Faith update

I haven't written about my focus word for the year, faith, in a while, and I feel I should because I have something kinda cool to report. If you were in church today, you may have already heard my story, so please don't feel obligated to continue reading. To everyone else, my story may not seem cool at first, but if plug on through to the end, you may change your mind :). So, I have been working at the Writing Center a whole lot less this semester due to student teaching, only about five hours or so a week to be exact. This has resulted in quite a hit to our monthly finances, but we are budgeting, and I am paying for my tuition a little here and a little there as we can afford it. I have also been praying a lot, and finding strength in reading the Book of Mormon, so God knows our situation well, and as a result, I haven't really been stressing about paying for school because I am trusting God, Sean said he'd help me pay my tuition, and I was planning on putting all of my paychecks toward the total anyway. Moving forward to last Monday, when I came home from student teaching, Forrest asked if he could take the car to the Orem Fitness Center, and I said yes. When he left, I changed my clothes and took the dogs for a walk because they were going crazy and really needed to get out. I came home 45 minutes later, started dinner, and Sean called and said Forrest had called him and said that he'd gotten into an accident but that he was ok. I am a total worry wart--every time my kids or husband leave home, I worry that they will get in an accident, so this phone call was, or could have been, my worst nightmare. But Sean was calm, and that calmed me, and right after I got off the phone, Forrest pulled into the driveway and came inside. He wasn't hurt at all, the car had only cosmetic damage, and best of all, the accident was the other driver's fault, and she was honest, took full responsibility, gave Forrest all of her info, and when I called her a little later, she said she'd send in a claim. The insurance claims agent came to assess the damage on Friday, after which, she left a check for us, and the amount was enough to pay for all but the last 300 dollars or so of my tuition. This whole experience was completely unexpected--not at all the way I thought or hoped my prayers would be answered--but I am getting used to God taking care of things in amazing and unpredictable ways. Faith works, everybody, and so does prayer. I know that things don't always turn out the way we want them to, but I also know that the Lord is watching out for us and so wants us to trust and confide in him and his infinite knowledge, wisdom, and immense love for us. When Corinne went into the MTC last fall and became ill there, at first I prayed and prayed that she would get well and be able to complete her mission as she had hoped and planned. But, I kept feeling that those prayers were selfish--they only had one way to be answered, MY way--and I changed my focus and asked the Lord to help me and my daughter accept his will for her. She came home just before Thanksgiving, spent the holidays with us, and got well enough to go to Korea in January, which was her dream. Then, I got a phone call from her in the middle of the night just a week and a half after she arrived. Her illness had returned. We talked for a while, and she confided in me that she really felt she should come home, even though she didn't want to. I was able to express my love for her and told her that I know the Lord loves her and that she was faithful and had served an honorable mission, no matter how short. We both wanted for her to be able to stay, but we had also both accepted that it was not the Lord's will for her to do so at this time. I could have been angry with the Lord, and blamed or accused him for not fulfilling his promise to my daughter, but I chose not to be. I chose to trust in him like I had PROMISED to do, and because of that choice, my heart and life are FILLED with love for him and his will. I don't know why it has taken me so long to trust him like I do now, well actually, that is not true; I do. There are many, many reasons that I chose not to believe before, but today, and I hope for the rest of my life, I will trust him fully and completely, for he has given me every reason to do so. No person on this earth has ever been there the way he is for me, and I have some amazing friends and family who are so good at meeting and fulfilling my needs, but not like this. The Lord fulfills his promises. The manner and time in which he does so may not make sense to us, but we should NEVER give up believing that he will. This is how faith is working in my life, and it is incredible!