FLASHES

by Phillip

Nothing I have experienced in probably the past ten years has energized me as much as receiving this call to serve in Sweden.  I mean, that’s where I served forty years ago!  Nobody gets called back to the same mission, do they?

 

No wonder I’m over the moon and most of the big dipper with excitement. 

This kind of exhilaration is completely irrepressible.

That is until I realize just how much Kim and I have to do to prepare to leave everything behind for eighteen months. I mean, how are we going to get everything done?

Tough question.  My best response is to consider how many people’s lives we can influence for the better while we are in Sweden.  And I am so fortunate to have already mastered the Swedish language .

Well, at least I had it mastered forty years ago… or thought I had it mastered.  I mean I can still read Swedish – mostly.  And when I take advantage of the language training offered to senior couples  I find I am remembering Swedish words I haven’t thought of in decades.  I just wish they were the words I needed to complete my thoughts.

I must confess this is how my days go, swinging like a pendulum from euphoria to panic. 

This frenetic bout of hot and cold flashes vacillating from wide eyed wonder to petrifying shock, can toggle back and forth several times in a single hour.

The other morning, while lying in bed long before the alarm was set to ring, I was fretted over how little time we had left to accomplish our preparations.  I was given a gift that morning.  I recalled a verse from the Book of Mormon found in Mosiah 4.

 “And see that all these things are done in wisdom and order; for it is not requisite that a man should run faster than he has strength. And again, it is expedient that he should be diligent, that thereby he might win the prize; therefore, all things must be done in order.”

Joseph Smith received similar counsel in Section 10 of the Doctrine and Covenants.

Since then, I have been able to focus oin my preparations without trepidation.  I move forward with diligence and faith, knowing that we are on God’s errand and He will be with us.