Talk on Prayer

Darren and I gave talk on Prayer on Sunday.  Here is mine:)

Talk on Prayer

Hello, I am very excited to give a talk today. I am going to introduce myself- I am Emily Ernst and I am married to Darren Ernst.  We have 4 kids- Paul who is 11, Ellie is 10, Kyle is 7 and Gabe is 1.5.  Darren is in his last semester of clinicals at Nurse Anesthesia school.  It feels so good to say that!  Although I will miss Florida soo much.  Just last week I was thinking how they must have forgotten about us and we would probably move without ever speaking.  But looks like that didn't happen.  I don't mind.  I am happy to speak. 

I have been asked to speak on prayer.  Prayer is such a deep subject, and I thought of a lot of different levels within prayer I could talk on.  I am going to take a little bit of a different approach.   I want to talk a little bit about prayers that go unanswered.

When I was a little girl we would go to Cooke City Montana every summer.  It was my favorite thing in the world.  I loved it.  Before we would go up there my parents would lay down the back seat and make a big bed in the back of our awesome station wagon.  I would lay in the back of the station wagon and look through the window up at the clouds as we drove.  Now as I would lay there looking up at the clouds I would pray.  I would pray my little heart out that I could see Jesus in the clouds. 

When we got there I would go out in the field by the cabin and watch the chipmunks scurry around.  They would make little tunnels through the ground.  I would sit there and pray and pray that Heavenly Father would let the chipmunks know that I would not hurt them, and I was their friend.  I would pray and pray so hard that the little chipmunks would come play with me and talk to me.  I promised that I would be nice to them, but I just wanted to hold them and be their friend!

Recently I went fishing with Paul.  It was our 3rd time fishing without catching a thing.  I prayed that he would catch something.  I felt like I had the right to pray for my son.

 Well, Paul didn't catch anything. 

To be honest, I was a little upset and confused.  Why would Heavenly Father not answer my prayers?  Was it wrong for me to ask for Paul to catch a fish? I was honestly bothered by him not catching a fish.  I am his mother.  I want what is best for him.  It would be so fun if he caught a big shark or something! Think of the memories!

Everyone always tell of the stories about when their prayers where answered.  What about the times our prayers are not answered? Like, never seeing Jesus in the clouds, never having chipmunks talk to you, and your son not catching a fish. 

 So when I got the call to talk on prayer I started thinking about some great story where I had a prayer miraculously answered.  I have some.  But I had also thought of the times when I felt very disappointed that my prayers were not answered.  

So, when I have questions like this I call my dad.  My dad is really smart. He always has the right answers and knows just what to say.  I called him up and told him I had asked to give a talk on prayer. I told him about never seeing Jesus in the clouds or chipmunks talking to me and Paul not catching a fish.   

He had really good advice. First he said

Ok Emily.  Lets think about this realistically.  If we always got what we prayed for, no one would ever be sick, or die, or be in pain, and we would all be thin and beautiful and rich and never get old.   Animals would be talking, Jesus would be appearing everywhere and we would not need any faith.  All of our lives would be perfect.  That's just not the way it works.  It is not what life is about.  That is not why we are here.  Prayers are all about faith. Prayers are NOT wishes.   Honestly, it makes sense.   

The object of our prayers should not be to present a wish list or a series of requests but to secure for ourselves and for others blessings that God is eager to bestow, according to His will and timing. Every sincere prayer is heard and answered by our Heavenly Father, but the answers we receive may not be what we expect or come to us when we want or in the way we anticipate.

-David A. Bednar 4/2008

I am not saying we should not pray and ask Heavenly Father for things.  That is NOT what I am saying at all.  What I am saying is that if you have prayers go unanswered in your life- just know that

 1. you are not alone. It happens to all of us.  I  think sometimes we only hear the stories of answered prayers.   So then when we pray and don't get an answer- at least I feel like- ''What's wrong with me? Did I do something wrong? Do I not have enough faith? Does Heavenly Father care about me, Does he hear MY prayers?"  I can tell you He does hear us and He does care about us.  And that is exactly why he doesn't answer all of our prayers. We are here to learn.   Even when the Savior was on the cross he felt alone. In Mark 15:35 It says, " And at the ninth hour Jesus cried with a loud voice, saying, Eloi, Eloi, lama sabachthani? which is, being interpreted, My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?

