You'll Never Walk Alone

Well tea and crumpets folks, it's happened again. (Crumpets are actually a real thing and they're super delicious and my favourite).  This has been a wild and eventful month. To start the month, I got to have a lovely Skype call with my family. They are just the best. I miss them to bits. It's hard to be away, but the mission life is good. We've seen some serious miracles in the people that were working with as well as in ourselves. It's been wonderful to see the Atonement of Jesus Christ work in lifting and strengthening, as well as making us all clean and new. I've done a lot of changing in these past four weeks. It's so encouraging to feel that same cleansing and strengthening power we promise to others working in my own life. 

It is a bit of an adventure to become someone you've never been before. Especially in a place where no one knows the person you used to be. To use a trivial example, I am now a lactose intolerant person. That is a person I never was before, but it's a huge part of who I am out here. Mainly because people are cooking for me all the time, and I have to get cozy with the idea that I will forever be a difficult dinner guest. It's still a struggle for me to tell people. I hate being an inconvenience, so it's really hard for me to tell people that feeding me will not be straightforward. My companion usually has to say it for me. I'm working on it. Maybe by the time I get home I won't be embarrassed about not being able to eat ice cream and chocolate. There are loads of delicious things I can eat, but they're not as obvious or common.... It's hard. But it's okay! I'm getting used to it.

One thing that has been a huge change in me its month has been my testimony of obedience. As members of the church, obedience is a huge part of our lives. As missionaries, it is even more so. There are a lot of things that we are asked to do. A very specific schedule we are asked to follow, a specific dress code we are expected to wear, and so many things in our thoughts and our conduct that need to be just so in order to fall in line with what we are asked to do. I believe in obedience. I have always believed in keeping the commandments of God, and I have always believed in following the missionaries standards. What I have struggled with throughout my mission is conviction, and my dedication to that belief. 

This really became clear a couple of weeks ago when Sister Belnap got sick. She had this nasty flu-like thing that totally laid her out for a few days. We weren't really able to do anything. We had to stay in the flat all day, and it was driving her up the wall. I was fine. In fact, I was enjoying the fact that we didn't go out and work every day. That bothered me. I didn't want to work, but I wanted to want to work. So, like the missionary that I am, I set to studying obedience, because I didn't understand why it was so important, and I needed to. I struggled for the rest of the week until that Sunday.

That Sunday was amazing. Because Sister Belnap was so sick, we had literally not done any real missionary work that week. However, we had so many people at church. We had investigators that we had lost contact with, and new people we had never met before. In a talk from General conference that I love, Jeffery R. Holland says that in the gospel, we get credit for trying. I had never really believed that before. I had always thought that maybe that was true for someone else, but that I wasn't even trying hard enough to get the minimum blessings. I learned that day that I was wrong. I hadn't even wanted to be obedient. I had only wanted to want to be obedient. And the Lord has blessed me abundantly for that.

And then it clicked. Obedience gives us power. Obedience to God's laws gives us spiritual power that we need in order to do what we are called to do. As members of the church, we need a certain amount of spiritual power to withstand the rigours of our lives. Because it's hard to be a member of the church! It's a rough world out there for people who are trying diligently to follow God! We desperately need the power that obedience gives us. As missionaries, we need even more spiritual power than we do as members before we are called. We are face to face with the reality of unbelief, and Satan's power over the earth. He is strong, but as we are obedient, we obtain the power that comes through Jesus Christ. And that power has always been and forever will be stronger than our adversary in this word. I've seen that as I've made a greater effort to be obedient. I have had more power and more strength. I have had what I have needed. But it only came after I humbled myself and submitted to the will of my kind and loving Father and my gentle Saviour. I invite you to do what I've done. If you need help from God, look at what you can do to qualify for that help you feel you need. He is a just God. He won't give us things we are not prepared to receive. He is also a merciful God. He will give us everything that He possibly can. He will give us absolutely everything we qualify for. All we have to do is qualify for it.

This is especially applicable, because I've just found out that I am going to need a lot more spiritual power in these next few transfers. Yesterday, Sunday, I got the call from President that I've been called to be a Sister Training Leader, and that I'll be serving in Nottingham with Sister Marsden. I'm excited and nervous, but I know that, as I am obedient, the Lord will bless me. And that's good cause I'm gonna need it.

This is kind of on a different note, but in the same theme. Not too long ago, I saw forget-me-nots for the first time. They are the most adorable teeniest tiniest little blue flowers. They are sooooo itty bitty, and they are the most beautiful blue ever. If sunshine were blue, it would be the colour of forget-me-nots. They are so pretty, but so small and so common that most people don't even notice them. One member actually thought they were weeds when we were weeding her garden! I fell absolutely in love with them on the spot, and I remembered that President Uchtdorf had given a lovely talk about forget-me-nots a while ago. So I looked it up, and it is totally awesome. He talks about how the five petals of the forget-me-not represent five things that we ought not to forget. All of them are great, but the one I really liked was "Forget not to be happy". He talked about how there are so many lovely little moments in our lives that make life beautiful, that we often just walk past, just like we do with forget-me-nots. We don't allow them to really beautify and give colour to our lives. 

