LDSscrap

Please not in my yard

A brother in our ward used to bring in youths from other stakes to do service projects in the neighborhood. Last year there were so many youth and to few projects so we received a ward of youth at our home with leaders in tow. Now my home does need work. It is 100 years old. We do work on it too, when we aren't at some child's event, church activity, extended family happening, service project, school, the doctors or flat in bed sick. But the point is I am capable of working on my own home, so I felt embarrassed when leaders and youth came knocking. Was there not someone more deserving or needy than me?


It is hard to accept service sometimes. Our natural pride gets in the way. After the pride usually comes humility. You are humbled that complete strangers would pitch in to clean out your back yard, hose down your siding, and take out the old apple tree. Then comes gratitude. All those projects were done in a few hours. It would have taken me and my family a few months. How grateful I was for these people to sacrifice their time.

Journal Challenge:

1. Journal or scrapbook about a time you accepted service. Was it with a grateful heart or a little bit of swallowed pride.

2, Share a time when you should have asked for a little bit of help but did not.

3. Did you ever refuse service? Could you really have used the help? How did you feel?

4. Share your feeling about the ultimate act of service from our Savior Jesus Christ. Have you accepted all that He is willing to do for you?

Have you ever had to accept service? 

O Pioneer...

Our home is located just North of the First Encampment Park in Salt Lake City. It is on the corner of 17th South and 5th East and according to history the first place that the pioneers stayed upon arriving in the valley. It was a small group sent ahead to see what they could find. These first pioneers names are now engraved on the big boulders located in this tiny little park. My children like to call it the Rock Park and we often visit and wonder about the names on the rocks. We also live across the street from one of Wilford Woodruff's homes and an older farm home of his. The owners have restored these places beautifully. We are so lucky to be surrounded by pioneer history.

Everyone has pioneers in their family. Maybe they did not cross the plains, but they did sacrificed in their own way to be the first in their family to accept the gospel. My father is a pioneer. He converted in London, England after standing up for some missionaries who were being heckled. He met my Mom, a missionary form a small town in Idaho a few years later. He came to the States to marry her and start his family. He left behind his nine siblings, his extended family, his culture, and life, and pioneered forward for a new life.

We encourage you to discover the first pioneers in your family. Those who accepted the gospel and created a new life for themselves. Journal or scrapbook those experiences.