A Gold Nugget...

A gem of truth!  I found one!  In Alaska people still go gold panning at times.  You take a pan designed for gold panning, scoop up small amount creekbank soil that hopefully is veined, cover with stream water and swish and swirl and tip and raise and lower the pan, this water movement will wash away the sand/dirt/rocks, the gold will sink to the bottom of the pan...one is ever hopeful of eventually seeing the glint of gold nuggets in the bottom of the pan.  some nuggets are big and rough hewn looking and others little slivered particles of gold shine.  It takes a lot of work and a lot of patience to pan.  

On my recent sabbatical I found many gold gems from my concentrated effort.  I want to share a real gem with you that I found while seeking gold for the health of my soul.

Do you ever feel that if you were a better person in the obedience factor of your life that the help you need, the blessings that you are seeking, the heavenly help you ask for that never seems to arrive... would suddenly be there?  So you try harder to live more righteously, to study more, to pray more, to serve more, to be more in all ways.  And yet...things stay the same and struggles still cling tenaciously.

Let me share my beautiful gold nugget story with you.  Sunday I had BYU channel on and President Cecil Samuelson was speaking and his statement took my breath away.  I hurried to see if I could write it down and I couldn't.  Then I saw it was going to be repeated so I recorded it but missed almost all of it except for my desired thought.  Then I tried to find the talk online and I couldn't.  I went back and painstakingly played and paused the talk to the one spot that I will ever cherish.  Then it came out in the Church news.  Here is the part that just hit me like a lightening bolt....

"One area of confusion not rare among us is the notion that worthiness is synonymous with perfection.  One can be fully worthy in a gospel sense and yet still be growing while dealing with personal imperfections...Perfectionism is corrosive and destructive and is the antithesis of the healthy quest of eventual perfection that the Savior prescribes....The uneasiness of which I speak is largely rooted in misunderstanding some have about timing and also about definition....With definitions...some mistakenly consider worthiness to be the same as perfection.  This is not true....Please remember that worthiness is vital but is not the same as perfection...not everything, especially perfection, can be achieved quickly or at once."

No wonder we get depressed at times,  in giving our all to the Church in obedience and service etc. and feeling unworthy, as needed help still doesn't seem to arrive and we deem ourselves unworthy and so goes the cycle.  The parts I highlighted shine as gold in my eyes.  I hit pay dirt!!!