My Trial of Faith

This is from a talk I gave in church 4/29/12
 My Trial of faith:
 Have you heard that analogy where the Lord takes a cottage that needed some remodeling and ends up knocking out all the walls and building a mansion instead. My life has been like that this last year. Only I wasn’t living in a cottage. I was living in a beautiful home that the Lord had helped me construct and in my opinion it only needed a little bit of tweeking to make it perfect. But the Lord had different plans and knocked the whole house down with seemingly almost nothing left of that original structure and way too quick for my comfort and security. I think about the only thing that was left was a good foundation of faith and the gospel and even that faith foundation was shown to be weak in areas and had to be strengthened. That is what I want to talk about today.
Strengthening Faith
From a talk given by Elder Richard G Scott in April Conference 2003

You will gather the fruits of faith as you follow the principles God has established for its use.

Some of those principles are:

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  Trust in God and in His willingness to provide help when needed, no matter how challenging the circumstance.
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  Obey His commandments and live to demonstrate that He can trust you.
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  Be sensitive to the quiet prompting of the Spirit.
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  Act courageously on that prompting.
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  Be patient and understanding when God lets you struggle to grow and answers come a piece at a time over an extended period.

Look for these principles as I tell my story.

 I am the type that has always had my life all planned out. In those areas that depended on others choices, I had alternatives planned out that I would be just as happy with.
 Then we come to:
 A year ago my then husband of almost 30 yrs walked out the door, stopped communicating with me, and filed for divorce. It wasn’t completely out of the blue. It had never been an easy marriage and the previous couple of years had been really challenging. I had considered divorce in the past and had weighed my options and thought about what I would do if it ever came to that. I was a stay at home mom with no real qualifying work experience. I had always made my choices based on what I thought was best for my children. I counted on the legal protection that I thought came with that marriage certificate and my former husbands verbal commitment to the importance of a stay at home mom for my financial security. Even though it was scary remaining financially dependent in that situation, I always made the choice that I thought was right for my children and trusted that the Lord would take care of me. So when the divorce happened, it became a real test of my faith in that area. Would the Lord really take care of all my needs? As time and time again I experienced more and more shattering of those illusions of security when they all fell through and didn’t end up being at all what I expected, it tested that faith over and over again. It was a time of tremendous fear and feelings of betrayal. Fighting against letting the anger or depression take over was a real challenge. As disappointment after disappointment came up, how easily I could have blamed the Lord for not meeting those expectations in the way I thought they should be met, and also turned away from the Lord. But because I have had experience in the past of trials of faith, I knew I could trust in the Lord even though I didn’t understand at all how things could possibly work out as all my best planning kept falling through. I had to learn to really just let go of it all and leave it in the Lords hands. I had to stop planning and just depend totally on the Lord, focus on whatever positive I could find and just take the next step. I didn’t know what the next day, or the next month would bring, let alone any further into the future than that. As long as I was turning to the Lord, I did always know at least a little of what I needed to be doing each day. I was running as fast as I could to do everything that needed to be done. On the days and times when I just couldn’t do it, I would pray for help to even function and the Lord would pick me up sometimes by sending just the right person to help me make it for a few more hours. While financially my faith was really being tested, one positive that I always felt was a tremendous outpouring of love. Heavenly Father surrounded me with love of many people and it was desperately needed. They couldn’t provide a lot of financial support, though the little bit here and there helped me make it through the worst times. They also weren’t able to give me a lot of advice or legal help, but the shoulder to cry on, the listening ear, the word of acknowledgement, the willing hands especially in the moving stage made all the difference in the world. I don’t think I will ever be able to thank properly all the people who really helped me so much that I wasn’t even able to acknowledge. I hope to pay that forward to others in need in whatever way I can.
 Just a few key things that help me:

1.  Constant prayer- Ask, then do my part.
2.  A determination from the very beginning that I was going to come out on the other side of this as a loving, trusting, happy person. Evaluating my choices with that in mind helps let go of places where I could get stuck in the anger, bitterness, and revenge. Recognizing that fear is really an evidence of where my faith is weak. That helps me focus on strengthening and trusting the Lord rather than trying to control the source of the fear.
3.  Focus on the positive/ gratitude- With all the loss and grief there was still a lot of abundance. 
4.  Doing everything I can to keep the Spirit which is also motivation to quickly work through the anger and come to a place of forgiveness. That forgiveness also needs to be for my own weakness. All of that is only possible because of an understanding of the atonement and knowing and having faith and trust in Christ. Knowing comes from scripture study and application. 
5.  Acknowledging the anger helps me stay out of the depression. Choosing to use the energy from that anger to motivate me to keep moving forward in my life instead of letting it be wasted energy used to try to punish the past.
6.  Listening for and acting on the guidance from the spirit. (practice) The things I am most sure of in my life right now are things that I have felt strong guidance from the spirit.

Some of those are:

•   Move into my current house. I knew I needed to move to a place where jobs were more accessible and find a place more affordable. I couldn't pay the high mortgage payment with the maintenance I was given and the job opportunities were nill. I prayed for the Lord to help me find a place that would meet my needs even though I wasn't aware of all of them. I determined my budget and started looking. I found one place in the time frame that I had. It ended up being perfect in so many ways that I never would have thought of.
•  I attended both the career and self employment workshops put on by the church employment office. They helped me gain confidence. It opened up the door to increasing my sewing business. I met people that have played other significant roles in my life.
•  I got involved with the single adult program at church. Marriage wasn't my primary goal but it did play a part. I wanted a chance to socialize and meet new people that I could do things with. I ended up meeting someone that encouraged my fiance to get to know me. Neither one of us were really looking for marriage this soon, but the compatibility and the connection is too undeniable to not act upon. I am getting married August 14.
• Continuing my education.- The opportunity to get my Bachelor Degree became an affordable possibility that works with my circumstances through the BYUI Pathway program. 
• I am discovering things from my past that I was led to do and learn that didn't have any relevance at the time are now starting to show their importance.