There is Room Enough

The past three weeks, different events kept leading me back to the

same question. “ Is there room for me in the Church? I just don’t fit
in.”

I stood with the Filipino sisters in an elevator when a local Chinese
member staring at them with a duck face. I faced ridicule when I
disagreed with bigotry and refuse to follow.I put my arms around a
troubled soul and love regardless of choices and values.I heard story
after story of faithful, strong, and caring Filipino sisters facing
challenges in their lives, gasping for air in a stormy sea.

I pled and implored my whole soul wanting to feel the reassurance
that God was aware of my situations, my feelings towards all the
injustice. He might not decide to fix everything, but I needed to know
that He knew, and that He had heard my cry.

I will not leave the Church but how do I stay?

With the lens of a researcher, I was seeking for the unconventional/
unorthodox views in General Conference and here is the list of part of
my findings:

1.  The number of blessing doesn’t positively correlated to the level
     of gratitude.

2.  Being grateful does not simply mean being cheerful in distress.

3.  We shouldn’t wait for positive outcome in order to be grateful.

4.  God’s awareness of us isn’t equal to the response time of
     answers to prayers but he knows us and hears the pleading of our
     hearts.

5.  What seemingly is considered a burden, weights, provides the way
     to safe/lift us.

6.  Happiness isn’t the absences of trials/burden.

My heart rejoiced with this renewing sense of the gospel. Years of
listening to “thank-i-mony”, and very narrow-minded sense of
understanding motivated me to stay outside of the box.

Just when I was getting ready to start watching the last session, I felt
a little hand tapping my shoulder. We hugged, and cried as I
facilitated and witnessed this child of God overcoming doubts and
confusions by diligently seeking answers and exercising agency. It
was miraculous and I once again appreciated Heavenly Father’s
humour for He kept putting people on my path to help eventually
leading to a way of rescuing my struggling self. 

I sat down and rejoined the conference.
As women, young, and elderly across the world singing
“I am a child of God; and He has sent me here”,

I knew,
there was room enough for me.

K.D.