God Loves Us!

     Sometimes it is easy to forget how much our Heavenly Father loves us.  I know I do forget and often even ask why he gives me certain responsibilities or trials.  I feel sometimes that when I am facing hard times, that He is further away... and that I am alone.  But really, He gives us these experiences because He loves us.  And if we think about, He gives us a challenge or correction and then what?  He wants to see how we handle it.  So He watches us, probably more intently than usual, to see how we will respond and what He can do to help us through it. 

     "I would like to speak of one particular attitude and practice we need to adopt if we are to meet our Heavenly Father’s high expectations. It is this: willingly to accept and even seek correction.  Paul said of divine correction or chastening, “For whom the Lord loveth he chasteneth” (Hebrews 12:6). Though it is often difficult to endure, truly we ought to rejoice that God considers us worth the time and trouble to correct."   

http://www.lds.org/general-conference/2011/04/as-many-as-i-love-i-rebuke-and-chasten?lang=eng

     "God uses another form of chastening or correction to guide us to a future we do not or cannot now envision but which He knows is the better way for us. President Hugh B. Brown, formerly a member of the Twelve and a counselor in the First Presidency, provided a personal experience. He told of purchasing a rundown farm in Canada many years ago. As he went about cleaning up and repairing his property, he came across a currant bush that had grown over six feet (1.8 m) high and was yielding no berries, so he pruned it back drastically, leaving only small stumps. Then he saw a drop like a tear on the top of each of these little stumps, as if the currant bush were crying, and thought he heard it say:  “How could you do this to me? I was making such wonderful growth. … And now you have cut me down. Every plant in the garden will look down on me. … How could you do this to me? I thought you were the gardener here.”

     President Brown replied, “Look, little currant bush, I am the gardener here, and I know what I want you to be. I didn’t intend you to be a fruit tree or a shade tree. I want you to be a currant bush, and someday, little currant bush, when you are laden with fruit, you are going to say, ‘Thank you, Mr. Gardener, for loving me enough to cut me down.’”

(- Elder D. Todd Christofferson, As Many as I Love, I Rebuke and Chasten, April 2011)

     Just like the little currant bush, we can even be offended by what life events our Father in Heaven puts in front of us.  But as the gardener in the story, God already knows who he wants us to be.  We have to trust in Him and let Him lead us through.  And as we follow His will for us, we will actually have the potential to be who He would have us be.

     I know that our Heavenly Father loves us!  Jesus Christ is evidence of that love and through Christ we can become who He knows we can be.  Our views of our life and of ourselves are so limited and biased.  Trust in the path that the Lord has given us.  It is the only way! (2 Nephi 31:21)