The salvation of man is through Love and in Love

July 1, 2016

Heyyyyooooo!!

This was a great week! One experience in particular stands out:

Two days ago the efy groups came to Nauvoo! We were able to show some of them around the visitor’s center, and it reminded me of my last summer when I was serving in Carthage and, despite being incredibly nervous, approached a group of efy kids/counselors and bore my simple testimony. It was an experience I wouldn’t forget. Watching the kids file in, I leaned over to my companion and expressed my love for the youth and explained that I had had one of the best experiences of my mission with a group from efy.

Well, fast forward to the next day (aka yesterday). I was serving in the Wilford Woodruff home. I was giving a tour to a family upstairs when sister cook, the senior sister I was serving with, came upstairs and told me there was a man downstairs who had just talked with her, and that I needed to go down and hear what he said for myself. Confused, I headed down the stairs. I met up with a man who was some sort of efy coordinator, and who explained that he was with the efy group that I had met last summer in Carthage. His eyes met mine, and he expressed that he had been looking for me last year, and had wished to tell me of the impact I had made on those kids. One girl, later on, had gotten up during a testimony meeting and expressed that she had never felt the spirit as strong as she did when I was speaking, and it was in that moment that she knew that Joseph Smith was a prophet.

Wowza.

I was speechless. He mentioned that he wasn’t sure I would even remember the experience due to the fact that we talk to hundreds of people each day, but I explained that I had literally mentioned it to my companion the previous day, and still believed it to be one of the best days of my mission. I was insanely shocked that HE remembered ME! He had seen me giving the tour upstairs and asked Sister Cook what my name was. She answered, “That’s Sister Pugmire!” And he replied, “Yupp. That’s her.”

Most of what we do here in Nauvoo has a very invisible impact, to us at least. We give all this good out into the world, but rarely get to see it’s effect. Well today, a whole year after I gave a little ounce of good, I got to see it. And it was a true tender mercy.

It’s a great reminder to me that whether or not I receive the validation, the good I give makes a difference. If I leave others better than I found them, they will go on to do the same. The ‘good energy’ I put out survives, it changes forms, and it makes its way throughout the world. The kindness of Mother Teresa, the courage of Rosa Parks, the wisdom of Buddha, it’s all still here. It’s being passed around, touching our lives.

I'll leave you with a new favorite quote from Viktor Frankl's book Man's Search for Meaning:

"For the first time in my life I saw Truth as it is set into song by so many poets, proclaimed as the final wisdom by so many thinkers. The Truth-that Love is the ultimate and highest goal to which man can aspire. Then I grasped the meaning of the greatest secret that human poetry and human though and belief have to impart: The salvation of man is through Love and in Love."

I love this companion of mine! :')