be a light

 Someone gave a talk a few Sundays ago and talked about a refiners fire. He said when steel is under extreme heat it glows and then can bend. I loved that. I've heard that comparison a thousand times. It's so funny how in the right place and the right time that it carries a different meaning. This time instead of hearing about the bending of the rod I kept thinking about the glow and light that is emitted from that heat. It is only through the pressure of the heat when the iron burns a bright glow ready to be molded. When we’re going through hard things, yes it’s horrible and hard to see hope, but we can be filled with light and be an example. 

I remember when Capri first got diagnosed thinking about the future and Capri being in the school system eventually. Letting my mind wander if I might have to advocate for her possibly or push for things even in her health care. I remember praying, "I don't want this experience to harden me." If I needed to speak up for our family could I do it lovingly and firmly and if I felt like I couldn't on my own, could God help me? I wanted to be a light from the get go. How could people see God in this journey while I was trying to find Him too? It was so hard in the very beginning and subsequent times after, of course. Overall though I felt such a strong impression that I didn't want it to crush me, even though there were many crushing nights, I wanted (want) to learn what I was (am) supposed to and provide some sliver of hope whatever trials you've got you can be filled with light. It's comically easy to say this outside of one of those hard moments. It's nearly impossible to think, "help me be filled with light and see the good in this hard time!" and mean it. It goes back to the glow of steel.  Steel can not be made into something different when its cold and not under some friction (heat) that process HAS to happen. And I think when we continue to experience that truth by our own path we have more patience in those difficult times to endure it well.

“No pain that we suffer, no trial that we experience is wasted. It ministers to our education, to the development of such qualities as patience, faith, fortitude and humility. All that we suffer and all that we endure, especially when we endure it patiently, builds up our characters, purifies our hearts, expands our souls, and makes us more tender and charitable, more worthy to be called the children of God . . . and it is through sorrow and suffering, toil and tribulation, that we gain the education that we come here to acquire and which will make us more like our Father and Mother in heaven.” -Orson F. Whitney