Day 203

     The hair Katie is growing looks darker than the hair she had before.  She had blond hair before the cancer, and last time it started to grow in, it was also very blond.  This time however, it looks darker.  The doctor told us that sometimes after chemo a person's hair can grow back a totally different color and texture.  Whatever color or texture her hair is, I am glad she has hair coming in - but I will miss her blond hair, if it isn't blond.  I guess time will tell...  She is beautiful no matter what - hair, no hair, blond, or brunette, curly, or straight.
     I was recently asked to share some thoughts, at a women's meeting at church, about patience like unto Sarah (wife of Abraham).  I am including this today for Katie to refer to in the future.  Most of these are quotes I have already posted, but they are some of my favorite quotes that have helped me learn more about patience, enduring, and trust in the Lord.

     It is easy to be patient with our family when our house is clean and our children are well behaved.  It is easy to be patient with ourselves, others, and God when our life is running smoothly.  However, having the "patience of Sarah" in the midst of our adversities can be challenging.  Here are five areas of patience I have learned about through my personal adversities:
1. Patient Endurance: 
     Neal A. Maxwell said: "Patient endurance is to be distinguished from merely being 'acted upon.'  Endurance is more than pacing up and down within the cell of our circumstance; it is not only acceptance of the things allotted to us, it is to 'act for ourselves' by magnifying what is allotted to us.  (See Alma 29:3, 6).
     "To endure in faith and doeth God's will involves much more than putting up with a circumstance.  Rather than shoulder-shrugging, true enduring is soul-trembling...Patient endurance permits us to cling to our faith in the Lord and our faith in His timing when we are being tossed about by the surf of circumstance.  Even when a seeming undertow grasps us, somehow, in the tumbling, we are being carried forward, though battered and bruised." (Ensign, Neal A. Maxwell, "Endure it Well").
2. Patience in the Lord's Timing: 
    "Faith means trust - trust in God's will, trust in His way of doing things, and trust in His timetable.  We should not try to impose our timetable on His...The issue for us is trusting God enough to trust also His timing.  If we can truly believe He has our welfare at heart, may we not let His plans unfold as He thinks best?
     "...Indeed, we cannot have true faith in the Lord without also having complete trust in the Lord's will and in the Lord's timing.
     "...Commit yourself to put the Lord first in your life...Faith and trust in the Lord give us the strength to accept and persist, whatever happens in our lives...
     "Stand ready to accept the Lord's planning and the agency of others in matters that inevitably affect you.  Plan, of course, but fix your planning on personal commitments that will carry you through no matter what happens.  Anchor your life to eternal principles, and act upon those principles whatever the circumstances and whatever the actions of others.  Then you can await the Lord's timing and be sure of the outcome in eternity...The most important Principal of timing is to take the long view." (Ensign, Dallin H. Oaks, "Timing", Oct., 2003).
3. Patience With Time Itself:
     "Paul wrote of how, even after faithful disciples had 'done the will of God,' they 'had need of patience.' (Heb: 10:36)...We are to 'run with patience the race that is set before us' (Heb. 12:1), and it is a marathon, not a dash...When you and I are unduly impatient, we are suggesting that we like our timetable better than God's.
     "By itself, of course, the passage of time does not bring an automatic advance.  Yet, like the prodigal son, we often need the 'process of time' in order to come to our spiritual senses.  The touching reunion of Jacob and Esau in the desert, so many years after their sibling rivalry, is a classic example.  Generosity can replace animosity.  Reflection can bring perception.  But reflection and introspection require time.  So many spiritual outcomes require saving truths to be mixed with time, forming the elixir of experience, that sovereign remedy for so many things.
     "Without patient and meek endurance we will learn less, see less, feel less, and hear less.  We who are egocentric and impatient shut down so much of our receiving capacity...How could there be refining fires without enduring some heat?  Or greater patience without enduring some instructive waiting?  Or more empathy without bearing one another's burdens - not only that others' burdens may be lightened, but that we may be enlightened through greater empathy?  How can there be later magnification without enduring some present deprivation? (Ensign, Neal A. Maxwell, "Endure it Well").
4. Patience With Others - them with you and you with them: 
     During the 2010 General Relief Society Meeting, President Monson said: "Life is perfect for none of us.  Rather than being judgmental and critical of each other, may we have the pure love of Christ for our fellow travelers in this journey through life.  May we recognize that each one is doing her best to deal with the challenges which come our way, and may we strive to do our best to help out." (Church News, March 3, 2012). 
     Neal A. Maxwell said: "When, for the moment, we ourselves are not being stretched on a particular cross, we ought to be at the foot of someone else's - full of empathy and proffering spiritual refreshment." (Ensign, Neal A. Maxwell, "Endure it Well"). 
     It is easy to make judgments on each other, but we are so inept to judge each other, because no one can really know what others have gone through, or why they are behaving the way they are.  We need to be patient, tolerant, kind and compassionate towards each other.  We are all trying to do our best - and sometimes we just need a little help and understanding from each other to help see us through.
     If however, you are on the other end of this and you are feeling judged, isolated, alone, misunderstood, misrepresented - you can be patient and tolerant too.  Realizing others may not have gone through what you are going through, and they do not (can not) understand.  Always remembering, we are all in different places on our journey.  Patience, tolerance, kindness, love - we are all in need.
5. Patience With Self:
     "Continue in patience until ye are perfected" (D&C 67:13).  It doesn't say be perfect today, it says to continue in patience until ye are perfected.  We also need to be patient, tolerant, kind, and loving to ourselves.