Instruments in the Hands of God

This post is part of the General Conference Odyssey. This week covers the General Relief Society session of the October 2005 conference.

Sister Kathleen H. Hughes is married to one of my favorite LDS authors, Dean Hughes. One of his books, Before the Dawn, was inspired, in part, by the unity of sisterhood he felt among the women when his wife served in the General Relief Society presidency. I enjoyed her talk so much in this session because she addressed some of my most glaring faults.

All of us long to possess Christ's pure love, called charity, but our humanness--the "natural woman" in us--gets in the way. We get angry, we become frustrated, we berate ourselves and others--and when we do, we cannot be the conduit of love we need to be if we are to become an instrument in Heavenly Father's hands. Being willing to forgive ourselves and others becomes an integral part of our ability to have the love of the Lord in our lives and to do His work.

I often think of the quote from C.S. Lewis about entering a cellar turning on the light and discovering rats. The light didn't create the rats, it revealed them. I have rats in my cellar! Big, ugly ones that are revealed when I'm frustrated by things I can't control. I often pray to be able to kill the rats and rid myself of them, to clean up my cellar.

Sister Hughes shared something she learned from a woman she had recently met.

Alicia told me something I will never forget. She said, "I only do one thing for myself when I go to church: I take the sacrament for me. The rest of the time I watch for others who need me and I try to help them and nurture them."

That is an insight I needed to be reminded of. And I tried it this past Sunday. At the potluck after the meetings I sat with sisters I don't normally sit with. We had a delightful time. I felt better for having done so. Not that I was better than them, rather that they gave me hope, strength, and sisterhood.

We can only be instruments in the hands of God if and when we are willing to forget our own troubles and inadequacies and reach out to serve others. He will sustain us, and though we may not know the outcome of our service each time, it is surely recorded in heaven. I look forward to seeing the effects of my efforts someday when I return Home.