story

During Sunday School on Sunday we talked about "how I was blind but now I see" it reminded me of a story from my mission. I served in the California Ventura Mission 99-01. While I was there I served with Elder Tommy Draschil in one of my areas he was my zone leader and told me this story. He said that when he was nineteen he went into the MTC and was there for a couple of days then he just thought you know what I don't know if I want to do this I don't even know if I want to be LDS.. He lived in Provo a couple of blocks from the MTC so he just walked out of the MTC and walked home.. I guess nothing as dramatic as those stories you hear of people jumping the fence or pushing their companion away and RUNNING...Elder Draschil just simply walked away from the MTC his mission and his religion..He said he went home took off his sacred religious clothes and went about living what he thought was a happy life ... He did this for about three or four years over the course of time he realized he was not happy... so one day he decided to pray and ask Heavenly Father what he should do.. he went up into the moutains and prayed with all his heart. He said he was up there for awhile when he came down he knew what he needed to do. He went to his bishop and started preparing to go on a mission. He got called to the exact same mission as he had been called when he was nineteen he was now about twenty-three or twenty-four. This time he did not leave the MTC and he served an AMAZING mission. He was a great zone leader and one of the highlights of my mission. He said to me Sister Wright, I was blind.. I thought I know what was to be happy but I was not happy... he said but now that I am living the gospel.. I really see..I was blind but now I see.. I am grateful that as a nineteen year old boy that he knew then that he did not have what it takes to serve a mission. I am also glad that when the time came, he was able to put right in his life what he needed too and serve a mission with all of his heart mind and strength.. Having a testimony of the gospel and living it is essential to our progression. May we all strive to be who we really are and live as Heavenly Father wants us to live and have the courage to repent and change to become that amazing person that Heavenly Father already knows that we are.