Number One?

It has been a long time! I got a job and it has pretty much consumed my life, I now work 12 hour night shifts at Roplast Industries...it is okay most of the time, just draining.

I haven't been focusing on my other goals because of it though, I have no idea what I weigh, but I feel lighter, I squat a lot at work so my thighs have been a-burning. other than that though, I work out here and there but not enough to burn more calories than I consume, just like morning warm-up type work-outs.

The calling is good, life itself is really good, I miss a lot of my friends but the holidays brought a lot of them to town and I got to see Grace so I am set for awhile.

I did receive my first talk, I give it next Sunday. Wish me luck!! I will be telling my conversion story...which means I say Great Scott!'s name a LOT. Win some, lose some I guess. I am trying to keep up with my studying but I am very behind. I need to make it a priority again, because in all honesty, I really miss it. Welp, I have to go get ready for work, see how fast that free time went? It is crazy!! But first, the first rough draft of my talk is done, here it is:

I am going to apologize in advance for any stuttering, and any excessive use of the word “umm”.

I so graciously received the ever-vague topic of “Anything You Want,” luckily Sutton offered up some suggestions, one of which was to tell the story of my conversion, so I suppose I should also apologize for talking about myself so much and the amount of times I am sure to say the name “Jordan”.

I spent, honestly, hours trying to figure out when my conversion story actually began, and perhaps unfortunately it began a long time ago. Naturally to figure it out, I went through all my old journals, which for those who don’t know me, is an extensive collection. I will skip a lot of years, don’t worry, some because of relevance, some because I just can’t say them out loud, let alone to an audience. I decided to start at the age of 6, when my mom married the man that I had already started calling “Dad”. Until that point of my life, despite the fire, the homeless months, Chris’s misguided attempts at our lives, my grandparents…I hadn’t ever heard of “Christ” unless it was pronounced “krissst” and ended in “mus”. Jesus, religion, God; were all foreign concepts to me. I didn’t know what prayer was, or why Shane talked to our food before we ate, or what it was like to believe in something. Shane (my dad) is a Jehovah’s Witness. My mom’s parents were religious when she was young, she grew up in a Witness home even, but because of her own trials she was convinced that if there was a God, he obviously didn’t care, so for her, teaching us religion gave us false hope. So he was not a part of our lives, until my dad came around. Now, he wasn’t model Witness. We didn’t pray every night, or read scriptures as a family, actually, the longer my parents were together the less religion seemed to be around.

We went to meeting for a few years, until my brother was born. The following few years were full of hit and miss Sundays, Tuesdays, and Thursdays. Now, the only thing they attend in a year is Memorial.

I am going to skip way ahead now, to when I was eleven, I broke my back. Or rather, my back broke me. I was asleep, it’s a long story, bottom line I still have no idea what happened to me; just that it did. In the years between 11 and 14 I went through countless tests, 29 MRI’s, 2 non-conclusive-scar-leaving biopsy’s, a ton of stress, and I even came to terms with death at one point when I was 12 when Cancer was the “logical cause” since my grandfather had died when I was eight from it. I went so far as writing a bucket list of nine things I never thought I would be able to do.

I tell you this because that was the first time in my life that I knelt at the end of my bed and asked God to help me. I asked that, if he couldn’t heal me, if he could at least make it not hurt to die, I asked if he would watch over my mom and my sister when I was gone, I asked him if he would let me make a friend before so someone not related to me would remember me. I cried myself to sleep every night when I could find sleep, I went to school and put up with all the stupid kids, and I started asking my grandparents about God, and his Son, and about the Truth. I met a Witness girl at meeting and went with her family to bible study and Tuesday meetings. I went with them when my family didn’t go on Sunday’s as well. I never learned anything, but I went and doodled on my notebook and wrote down the scriptures they looked up so I could read them with my grandpa later. I went through the motions. I was 14 when I stopped going entirely. It didn’t feel right, and I had made it through my back. I didn’t need God anymore, the biggest lie I have ever told myself. I wasn’t friends with the girl anymore; I had new worldly friends, I was starting high school, and belief wasn’t a priority in my life.

Now, backtracking a bit, in seventh grade I did make friends, one of which, was Our very own Trevor Hardwick. I didn’t know he was Mormon. He never talked about religion, in all honesty though, I wouldn’t have responded well to it if he had, I wasn’t ready. I didn’t recognize that I hadn’t gotten myself through my trials, I couldn’t see why I would even have trials if God cared. I know better now, of course. Back then though, I almost held God in contempt for the sheer amount of times I had had to face death and move on.

