Sticks & Stones and Wild Beasts

Hello!

How is everyone? Good? Good! Thank you so much for all the emails and prayers being sent my way. I love the emails and can always feel your prayers:).  So another great week here in Nampa. The temple tours are now done. It is definitely a bitter sweet. We are sad to leave the temple but so excited to get back to normal missionary proselyting (and finally get to use the referrals we have been getting YAY). 

So since we have been at the temple so much, I have gotten to study my scriptures a lot. It has been the best! I want to share with you one quick lesson that I've learned from my studies this week. So if you will all turn to 1 Nephi Chapter 16 with me hehe. Chapter 16 is the bom.com and there is just so much you can learn from it but I will share one quick message. 

So the story goes. Nephi and his family are in the wilderness and things are going well. They have weapons to get food. They have this Liahona (compass) that is guiding them to where they need to go. Life is pretty swell. Then Nephi's bow breaks and chaos ensues. Everyone is upset... Lehi, Ishmael, Lamen, even Nephi BUT Nephi instead of just being upset goes to work. He finds sticks and stones and he makes weapons. Then he goes and he fights off "wild beasts" with these hand-made weapons. 

A few things we can get out of this:

1.) Take what you have to the Lord and he will make it work. 

Sticks and stones are all Nephi had. He didn't have fine steel or a professional bow maker. He had sticks, stones, a determined mind, and faith in the Lord. Then he goes to his father, the prophet, so he can ask of the Lord to make it work... and it did. 

2.) BOOM the Lord will make it even better 

Not only didn't it work, but the results were better than before. Verse 14 says they went and "slain food". What does Nephi slay? "WILD BEAST". Nephi doesn't just get some bunny or duck for his family. He is bringing back the whole bear. 

When we bring all we can to the Lord he does not just qualify us. No. He over qualifies us. He takes our abilities and talents and weakness and makes them more useful than we could ever imagine. This week I had so many just bunnies and ducks that I thought would be impossible for me to overcome, like talking on the phone and approaching people on the street. However, I took all I had to the Lord and put my trust in His hands and I came home each night with bears hanging on my shoulders. The Lord can do miracles if you simply let Him. He has performed miracles in me, he has performed miracles in my investigators, and he can perform miracles in you. Let him!

I love all of you guys and I hope you have a great week!

Love Sister Aase 

A member in our ward, my Trainer, Sister Soelberg, & ME!