God is Good to the Johnsons

Ayer tuve el privilegio de hablar con mi primito, Élder Josh Harper, quien esta sirviendo una misión de tiempo completo para la Iglesia de JesuCristo de los Santos de los Últimos Días en la ciudad de México. Llamó a su mamá para el día de la madre. Era una experiencia única poder hablar con mi primito en Español, porque nosotros dos somos de Utah y hemos crecido hablando Inglés juntos. Mi hermanito Jordan recién recibió su llamamiento misional a Piura, Perú. Él preguntó a Josh, "¿Como puedo prepararme para servir la misión?" y mi primo respondió, "Que te esfuerces a tener una relación personal con Padre Celestial." ¿Que consejo verdadero e importante, no? El rostro de Élder Harper ha cambiado. Siempre ha sido un joven buenísimo, siempre se ha involucrado en servicio y es muy bondadoso. Pero su conocimiento de la veracidad del evangelio de JesuCristo ha entrado en su corazón, y este conocimiento--este testimonio--brilla en él. Le pregunté, "¿Estás enamor...

It always makes me laugh when a student accidentally calls me mom, especially when they don't catch themselves saying it and they continue on with the conversation as normal. I am so grateful for my mother, and my husband's mother. These women worked (and continue to work) continuously to nurture, love, kiss and hug, teach and listen, cook and clean, minister and mop as they raised us. I love them. Today, however, I also want to salute every single woman who has ever loved, nurtured, kissed and hugged, taught and listened, cooked and cleaned, ministered and mopped in my behalf and/or the behalf of any one of God's children. To you, we can proudly and accidentally call mom, and not even bat an eyelash. God bless you for mothering. The world needs women like you!

Today, it's been gray skies Blanketing the Utah heavens in that downy cotton That looks like it's brushed up against some charcoal, accidentally. The earth around me is filled with that clean smell, like it finally decided to take a shower. The greens look greener and the flowers look fresher, magnified by the shine of water. I see things twice, because everything is found in it's place as well as it's double in a mirror puddle. All this,  because it decided to rain in the desert. and it's beautiful.

So my brother was told this week by a friend (a friend, I might add, that he made only a few months ago) that he is the one who taught her unconditional love. Before him, she claims, she has never felt unconditionally loved. Note, my brother and this young lady are friends, no otherwise interest. But his friendship has meant something profound to her. I really look up to my brother for embodying that. However, as my mom, brother and I chatted about this experience, we all felt a little melancholy that he was the first to show her that. Hearing a little more about her difficult life, it made a little more sense. But it still wrenched our hearts a mite. I was reminded of a friend I used to work with. We worked together for about 8 months, we spent several hours a day together--often one-on-one--during that time. On my last day of work, she turned to me and said, "Mikayla, when I first met you I didn't trust you. I thought you were way too happy and way too nice all the time....

Today as I was walking with my husband out of the temple, we passed a cheerful gentleman who was walking with the assistance of a candy apple red cane. I nearly blurted, "Hey, I have the exact same cane you do! It's a good one!" Because, well, I do. I just didn't have it on me. For three weeks last fall I suffered from pelvic displacement. The hip issue was a result of my growing baby's strain on my body in the last stretch of the third trimester of pregnancy. It started out as nothing more than a little discomfort at the end of the day to woefully staring across my classroom at a stack of papers and wondering if I really, really needed them because it might take me ten minutes to get there and I might just yelp and cry the whole way, too. Imagine that your right leg is chipper and dandy, but when you put any weight at all on your left leg you get jabbed in the side with dozens of unforgiving little needles. That's about what it felt like. My husband cam...

Today in the library I saw a book about the orphan trains of the late 1800's. Children whose parents died Children whose parents left Children whose parents were healthy but could not provide for them. Children who were sent away far, far away aboard a train in dapper dress. Some were given new families that loved them And some were simply                         given new families. Their voices reach me across a space of 130 years as they recall in soft tones  their journey. They had to ride from town to town away from all they ever knew                 with coats and boots shining bright and new without the people that loved them. And I have to trust And have to pray And have to hope God will make it right for them Someday. Yesterday I heard memories from the world war The second one. I heard about the horror of bombs falling, exploding on Ame...

I was 19, about to start my sophomore year of college. It was the first evening in our apartment (I had not even spent the night there yet) on a late August evening when a knock came at our door. A kid from Hawaii in his early twenties was on the other side, and he asked politely, "Do any of you have a twenty dollar bill I could borrow?" Well, I don't know about you. But I'm not the first to raise my hand to give that amount of money to total strangers under the supposed pretense of letting them "borrow" it. I had just paid for tuition and the deposit and first month's rent on my apartment. And on an undergrad minimum-wage type income, well, 20 bucks was my grocery budget for the week and then some. But I heard the guy out. His wallet and his phone were locked in his sister's car, who happened to be at the temple and was unreachable. He was to pick up a girl for a date in less than half an hour. He couldn't reschedule the date because he didn...