I love technology!! And I hate technology. I love the convenience but I hate that I'm so tied to it. I did it to myself so I won't complain much. I love that I can get on Skype and send Brian a text message any time I need/want to. I try not to do it in the middle of the day since being woken up in the middle of his night by a message would probably freak him out! I also love that I can use Skype to call his cell phone. I love that from time to time we can even get enough of an internet connection to actually video call on Skype. Okay, maybe it's just Skype that I love, not technology in general. LOL
I've thought a lot about communications in the past 9 months. I wonder how it was for my grandparent's generation to have to wait months and months to receive letters from loved ones off at war. And then, when you did get something, it was probably cut to shreds by the censors unless the soldier had been incredibly careful about what they wrote.
I've thought about how much communications have changed in just the last 20 years. When Brian and I met 19 years ago, we could call on the phone but it was quite an expensive, long-distance call. All we had were land lines. The 1st month after we met, he was in Oregon and I was in Idaho. We each had a $600 phone bill because you paid for each and every minute you were on the phone. Nothing like the unlimited minutes plan we have now for well under $100!! We realized very quickly that we couldn't afford to continue that! So we wrote letters. Actual letters that got addressed, a stamp put on the envelope and put in a mail box to be collected by a mailman. We each wrote several letters every week for about 10 weeks. We still have all of those letters and they are a precious reminder of our courtship and a history of how we got to know each other so well in so short of a span of time.
Now, today, a lot of the communication that takes place has been reduced to text messages that hardly resemble the English language. Many articles have been written on the demise of actual communication and many agonize over the lack of inter-personal relationships because technology has taken the place of face-to-face communication. Is it all bad? No, I don't think so. Our ability to communicate with someone isn't dependent on either face-to-face or technology-aided contact. It's dependent on our willingness to communicate.
Now, stay with me because I'm going to seemingly go off on a totally different tangent. Brian sent me a very significant email this afternoon. We have discussed many times over the past 9 months why the Lord has put us on this path. It's not an easy one!! If I had my choice, I wouldn't choose to have my husband that I love so dearly (and actually still like, too!) be literally on the other side of the world for 12 weeks at a time. I would choose for him to be home, helping me raise our children, being by my side through all the ups and downs that life brings. In every discussion, we always come back to the fact that we KNOW God is directing our paths. He has a plan for us and even though we don't know every detail of that plan, we know we are in His hands and He is guiding us. In our Church, we have no paid clergy. All positions, leadership, teachers, librarians, everything, are filled voluntarily by members of the congregation. There is a small congregation at the base Brian is working on. He was asked last Fall to fill one of the leadership positions. In our vernacular, he was the 2nd counselor in the Branch Presidency. In normal situations, a person would be interviewed in person by a Stake President and during that interview the call would be extended and accepted. Being in AFG is not a normal situation! LOL Brian's interview was conducted by email. A list of questions was sent and, after filling out the answers, it was returned. Then another email arrived and he was asked to serve.
When he was at home on leave, another email arrived. It was again from the District President and was very similar (if not exactly the same) as the previous interview email. Brian again filled out the answers and returned it. This afternoon, Brian forwarded the 2nd email to me. He has been called as the Branch President of the Leatherneck Military Branch. For those unfamiliar with "Mormonisms", the titles Pastor, Father, Bishop or other similar titles would be the equivalent. He will have the responsibility of watching over the members of the congregation, assisting them wherever possible, counseling them, hearing their confessions, scheduling the Sunday meetings and doing whatever else he is guided to do by the Lord. Even as I type this, I'm overwhelmed by it all! I truly wish I was there with him to be the helpmeet a wife is meant to be. I wish I could do more than pray even more fervently for him. I know this will be a challenge for him. He is a good leader. He inspires others and people naturally are drawn to him. We've joked for years that he should have been a professional counselor because people just gravitate to him and are comfortable spilling everything to him! He truly knows how to communicate. We believe that part of the reason God has lead us in this path is so Brian can be in this position to do God's work.
Now let's see if I can tie this all together. I firmly believe that God has had a hand in the rapid development of technology. He uses it for His purposes whether it is to bring 2 people together (like my brother and sister-in-law who met online), to broadcast the words of a living prophet to all the world, or to call an obscure electrician to be the branch president in a remote corner of the world where our Church probably hadn't even been heard of until foreign armies arrived. Technology has enabled the Word to be taken to the farthest reaches of our planet. It has allowed people to have His word that wouldn't have otherwise through advances in translation, printing and availability of media such as dvds and the internet.
I love technology for the good that it brings to the world and, more specifically, to my life. I love it for the ability I have to be close to my husband despite the actual miles that separate us. I love it for the ability I have to find old friends and meet new friends. I love that I have sciptures at my fingertips on my iPad along with my hymnbook and lesson manuals for my Primary class. I love that I can download books to my heart's content to keep at my fingertips for when I have a few minutes. I love that I can keep all my photos handy and relatively safe. And I love so many more things about technology!!! I'm so grateful to be living in this time and this place where God has blessed us with these things to help us further His purposes. There is no doubt that God is leading, guiding and planning our path. May He also bless us that we will recognize and remain on that path always!!!
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