Saving a Soul

I swear... someone in the library is coughing up a hair ball.... A large one....That is the setting in which I begin this letter... ANYWAYS

 
 

It is disappointing as people who seem so ready disappear from our teaching pool, but it's ok. The ones that are ready are so ready, and the ones who are not are not, and they kind of sift themselves out. Don't worry, Brooklyn is still going strong. Both she and Kamille (our ward mission leader's girlfriend) watched conference and loved it.
 

This week was truly humbling. I don't think I've been involved in truly saving someone's life until we met a referral from one of our investigators on Friday. We have been dropping off food at her house for three weeks now after we volunteer at the food bank. We usually just drop it off and run, but this week we decided to hand deliver it. To our surprise, she was home and she let us in. After shooing all of the people out of the house, she sat on her couch and preceded to tell us one of the saddest stories I have ever heard in my entire life. She has bordline-personality disorder from a life of distrust of others. Both of her parents, abused her, drugged themselves and her up since the time she was three. Both of them have cancer and are now in jail. (Probably lung cancer: It smelled like a casino in there). She decided to become a teenage mother to create a normal family situation, but the system took her daughter away. Regardless, her whole life she has had to be the mom for her siblings as well. She told me about things that her younger siblings have done, and choices they've made and I just wanted to cry--they are 15 and 12 and have done things no grown person should ever do, let alone a middle school child. She has to unspeakable things to make money for her family, and she has attempted ending her own life several times. She is the sweetest, nicest, and most loving person. She is just trying to love, forgive, and do what is right, yet she has no self-esteem. I never realized before how powerful the knowledge that we are children of a perfect, loving God is. Nor do I think I ever realized the power and safety of Christ-centered families and homes.

 

Want to know the scariest thing? That could have been me. She is only twenty. I could have been born in her shoes. I could have faced all she faced. WHY DID I GET HANDED SUCH A GOOD LIFE??????????????? I don't know. But I do know that Christ has been in her shoes. I don't think I've understood the atonement as powerfully as I did sitting in that young woman's home. If Christ just suffered what she alone suffered, that would have been an insurmountable task. And yet, He did so much more. I know someone that can take all of that pain, and absorb it for her. All of that anguish, all of her suffering can be swallowed up in the Savior that loves her. Christ is waiting to cradle her in His arms. 2 Nephi 1:15 But behold, the Lord hath redeemed my soul from hell; I have beheld his glory, and I am encircled about eternally in the arms of his love.
 

This experience made me realize/remember why I am going into recreation therapy. Writing papers is fun, creating things is fun, teaching people is worthwhile, so is healing bodies, but healing a soul... To me there is no greater cause.
 

Please turn to Christ, and let Him heal your souls. I realize everyday, my own nothingness. I teach, but really the spirit is the teacher. I find, but really God is putting people he has already prepared in my path. I work, but He has created my body, given me everything that I have, the air I breathe and the food I eat. Please, let go, just hand back what is really God's anyways and let Christ heal your soul.
 

I love you, and I will try to expand my love more and more each day.

Sister Hill