i am important in the eyes of God

yesterday i went to the temple. i wanted to write down three names on the prayer roll, one of them being my own. i've never written in my own name on the prayer roll because that just seems odd to me, but i've been so filled with anger lately that i just needed extra prayers. so i wrote down the three names, including my own, but then erased my own and wrote another. then i went home thinking nothing of it.

fast forward to this morning. in the last twenty-four hours i found out my cousin committed suicide and instead of feeling better, i'm feeling more sad than ever. as i was moving furniture and boxes out of our front room in preparation for the tile to be set, billie perini knocked on my door. she came to tell me she has just returned from the temple and while there she felt impressed to put my name on the prayer roll.

my name.

it felt like God sent her as a messenger to tell me that my name is worth putting on that prayer roll; that i count; that i'm important to Him and He sees me. He knows my heart is so sad right now and feels betrayed, deceived, and just so sorrowful. i cannot express adequately how strongly i feel that God sent her to me today. she said she has been trying to listen and follow through on promptings. i'm so grateful she did.

i saw God in billie's eyes today.

Working together

so we moved back to arizona. that's another story altogether, but the long and short of it is that we are back in our yale street home trying to make it a home we can live in. devan and chas have been working together every weekend (and many week days) to open up the central portion of the home and put in beams for support where necessary.

while the work they've done has been incredibly impressive -- even the city inspector was impressed, calling their first foray into placing a beam "beautiful" three times -- what has been even more impressive has been the kindness with which they have worked together. last night i was in the bathroom taking a long, long shower (cause i'm post eye surgery) and i could hear them talking to each other. listening to them work out the math necessary to build the beam structure was awesome. those men are so smart. and they asked each other questions and thought through each other's ideas with kindness.

there is little else that makes my heart feel as much joy as listening to devan and chas talk to each other and work together in love and patience. both of these men have struggled internally in ways that i think have affected their sense of self and their ability to feel settled inside to the extent that they can easily let go of pride. as a result, sometimes they struggle to work together in kindness and patience. but they are both men of God and are two men that i know are absolutely good to the core -- they both have souls that are just so good. they both intuitively know what is good and are drawn to goodness.

so i love when their goodness is felt in our home. i felt God in our home last night.