Heat

I made some banana bread today.

It actually turned out really good.

It was soft and moist with no burns or gooey spots.

It was just right.

As I sat eating a slice late at night I started thinking about how my bread got from the slimy ingredients I put in the pan to the delicious fluffy bread I was eating. The answer to this transformation of my dough to bread all happened because of heat.

It was also important that just the right ingredients mixed together before it was exposed to that heat and that it was IN the heat for just the right amount of time. Otherwise my bread couldn't become the deliciousness I was eating.

And as I ate my bread it dawned on me that our lives are kind of the same.

The Lord is so careful to put just the right experiences, or ingredients, in our life at just the right time so when a trial comes along we have the opportunity to grow and become a "delicious piece of bread". If we try to escape from our trials too quickly we might still be a little gooey in the middle, or in other words we won't reach our full potential.

The Lord said:

"My [daughter], peace be unto thy soul; thine adversity and thine afflictions shall be but a small moment; And then, if thou endure it well, God shall exalt thee on high; thou shalt triumph over all thy [trials] " (D&C 121:7-8)

So the next time I'm in the midst of the heat, I think I'll try to remember my banana bread and imagine what "deliciousness" I can become if I endure it well.