 2. We do not know what is best for us-seriously.  We don't.  but thank goodness we have a loving Heavenly Father who does.   

3. It takes faith to trust him and not get upset when our prayers are  not answered the way we want.  We need to understand that Heavenly Father has his reasons and we need to trust Him.    

I want to tell a story that illustrates praying for things that we THINK want.

A number of years ago we got in the business of flipping houses.  There was this one house that we were trying to get for a great deal and the profit margins were huge.  I prayed and prayed that we would get the house.  We ended up getting the house.  Well, after we bought it we started the remodeling, and it turned into a nightmare.  The house had radon, and mold.  After months, we finally got those problems fixed, and got the house listed.  Then the marked crashed.  We sat on the house for a year trying desperately to sell it.  When we finally sold it we lost a lot of money. 

Wo, why am I telling you this story?  Because I believe in life a lot of times we don't know what we want, and we are praying for the wrong things.  We think we want to buy a house, but we don't know that it has radon, and mold and the market is going to collapse. A young girl might be praying to marry some guy who is going to end up being a big jerk.  A  man may really want a certain job and doesn't know that the company is going to go out of business in 6 months. A family might want to move to a city that is going to end up falling into the sea.   We don't know the future.  Heavenly Father does. I was praying to get that house to make money.  That was my motive.  Our priorities are so different from Heavenly Fathers.   He doesn't care about money.  He cares about our hearts.  He cares about us learning to have humility, patience, and compassion.    

There is a story that I love of an old farmer whose only horse ran away. That evening the neighbors gathered to commiserate with him since this was such bad luck. "Your farm will suffer, and you cannot plow," they said. "Surely this is a terrible thing to have happened to you."

He said, "Maybe yes, maybe no."

The next day the horse returned but brought with it six wild horses, and the neighbors came to congratulate him and exclaim at his good fortune. "You are richer than you were before!" they said. "Surely this has turned out to be a good thing for you, after all."

He said, "Maybe yes, maybe no."

And then, the following day, his son tried to saddle and ride one of the wild horses. He was thrown and broke his leg, and he couldn't work on the farm. Again the neighbors came to offer their sympathy for the incident. "There is more work than only you can handle, and you may be driven poor," they said. "Surely this is a terrible misfortune."

The old farmer said, "Maybe yes, maybe no."

The day after that, the country went to war and officers came to the village to seize young men for the army, but because of his broken leg the farmer's son was rejected. When the neighbors came again, they said, "How fortunate! Things have worked out after all. Most young men never return alive from the war. Surely this is the best of fortunes for you!"

And the old man said, "Maybe yes, maybe no."

 We all know we have to study it out in our mind and make the decision yourself.  You should pray for what you THINK you want.  But always remember our wisdom is nothing compared to Gods.

I'm going to give an example.  Right now we are looking for jobs.  Before a bunch of hard stuff happened to me-back in my naive days,  I would be praying like this, "Heavenly Father, we really want to move back to Idaho.  Please, please, please let us find a job in Idaho.   We really want to live there.  Please help Darren find a job in Idaho!"  Now I am much more cautious, my prayers are like this, "Heavenly Father, We would really like to move back to Idaho.  If that is what is best for our family please let it happen.  But other places might be nice to.  I don't know if there is another place out there that would be better for our family- if there is help us to find it.  I don't know what would be best for our family, but I know Thou knows, so please guide us to the best place for our family.  I like Idaho- but I trust Thee."  See the difference?

God wants to help us.  He wants to answer our prayers.  He loves us. I don't think we should hesitate to ask for what you want- but then leave it up to the Lord.

Alma said, in Alma 34:18-27" Yea, cry unto him for mercy; for he is ^amighty to save. Yea, humble yourselves, and continue in ^aprayer unto him. Cry unto him when ye are in your ^afields, yea, over all your flocks. ^aCry unto him in your houses, yea, over all your household, both morning, mid-day, and evening.  Yea, cry unto him against the power of your ^aenemies.  Yea, ^acry unto him against the ^bdevil, who is an enemy to all ^crighteousness.  Cry unto him over the crops of your fields, that ye may prosper in them.  Cry over the flocks of your fields, that they may increase.  But this is not all; ye must ^apour out your souls in your ^bclosets, and your secret places, and in your wilderness.  Yea, and when you do not cry unto the Lord, let your ^ahearts be ^bfull, drawn out in prayer unto him continually for your ^cwelfare, and also for the welfare of ^dthose who are around you.

