In May I graduated from high school and was given the book Daughters of God by M. Russell Ballard as a gift. I just recently finished it and have found it absolutely amazing. As a young women getting ready to start my life, go off to college, meet my eternal companion, and start a beautiful family this book has given me hope and strength. The worth of a righteous woman is diminishing in the eyes of the world, but it will never diminish in the sight of our Eternal Father. Near the end of the book Elder Ballard speaks of the Savior and his humble response to the Father's question, "Who can I send?" The Lord simply replied "Here am I, send me." Elder Ballard then continues and encourages us to be the kind of women who, when asked to do hard things, simply replies "Here am I, send me."
Finishing this book was the perfect ending to a journey that I started in February. Five months ago I was encouraged to sign up for the Bryce Canyon Half-Marathon. I struggled for a long time debating whether or not this was something I really wanted to do. For weeks I mused over the pros and cons of this task. In order to do this I knew that I would have to rely on the Lord. So I started running. At first it was only two miles, but eventually I worked up to three just in time to start my real training. In May my sister Holly and I started training together. Each run was an opportunity to converse with my loving Father. He taught me so many things, about myself, about Him, about this life. My training finally ended and the race was here. The Thornton's, Mckay, Mom, and I had a great time that weekend enjoying Bryce Canyon. The race was hard. Harder than I expected. It was long. 13.1 miles is a long way to run, but just like so many times before the Lord sent his angels to rescue me. One of them was in the form of my sister Holly. What an amazing women. I am truly in awe at the women she is. As I struggled to keep positive the second half of the race I would often times look at my sister and thank my Heavenly Father for such a strong sister that could help me along my journey in life. There were many times I would feed off of her energy and that would be the only thing getting me through my runs. I know I could not have done this race without her. There have also been many times when I have ran away to her house crying about how hard my life is and she would listen and give me advice and even deal with my melodramatic scenes. How grateful I am for her in my life.
I finished the race. 13.1 miles in 2 hours and 28 minutes. I was able to run it in my goal time with 2 minutes to spare. I am filled with gratitude to my Savior who carried me through it. In the end, as I have pondered this experience, the most valuable thing that I have learned is that I am a Daughter of God, who loves me and I love him. He is my strength, my hope, my everything. He knows me by name and will do anything for my happiness and the happiness of all his precious sons and daughters. When I am weak, then am I strong.
As my life moves forward and changes I am thankful for this knowledge that I have been given. Inevitably trails will come, but I hope I can always remember this and when the Lord calls upon me I pray for strength to simply reply "Here am I, send me."
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