One of the reasons I am so grateful we moved to Logan Utah, is all the amazing people we have met here. Sam and Emily are at the top of that list. They are some of the most generous and down-to-earth people I have ever met. I was so grateful to be able to photograph their beautiful family. Emily and Sam first met in high school in California. Emily described herself as pretty quiet and said the first time Sam tried to talk to her, she felt like she couldn’t even speak! Sam was cracking jokes and talking to everyone. Emily kept to herself, and laughed as Sam tried to guess who she was, by making up a funny story about what her life was like. A few months later, they met up again and officially got together. But it wasn’t long before they both ended up moving and broke it off because of the distance. Time passed and they lived their separate lives until one day Emily received a long message from Sam saying that he loved her and had made a mistake in letting her go. He then moved all the way back to California just so they could be together! They are now married and living in Logan with their adorable baby girl named Olivia, or Olive for short. I asked Emily if she wanted to share her conversion story and she went above and beyond! I felt so inspired as I read through it. We all have hard challenges, but with the Atonement, we can be healed. I am so grateful that Emily chose to share her amazing story. “My whole life I grew up in the Catholic Church. Every Sunday, I went to mass with my family. Being in the Catholic Church growing up felt right to me. I didn’t know anything else. I remember being young, going to catechism, and looking forward to the day I was going to get baptized. I was juggling school, soccer, dance, and catechism all at the same time. It was very time consuming, but it was worth it. The time finally came that I was able to get baptized. It was a special day. My faith was stronger than it had ever been before. About two years after I got baptized, tragedy struck my family. I was 13 years old when my older sister who was 16 years old took her own life. Sadly, I was the one who found her. From that moment, everything that I felt about God suddenly went to black. There was no longer that brightness, peace or happiness I once felt. I felt that God had betrayed me and my family. I felt so much hurt and anger. I thought to myself “Why would God do this?” By the day of my sister’s funeral, my whole faith had crumbled. I felt that my faith had gone down in the ground with my sister. I was scared because I had no idea what was going to happen to her. At that moment I believed that there was no heaven, no hell, no after-life. For 5 years I had no faith, no more interest in God, the Almighty. I wouldn’t say I was atheist because I knew there was a God. I just wasn’t on speaking terms with Him. I didn’t know what to believe or what to think. I became so lost. One day, Sam introduced me to some missionaries (from The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints.) I told him that I had no interest. The first Elder I ever talked to was Elder Young, and I will never forget him and the kind messages and words he spoke to me. I told him what I had been struggling with for the past 4 years, and I was afraid he was going to judge me or say something insensitive. But he didn’t, and I will forever be grateful for that. When we moved to Logan, our next set of missionaries came. They were Elder Wheeler and Elder Nasca. I will admit I was skeptical on the first few visits. I remember Elder Wheeler asking me to read the Book of Mormon and see how I felt about it. By the end of the week, I was already in 2nd Nephi. He asked me what I thought. I told him, “ I like it…I didn’t get any negative or doubtful feeling about it. So I guess that’s good right?” He then told me to open up to Alma 32:28. I remember it said, “It must needs be that this is a good seed, or that the word is good, for it beginneth to enlarge my soul; yea, it beginneth to enlighten my understanding, yea, it beginneth to be delicious to me.” From then on, my seed grew more and more each day, and my faith slowly started to come back. After a couple months, Sam and I decided we both wanted to be baptized. Unfortunately, I had to wait because I lost all my important documents during the move. It was a long and hard process. Sometimes I wondered if I should still follow through, because of how difficult it was. But I held on tight to the iron rod, until we finally got all my paperwork. We called the missionaries and they hurried over. We immediately started the process toward baptism. September 3rd was the day I became one of Heavenly Father’s children again. It was the most amazing feeling I could ever feel besides getting married to the love of my life and having a beautiful daughter. Getting baptized was the best thing I could ever do for myself and for my family. I cannot express enough how blessed I am to have the gospel in our lives, and to raise our family in the Church. I truly believe that the Lord put me through one of the hardest trials in my life to be able to go through the experience I did with the church, and to be quite honest, I would do it all again for HIM.”
1 Comment
Lynae
2/24/2017 04:46:26 pm
What an amazing testimony! Thank you for sharing this! I love this post and these pictures are incredible once again!
Reply
Leave a Reply. |
Hi, I'm Kalee.I believe we have the power to cultivate authenticity & genuine relationships, which bring meaning & true joy to our lives. Let me show you what I mean. Archives
March 2017
Categories |