Welcome to the Astoria Ward Relief Society Blog!
Today is Day 1 in our 14 Day walk with Christ. We'll be using this space to share our experiences as we ponder and reflect each day upon a different aspect of His gospel. Please feel free to leave your own comments as you feel prompted to do so.
Day 1-Faith
D&C 14:7
And, if you keep my commandments and endure to the end you shall have eternal life, which gift is the greatest of all the gifts of God."
I am a Child of a loving Father in Heaven. Trust in him and have faith. He will never lead us astray.
Peace Be unto You
(John 20:19-29)
In the evening of the day Jesus was resurrected, His disciples met together in a room with the doors shut tightly against the Jews whom they feared. Suddenly, Jesus was standing in their midst. The apostles were startled and perhaps a little frightened, for they supposed they were seeing only a spirit.
To ease their alarm, Jesus spoke to them saying, Peace be unto you, and then to help them know that it was really He, Jesus showed them the mark of the soldier's spear in His side and the nail prints in His hands and feet where He had hung on the cross.
Then said Jesus to them again, Peace be unto you: as my Father hath sent me, even so I send you.
And when he had said this, he breathed on them, and saith unto them, Receive ye the Holy Ghost.
One of the apostles, Thomas, called Didymus, was not present when Jesus appeared to the others. When he was told of the Savior's visit he would not believe his brethren. However, eight days later Thomas was meeting with the disciples behind closed doors when, without warning, Jesus again appeared before them in the room. And again He allayed their fears by saying, Peace be unto you.
Then, knowing of Thomas's doubts, He said to that disciple, Reach hither thy finger, and behold my hands; and reach hither thy hand, and thrust it into my side: and be not faithless, but believing.
Thomas realized now that all that he had been told was true and answered, My Lord and My God.
Then with a mild reprimand, the Savior told Thomas what the difference is between belief and a true faith:
Thomas, because thou hast seen me, thou hast believed: blessed are they that have not seen, and yet have believed.
Gone is the sting of death. The grave is robbed of its victory.
He was the master of life and death, the man of miracles. It was He who made the blind to see, the lame to walk, the dead to live.
I am really excited about this program--it's such a great way to share our testimonies with each other and strengthen our Relief Society.
ReplyDeleteAs for the topic of faith, I've been thinking a lot about this lately with Archer ending up in the pediatric cardiac ICU. The day he and I rode to Elmhurst in the ambulence was such a whirlwind day full of emotions, the unknown, fear, prayer and tears.
Before I had taken Archer to the Dr. in the morning, I asked President Miranda for a blessing of healing for Archer. He blessed Archer that his organs would function according to their intended purpose and other equally amazing and specific blessings, and all this was long before I knew that Archer had a heart condition.
That night I reminded myself that "faith precedes the miracle" and that "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." I decided that I had a choice. I could choose to be faithful and believe in the blessing Archer received, or I could continue to be fearful that he would not make it.
I also had to decide to be willing to accept it if Archer were taken from me early, but to be faithful that this situation would not happen yet, that I would have some time with him on this earth. It wasn't easy, but after making those choices, I have been blessed with peace, hope, and my faith is strengthened that it is true that Archer will have some time on this earth, and this was confirmed to me in so many ways over the next few days, as well as in the blessing Gavin gave Archer that first Sunday Archer was in the hospital.
I know that Heavenly Father is aware of us, that he loves us, and that challenges we face are for our good. These challenges will test our faith to see whether we will choose to trust in Him or choose to remain fearful of the future. Faith cannot exist where there is fear, but neither can fear exist where there is faith and hope.
I am grateful for my son Archer and for what I'm learning from the experiences I'm going through due to his heart condition. I hope I can keep applying what I've learned to other areas in my life, as well.