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Here's a
little incident that I thought I'd share. I learned a lot from
it, and maybe it might touch someone else too. (I love your
site!)
The scriptures
teach us that we need to become more childlike in our faith; more
humble and trusting in the Lord. This was brought home to me
through a special little miracle that came about as an answer to a
child's prayer.
When my nephew Logan was a toddler, he used to spend the night
with me on Saturdays and go to church with me on Sunday mornings,
while his single mother worked a graveyard shift. It was a special
bonding time for us, and I enjoyed having a child with me at
church. However, I had two problems. One was that I was
constantly running late, seeing how I had a (ahem!) small problem
with being organized. The other problem was that my car at the
time was an old clunker that was only fairly reliable. The Sunday
morning of our miracle, both of those factors came into play.
We were running
late, as usual, so when Logan and I finally buckled ourselves
into the car, we only had a few minutes to spare before the
start of our church's Sacrament meeting. (Which meant that most
all of my neighbors - who were in the same congregation - were
most likely already settling into their pews at church. I
turned the key, expecting to here the familiar hum of the engine
start up.
But there was no
hum, only that sick little whir, whir, whir of the engine trying
to catch, but not succeeding. Oh, no, what bad timing! If the
car didn't start, we wouldn't make it to church at all! I tried
again.
Whir...whir... whir.......whir.....whir.......................wh................This
wasn't good. I was afraid of flooding the engine, so I waited a
couple of minutes and tried once more. Guess what happened.
Right, I flooded the engine. (Obviously I am the opposite of
mechanically inclined!)
I sadly turned to
Logan and apologized, adding that it looked like we weren't
going to be able to get to church after all. He looked at me
and without a moment's hesitation, asked, "Why don't we pray
about it?"
Wow! Why didn't I
think of that? I was so proud of him for coming up with that
solution, and agreed that's what we should do. But then, I'm
ashamed to admit, my faith wavered a bit. What if we asked, and
didn't get an obvious answer? How would that affect Logan's
faith? How was I gonna explain why we were still stuck? After
all, it was my fault we were running late and there were no
neighbors left to help us, not to mention it was my fault for
having a clunky old car in the first place. But regardless,
here was Logan innocently expecting that if we prayed, Heavenly
Father would help us. Gulp!
I asked him if he
wanted to offer the prayer, but he declined and asked me to do
it. So we bowed our heads and I offered our request up to the
Lord. I reminded Him that although this dilemma was mostly my
fault, we were coming to Him with a righteous desire (to go to
church), and that Logan was blameless. We asked Heavenly Father
to help us get the car started so we could honor Him on His
Sabbath day.
After the prayer,
I looked at Logan. He settled back in his seat, and said,
"Okay, Aunt Linda, it'll start now!" I marveled at his childish
faith, and offered a silent prayer of apology for doubting,
while praying the car would indeed start.
With great
trepidation, I turned the key, expecting to hear the faint whir
whir whir again.
But to my
delighted surprise, instead there came a strong "vroom!" as the
engine turned over and started right up! I looked at Logan,
amazed. He smiled and said, "I knew it would start!"
You can bet I was
a humbled aunt as I drove us to the chapel that morning. It was
Logan's faith, not mine, that resulted in that answered prayer.
I know that Heavenly Father was pleased with Logan, and does
indeed hear and answer prayers asked in faith. I have since
learned to be more trusting, and am grateful to Logan for having
set such a good example for his too-cynical babysitter.
Sincerely, Linda
PS-When the
meetings were over and we returned to the car, it was totally
dead. One of my neighbors helped us get home, and the car was
in the shop the next day. But thanks to a child's faith, and
a loving Father in Heaven who hears and answers prayers, we
were able to honor the Sabbath day and attend our worship
services that morning.
Dear Merrill,
I was baptized
into the Methodist faith when I was just 10 days old at
Havant Methodist Church, because my mother believed that if
a child was not baptized and died would not go to heaven,
when I was about 4 years old I was sent to the Church of
England Sunday school (St Albans) because my parents wanted
me to join the local church school where my sisters
attended, I did not think much of Sunday school and was
always getting told off for spending my three penny bit on
the way to church rather then give it to the collection.
