I spoke in church this past week.

This always induces
All kinds of anxiety
But I agreed anyway
Because I’ve been thinking
About a recent experience
Where my faith was stretched,
And I had to really
Make a conscious choice
To continue to trust God.
At a time
When it felt really difficult.
At a time
When I felt betrayed.

So this is a longer post,
But here is what I shared,
From what I learned
About trusting God:

First I shared a quick version of this story

https://deeshasdiary.com/2025/05/02/the-boss/

About how my son told me
And continues to tell me
That HE is the boss of HIM,
And not me.

It was so funny.
But it ultimately
Led to a really great conversation
With him
Because my son told me
I could be like a counselor
Or a coach.
I could make suggestions
And then he would decide;
Just like
What our heavenly parents
Do with us.

I think that
As human beings,
We generally don’t really love
Being told what to do.
Unless it’s something
We were going to do
Anyway.

In Exodus chapter 5
When Moses was like,
“Hey Pharoh,
God wants you to let the Israelites
Go free from being your slaves.”
And Pharoh was like,
“Who is that?
Why should I listen to him?
I don’t know him
And I’m not going to do that.”

And so today I want to talk about:

1. Who is God?
   What do we know about Him?
2. What to do during times
   When it’s hard to trust Him.
3. Why should we listen to Him?
   Or in other words, do we want Him to be the boss of us?
   Or our counselor and coach?

So first, who is God
And what do we know about Him?
We know that agency
And our freedom
To make choice for ourselves
Is important to Him;
Both in the pre-earth life
As well as during this life.
In fact,
It’s so important
That He was willing to lose
1/3 of his children
Rather than forcing them to stay.
Because Our Father in Heaven
Doesn’t want to force me,
Or my children,
To have a relationship with Him.
Instead, He wants all of us
To WANT to have a relationship with Him.
And he doesn’t want us to just
Keep His commandments,
He wants us to WANT
To keep His commandments.
Just like he always has.
And when we realize
That His commandments
Are actually just invitations
Extended out of love
That changes things a little bit too.
He wants us to desire them,
But He still respects our agency
And our right to choose.
He still respects
That you are the boss of you,
Just like my son.
But we get to decide
If we want Him to be our coach, our counselor.
And main thing that makes
A great coach
Is being able to trust them.
Trust that they have
Our best interests at heart.

So it’s interesting
That one of His
Most repeated invitations
In the scriptures is
FEAR NOT.
Or in other words,
He’s saying:
“TRUST ME.
Trust me and my timing
And that I am big enough
And powerful enough
To make everything okay
Even if you can’t see how yet.”

Other things we know
About God
From scripture are:

1. He has given us
Everything we have –
A world to live in
Nature
Our income
Our families.
And not just that,
But He wants us to have
EVEN ALL HE HAS. (Luke 12:44)

2. We know
That He weeps
For us,
When the enemy
Is laughing
Because he has us
In chains (Moses 7:29)

3. We know that He loves us.
So much
That He gave us
His only begotten son,
Jesus Christ,
So that it’s possible
For us to move forward (John 3:16)

4. Even in the scriptures
When he seems like a harsh God
Who destroys cities and people,
If you read closely,
His anger is always kindled
Against those who are hurting others
Or taking advantage
Of his children.
Like when he’s angry
Because of the way
People are treating groups
Who are vulnerable.
Like the poor
And needy
And women
And children.
He takes it very personally
When people hurt us.
So we know He has our back.
(Mormon 4:14, Isaiah 10)

5. We also know
He is faithful.
He has faith in US
And our children
And in His perfect plan.
He’s committed
To our relationship with Him.
He’s all in.
Have you ever been
In a relationship
With someone
And one person
Is ALL IN
And the other one
Is just NOT as committed?
That’s not God.
He wants us to know
He is committed to us.
(1 Corinthians 1:9)

So to recap:

1. He’s given me everything I have, including his only begotten son, Jesus Christ
2. He wants me to eventually have ALL that He has
3. He loves me and deeply cares about my pain and my feelings
4. He has my back
5. And he is fully committed to our relationship and He loved me first

That sounds like Someone
I can probably trust.

But what can I do
During the times
When it’s hard to trust Him?

I want to acknowledge something
That we might call
“Judas moments”:
We talk about
How Judas betrayed Jesus
And while that may be true,
It might also be true
That Judas felt
Betrayed by Jesus.

Because when Jesus said
He had come to save them,
Judas thought He meant
From the oppressive Roman rule
That they were under.
And Judas’ opinion was that
Jesus wasn’t doing it “right.”
Because Jesus
Wasn’t doing it
The way
Judas thought He should.

In your life
Have you ever thought,
“That’s not
How I thought this would go?”

Or
Jesus didn’t show up
In a situation
The way you thought
He was going to?

Or maybe
He didn’t protect your loved ones
The way you thought
He said he would?

Or maybe
He didn’t really
Answer that prayer
The way you thought He would,
Or the way you wanted Him to?

It can challenge our trust,
Especially when
The enemy wants to offer
All kinds of lies
For the reasons
Why things happened
The way they did.
Like
“He must not care about you.”
And
“He doesn’t hear and answer your prayers.”

And that simply isn’t true,
Even though they can feel true.

In those moments,
We can choose –
Are we going to respond
Like the disciples did?
And trust God
Even though we don’t understand.
Or are we going
To rely on our own knowledge
And respond the way Judas did?

And trusting Him
Doesn’t mean
That everything
Is going to be great
All the time.

