Multiple Surgeries & Much Pain

Everyone has a story, a need, a lack, a place of inadequacy. I know the details of mine, and you know the details of yours. And the Lord? He knows about every story, and every dark place, and every hope and heartache and happily ever after.

Kobin's summer was off to a boring start as he recovered from brain surgery. But music, and the help of a generous neighbor, turned it all around.

“Elora’s death will always be a scar on my heart, but the things I’ve learned and the relationship I have with Christ are sacred to me beyond measure.”

I have found that focusing on Christ brings me a sense of peace that I would not have otherwise.

INTRODUCTION: I have been interested in a statement made about Abraham by Moses in Genesis 24:

When Captain Chris R. Stricklin got up the morning of September 14, 2003, ejecting from his airplane was the furthest thing from his mind. The sky over Mountain Home Air Force Base in western Idaho was royal blue, without even a wisp of a cloud—a perfect day for an airshow. His aircraft, the F-16 Fighting Falcon sat fueled, polished, and ready to fly. He was a member of the elite United States Air Force Air Demonstration Squadron—the Thunderbirds—and he was about to give the gathering crowd a show they would never forget.

It all started with the fathers. As with countless Jewish girls, Mary’s betrothal likely began when, by custom, Joseph’s father approached hers. Before Joseph’s father said more than a few words, Mary’s father likely knew what he wanted. To be brief, he wanted to discuss a possible engagement of his son with Mary. That topic would require a somewhat formal meeting.1 Whether Joseph’s father was the first parent to approach Mary’s father we cannot know. It is certainly possible that her father had been approached by other fathers of young men in Nazareth. Mary would surely have been visible to all the fathers in the small town. She may have been one of the few eligible young women that year in a settlement that sat apart, high above the surrounding plains at the top of steep hills that rose near one another and, falling precipitously toward each other, formed a bowl-like setting for Nazareth’s few inhabitants.

On March 23, the Church updated its statement about a former Church mission president who committed sexual assault:

What has been lacking for many members of the Church in their recovery attempts from pornography addiction is the proper clinical knowledge of how addictions can so easily develop in the brain, how their agency can be compromised, and then what to do about it in a practical, understandable way.