Change

I think that I’ve mentioned before that as beings born from a timeless world we are not used to change. I think of different periods in my life like when I was young and just going to college or when my children were little and how I thought that they would always be the same, but I got older and so did my children and it all happened way faster than I expected.

Change happens many times faster here in the mission but there is still that illusion that things will not change. When we arrived here in Mexico nearly fifteen months ago we thought for example that we would always have President Sister Crickmore with us. They leave in four days. What is even more scary is the end of our mission coming like the ground as if we´d jumped out a plane without a parachute. When we arrived here we thought we had all the time in the world.

Clearly part of the reason that our Heavenly Father fashioned this test that we call mortal life like he did was so that we could learn to understand and appreciate time. Living with Him in our premortal lives we probably had little or no concept of it. Change there must have been nearly imperceptible. We could expect the people we loved to be there today, tomorrow, and nearly forever. But that was an illusion too.

   

I’ve learned a little from these experiences. When I was with my young grandchildren I treasured every day, knowing that they would not last forever. On this mission, having learned from my last, I have kept a careful diary of what has happened to us here, treasuring our experiences for the future when I will not feel the Spirit so powerfully on a daily basis. Out of it all, I feel gratitude for the life my Heavenly Father has blessed me with and the knowledge that one day I will return to the timeless world and there the associations that have seemed far too fleeting in this life will be renewed and much more appreciated for the eternities to come.