One of my favorite quotes I have hanging in my house is one of the Mary Crandel.  When they arrived to the Salt Lake Valley the Captain asked her, "Aren't your shoes almost worn out?"
She replied, "No sir, my shoes are almost as good as when I started." to which he asked, "How is it that yours are good when almost all the company are barefooted?"
"Perhaps they did not pray as I have that their shoes would not wear out," she answered.
She recorded in her journal, "I had a horror of going barefooted. My prayer was daily that my shoes might last me till I reached the end of my journey."

One last thing I want to mention about prayers is the importance of praying out loud.  When Joesph Smith prayed in the Sacred Grove he said,

"So, in accordance with this, my determination to ask of God, I retired to the woods to make the attempt. It was on the morning of a beautiful, clear day, early in the spring of eighteen hundred and twenty. It was the first time in my life that I had made such an attempt, for amidst all my anxieties I had never as yet made the attempt to pray vocally."

I notice a huge difference in my prayers when I pray vocally.  It helps me to stay focused. 

I challenge all of us to make our prayers more sincere and have more faith in Heavenly Father that he knows what is best for us.  I have a couple of stories of prayers not answered, but I have MANY many more of my prayers being answered.  And many times that were probably answered in ways that I could not see.  I love him and know he loves us and does hear our prayers, and answers them when it is best for us.   I say these things in the name of Jesus Christ Amen.

Touche!

Yesterday Ellie was taking forever getting ready.  I told her, "hurry up!  You are taking forever, and you always make us late!"  She replied calmy, "It's a gene.  And I got it from you." 
What a little twerp!

Lover's Key

As I mentioned we had visitors last week.  One day we took a trip to Lover's Key.  Lover's Key is a fun beach just a short 25 min. from our house. I can't believe I live so close to so many fun places! On the way up we stopped at this fun restaurant on the water and got $3 fish taco's to go.  They hit the spot! And look at the ambience of this place!  I love it!  

How fun is this?! Take a seat in paradise!

Or you could sit here.

Or here.

We took the tram to the beach and lounged.  Oh the beach life.

I snorkeled forever trying to find a 9 legged starfish for Erica and Rach- and it paid off- I found one!

Here it is!

I love this picture.  I think I am going to paint it. 

I tried and tried to get Gabe to look at me.  He gave me the cold shoulder.

And just kept running away.

Teaching him early how to shell!

Hi!!

There we go!

Finally- he let me take his picture! LOL

Look at this sweet baby!  I love it when he falls asleep at the beach.  I can get a break from chasing him around and do what I want- usually it is snorkel or read. 

Hey Paul! Homeschooling at it's finest. 

Visitors!

We had visitors all last week.  Darren's sister and her husband, Erica and Mike came from Utah, and his other sister, Rachael, came from Massachusetts to visit for a week.  We had a great time- and the week just flew by so fast!

 They flew in on Saturday, so that night we watched the BYU game.  Sunday we went to church, took much needed naps, and then went to Vanderbilt Beach to watch the sunset. 

Monday we got up and headed to one of our favorite spots- Shark Tooth Beach! Actually it's called Caspersen Beach in Venice, but we just call it Shark Tooth.   We stayed the whole day and had a fantastic time.
 My favorite was actually the snorkeling.  There were a bunch of rocks going out from shore and so Rachie and I snorkeled around them.  It was pretty dang good snorkeling for not being a living coral reef.  We saw a bunch of fish! All sorts of shapes and colors and sizes. We saw some good sized Tarpon, probably 4 or 5 feet. a bunch of striped Sheep-heads.  A Parrot fish, an Angel fish.  A school of Grunt fish.  Darren and the girls saw a white stingray that was huge.  I couldn't believe all the fish we saw- it was amazing!

Here is the drive to Caspersen Beach- I always feel like we are in a different country. Love it!

The water was gorgeous.

Almost there!

