My baby girl just got baptized! It was the sweetest thing. She was nervous before, but right after she was fluttering. “I’m baptized!” she exclaimed to me as I was wrapping the towel around her. Her hands were fluttering away (it’s her excited tick – to flap her hands in front of her and jump up and down) and her face beamed with radiant happiness. Nothing could have taken it away – it was that unstoppable happiness you get when you KNOW something, when what you know is far beyond anyone or anything else. Jentri was radiating with the Light of Christ, that pure, certain knowledge, and she was happy, truly happy.
This wasn’t the first time I’ve seen that Light in someone’s face this weekend. Just yesterday I attended my cousin’s funeral. Funerals are sad, yes, but they are also sweet – sweet in that you get to see family and friends you haven’t seen in years. My cousin was there. I don’t even remember the last time I saw her. As kids we were close and played together often. But as adults, we have grown far apart.
Life has been difficult to her. She has gone through some very difficult things over the past twenty years and has known more than her share of darkness. I was hoping she would be there. I had heard that she had remarried and was preparing to attend the temple. So when she walked through the door, I jumped up and went straight to her. I gave her a big hug and inquired about her life. She had just recently gone through the Las Vegas temple. She beamed with that same Light as she went on about how happy she was, how much she loved the temple and how she never wants to leave when she is there. And then she added some words that simply brought me to tears. She said, “It’s the peace I’ve been needing all this time.”
I hugged her and excused myself to the restroom where I bawled like a little baby. (Luckily I was at a funeral and it was okay for me to look like I had been crying, ha ha.) These tears weren’t tears of sadness, nope, they were tears of gratitude and humility. I can’t tell you enough how amazing our Heavenly Father really is. How special His love is. My cousin suffered for so many years and now knows peace and happiness through the Gospel of Jesus Christ. This is what He does for us. This is repentance. This is salvation. This is hope. This is His love.
I am so happy for her! And I am so happy for my baby girl. And I am so happy for all of the other people I have witnessed and will yet witness find peace and happiness through the Savior’s rescuing grace. I conclude in unison the words of Ammon, “Now my brethren, we see that God is mindful of every people, whatsoever land they may be in; yea, he numbereth his people, and his bowels of mercy are over all the earth. Now this is my joy, and my great thanksgiving; yea, and I will give thanks unto my God forever. Amen.” (Alma 26)
Forever grateful!
