General Update

 

From Paul:

 

Cycle 7 week 3

 

This is the Sunday before Christmas. We are settling into somewhat of a pattern. Doris enjoys some time away from home during the day, and morning hours are more conducive to those outings than afternoons. We have also been taking our walks typically in the mornings. As we contemplate the beautiful aspect of this Christmas season, the celebration and time with family, we find gratitude in that great gift that is represented by the birth of Jesus Christ and His mission of redeeming us to God.

 

We are reminded from time to time that this Christmas season we had expected to be in England as missionaries. Given the situation we have now, we are grateful that God has provided a time for treatment and healing.

 

There is great power and meaning in the plan of our Heavenly Father for our happiness and progression to being able to enjoy Eternal Life with our families. In the meanwhile, we experience the challenges of our mortal sojourn. Each one of us experiences different things.

 

Regardless of how much we may be alike, there is nobody who has exactly the same experiences from beginning to end. In this way our experiences a passengers on Planet Earth are unique to each of us and they are available to teach just what we need to learn, do and experience to bring us to a higher state of glory and joy. In the meanwhile, we catch glimpses of that joy, precursors of the glory that may be ours. The choices that we make factor into our experiences and learning. In a way, we bring about our own training on the basis of the consequences of our choices. There are also experiences that we did not “sign up for”. These challenges and trials may be either the results of the choices of others that affect us, or the fine tuning of a loving Heavenly Father Who knows what it will take to refine us into heirs of salvation.

 

As a comforting hymn teaches:

 

When through fiery trials thy pathway shall lie,

My grace, all sufficient, shall be thy supply.

The flame shall not hurt thee; I only design

Thy dross to consume, thy dross to consume,

Thy dross to consume and thy gold to refine.

 

How Firm a Foundation

 

How Firm a Foundation | Tabernacle Choir at Temple Square

 

From Doris:

Christmas

It is hard for me to not compare this Christmas with those of the past. My physical limitations are real and I can’t ignore them. It is easy to feel sorry for myself. The rest of the world is celebrating the season while I am trying to navigate through each day. 

In December of 1986, our house was burglarized while Paul and I were at the temple. Our children were at my parents’ house. The thieves took only small items. That included my diamond engagement ring I had only secured in my jewelry box a few days prior because the band had broken. 

The police came to our house and dusted for fingerprints. They gave us no hope that our stolen items would be recovered. (They were not.) The police figured my jewelry was long gone, sold by thieves who wanted money for drugs.

This experience shook me. I was frightened and angry. I felt that Christmas had been stolen from me. Thankfully I had an experience which taught me otherwise. We had the privilege of listening to our stake choir sing excerpts from Handel’s Messiah. As I sat in the audience, I was overcome with a powerful witness that nothing could take away Christmas because Christ had already paid the price necessary to save His Father’s children.

This Christmas as the world seems to carry on its celebration without me, I choose to remember that nothing can steal Christmas…even cancer.

Worthy is the Lamb | Tabernacle Choir at Temple Square