AHHH! Gabe couldn't wait to roll around in the sand!  At least he doesn't eat it by the handful anymore.

Then he put on Darrens hat and walked around being absolutely adorable.

See?!!

I love my kids!!

As we pulled up to the beach and were unloading stuff I noticed a huge bag of lollipops.  I never buy candy like that for my kids.  So I was like- "Where did this come from?! Put that back! No way!"  I had visions on dentist trips flash before my eyes and kids saying things like "I''m not hungry for dinner".  I tried to not let them bring the suckers, but Erica had bought them, and everyone else wanted them so in the end, I lost. It was futile, I had to let the Aunts spoil my kids!  The rest of the day was a battle of Gabe insisting on always having a lollipop in each hand, dropping one in the sand, then having a  temper tantrum till he got another one.  Trying to reason with him and saying things like, "Hey, you already have one! Look, in that hand, right there, you don't need another one! Eat the one you have first!  You have already dropped 7 in the sand! I washed it off, it doesn't have sand on it anymore! "  made no difference.  In the end everyone else ended up eating lollipops as fast as they could cause Gabe started wanting the ones in other people mouths.  I guess it tastes better than the ones covered in sand! er I mean, previously covered in sand, but washed off.

Oh what the heck.  Look at that face.  Give him whatever he wants.

Rachie and Erica

Darren was full boar on Shark tooth hunting!  We found our best ones yet!

Darren would scoop up piles of sand and dump them in everyone's sifters.  

The Master at work.

Rachie and Ellie with a sifter full.  Typically we found 1 or 2 teeth per sifter.

Can't go to the beach without burying someone!

Erica and Mike

Rachie and Paul

Erica and Paul. Someone hijacked my camera. I didn't take any of these pictures-but I like them! 

We built sand castles, or shall we say, sand pyramids?

We buried Kyle and put a ton of sand on top.  We challenged him to try and get out.  He did it, but it took him a while!

You can do it Kyle!

Here's what he looked like after. LOL

I'll just call the doctor right now to make an appointment to get that sand out of your ear.

We had an awesome time snorkeling for sand dollars and seashells!  You have to go off shore a little ways to find the sand dollars.   The coolest thing EVER happened while we were snorkeling.  Erica, Mike and I were out snorkeling about 75 feet from shore, the water was about 10 feet deep- but we could see the bottom- when I heard Darren on the beach yelling, "Dolphin! Dolphin! Right by you guys!" I frantically looked around in the water, then I looked above the water, then under the water again, when I saw about a dolphin about 6 or 7 feet away swim right between me and Mike!  It was definitely one of the coolest things I have ever seen!  I wanted the dolphin to come swim with me so bad- but it didn't, it just swam away.  That's ok, it was awesome to see it.  Poor Mike didn't see the dolphin because his back was towards it:(

Ellie found this cool dead Puffer fish that stunk really bad.

Everyone refused to let me bring the stinky puffer fish home.  So I told them I would throw it away.  I sneakly put it in a plastic bag and hid it in the back of the car.  Paul needs it for his science collection! It is currently outside still stinking it up.

Good Bye Shark Tooth beach.  Thank you for one of the best beach days in the history of ever!

On the way home I took some pictures of these fun statues that are around the town of Venice. 

Kind of reminds me of the moose statues in Jackson Hole.  Only dolphins and turtles in Florida.

This is a piece of a very rare Lions Paw Shell that we found.  The kids and I were so excited to find it! You probably don't care, but I do, and well, it's my blog:)

Here's some of the Booty!

Some fun shells we found-Ceriths and Augers and Sea Glass on the right.  That is the first Sea Glass I have ever found! FANGLASTIC!

A beautiful Lightning Welk.

We found these 2 really cool Leopard Crab Shells.  Gabe broke them both into pieces:(

Here is our shark tooth collection so far.  We have a lot more than this- but these are the biggest ones.

And these are ALL ones we found in one day.  See those 3 at the bottom? Those are the biggest ones ever! Rachie, Erica, and I all found one of the biggies.  The rest are all pretty awesome too.

Well, we had an incredible beach day.  We kept the sunscreen on thick so no one got burned- which is always a plus when you have a whole week of beach days left.  Stay tuned for more:)