A Deteriorating World!

We live in a time where bad is good and good is bad.  My mind is numb to read of all the reports of abuse and violence in the news.  What's perhaps more shocking is when some of these people are members of the church and have high profile names.

I'm completely blown away when I read about teachers who have violated their students or fathers who have abused or violated their children or marriage counselors who have taken advantage of their clients.  To read these things makes my heart ache and my soul sad.  We are at war with Satan and he is winning!  He is winning!  So much wickedness is being pored out upon the world and as the Lord has said, "in the latter days even the most elect will fall". (of course this isn't the exact words but close)  The Lords helps us understand by this scripture that we are all vulnerable and that we must keep our selves always on guard.  Never take yours eyes off the course, be steadfast and obedient!

The days of our Lords coming are soon, yet no man knows how soon, but the signs are there, we just need to look and we will see.  Now is the time to get our house in order with the anticipation of his coming!

Nothing to write yet to much to tell.

This is my third entry, and to be honest I'm finding this fun!  Deep down inside I've always wanted to be a writer.  I have a very creative imagination and love to hear stories and tell them. Even though all my stories are in my head and I usually tell no one.  I guess, it's my little secret.  My wife knows that I would like to be an author one day and she is my biggest supporter.

One of the authors that I admire is Brandon Sanderson.  He's written a great amount of books, and has lately become very famous.  He's finishing up the "Wheel of Time" series by Robert Jordan and has several of his own novels, one in particular "The Way of Kings".  I guess perhaps why I admire him, is, that he started as a nobody at BYU writing books and giving them to his friends to read and chasing his dreams to become published writer.  That dream came true and he is now a very well known fantasy writer from Utah who attended BYU.

Perhaps one day when I can write better and make sense of whats in my head, perhaps I may write something, but for now, I will be the silent dreamer who has plenty of stories in his head but not a clue how to start.  I guess writing this blog is a start.  (even if I'm the only one who will ever read it!) ha, ha, ha :)

World Wide leadership Meeting

Today was the world wide leadership meeting and I do have to say I liked it.  A lot of issues were discussed there and I found it very interesting.  Several of the Apostles spoke and spoke in respects to the Hand Book 2.  I have not read it all that much but it does have a lot of good information.  The one thing that that makes me happy is the we have a church of order.  The Church is perfect yet the people are not, but having gone to this meeting today, I know that the lord is very mindful of his children and has given us inspired leaders to guide his church in these last days.

A quote from Elder Neal A Anderson today is:

 "When we are on the lords errand we can expect the lords help" he also said referring to our work within the church "This is a spiritual work and can only be done in the lords way" 
Serving in and working in the lords work has been a tremendous blessing in my life and I'm very grateful for these wonderful opportunities given to me.  As we serve with all our heart we will see doors open to us and blessing come down upon us.  This is my witness and I know its true.  As we accept and fulfil our calling we grow in capacity as well as spirituality.

Fist day of my blog

I'm new to this and I'm mainly doing this for a couple of reasons.  First for my family and kids.  I want this to be somewhere they can read about my experiences as well as my time away from them as I embark to leave to China (in the summer). Another reason is to get used to writing on a regular basis and to improve my writing skills.  I read a friends blog today. (Matt Hansen) and his blog really touched me.  He shared several spiritual experiences on his blog that touched me and I would also like this to be a place where I can share stories and experiences about my life and what I will learn.  I hope this can be a place people (my family and anyone interested in reading this) can get to know me and why I love the lord and his gospel.

To start today was a tuff day,

I took the foreign service exam for the second time and "boy" the 4 hour test was to long.  I'm not used to this.  For those who have no clue as to what this is go to state.gov and find careers and look under foreign service officer.  Working for the FS has been a goal and dream of mine and my families for more than ten years.  I finally took the first step last year and took the exam for the first time.  I obviously did not pass, but the learning experience was great.  This time around I did much better and I hope I pass.  I think the hardest thing about this was essay portion and English comprehension.  I hard a hard time on these two sections.  In total there are 4 sections one about you as a person another about your job knowledge ( which includes history, politics and bunch of more stuff) and the next is the English portion where you edit articles and correct sentences with correct grammar etc and the last is the essay part.

If I pass the first part I go to next faze which is to sent them some personal examples of experiences in my life that define my character.  If they like what I say I'm then invited to an oral exam in DC and if I pass this then I get medical and security clearance and then, I'm putt on waiting list based on my overall score and wait for an offer.  Long process right?

In the mean time I'm learning Chinese and will be in China for three months this summer.  One, learning Chinese and two participating in a Health initiative with the Dep. of Public Health at the U.  I've also recently decided to pursue a MS degree in Public Health.  These are the immediate plans and I will see how things unfold.