I remember when I was 16 years old I had just gotten my drivers license and I was so excited because I wanted to go to a birthday party! There was a law at this time that you couldn’t drive with anyone else in the car for at least a couple months. I asked my dad if I could go to this Birthday party and he said “okay but Jenny I need you to make me a promise, promise me that you won’t drive with anyone else in the car. I said “okay dad, I promise I will do that.” So I went to this party and when the time came to go home my friends all needed a ride. I started to justify because I didn’t think it was that big of a deal. I drove my friends home and on the way I got a phone call from my dad. “Jenny are you almost home?” I said “yeah. I am on my way!” He asked if there was anyone in the car and I admitted to my dad that I did have my friends in the car. He said “drop them off and come home.” As I arrived home, my dad was standing in the driveway. We walked inside the house together and he said “Jenny why did you break your promise?” I told him I didn’t think it was that big of a deal. He then told me that I could have gotten my license taken away until I was at least 18 if I would have gotten pulled over. Then it hit me in my young 16 year old mind, my dad didn’t make that promise with me because he wanted me to be miserable, or want me to not look cool in front of my friends, he saw the bigger picture and saw the consequences that would come. He wanted the best possible outcome for my life, and just as we have loving parents on earth, we have a loving Heavenly Father who knows how we will be most happy in this life! He knows and sees the bigger picture that sometimes we don’t see.
D&C 82:10- I the lord am bound when ye do what I say, but when ye do not what I say, ye have no promise.
God wants all of his children to make promises with him! I know this because I had so many experiences where we were led to those people. There was this one time we were walking behind apartment complexes. We were in a hurry, but I felt really strongly that we needed to knock on one of the back porch doors. I thought to myself “This is going to be so awkward knocking on someone’s back porch” But when the spirit speaks, you gotta follow it! When we knocked on the door Rene answered. She said what are you doing? What do you want? We told her we were missionaries and felt we needed to knock on her door. She said “I can’t believe you are here right now. My mom just passed away and its her Birthday today. I was going to go drink and smoke until I couldn’t feel the pain anymore.” We were able to share with her the Plan of salvation and let her know she will see her mom again! She told us she knows God sent us and knew we were there for a reason. I know that God loves his children! He wants us to make these promises because they make us happy!!
So what is the very first promise we make with God? It’s baptism. But even more than a promise this is a covenant, which means we promise God something and he promises us something right back. We promise we will keep the commandments and be a witness for God and a strength and comfort to others. What does God promise us in return? His spirit more abundantly upon us! He promises eternal life and eternal blessings. He promises that if we follow him, we will be MOST happy in this life. That sounds pretty good to me!
Its so very simple. Elder Ballard came to our mission and he said “Satan is the master of complexity, but Jesus Christ is the master of simplicity.” I know that this is true. I met a lot of people who justified their actions. People would find ways over and around things to try and get rid of the guilt that they felt and instead of justifying our actions and instead of wondering why life is not going the way we want it to, remember that faith is an action! God can’t force us to keep our side of the promise. He can’t and he won’t. We have to remember the covenants we have made and change and repent! It is then we will feel the spirit more in our lives! This doesn’t mean that life will be easy because life isn’t easy…but it means that we have gods promise that everything is going to be okay.
D Todd Christofferson said:
“What is the source of such moral and spiritual power, and how do we
obtain it? The source is God. Our access to that power is through our
covenants with Him. A covenant is an agreement between God and man,
whose terms are set by God. In these divine agreements, God binds
Himself to sustain, sanctify, and exalt us in return for our
commitment to serve Him and keep His commandments.”
Knowing this has helped me so much on my mission. I was truly taught how important it is to keep covenants and the principle of sacrifice. A lot of the time, we are not willing to sacrifice to make these promises with God. The sacrificed made to serve a mission actually affected my feelings for the gospel. It made me a deeper love for it and more dedication to serve our savior, Jesus Christ. There were some very special people who taught me the true meaning of sacrifice. One of them was YuXia Kuang. She is from China and came to the DC area with her family and one day her son Shun fan said “mom we need to learn about Jesus Christ” They had no Christian background and Yu Xia did not even know who this was and so her and her son went walking down a street called 23rd street. On this street there are 5 or 6 churches, but she said they went to the first church with Jesus Christs name in it, which is The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints. We taught Yu Xia Kuang and once she realized she is a daughter of God and knew her relationship with Jesus Christ, there was NOTHING that was going to stop her from entering into the waters of baptism. Her friends disowned her, she couldn’t tell her family, but she knew. She knew what Jesus Christ had done for her. There was nothing to stop her. We sat down with her one day and I asked her how she was doing and asked if she was doing okay. And she said “I know what Jesus Christ has done for me, if he can do it, so can I. I am doing this. I want to. They are now back in china. Shun fan 8 and will be baptized soon!
John Lahlou is another wonderful person I had the opportunity to meet and teach. He is from morocco and came here 13 years ago. He was a Muslim and wanted to come to America to see how the education worked here because he is a professor and he ended up getting baptized into a different Christian church. His family disowned him and said he couldn’t come back. Ever since then he has searched for the truth because he felt that something was missing. John was the happiest man that I knew. When missionaries knocked on his door and he learned about the gospel, he knew that this was Christs church and he didn’t have anyone. He didn’t have his family. He is 76 years old and all alone. But he has the gospel of Jesus Christ. Every time John came up to me he would say “I am so happy! I am a Mormon! I am so happy” He gave up everything to be here and to believe in Jesus Christ.
This truly is true happiness. If you don’t believe me, try it for yourself because I know that when we sacrifice in our lives to come closer to our heavenly father then we will come closer to him and we will feel him more in our lives. Start where you are! Doesn’t matter if you are not baptized yet, or if you are fully active in the church, even if you don’t even know if God is there…Start where you are. Go home tonight and pray. Ask God what you need to do. Ask him what the next step is for you and he will let you know. When you come to know this is true, you won’t want to wait one more second. His hands are stretched out ready to receive us! Just as my dad was standing in the driveway, because he was so nervous for me and waiting for me to come home. So is our heavenly father, waiting for us to come home with open arms for us to come home. He wants us to be most happy and most successful in this life. He wants to bless us eternally. Not just here but forever! I promise that as you sacrifice things in your life then your relationship with god will strengthen! Lay claim on promised blessings. Don’t hold yourself back! There are so many blessings God wants to give his children.
As I made and kept covenants with heavenly father, opportunities truly did open and as I look back I see that every step that I took was guided by heavenly father. I didn’t know if I would ever serve a mission, I didn’t know if I wanted it to be in my plans because I was really nervous! But thank HEAVENS our plans don’t always work out the way we expect because God has better plans. He opened up opportunities as I made and kept covenants. I remembered who I am, where I came from and where I want to go. I will never be able to thank him enough for guiding me to the Washington DC south mission where I met people who changed my life forever.
For the youth who are thinking about serving a mission, for the young men…IT’S A COMMANDMENT! It would be silly not to go. It is the most peace joy and happiness you will ever feel in your whole entire life. But for the young woman, I was given some incredible advise from a young age, and the advise is this: Live worthy and prepare yourself to be an instrument in Gods hands and if and when the lord calls you, you will be ready and prepared to serve. I know this is true. I know heavenly father and Jesus Christ lives and God loves all of his children. I know the Book of Mormon truly is another Testamant of our savior Jesus Christ. I know that Joseph smith truly did see heavenly father and Jesus Christ in the grove of trees that day and because of it we have the fullness of the gospel on the earth today. I know that these things are true and I’m so grateful for it.
By: Jenny Lee Olson aka Sister Olson
