Why I Believe Wednesday: "But If Not"

The phrase and the talk "but if not" have been particularly on my mind in these last two weeks.  I've been having a rough time, and really WRESTLING with a lot of feelings of disappointment and loneliness, especially in my relationship with God.  I know He loves us and is aware of our feelings and (eventually) grants us our deepest desires, but I sure haven't felt that way lately.  There's a disconnect between what I know and how I feel, especially since some of these disappointments have come to crush me all at once in the most tender places of my heart.  It's just been a struggle, even just *being,* and I'm exhausted.

I'm sure anyone who's LDS remembers the wonderful Conference talk "But if Not" by Elder Dennis E. Simmons.  We all have our trials and our ups and downs, no matter how righteous we are or no matter how much faith we have.  In the moment, that can seem very cruel, and very lonely, and you wonder what you've done wrong or why everyone else (it seems) is getting what they want and you've just been completely neglected and forgotten.  And sometimes you HAVE done something wrong and need to repent...but sometimes it's just the way life is, and we have to have faith--REAL faith--that it will be all right in the end.  That somehow, in some way, if we remain faithful, the Lord will make it up to us with all that He has--and you quite literally cannot ask for more.  So, instead of just posting a bunch of feelings and experiences I'm going through, I'm going to challenge you to go back and read the two talks I've linked up to, and maybe if you're also going through a difficult time WAITING for those blessings to come, you'll have a little more hope, too.  'Cause all good things happen eventually.  :)