The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints

Today's tender mercy is that I am blessed to be a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. Everything about the gospel uplifts me. When I attend church each week, when I study the scriptures, when I study other doctrinal books, or when I listen to or read general conference talks I feel so uplifted and inspired. I also feel it is a tender mercy to know that I have a Heavenly Father who loves me unconditionally; a Savior, Jesus Christ, who suffered in the Garden of Gethsemane, died at Calvary, and rose on the third day so I that I could repent of my sins and live again; and to have the gift of the Holy Ghost so that I have the opportunity to have him as a constant companion who can help guide me through the challenges I face each day or comfort me when the challenges seem to much to bear. Yes, I am blessed to be a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. If you are interested in learning more about my church visit www.mormon.org.

Addiction Recovery

Today the tender mercy I have to recognize is the addiction recovery program of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. I don't have your normal everyday addiction like drugs, alcohol or pornography, but I do have an addiction and I am not going to go into detail about it because it is personal. The addiction recovery program put on by the LDS church is based on the Alcoholic's Anonymous 12 step program, but it is centered on Christ. I admit that I haven't been perfect in working the steps, in fact I have been very far from perfect in working them, but going to the meetings each week and getting the support of the people there has helped me to continue to work to overcome my addictive behavior. The Spirit of the Lord is always at the meetings and the people are absolutely wonderful. It is truly a tender mercy from the Lord that my Relief Society president suggested to me to attend these meetings.

A New Beginning

It has been months since I have posted a tender mercy and let me tell you there have been tender mercies a plenty in my life that I haven't recorded. As such I have decided to make an effort at this blog again. I am going to try to record tender mercies from the Lord at least a few times a week. The entries on the blog may be long or short, but there will be an entry at least a few times a week is the goal.

So here it goes....the tender mercy I want to recognize today is the fact that the appeal for my financial aid was approved. It was even approved in less than the minimum time frame of four weeks they gave me (three weeks and six days to be exact ;) ). This approval gives me the opportunity to begin school on August 25, which is in and of itself a tender mercy.

So to whoever reads this - what tender mercies has the Lord blessed you with today?

Tender Mercy for February 5, 2014

Today's tender mercy is that I actually didn't file my taxes on Saturday like I thought I did! The reason being that I had some info about some income I had forgotten about come in the mail today. If I had actually filed my return through H&R Block I would have had to wait and file an amended return, but lucky me I misunderstood their website and actually hadn't even filed my return. Yep, here's to mistakes that end up saving the day.

Tender Mercy for February 2, 2014

Today's tender mercy is the beauty of this earth, especially flowers. On my walks the past few weeks I have been stopping to take pictures of flowers. Here a some of my favorites.

So next time you are walking around take a moment to enjoy the flowers. I am grateful for a loving Heavenly Father who gave us flowers...such a tender mercy!!

Tender Mercy for February 1, 2014

I missed posting yesterday. I was in a kind of funk and couldn't come up with a tender mercy. I know they happen every day, but I just couldn't come up with anything I felt was blog worthy.
Today's tender mercy is a kind, loving, and honest roommate. Today did not turn out as planned. I have been planning for a month to go to the Chinese New Year celebration in LA, but then my two traveling companions got sick. I was so frustrated that things did not go as planned - that I couldn't go because they weren't going. Later in the day my roommate Lauren (one of those who got sick) said that she had realized that she shouldn't feel bad about me not going today because based on all the adventurous things I have done in my life (namely live in China and in Washington, D.C.) I could have gone by myself, but just chose not to go by myself. At first her saying this frustrated the heck out of me. I mean why shouldn't she feel sorry for me...I hadn't been able to go because my friends had gotten sick. The more I thought about it though I realized that she was right. I made a choice and that choice was not to go. Whether or not I thought I was making that decision when I made it I did. The Lord gives us agency in this life and we use it all the time and today I was reminded by an honest roommate and friend that sometimes we don't even realize we are using this great gift.
To end on a bright note Lauren and I did enjoy a great dinner at Claim Jumper. It was a good end to an unexpected day.

Tender Mercy for January 30, 2014

Today my tender mercy didn't really happen today, but I thought a lot about it today. Today is my niece Madison's 8th birthday. It is such a tender mercy to have her in my life. I love how she just loves me and doesn't judge me. I love our dinners, breakfasts, and everything in between. I have included a few pictures that I feel show her personality well.

Showing off her whipped cream mustache at breakfast.

Showing off a gift she picked out for her dad and wearing a dress of course!

Happy 8th Birthday Madison!!

January 29, 2014 Tender Mercy

Today's tender mercy is that the Lord is allowing me to see progress as I strive to exercise and eat better. I lost over three pounds this past week! I wasn't perfect in either eating or working out, but the Lord let me see some results so I would be encouraged to keep on moving forward.

Tender Mercy for January 28, 2014

Today's tender mercy is that I work for a kind and patient professor. I had to print off three different reports three different times because of problems with the reports title! He never complained though even when the first time was because of my lack of attention to detail. So I guess a second tender mercy is that I was kindly reminded that I need to pay attention to the details!

Tender Mercy for January 27, 2014

My tender mercy for today is that in my institute class (a religion class) we learned more effective ways to study the scriptures and teachings of our living prophets. The ones that stood out to me were to ask questions and to cross-reference scriptures and general conference talks.

Sunday, January 26, 2014 Tender Mercy

So in an aim to recognize a minimum of one tender mercy a day I am starting with this Sunday.
Today's tender mercy was the lesson in relief society (our church's woman's organization) being on Elder Jeffrey R. Holland's October 2014 conference talk Like a Broken Vessel. The things shared by the sisters during the lesson helped me to realize that I am not alone in the struggles I have in life and that I need to continually strive to gain empathy from my own experiences.

The week of January 19th

So I think I am going to aim for a weekly posting of what the tender mercies of my life have been over the past week. So for the week of January 19th to 25th 2014 some tender mercies are as follows:

1. Awesome stake conference broadcast on Sunday the 19th. It had many wonderful talks that inspired me and we got to hear from President Henry B. Eyring of the 1st presidency.
2. School not starting on Monday, January 20 because it was Martin Luther King Day. I totally thought it did start and even drove over to the institute building to park, but I was grateful because it gave me one more day to relax.
3. A good dentist. I had to endure five hours of dental work on Wednesday (not a fun way to spend your only weekday off!), but Dr. Jain was so kind that she called me on Thursday to make sure I was feeling okay.
4. The ability to have three gospel conversations. We were challenged during the Saturday evening session of our stake conference to make a goal to have a certain number of gospel conversations during the upcoming week. My goal was to have five conversations, but coming from a girl who is shy about talking about the gospel I think three out of five is a tender mercy.
5. The ability to get up most days and workout. I was able to get up on Monday, Tuesday, Thursday, and Saturday to work out. It felt great and I know my days went better because of working out.

There are many other tender mercies I had during the week, but these are the main ones that come to mind. I said earlier that I was going to do a weekly post, but I think I will aim for a one line a day post. We'll see how it goes.