I was right where Satan wanted me.

Now, don’t get me wrong, I was a good kid, straight A’s, good friends, I wasn’t allowed to date so guys were a non-issue, I had seen the negative effects of alcohol and tobacco first hand, I pumped enough kegs as I kid I will never feel the urge to do it again. But I had decided that if I couldn’t see it then it wasn’t worth my time.

Now, I made friends in high school (who I love dearly) but were very set in their beliefs to a point where if you said something that even bordered on disagreeing with them, they would shove it down your throat, and I already had grandparents for that, so it wasn’t appreciated. By that point I kind of shut out anything religious, I told myself that there was no way to figure out who was right. So I didn’t try.

Sophomore year about five of my friends divulged their crush to me (all the same guy) and you will NEVER guess who it was. Don’t worry, I am going to tell you, but for those of you who don’t know Jordan Collins, he is great, you should make it a point to meet him when he gets back from Africa. He is one of the absolute best friends I have ever had. Back to high school though, he was undoubtedly attractive, but I got real sick real fast of hearing gooey girl-crush things from all my friends. I didn’t have any classes with him, or know him personally, or care about his perfect smile or mor-do.

By the end of sophomore year; however, our groups had merged and bonded through homecomings and he hung out with us every day, and I finally asked what “Mor-Do” meant. And that was the first time I had heard of Mormons. We talked a bit, exchanged numbers, and that summer I asked a few questions, we laughed, you know, became friends, blah-blah-blah. Junior year I did have classes with him, and I am not sure exactly when it happened but it became a habit that every time my grandparents talked to me about Anything religious, or scripture based, I turned around and asked Jordan what he believed about it. In a lot of aspects the two religions matched up for a long time: the trinity for example. As I kept asking questions the differences started emerging and my curiosity just kept growing and growing. With Junior year came more friends crushing on Jordan, a closer friendship between us, and a lot of homework help. I found myself talking to him almost every day, either about religion or about school, or just making jokes and always being sarcastic. I went to him for everything I could, because whether I liked it or not, he always gave me the best advice, and he always told me point blank when I was being stupid and just needed to swallow my feelings and move on. He always told me why I was being stupid to, like he gave me a list of reason, we argued for about nine and half hours once about it.

By the summer between Junior and Senior year I was staying up until 2 or 3 in the morning multiple times a week asking Jordan questions until one of us fell asleep, usually him. I felt annoying, but I didn't stop so...I asked him about God and about Hell and dis-fellowship, gays, the whole caffeine thing everyone says, I asked about garments and modesty, and what I learned was called the presidency in a ward or branch, about God having a physical body (which was a huge revelation that someone actually believed he had one, that for me, was huge because I had been asking that question for years). He told me about the three kingdoms of glory, and about the priesthood authority, about the spirit world, and life after death. I asked about prayer a lot. And so much more.

Senior year I started dating this guy named Josh, and he didn’t like how much I went to Jordan with my issues and questions, and well, he really just didn’t like me even being friends with Jordan. I told him I wasn’t going to completely give up Jordan, but that I would stop texting him so much. I could see where he was coming from, so the questions, the late night conversations, pretty much everything short of AP Homework help, just stopped. After a little while of me brushing conversations off, Jordan didn’t push it, he isn’t that type of guy, he just let it go.  So for about five and a half months, that’s how things were. I made huge, life-changing mistakes in those months that pushed the boundaries of my morals. I was happy, but I wasn’t being the best me that I had been becoming.

Through those months things were great and then okay, but one thing never changed and drove me absolutely batty. Josh’s insecurities about Jordan seemed to escalate and were actually a huge reason that the relationship ended in the terms that it was. Jordan and I started talking again outside of school,  the same week, there was a very…public, very almost aggressive incident at the school blood drive. After that Jordan and my original relationship picked right back up where it left off, only it started speeding up, I started asking my questions (and I had a lot by this point) I think it was a little overwhelming for him.

