Desire.

The question that has been on my mind frequently the past couple days is how do I permanently change my desire.  What sparked my interest in this subject so much was reading a quote from Elder Oaks: 

"Desires dictate our priorities, priorities shape our choices, and choices determine our actions. The desires we act on determine our changing, our achieving, and our becoming.:

Desires are lead to what I become, determine and change. If I want to have the gift of charity I have to desire it. If I want to be an incredible runner I have to be determined to run.  If I want to return to live with my Heavenly Father again I have to show him my desire by changing my priorities from worldly things to heavenly things.  

I don't think I will ever get to the point where all my desires are heavenly in this life but I hope along this journey we call life it can become easier and easier to resist the lures of Satan.  

There are things that I hope for in life.  I want to be a faithful mother, successful interior designer, a wise friend and a determined learner.  All of these things can be achieved when I turn my actions towards Christ and have him guide me through lives challenges.  The key to it all is having the FAITH to do the ACTION, make the CHANGE, and then show the DESIRE.  

Love, Sister Jessica Ivins 

Magnifying Talents

When I was a young girl I used to practice my handwriting.  To this day I have notebooks filled with the alphabet.  I would admire my mothers beautiful calligraphy and try my very best to achieve what she had.  I even went to the extreme of tracing her letters over and over again to capture her perfect letters.  Now about 12 years later I have the talent of good handwriting.  Even the degree I am achieving has a "handwriting" segment.  I consider now all that hard work turned into a talent.  

In Matthew 25 Jesus Christ gives the parable of the talents.  In this lesson he gives one servant 5 talents (money in that time), another servant 2 talents, and the last servant 1 talent.  The servant that was given 5 talents later came to the Savior and says I have gained 5 talents more from the 5 you gave me.  Making him have 10 talents.  The next servant first having 2 comes with four again basically saying I have magnified what you gave me to give it back to you in return.  I love how the Lord responds to these faithful disciples in verse 21:

"Well done, thou good and faithful servant: thou hast been faithful over a few things, I will make thee ruler over many things: enter thou into the joy of thy lord." 

Lastly the final servant comes to Jesus and basically says "I buried my talent to preserve it. I was afraid I would loose it." Although he was being safe he did not use the potential he could of had.  

I thought about this for a long time.  How many opportunities have I missed due too not wanting to get out of my shell.  Heavenly Father has given us many many talents but we must put forward the effort in mastering them.  Overall,  I am grateful for the gifts that God has given me to magnify :)