Feeling Strengthened

Recently I have thought about decisions I have made in the past, and how things are going to work out for me in the future because of them.  I have questioned myself and those decisions.  I have found myself doubting and afraid.  I have wondered if "maybe I could try to date so-and-so again.  Maybe I didn't give it enough of a try", or "maybe I could go back to Provo instead of go to Utah State - that might be easier."   "What exactly do new relationships, or a new school, or a new environment hold for me?"  These questions are talked about in one of my favorite talks by Elder Holland "Faith is for the Future."  He tells the story of how one night he and his new bride were walking along BYU campus feeling slightly discouraged at the things they were lacking.  Particularly money.  He turned to his wife Pat, and in a moment of despair and desperate confusion told her, "we can go back, I can get a decent enough job to provide for us, we don't have to be here."  She then grabbed him by the lapels and told him, "we are not going back.  The future holds everything for us."  It is this very story, and those very lines that come to my mind whenever I think about taking the less frightening or possibly easier rout.  Elder Holland said that years and years later, after that experience, he would sit on BYU campus and watch young students much like his old self walk around with expressions of their faces that seemed to ask the same questions that I have asked myself in the last while.  To them - to me - he said to some effect:  "Faith is for the future.  The future holds everything."
I know I cannot go back.  Am I scared?  Yes.  Will it be hard?  Most definitely.  However, I am where I am for a reason.  Maybe lots of reasons.  I don't really know what the Lord has planned for me,  I know it's something though, so for now I go with that.  I told my Becca the other day, when we were talking about life and growing up, "so we step into the future and into the unknown with our fists clenched to hide our shaking hands, our heads held high to intimidate the enemy, and with faith in the Lord to lead us to victory.  We will not go back."  Okay, I didn't say exactly that, but it was close and it's true!  I love the Gospel of Jesus Christ.  I love Him.  He LIVES!  He conquered death and lives.  It is through Him that we live as well.  Now and forever.   We are children of a loving Father in Heaven and He is all knowing - and WE WILL BE GUIDED.  "Faith is believing that the outcome with be good.  Worry is believing that the outcome will be bad.  Faith in the Lord Jesus Christ is believing that whatever the outcome, it will indeed be for our BEST good."  So, my friends, I've said it a thousand times, and I'll say it again.  "The future is as bright as your faith," and "we are NOT going back."
Happy Sunday, indeed. :)