A leap of faith

I know I've dropped off the face of the blogging earth. I can't keep up with my life, it moves too fast. But I was thinking about this today and thought I would share. I've not made it a secret that the last 7 years in Az have been difficult for me. We've been through so much both spiritually and temporally, and most of it has been just plain hard. But a couple months ago I decided to go back to church full time. Not that I ever really left the church, just that I was lazy and only went when I felt like it. But we've been going through things with our kids lately and I decided that I needed to suck it up and go regardless of how I felt about it because it was where the kids and I needed to be. And you know what, it's starting to get better. Not all at once, and not a lot. But a little. And right now that's enough because it's what I need.

So you know what happens when you don't go to church regularly and feed your spirit regularly? You lose that link with our Father in Heaven. For me, I lost the knowledge that He was there with me and really listened to me and wanted to help me. I mean, sure I knew it in the way that primary children can give you that answer when asked, but I didn't really KNOW it deep down. After all, who am I? My needs aren't greater than anyone, I'm not more special so therefore why would He pay attention to me. As the song says, I'm one of the ninety and nine. But I've had two experiences in the last week that have proven me to be 100% incorrect about my assumptions.

I was in the hallway before relief society this week, just hanging out avoiding going to Sunday school. That's when the relief society president came to talk to me about a lesson she had given a few weeks ago. One that really touched my heart and has helped me tremendously on my way back to church and spirituality. She told me how she had really struggled to put the lesson together for that week. So much so that her husband gave her a blessing, and in that blessing he blessed her that the person who needed to hear her message would be there that week. So I'm not arrogant enough to believe that the lesson was aimed just at me. I'm sure we all got something out of it, it was a wonderful lesson. But it started me thinking.

Today I was getting my hair colored, and my friend who does my hair and I were talking about our kids in school. My son is in the same grade as her daughter at school and we were talking about some teachers they'd had the year before. When my friend mentions the really difficult time her daughter had with one of the teachers the previous year. The details she was giving me confused me as to who the teacher was, until she mentioned she was the teacher who came in after winter break--when I had felt very strongly about pulling my son from school and homeschooling him. The stories I was hearing made me know without a doubt that my son would have had a very hard time in her class. I can't know what would have happened if I had left him in school, but I'm left with chills about how this teacher treated her students, especially one who is different and was already suffering from depression.

What I'm left with is a very strong testimony that our Father in Heaven does know every single one of us. He know us, and loves us. He is always watching over us. Just because He does not always give us the answers we seek and we do not always recognize the answers He gives doesn't mean that He's not there giving them. I have been begging Him to show me that He's there for me, and He answered me in a way that I cannot deny. I don't always know why I feel prompted to do things, but I do know that when I heed his promptings, blessings follow. It has only been after I listened and pulled my son from school, so much against what I wanted to do, that He has led me to the right people to try to get the help my son needs in school. After I took the leap of faith, He is blessing me in ways that I don't even realize, my benevolent puppet master in the background laying the groundwork for blessing me so that I don't even recognize He's been there all along. If that's not fatherly love, I don't know what is.