I know, I know... it's been ages!! I should be doing dishes!!! I just wanted to quick share. I've mentioned briefly the Temple Walk our young men and young women are doing, from the Draper Temple to the Salt Lake Temple. Well now we're about six weeks away from the big day and so that means I get to train... a lot!! We were given a training schedule by the ward that did this last year, and you walk 4 days a week, between 3 and 13 miles. We've done five 3 milers, three 4 milers, a 6 miler, and an 8 miler. Tomorrow I have to walk 4, Saturday we are walking 10. It nearly kills me every time. That may be a slight exaggeration, but this is the hardest thing I've done in a while. Last Sunday we had a meeting to get our ward on board to support our effort and we talked about how this experience isn't about walking. It's about showing our youth that the Temple is important. It's a metaphor for them to prepare to be worthy to someday enter the Temple and partake of the work and the Spirit there. It's an opportunity for them to sacrifice and to find out that they can indeed do hard things. In the midst of teaching them this lesson, I too am learning what it means to sacrifice and to accomplish something hard. There are a few of our youth and probably some of the leaders that could wake up that Saturday morning and walk 22 1/2 miles with very little thought or preparation. I am not included in that number. I can barely walk 3 miles with very little thought or preparation. Last Saturday, we walked 8. I'm learning with every week, that even though I think I can't make it, I can. I may make it a few minutes behind the rest, but I am present and accounted for. I've been thinking a lot about that. Each of us is at a different place in our lives. Each of us is striving to be the best we know how to be, and it doesn't really matter how we do it, or how long it takes... as long as we all end up in the same place in the end. Holly, our YW president has mentioned before, that like this walk, some of our youth will probably make it to the Temple without much preparation. They will probably end up in a place in their lives where they are worthy to enter and receive the blessings of the Temple, without having to endure the hard things, but how much stronger will they be if they figure out they can in fact handle hard things. I believe with all my heart, that those are the kids that are going to endure to the end and make it back to Heavenly Father. This walk is inspired by John Rowe Moyle, a stonecutter on the Salt Lake Temple, who walked this distance every year for 20 + years and then after being kicked by a cow, walked on a homemade wooden leg, and carved "Holiness to the Lord" on the east wall of the Temple. There is a movie about him called "Only a Stonecutter." At the end of the movie, it says "John Rowe Moyle was not just carving words. He was setting in stone what it was that motivated him to act. Holiness to the Lord." I want to be motivated to act by Holiness to the Lord, and that's why I've chosen to do this hard thing. I believe that this experience will change my life.
