Superba

Learned a new word this weekend from a very interesting man. The word; superba.

One Sunday afternoon we decided to go tract a town that we had never been to before. As we were out we ran into an elderly man that was a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints but because he lived about 30 miles away from the nearest church building and didn't have transportation he doesn't really attend.

As we knocked on his door and he opened it, he just looked so happy and grateful that we were there. At the time neither I nor my companion knew that he was a member. From that visit we learned a lot about him and his history. One thing stood out to me was that he kept asking us if we were from the ward and when we would say yes he would clap his hands and say, "Superba!" He was just so happy to have the Spirit in his home again.

I think that we all go through times in our lives when we have drawn away from God and Jesus Christ. That because of one reason or another our relationship with them weakens and it isn't as strong as it once was. The wonderful thing is that Jesus Christ is always on the other side of the door knocking waiting for us to answer and let him in. Just like this fella answering the door and exclaiming, "superba" because we were there we to should open the door to Jesus Christ and shout, "superba" because he is in our lives.

Lightening = wake up!

No surprise to anyone it has been raining a lot in Montana. Now I don't really have a problem with rain I love to watch storms move in. One thing I really love is thunderstorms. There is something behind watching the lightening and listening to the thunder. It just gives me a thrill of some sorts.

With all this rain I was expecting us to have a thunderstorm anytime soon. Days would go by but no storm. Rain would fall but no storm. I had almost lost hope that we would have a storm. Finally one came at 4:30 in the morning. Not at all when I had hoped for or even desired. Luckily for me the thunder woke me up and I was able to see a couple of lightening strikes before I fell back to sleep. The next morning I was talking to a lady we live with about the storm. My companion later on asks if there was a storm because she didn't wake up from anything and had only heard about it from me and our host member talking about it.

This reminds me of when Christ is going to come again. He says he will come as a thief in the night. We won't know when it will come and we each  pray that we will be able to recognize when he comes. Now I don't want to be a deep sleeper in spiritual things and miss over the signs in life that point me to God because I can't wake up. This can happen to any of us though. We can each be deep sleepers. Luckily though God loves us and He wants us to be awake for when Christ comes again. He gives us prophets and the scriptures to wake us up. By following the guidance of the Lord's words we can be awake and ready for the day when Christ will return.

Happy Memorial Day!

Thanks to those who have come before us and fought for the freedom that we hold so dear to our hearts now.

Glen Jensen





Jeramy Jensen





Lawrence Jensen



Perennial

per·en·ni·al

[puh-ren-ee-uhl]

–adjective

1.

lasting for an indefinitely long time; enduring:

2.

(of plants) having a life cycle lasting more than two years.

3.

lasting or continuing throughout the entire year, as a stream.

Now I have decided that if I am ever going to have a garden I will most likely have a ton of perennial flowers because they come back every year. I kind of like that because then you don't have to worry about replanting every year; you plant them and they grow and then come back each year. Also they are just pretty to look at. While they do come back each year you still have to water them and weed them and fertilize them.

Now gospel time. Our testimony should be perennial testimonies, lasting for an indefinitely long time; enduring; lasting and continuing throughout the entire year. How much easier would that be? We wouldn't have to redevelop our testimonies or re-find them each year. All we would have to do is tend them. Some might say that tending our testimonies takes to much time and effort. While yes you do have to continually be working at it, reading, praying, keeping the commandments, going to church it is so much easier to keep it alive and strong then having to redevelop or regrow it each year. Also another blessing about keeping our testimonies in the perennial section is that instead of having to start over fresh you can just keep building on it and making it stronger.

So keep taking care of your perennial bulbs so you don't have to replant them every year.

I Am a Child of God

I really love this clip and how it really shows that we are all children of God our Heavenly Father. Take time today and think how it makes you feel to be a child of God and write your own verse to this song.

Brands and Trust

This past week we went and helped a member in one of our wards brand his calves. We were pretty excited to do it because I feel like that is a Montanan experience that you can't pass up. It was a very interesting experience and something that wouldn't bother me again.

One thing that I thought was interesting was the different ways the calves responded to being poked, prodded, and branded. Most would squirm and cry out and let us all know they didn't appreciate what we were doing to them. Some would try to get out of the contraption; most didn't succeed. One calf did though and I would say that I was pretty shocked and kind of happy for him. Then there were a couple of calves that didn't even move or cry out.

As Sister Williams and I were observing these different reactions we tried to decide what kind of calf we would be. Would I be normal and squirm and cry, would I try my hardest to get out of it, would I get out of it, or would I not do anything at all and just lay there? For a while I was saying that I would be like the one calf who broke his way out of the calving table and got loose. I don't know now if I would want to be that calf because he just was dragging it out even longer because he had to go back through the whole process again.

Now I don't want to be one that just tries to go around trials or just avoid them because they don't go away they just get bigger. I think of us as those calves here on earth and God and Jesus as those men that branded the calves. Sometimes we go through hard things but they won't give us anything that we can't handle. Those calves that put their trust in the men had the branding go by so much faster than those who kicked and fought against it. The same works with God. The prophet Alma teaches his son Helaman this exact concept and he says to him,"that whosoever shall put their trust in God shall be supported in their trials, and their troubles, and their afflictions, and shall be lifted up at the last day."(Alma 36:3) 

Life isn't easy nor was it meant to be easy but I do know that as we put our trust in the Lord, especially during in our trials, life is so much better.

Uniqueness

"Every star is different and so is every child."

One thing that really does make me happy is being unique. I like doing things, saying things, wearing thing others don't. In high school I used to get the biggest urges to wear things that were just weird that carried on to college and even now. I picked to play the french horn because I knew no one else  in my area played it. Then of course, I say things that most people don't.

There has always been something deep inside of me that tells me I have to be different, It makes me think my mom was inspired than to name me what she did--Crikette. I have yet to meet someone with their first name as Crikette; regardless of the spelling.

The wonderful thing is I know that God love me the way I am; in fact, He created me. In Jeremiah 31:3 the Lord speaks of how much He loves us: "...yea I have loved thee with an everlasting love, therefore with loving kindness have I drawn thee."

God loves us with all our quircks and differences. He loves us even when we are 5'1" with red hair. He loves us just the way we are because He has created us just the way we are. Look at all the variety in nature. To me that testifies that He loves diversity.

So celebrate your uniqueness! Celebrate that you are a beloved child of God with your own personality. Celebrate individuality.