according to plan. Bringing
them all back into my life was enough to start my healing process.
What I need to remind myself is best explained in the
teachings of Harold B. Lee,
“Testimony
is as elusive as a moonbeam; it’s as fragile as an orchid; you have to
recapture it every morning of your life. You have to hold on by study, and by
faith, and by prayer…
That which you possess today in testimony will not be yours
tomorrow unless you do something about it. Your testimony is either going to
increase or it is going to diminish, depending on you.”
And going through that time that I thought I would never be
able to bear my testimony again, I can tell you that the start I had was I hope these things are true. But, you know what, I can say I believe these things are true. But what I feel these days and in the moments
I get is more that believe. It’s more than saying I believe it will rain tomorrow.
Now I feel like I can step it up one more and say I know these things are true.
It’s not because I have Heavenly Father and Jesus standing right here in
front of me, but because when I look back on my experiences, I have to use a
better word than believe. I hope that as I shared my experiences today,
you can know. That you can know the
church is true and that God and His Son exist and have a plan for us.
I say these things in the name of Jesus Christ, Amen.
