Something I can't live without - 5.20.12

I team teach the 12-15 year old Sunday School class with one of the best ladies I know.  She and I have been great friends and have done a lot of crazy things together.  I sure do love her!  But, sometimes I worry I flake on her to much.  It's probably because I do.  Like last Sunday when I was supposed to teach the lesson and I text her Sunday morning to tell her I sick and not be able to make it.  I felt so bad about it that I decided there was no way in China I was going to do that to her this week.  Even if I didn't feel good and had been sick again this morning (too much sun, not enough fluids or food make for a sick me).  But I made it to teach the lesson.  I walked in thinking this is going to be one of those lessons....The one's that everyone is going to just look at you and not say a word.  The one where all of the kids are going to be thinking, will this woman please just shut up. Well, I had just got started giving my speal about how if I ran out throwing up that Myndi would take over the lesson when the Sunday School President came in to ask her to go to some teacher development class.  So I didn't have a backup plan, but sweet little Amanda, one of my most favorite young women in the whole world said a really sweet prayer that I would make it through the lesson and that they would learn something.  Bless her!

So I get started with the lesson, and in walks Brother Someone, (not sure who he even is, but I am pretty sure he is in the Sunday School Presidency).  I LOVE TEACHING TEENAGERS, but I don't like teaching adults so much, and I am not really sure why, but this guy made me nervous.  Probably the biggest reason was because I had only looked at the lesson one time and that had been just a quick glance through to see what the lesson was on and if I needed to prepare anything special.  Not my best lesson!

Anyway, the lesson was on our Membership in the Church of Jesus Christ.  Isn't it amazing how when you are thinking about something there is a little parting of the clouds and an amen comes down.  Today lesson was a case in point... I had been thinking about the picture today "Something I can't live without" and as I was teaching that amen came.

I can't live without my testimony.  I have tried, trust me I have.  There have been several moments in the last year that I have thought I could just throw in the towel and be done with everything I knew.  But, it always comes back, usually full circle to that sweet reminder that I know better.  I can't live without the knowledge that I have a Heavenly Father who loves me, and that He loves me enough to give me opportunities to grow and become a better person.  I can't live with the knowing that I have a kind and loving older brother who was willing and able to come live a cruel life and atone for my sins and pay my price to return to live with my Heavenly Father, and because of his atonement that I ALWAYS have someone who knows exactly what I am going through.  I can't live without the knowledge that Joseph Smith as a young man went into a grove asking a simple question and there He saw Heavenly Father and Jesus Christ.  I can't live without knowing that President Thomas S. Monson is a prophet of God who leads the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints today, and that He receives revelation directly from Heavenly Father.

And more importantly to me today... I can't live without the knowledge that Families can be forever and that because of everything else that I know as a Member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints I know I will see my Dad again.  It's what keeps me going on the days I don't want to.  It is what gives me the desire to be a better person.  It is what gives me hope.  It is what gets me out of bed every morning. Today, I can't live without that.