7-14-2024 Understanding True Forgiveness

Today at church I was very discombobulated! I had been called to Dallas, TX for work on Thursday 7-11-2024 to program and commission some specialized electrical equipment. Melody was able to go with me! We had a normal day on Friday, traveled there and I got to the site after lunch. I worked onsite until 6:30 PM and finished my task, but also found a major issue from the factory that will be repaired this week, really helping my customer! Melody went a cemetery in Midlothian while I was on the jobsite. She gathered names and entered them into Family Search, learning that several of them had a connection to our family lines! She has been working on their temple files so that we can take them to the temple and complete their work!!

Saturday started normally, but ended in a small nightmare! I worked on my report for the site in the hotel room all morning. Then finished the bulletin and sent it out to the ward. We left the hotel and turned the rental car in around 12:30pm. Our flight was at 2:15p so we had plenty of time. We got through security pretty quick and went and had lunch in the terminal. When we got to the gate our plane was there, but the attendant made an announcement that the flight was delayed, there was an issue with the cargo door sealing properly. We ended up delayed for 8 hours! They got us on a different plane at 10pm to come home, landing in West Palm Beach at 1:15am. We finally got home and in bed at 2:30am.

I had to cancel bishopric meeting and got to the church later than I ever wanted to as a bishop. I had a temple recommend interview to perform, printed the bulletin QR codes, set up everything in the chapel. But, I did not have proper briefings from my counselors, so I was sadly off my game. I made a few errors in announcements and with a calling, I did not like presenting things that way in sacrament. To top it off, the sacrament trays did not get filled with water! However, the priesthood handled it like champs! They filled the trays, blessed the water, and moved forward. Afterwards Bro Martinez and the Teacher Quorum felt bad for not completing their responsibility.

I had a few moments of reflection during the administration of the sacrament. I thought about everything we did wrong that morning, and how the Savior and Heavenly Father must feel that we/ I messed everything up so bad. But the thought quickly came to my mind that it was no big deal! The Lord would never hold a grudge because of a mistake, he provided a way for us to be forgiven!! I stepped to the mic and apologized for the oversight, and thanked everyone in attendance for their patience while we worked through the issues. Never once did I feel like we had made a grievous error, or that the Lord was disappointed. I felt the opposite- Love, Compassion, Kindness, Understanding. It truly added to the spirit of the meeting as Amanda, Susan, and Jennifer did an amazing job with their talks!

I want to reiterate the point- The Savior Will Never Hold A Grudge!! We can mess up. We can make mistakes. But with a broken heart and a contrite spirit, the Lord will always forgive when we ask Him! There is no need to stress or be over worried, He is always there! He is willing and able to make up the difference after all we can do!