I was sitting in Sacrament meeting last week feeling good about my decision NOT to bear (bare?) my testimony when I had the crazy thought that it was okay because I would be speaking soon anyway. "Well that's just crazy," I thinks to myself, "I've been in the ward for 6 months and they always ask new people to speak when they're new." I thought my Bishop was giving me a reprieve because he knows how busy I am in school.
As it turned out, a couple hours after church, I get a phone call from the 1st counselor asking me to speak in church next week. I realized my stray thought earlier that day was really a prompting (warning?) so it was easy to say yes. Then he gave me the topic "A Time to Prepare," a conference talk by a member of the Seventy, Ian Ardern. The talk is about the wise use of time. (I think this is the spiritual equivalent of being hit in the face?) Well, it's ironic for a few of reasons:
1) I am in grad school and my concept of time is something between "death march" and "dog years." (If that sounds crazy, that's exactly my point!)
2) I do NOT know how I get anything done. Seriously, I don't know how everything keeps coming together for me to finish assignments and prep for clients and the like. Which makes me think I am either so good at time management that I have traveled above the plane where time has any meaning... or a whole lotta divine intervention! (Yeah, I know... it's the second one...)
3) One of the most profound conversations I had with my dad was about being prepared (for death).
4) And now they want me to speak about that on the very day that is the anniversary of his death!?!
Funny how life works. And by funny, I mean the exact opposite...
On the other hand, to be totally honest, I feel like this will actually be a blessing for me. I've had a rough-ish week and a big part of it is not having time to meditate, ponder/pray, or do anything to really help deal with the feeling of loss that I feel. I think this will help me put things back into perspective. I'll let you know how it goes...
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