Women's Conference

This past Friday, I went to BYU Women's Conference and the theme this year was "Thou art come to the kingdom for such a time as this." What an elaborate and well choreographed event this was! I swear there were literally thousands upon thousands of people there just that day. I was very impressed. I went to a few very good lectures. The first was on the redeeming power of the Atonement, the 2nd was about Fasting & Praying, and the third, my personal favorite was about creating harmonious families with less-active members. This latter one I hope to someday find published somewhere because both speakers were excellent! The first one discussed her 50-year marriage to a man who was not a member, and the second described her relationship with her father who had never become a member. This last one was like hearing Natalie talk in 20 years about her father and it struck me like a brick in my head and I just cried. What rediculous and silly choices I have made in my younger years are having such a profound influence upon my daughter!

2 Nephi 2:2
Nevertheless, Jacob, my first-born in the wilderness, thou knowest the greatness of God; and he shall consecrate thine afflictions for thy gain.

I looked up "consecrate" in the dictionary and it means: to make (something) an object of honor or veneration; hallow

I'm like the next person and have had my share of troubles/challenges/problems etc. And when I read this scripture I can't help but feel built up. It has been a hard lesson to learn that your challenges are with us to make us stronger. The Lord does not give them to us indiscriminantly without purpose. To "consecrate thine aflictions for thy gain" means that he will use them to make us better. HE will use them, not WE will use them. We have to remember that we don't have much to do with it other than to set our own will.

Something someone said at Women's Conference was very interesting and I don't want to forget it. She said that our free will was the ONLY thing we had to freely give away and that's why the Lord wants it. Everything else we have are things he's given to us and can take away at any moment. He is not allowed, by the laws he created, to take our will. If we love him, we will give it to him to prove that we not only TRUST him (it's the whole have a bird, set it free...if it loves you it'll come back dealio), but realize that he knows and wants what's best for us and will guide us if we let him.

So back to the consecration thing. We give up our free will, we let him do the talking. He will make things hard for us and that's when we get to the trust part. We have to trust that the hard stuff he deals out is for our own good. He doesn't want to see us suffer...he wants to see us rise above it, stand taller, be better. He wants us to learn and know that he will be there to support us when the challenge becomes too hard for us alone to bear. After all, we're still only the children of men.