One night around midnight, he asked me if he could give me a Book of Mormon. I was skeptical because I had already asked my grandpa his opinion of the Mormons and he, well he definitely had one. But I thought about it, and I figured, this is a wonderful guy, the other Mormons I know at school are amazing (Jen Carlson was also a very close friend by that point, I asked her some things while with josh, even then I needed my dose of Mormon apparently). Anyways, I told myself that, there was no harm reading a book that some of the best people in my life lived by. I thought that, even if I didn’t end up believing in it, I would probably become a better person just from reading it. So I said yes, and the very next day Jordan gave me a little blue book and when I opened it in my next class I saw that he had written in it, which initially made me a little upset because I mean he had written in my book! But then I read what he wrote, and I almost cried in class. He had marked Moroni 10:3-5. And also his favorite scripture: Ether 12:27, which I didn’t actually know he marked until recently. As I began reading I had an abundance more questions, and he tried to answer all of them, a couple weeks later he asked if I was interested in attending General Conference with his family. I didn’t really know what I was signing up for, but I said yes, and I absolutely just wanted nothing more than for it to just keep going on, I did not want to go home, or stop taking notes. I wanted to just sit in that chapel and listen to them speak. That same week he asked if I would take the lessons with the missionaries. I was freaked out, I was thinking “oh man, what has my curiosity led to” what will my parents think? But most importantly I wanted to know if I believed any of it, so I said yes. The first lesson was okay, I wasn’t comfortable with the missionaries yet, thankfully Jordan was always there. I am very uncomfortable around new people, we met multiple times every week.

One thing I do remember from the first lesson was when Elder Lundell spoke for the first time, and asked me if I would ever consider baptism. It was, no joke, the first words out of his mouth. I said, way less eloquently than this, “that I would be baptized if and only if I truly believed that the religion was true, and not a moment sooner.” A couple more lessons down and I just knew. I knew there was no way I would ever be able to forget about the priesthood, about the way I felt at general conference, about the Restoration, the way I felt when I read the Book of Mormon, the way it had already impacted my life. And it was at Jordan’s house, at a lesson when they asked if I would be baptized on May 11th. I hesitated, not because I didn’t want it, but because of my family. I said yes anyways, again. My parents knew at this point that I was taking the lessons…but they didn’t know about my conversations and curiosity before that so…it was a huge shock to them and my dad wouldn’t sign the paper that would allow me to be baptized…luckily I didn’t need his signature anyways. To this day he believes I converted for some guy, and for a while it bothered me, but I decided that as long as I know why I converted that he can think whatever he wants.

Before my baptism I tried to make them understand, they sat in on lessons, my grandparents did too. It was a bad idea. 100% the biggest mistake from my conversion. It hurt me, it was horrifyingly painful to listen to their opinions when the missionaries left, and then my phone buzzed and I was sitting there in the corner of my couch crying while I was being, instructed, for lack of a better term, for my stupidity. But as I said, my phone buzzed and I read a message from Jordan that said, and I quote, “That was awesome. One of the best lessons I have ever been to.” Which just made me cry for a whole new reason. The missionaries sent me a message that was almost identical. They loved the lesson, it was adventurous and different. So I got interviewed, got baptized, confirmed, a couple months later Jed and Tiffany Hancock took Jordan and I to the Temple, and he baptized me there too, it was amazing.

And I could say, “And that’s my conversion story!” but that’s not true. Everything I have said up to this point has been simply a very long winded testimony about conversion. I experience conversion as I live the gospel, every time I kneel down to pray, or I open my scriptures to study, or I see the beauty and think “He put that here for me to witness” or I talk about the Gospel with anyone, when I get emails from Africa telling me that I inspire him, when I go to Thanksgiving with the Torricelli’s and the Collins’ and fifty some-odd people pray together, when I set the example to myself of who I want to be when I grow up and get married and have kids. I convert again and again, every day that I live true to the Gospel, I can’t imagine my life any differently, I know that Jordan’s favorite scripture is true, I know that God gives me weakness so that it can be turned into strength, I know that through faith, and action, I can do anything with His help. I can overcome anything. I will always be a convert, but I hope that there won’t come a day in any of our lives that we aren’t converted. I hope that my conversion can be renewed daily as I live what I have come to believe. And finally, I hope that all of you can find it in yourselves to recognize the little things that re-convert you every single day, the little moments that remind you why you are here, what you believe, and where you come from, and to just be thankful for those moments, because your personal conversion, is your blessing from God that no one will ever be able to take from you.

I say these things in the name of Jesus Christ. Amen.

 So, there it is, Draft Number One.

Declaration-assertion of belief or knowledge; avowal.

 

 

Sincerely,

SamanthaMarie