When I was ten we moved so I had to move school so I did not
have to go to church anymore.
When I was 12
I decided that I wanted to go to church again to explore my
faith, this was about the same time as I fell in love with
Donny. I became very interested in The Church of Jesus
Christ of Latter-day Saints because of you Osmond Brothers.
But there was no church of that faith near where I lived
also I had no support from my parents about faith, they told
me many times that I was strange because I wanted to know
about Jesus Christ. I could never understand this attitude
because it was my parents that had me baptized and sent me
to a church school. I attended the church that I had gone to
has a small child and decided to be confirmed I had to
attend confirmation classes, the vicar Father Woods and the
curate Father Maurrell had a big influence on me. It was a
great moment in my life when I was confirmed and took my
first holy communion. I attended the church until I was
fifteen. When I studied my CSE's (our school exams) for
English I did a project on the Mormon faith. Then I went
through a bit of a rebellious stage and stopped attending
church. I never did things at that time that was against my
parents but maybe I bowed down to their wishes for me not to
attend church.
When I met my future husband I knew I could only get married
in church fortunately Les agreed. So we went together to my
old church and asked if we could be married there, so a date
was planned and all the preparations were put into place. I
was still a bit rebellious and found that I was expecting my
first child, my mother wanted me to cancel the church
wedding and get married in a registry office. I felt that I
could only get married in church and that I was marrying Les
because I loved him not because I was expecting. So we were
married as planned. Because I took my vows in church I have
stuck to them throughout the 29 years of marriage. We had
three children very quickly two girls then a boy and we had
them all baptized, because I made a vow when they were
baptized to bring them up in a Christian home and to teach
them about Jesus Christ, when Emma my eldest was old enough
for Sunday school I started to look for a church to go to
because it was to far to walk to St Albans, because we had
moved.
I took Emma to
the local nursery which happened to be in the local
Methodist church (Botley Drive). Les and I attended the odd
service in the church that the nursery put on. Then I
started Emma at the Sunday school, Emma started school in
the September when she was four and I met a lady at the
school gates called Grace, I got talking to her and
mentioned my dilemma and she invited me to go to her house
for a cup of tea (which I used to drink) while there she
mentioned that her daughters belonged to Girls Brigade and
her sons belonged to Boys Brigade also her husband helped
out in BB. Grace invited me along to a church service with
her, she told me it was ok to take all my children because
they would be made very welcome. There I met the minister
the rev Barry Snook, he embraced my whole family and showed
us all love. I became a member of the Methodist church. So I
had gone full circle.
My children
grew up in the church all of them joined the Brigades and
they of chose to be confirmed. They have now grown up with
children of there own, my eldest granddaughter has attended
the church all her life she has just started senior school
and has always attended a church school and she is a member
of Girls Brigade. Three of my grandsons belong to the Boys
Brigade and try to attend church once a month, one of them
is autistic so some times it is difficult to get him there.
One of my grandsons is due to start bb next year and the
other three grandchildren are to young. It is a great thrill
to me to have Jesus Christ in my life and I shall always be
grateful for the day I met grace because we became best of
friends, she died this year of cancer she held her faith to
the end, she told me not to worry when she is gone because
God was going to hold a party for her in heaven and that she
will always be near me.
My mother
still ridicules me for my faith and my brother and sisters
think I am a bit odd because of my religious beliefs,
because I do not partake of any alcohol, tea or coffee or
even coca cola or Pepsi and I do not believe in smoking.
When I go to a family party or at Christmas the family try
to get me to drink a substance that I do not want but I have
now managed to stick to it for over 20 years. I hope I
haven't bored you to much but I just wanted to say that it
is still possible to keep a faith even if your parents don't
believe or the people around you mock you. My friends all
respect my faith and ask me questions but the know that I
will not force it on them they know the way I live and why
it is no secret. ~ Beverley
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