I thought about that a lot. I thought about how many little things happen in the day to day life of a missionary that aren't big journal-worthy moments, but that are still good and wonderful and are the little blue flowers of our lives. I wanted to remember those too. So I created my Forget-Me-Not book. It's a little blue book that I carry with me all the time, and whenever something small but good happens that makes my day better, I Forget-Me-Not it. It's brought me a lot of happiness, and I'm already super grateful for it, as I'm leaving Cheltenham. I've recorded a lot of lovely things from here that will bring me joy. It's helped me to remember that even little good things are incredibly valuable. And things don't have to be rare to be beautiful. Also, forget-me-nots are now my favourite flower. Do you think they'll grow in Arizona?

So. We have this investigator named Vicki. She came to the general women's meeting, which was all about serving, and mainly about serving the refugees. At the end of the meeting, the Stake Relief Society president got up and talked about how she felt prompted to get up and tell everyone that she was thinking that the way the stake could get involved might be through putting dignity packs together through a local charity. Everyone thought it sounded like a great idea. The only thing was, there was no program for dignity packs already in place. But it was alright, we thought, we'd figure it out eventually.

Eventually was not good enough for Vicki. That day, she told us later, she sat out in her garden, and a concept for a full on charity organisation blossomed in her head. She gives full credit to Heavenly Father for giving her the idea, but I and everyone else give her full credit for listening. By the time we went to see her the next Tuesday, four days later, she had it entirely on lock.

So the concept is that she would hand out these bags, D.A.P.S, or Dignity Aid Packs, to people with a list of suggestions for things that they could put in. People could then take the packs, fill them with whatever they felt women and children in refugee camps might need that they could afford, and return them to Vicki, who would pass them off to the charity who would distribute them to refugees. By the time we got to her, she had all the graphics done for the stickers and things that would go on and in the bags, she had a logo figured out, she had the funding she needed to get everything printed up and she was ready to go. A few days later, D.A.P.S had both a Twitter ands Facebook account. When the print and the bags came in, we helped her package them up so that they looked all pretty, and they started going out to people. This was all about a month ago. The ward in Cheltenham caught wind of it, and the Relief Society took it on board. And then the stake relief society president, the one who really kicked this whole thing off in the first place, found out about it, and now there is going to be a stake service day in June, centred around filling these dignity packs. 

And then, it really exploded. People had already started taking four or five or ten and handing them out to their friends to fill and return. Through Facebook, a socialite here in Cheltenham caught wind of it, got inspired, and asked for 50 bags. Another woman asked for 25. People all over the country have been asking for these bags. The charity, People in Motion, are doing a talk at a school sometime soon about the refugee situation, and at the end, they'll be handing out D.A.P.S. They're getting another batch of bags made up, because they're already almost out.

But that's not even the most exciting part. The packs have started coming back. Not just a couple. The first round of packs have come back, and there are around 120 bags, from people that Vicki doesn't even know. At first, she thought this would be a kind of localised thing. Now, the perspective is shifting. The local newspaper is going to do a story on it, and Vicki's partner, who just so happens to be a graphic designer and a professional photographer, has offered to put a website together, and take a trip to the main refugee camp in France to do some photo-journalism pro bono. It's amazing what she's accomplished!

I guess this brings everything back around to my big take away from this month. In everything that has happened this month, the hand of the Lord has been so evident.  The truth is, we will never walk alone. God loves us too much to leave us without help for even a minute. The help is always, always there. He cares so deeply about us that He sent His son, Jesus Christ, to perform the atonement that He might know how to help us. When we turn to God in prayer, when we read the scriptures, we always have that help that we need. The only time we will ever be alone is when we ignore Christ's presence right beside us, ever offering us more than we can dream of. Remember that. Christ is there to support and strengthen us through every trial, every affliction. The Atonement does not just cleanse sin, it strengthens hearts. It is the reason we are able to change and become new. It is the way. He is the way. 

I know this is true. I know that God is supporting me. I know that, without the strength that comes from relying on the Atonement of Christ, I wouldn't be able to do any of this. I wouldn't have even been able to get out on a mission. Without Him, I can do nothing. But I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me. He is my light and my hope. And I am forever grateful for Him, and indebted to Him. 

This next month is going to be a crazy one for me. I have absolutely no idea what's going to happen, but I know it's going to be awesome! Have a great month, friends! Enjoy summer!!

Toodle pip!

Sister Pike