My Missionary

My brother Benjamin is serving his mission in the Long Beach, California Spanish speaking mission.  This letter he sent to my little sister, Becky and she shared it with the rest of us.  It was so powerful that I wanted to share it with everyone else.  He is giving Becky advice about how to best prepare to go on  a mission:


The best way to prepare for a mission is to put Heavenly Father's will before you're own. We each have our own individual way of being instruments in the Lord's hands, but not even we have the mental capacity to understand what it takes to really do the Lord's work. If you are willing to do what God wants you to do, He will show you and guide you. He won't tell you things to study, He'll tell you things to DO. You MUST be willing to serve and act, you MUST be willing to correct your own mistakes, and you MUST rely on the Spirit. That takes a lot of work. You have to study, you have to be converted to the Gospel, but most importantly, you have to LOVE people. So, what you need is faith, hope, charity, and love, with an eye single to the Glory of God. You have to thrust in your sickle with your might, being willing to do whatever it takes, whatever God requires. And you can't have pansies, you've got to be a hard core, weathered, blistered farmer to know how to plant, water, and reap. 

Ultimately, the motivation for going on a mission is out of love for your fellow men, and out of love for God. As a missionary, you are becoming more like God than you have ever been in your life. You are doing what He does all the time. If you have an eye single to that glory, and are willing to submit yourself to His will, and you qualify and are called by His voice, He will give you the necessary power in the very moment that you need it. You will progress faster and learn more quickly, and you will also be shown your weaknesses more painfully. I need to be a missionary, or else I don't learn. I have to be willing to share the Gospel, or my social skills will die. God called me to be a missionary because I would basically shrivel up and die otherwise. 

When you study, if you study with the mindset of "I'm going to use this so that others can understand, or for the benefit of others" and you truly intend to do so, God will bless you, He will inspire your mind, He will more readily answer prayers about people you are willing to help, and He will be closer to you than ever. He'll be right at your side because now you and He are a team. When you do talk with the person, you must follow the Spirit. He will use your skill sets and the skills of your companion to make the best lesson possibly available to Him from each of you. If you weren't inspired to speak, it's because He didn't want you to speak. If He wanted to you say something, it's because He trusted you and your knowledge, and He knew that what you would say would have a greater effect on that person than the words of any other person in that moment. That's why we go to Church. That's why we read the scriptures. For other people who need it more than we do. If we truly are thinking of others, and are planning on helping others, then He will inspire you in your studies, and He will piggyback revelation for other people little things that you needed to know. If you set goals so that you can be a better teacher, a better missionary, or a better friend or more Christlike, then Heavenly Father will bend over backwards to help you with those goals. He'll remind you of goals that work, and he'll tell you that something isn't working. If we become a more selfless people, we will be a people of God. But first must come conversion. 

That's the practice what you're planning on preaching part. Study the doctrine for others, willing to do as God wills, then set goals for yourself, so that you might be more converted to that principle, then pray so that you might have the Spirit as you preach, and then pray that you might be more converted and be more like Christ. Conversion is the key to effective missionary preaching. A natural fruit of conversion is a desire to do good, and to preach the gospel.

Becky, I know that this gospel is true. It is the most substantial truth. I know that God lives and gives us opportunities to be like Him in missionary work, and that He can and will work through you if you have a testimony and are willing to do what He asks, even to the smallest degree. You can and will be the source of great goodness brought about in this generation, and I'm proud to know you. You will have greater power in your conviction and your testimony of living Gospel principles and the blessings that come from them as you work to be converted to the gospel by learning and applying the principles of the Gospel, looking anxiously for the fulfillment of that faith, which is the blessings of being righteous.

This very letter is a great example. I'm writing intending to help you, but God is also giving things to help me as well. So, will you print this out for me, and send it to me in the mail? and then will you print another copy out, and give it to someone thinking of going on a mission? I love you, Becky. 

Elder Bowen

I'm not a groupie...right?

Last Christmas Sarah Sample was doing in home concerts so that she could stay close to her family but still perform.  So my sister Michelle invited her to our house. At first I was a little skeptical, but it turned out great! She has such a spunky and fun personality :)  Her voice was so rich and full...it gave me the chillies (more than one chill, har har).  I decided I like her voice much better in person than on a recording...but I still like her.

For those who don't know Sarah she started singing to audiences in Ellen Eccles Theature while she attended USU around 2000ish.  Since then her career has taken off.  Awesome to know that someone like that came from the same place as me :)

Anyway.  She has a new album coming out and here's a free download of one of her songs!!! Who doesn't like free things? She is more on the folky side so if that drives you nuts (I understand) just go look up the lyrics for it, they are so touching.  Click here for the download. 

I love how she writes about real life. About being a mother.  About going through med. school with her husband.  About missing her kids when she is away.

Plus I think she's gorgeous and can pull off that pixie white hair like I wish I could ;)

Color Me Crafty

Being married does something to a women.  Among other things it has given me permission to actually be a girl.  Without diving too far into the depths of psychology I'll say that I have connected with my desire to be crafty; Painting, sewing, decorating.  All things I voluntarily avoided in my pre-marriage life because those were girly things and I, Heidi Bowen (at the time), did not do girly things.  I rock climbed and hiked big mountains and road my bike in the woods because it was cool and exponentially more fun.

