Sweet Sunday

First I wanted to encourage you to read this lovely post that my boys' second grade teacher, Jackie Warner wrote on her blog. It's a sweet and uplifting story about the power of the Holy Ghost to comfort and the 'tender mercies' as Jackie puts it that God so often grants us. I've been thinking of this story a lot over the last few days and thought perhaps you might enjoy it too.

Today I had a neat thing happen - a happy mom moment. David and I often think our one boy, Charlie is terribly contrary. He's a 'contrarian'. If everyone's going one way, Charlie will want to go the opposite direction. For instance, yesterday afternoon we had tithing settlement. David, Xander and I all sat erect and eager to answer the Bishops questions; Charlie sat sprawled across his seat generally exuding an aura of disdain and, well, contrariness. The Bishop commented on how Xander was a fine young man, so reverent, so well mannered. Of course he extended his compliment to Charlie as well, but everyone (including Charlie) knew it was meant for Xan.

And so it will likely go for Charlie most of his life, particularly at Church; he will appear to be contrary and people will judge him for it. When preparing for the Primary program at Church Xander accused Charlie of not being a good boy because he didn't want to participate in the program. Charlie said "I love Jesus, I just don't like to sing." And that pretty much sums up Charlie as evidenced by today's testimony meeting.

I had asked the boys if they wanted to bear their testimonies because they often do, but had not the past two months or so. Xan said he didn't think so and Charlie said he was thinking about it. They were busy coloring. I bore my testimony about the power of music to carry the thoughts of our heart to Heavenly Father when our words don't seem adequate enough. Before passing the mic I asked the boys if they wanted to use it, but both passed. Several more testimonies were born and the boys quietly colored without expressing any interest in what was going on around them. When suddenly Charlie put the cap on his marker and stood up. He had to sit down and wait for his turn, but he didn't falter and soon he had the mic in his hand.

In a clear voice, free of baby-talk (which he often affects) he bore his testimony about his love for Jesus. He said he knew Jesus was his Savior and that He was his favorite person. He spoke for a full minute or so, all about the Savior and his love for him. His testimony was heart-felt, utterly sincere and completely unique to Charlie. It was his testimony.

This little boy is an enigma to me. He appears to be rebellious, contrary, disdainful. But inside he is feeling and thinking and connected. He is a river that runs deep.

Tonight David received a blessing from Kenny and Daniel, his nephews. These boys are amazing boys, I love them so much. Scratch that, they are amazing MEN. (Both are married, duh.) In the blessing Kenny said something about how when the boys are older our whole family will be together again and there will be no angry feelings. He was speaking of Sam returning home, surely. Something huge we hope really will happen one day. He also said something else that made evident Heavenly Father's hand in the blessing because no one else knows about it.

We are thinking of trying to find our last child through adoption. We have, in visions past, seen our family and in dreams presently, felt our last child near. All are accounted for except for a little girl. We had the opportunity to be considered as the adoptive parents recently but it fell through. Now we feel we need to take official steps toward finding this child. Scary! We feel so old, haha, but we want to be obedient and more than that, we want this girl in our life. In blessings past we've been told that she would be "a gift" and in our visions and dreams of her she has been a joy.

The Christmas devotional, music practice for a Christmas program I'm involved in ... everything about this day has been sweet, renewing, uplifting. A sweet Sunday, indeed!