I can be "visited", too...

Brett got me new scriptures for my new calling (Young Womens...Woo hoo!) and I just love them. It's the snap-button kind, so I'm happy I don't have to carry around a case anymore...I already have too much to carry at church!

Check out those crisp new pages!

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The best part is that it has made me excited about reading them again. For some reason after having kids it was just so difficult for me to do that. I wanted to, but it seemed I could never stay awake once I'd opened them. I remembered back in high school having such a love for the scriptures. In my journal from those days I talked about reading them nearly every day--the testimony I had of them, the hunger I had to read them more and more. I wanted to feel that way again. When the new Young Womens presidency members were set apart, each blessing was different. But the one common thread was the promise given to each of us that if we would incorporate the scriptures into our daily lives, we would be blessed with inspiration and peace. When I left the bishop's office, I felt motivated and had a desire to do everything I could to invite the Spirit into my life so that I could truly be a tool in the hands of the Lord for our young women as well as my family. I'm proud of myself and happy to say that I've been reading them everyday for a week now (that might not seem like much to some, but for me it's more than I've done in a very long time). I truly have felt a difference in my life. I'm a more patient mother. I'm prioritizing other aspects of my life better. I feel as though I'm more in-tune. And it's fun to have new scriptures that aren't so "marked up". I'm able to take a fresh approach to scriptures I've read before and find new meanings. Kind of like a clean slate that can inspire my life as it is now. Does that make sense? One scripture I read in a new light was:

2 Nephi 2:16

"...having great desires to know the mysteries of God, wherefore,

I did cry unto the Lord; and behold he did visit me,

and did soften my heart that I did believe all

the words which had been spoken..."

For some reason, in the past I had always interpreted this scripture to mean that the Lord actually physically visited Nephi. Perhaps it's probably obvious to most that He didn't, but until I read it last week, it never occurred to me that the Lord "visited" Nephi in the same way he can and does visit me and the majority of other people: through the Spirit. I read the footnotes in Alma and Doctrine and Covenants. I think that before I almost felt like, "Yeah, but Nephi was the son of a great prophet. And eventually he was a prophet himself. His spiritual level was that of someone whom the Lord would visit. I'm just me. I'm not a great spiritual leader." Somehow, knowing that Nephi's prayers were not answered in some grand vision, but rather, through the spirit, made me feel less insignificant, less unworthy of the Lord's attention. And Nephi made it sound so large-scale. He made it sound as though he and the Lord had an actual conversation. Maybe I need to have a different perspective with my daily prayers; I need to recognize that communication through the spirit is something I've taken for granted. It made me realize that I need to treat that blessing of the Holy Ghost as more of a 'big deal', looking at it as though the Lord and I are having a verbal conversation One-on-one. Anyway, like I said, this may be simple-minded, but I just found it interesting how one little scripture could come across so new to me and bring to light these thoughts and feelings.

P.S. Is that a buff Nephi picture, or what??? I found it on a Janeen Brady website.