But after my internship I had a few weeks wait before I could start working again.  Being a recreation therapist in an inpatient psych unit calls for A LOT of creativity and my mind was still reeling, begging me to satisfy it's need to think, to be creative. So, I sicked my creative mind on my house.  Here are the results:

Kitchen

Homemade magnets out of my scrap fabric, flowers, and feathers.  I was tired of looking at white.

 Before and after can shelf! A little spray paint, a little fabric and boom! Best corner of the kitchen.  I made the rod for the curtain out of a metal tape measure and fabric and paint was on sale. It all turned out to be about $10

 Menu board.  Found the frame at Wal-mart and painted it white and black.  Dry erase marker for everything else.

Found this beauty at the DI.  It was originally this ugly tan color with a semi cheesy saying on it.  I painted it white and made a stencil from a picture I found on google.  (Congratulations Cassandra on your up coming wedding!)

Living Room:

 I sort of missed the mark with these pillows.  Eh, I'm still a little shaky on my decorating legs.  But, I wanted to document my progress.  I like the shabby style...I'll need some practice.

This one was found on pinterest.  It made me nervous to put lace in my decor.  I felt like I was flirting a little too close to the grandma line.

Painting:

I bought Wal-mart water colors back in high school.  I picked it up again the other day and this is what I did:

Logan Temple.  I saw a couple weeks ago after a few fires.  The smoke made the mountains layer in the coolest way.

 This is a view from a  hike Austin and I took...a couple different ones actually.  The first one was my first shot at it.  Wasn't what I was looking for, so I did it again.

 A weird flower.  I tried modge podge on top of it to see what it would do. It blended the colors interestingly.

This one is Austin's favorite. So it got framed.  A pretty cherry tree to remind us of spring.

Last but not least, the door.  This is my effort to make a Halloween wreath:

Like I said, I'm still finding my decorating legs and haven't quite picked a style I like.  I'm experimenting.  But I must say, it's not too bad being a girl.

"Isn’t it remarkable to think that your very spirits are fashioned by an endlessly creative and eternally compassionate God? Think about it—your spirit body is a masterpiece, created with a beauty, function, and capacity beyond imagination."

Dieter F. Uchtdorf

Happiness, Your Heritage

Quiet Hearts

Today I have a quiet heart.  I usually have a happy and full heart.  But today it is quiet and still.  

Last night Austin and I read in Alma 9.  Alma is calling Ammonihah to repentance and is telling the Nephites that because of the light given them it would be worse for them than the Laminites if they don't repent.  It's supposed to be a little foreboding using words like "destroy" and "transgress".  But the way I read some of the verses in my head it read to me like it was a list of my blessings:

 21 Having been visited by the Spirit of God; having conversed with angels, and having been spoken unto by the voice of the Lord; and having the spirit of prophecy, and the spirit of revelation, and also many gifts, the gift of speaking with tongues, and the gift of preaching, and the gift of the Holy Ghost, and the gift of translation;

 22 Yea, and after having been delivered of God out of the land of Jerusalem, by the hand of the Lord; having been saved from famine, and from sickness, and all manner of diseases of every kind; and they having waxed strong in battle, that they might not be destroyed; having been brought out of bondage time after time, and having been kept and preserved until now; and they have been prospered until they are rich in all manner of things—

Today I saw some thing that made my heart ache and yearn, but it also reminded me of how very aware Heavenly Father is of the desires of my heart.  He has heard my prayers and I've felt how very deeply He cares about those desires.  I decided that I will not be impatient, I'm just going to trust; and I'm going to do it well.  I am enduring well. 

When you're mature...

When you're mature, like Austin and I, you dare your husband to stuff grapes up his nose....and then he does it.

 Haha :)  What a hilarious moment.  Okay, I'm not dedicating a whole post to grape nose.  Although it is worthy of it.  

I find it slightly hilarious that people try to do sexy faces for formal pictures.  I'm not sure if it's because they want their children to look at it while they're perusing old wedding albums, "Look kids! That is what Mommy's face looked like when I was lusting after your father!".  Or if they think it makes them more attractive...I don't know, whatever.  To each man his own.  My policy is if you are taking a picture for a happy occasion you should at least try to look happy.  So this is Austin and I making fun of the sexy face on our walk through the canyon.

We call this shoot: Senior Pictures.

How debonair.

Am I making out with the leaf?  Or the photographer?  Who knows.

Our Deepest Fear

“Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate. Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure. It is our light, not our darkness that most frightens us. We ask ourselves, Who am I to be brilliant, gorgeous, talented, fabulous? Actually, who are you not to be? You are a child of God. Your playing small does not serve the world. There is nothing enlightened about shrinking so that other people won't feel insecure around you. We are all meant to shine, as children do. We were born to make manifest the glory of God that is within us. It's not just in some of us; it's in everyone. And as we let our own light shine, we unconsciously give other people permission to do the same. As we are liberated from our own fear, our presence automatically liberates others.”

~Marianne Williamson

A Return to  Love: Reflections on Principles of A  Course in  Miracles

Introducing: His Chubstanence

Daniel Joshua McKinney was born April 27, 2012 at 2:10 pm and weighed in at 7.7 lbs and 21 inches long. He loves watching fans and clocks.  He loves cooing and smiling at other babys, especially the one in the bathroom mirror.  He loves the sounds of kitty meows and soft singing.

I fell in love with him instantly. 

This is one of his signature positions.  He still does it.

We affectionately call him "His Chubstancance"