So in the times
When it feels like
The Saturday
After Jesus was crucified,
Before He was resurrected
And it feels like there is no way
Things can possibly
Be fixed or healed,
What do we do then?

When I’m in that place,
It helps me to remember
Why I can trust him.
And why I want
To trust Him.
And going back
To look at the times
People made the choice
To trust Him –
And the miracles
That always follow –
Is really helpful for me.

The scriptures
Are a great resource for this,
So I just want to share
3 examples from them,
When ordinary people
Made the choice
To trust God
And then miracles followed:

First
In the Book of Mormon,
When Nephi was like:
Never have I ever
Built a boat,
But I am going to do it
Because God told me to.
And then
My family and I
Are going to get in it
And sail across the ocean
To the promised land.
Was there a moment
When they had to choose to trust God?
I asked my family
If they would get into a boat
That our youngest son built
And cross the ocean
And we had a good laugh about that.
I don’t know what they thought,
But I imagine
Walking up into the boat
And all of my earthly possessions
Are on it
And thinking,
We are going to be out
In the middle of the ocean!
Like, we could run out of food
And water
And there’s probably not a lot of privacy
And also
We don’t even know
How long this voyage
Is going to take!
But they made a choice
To trust God
And they got on the boat.
And then they made it to the promised land.
A miracle!
(1 Nephi 18:23)

Second
When the prophet Elijah
Asked a widow
To bring him some bread
She tells him
She has a handful of flour
And a little bit of oil
To make one last meal
For herself and her son
And then they will die
Because that’s all they have.
And then Elijah tells her,
OK, but first
Will you make
A small loaf for me,
And then make one
For you and your son.
Was she like,
I’m sorry, what?
But he goes on to say,
If you do this,
God has promised
That you won’t run out
Of flour or oil
Until it rains again.
Imagine being that widow
And she’s looking
At the last bit
Of her flour
And the last bit
Of her oil.
Would you decide
To make bread
For the prophet first?
Do you think
In that moment,
It was difficult for her
To believe
What he said was true?
But she made a choice.
She chose to trust God
And make one for Elijah first.
And then
Just like he promised,
She didn’t run out
Of flour or oil.
And I don’t know
The answer to this,
But did she go back home
And there was a giant pile of flour
And a Costco sized bottle of oil?
Or is it more likely
That every day,
There was another handful of flour
In the bottom of the jar
And a little bit of oil
In the bottle?
Either way,
It was a miracle.
(1 Kings 17)

The third example
I want to share
Is Jesus’ mother Mary.
She chose to trust God.
She agreed to do His will.
But think for a moment
About her situation
On the night
Jesus is born:
She’s going into labor
And all the hotels are full
And her only option
Is to give birth
To the Son of God
In a stable
With animals
And it’s not super clean
And probably doesn’t smell very good.
Was there a moment
That she looked around
And thought,
“Well THIS isn’t quite
What I was picturing
When I agreed to this.”
And then Jesus was born.
A miracle!
(Luke 2)

And there are countless
Other stories
Of people
In the scriptures
Who choose to trust God.
They act in faith
And then miracles come.

Recently
Our family felt prompted
To keep our own
Family Faith Journal.
It’s just a shared note
On our phones
With experiences that we’ve had
To strengthen our own testimonies.
It has things like:

How we’ve gotten our testimonies
That the Book of Mormon was true.

How the older boys
And my husband
Got their answers
To serve full-time missions.

The time
My son Josh
Listened to the prompting
To wear a helmet
And then crashed on his bike.

The time we went
To the temple
On vacation,
Even though
It was supposed to be
The last sunny day.
And then
The next day
We were blessed
With another sunny day
Instead of clouds.

The time my dad died suddenly
Because his aorta ruptured.
And God let me know
Years later
That he hadn’t wanted to
But he stayed
Because he was obedient.

The various times
We felt prompted
To check on our kids
And then learned later
What the reason was.

This record is so precious to me,
Because we can all look back
During the Saturdays of our lives
And remember those personal experiences
And gather courage
To look forward with faith.

President Russell M. Nelson
Told us
To seek and expect miracles.

And I offer my testimony
That the first step
To many of the miracles
I’ve experienced in my life,
Came after a conscious decision
To trust God.

Elder Jeffrey R. Holland reassured us:
“Some blessings come soon,
Some come late,
And some don’t come until heaven;
But for those who embrace
The gospel of Jesus Christ,
They come.”

The testimony
I want to close with today
Is that every single time
I choose to trust my Heavenly Father,
Especially when I’m unsure,
He always works a miracle.
And let’s me see
A little bit clearer
About where He was.
Even if it isn’t the outcome I wanted.

I wish I remembered
Where I heard this quote,
But it was:
“Trust in God, not in outcomes.”

Recently
I had yet another experience
Where I had the opportunity
To make a conscious decision
To trust what God was doing.
And it was hard
Because I was feeling betrayed
Like Judas did.
I was really feeling like,
This was NOT
How things were supposed to go.
And after weeks
Of wrestling with this,
I finally prayed
And told Him
I didn’t understand at all,
But I’m going to choose to trust You.

Personal revelation followed:
About the role of angels,
And how much
Our Heavenly Father values
And respects our agency.

I love him.
I’m so grateful
Because every time
I make the choice
To trust Him,
He answers
With revelation
And miracles.

And that makes me want to
Continue to trust Him.

And while I will always
Be the boss of me-
Which He respects –
I hope
I will always want Him
To be my Counselor
And my Coach.

In the name of Jesus Christ, Amen.