God Endorses Garlic Bread

the casualty with which people talk about what happened to people i know and love, using their memory to prove a point is just heartbreaking.

Oh. My. Goodness.

I felt him. I felt God talking to me. I felt his warmth and his comfort and his power. The promises that he gave me and the directions are so... So perfect. So personalised.

We had been preparing Nikki for trials that would come before her baptism. Remembering my own doubts, anxieties and struggles prior to my baptism date, I warned Nikki that she should stay strong in the face of these troubles. “The adversity will do everything he can to stop you from feeling the joy that comes when you join the church,” I said, uncharacteristically serious.

“It’s because he can’t feel happiness. He wants everyone to feel as much sorrow as him.” Sister Huffaker intoned. 

Nikki took our warnings seriously. She prayed every morning and night for the strength to overcome not just her clinically diagnosed anxiety, but extra anxieties that would come in the face of such a life-altering change. My friend prepared herself, safeguarded herself with the scriptures, with dutiful studying and worship. 

So concerned with Nikki’s spiritual progress, I forgot my own.

On what was the most joyful day of our friendship, I was neck-deep in the early stages of what would become a two-month long, stifling depression.

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I was- and I am, struggling. Things that were once easy suddenly became very hard. One hour of church became torturous, three hours was unthinkable. My mind fogged up every time I opened my scriptures to the point where I hadn’t opened them for two weeks. I was struggling with the bare essentials of life- remembering to eat, showering, sleeping. How was I meant to find the time to read my scriptures, attend the temple, be with my non-member family, go to church for three hours a week, go to institute, let my home teachers come over, go to institute, and meet with the missionaries every week? I prayed to know how it could all fit in when I’m so deeply depressed. The answer from my Heavenly Father, who knows me innately, brought me clarity and relief: You are doing the best you can. That’s all I ask of you. He knows that I’m struggling. He knows. Oh Lord, does he know.  His Son has felt my pain. The Lord knows that on Sunday morning, when I wake up, brush my teeth, and burst into tears, He does not expect more from me than I can manage. He knows that I’m not going to institute because I’m struggling through long casual work to be able to afford to feed my family. He knows my intentions. He knows my fears. He knows that in all of this, I am doing my best. I worried for a long time about the example that I was setting for Nikki as a recent convert, and the friend who introduced her to the gospel. If she saw that I wasn’t doing certain things anymore, would she think that was ‘okay’? I hope so. I hope Nikki knows that  the Lord knows our heart, and that saving face isn’t a reason to do anything. I hope Nikki knows that our Heavenly Father, who loves us, who created us, expects us to be kind to ourselves. He calls us to try our hardest, He sets standards for this life; but he knows that we will fall. He knows that things will be hard in this life, in this body with an imperfect mind. I hope she knows that that is exactly why He made a plan, why He sent his only son.

As I typed my hopes for Nikki, my best friend, I came to my own conclusions.