Living on faith and macaroni

A few months ago we had a bunch of friends over for cake to celebrate a birthday. Derek was looking for the trash can and I told him it was in the pantry. He opened the door and then turned around and said, "Oh this is the pantry? Then where do y'all keep your food?" Haha Evan and I just looked at each other and laughed and said, "In there." It was this perfect little newlywed moment... sometimes you get to the end of the month and eat cereal for dinner, or PB&J's. Turns out, it works just fine.

I've learned so many things like that ... like how to work a tight budget, or that you have to actually move the clothes from the washer to the dryer or else you'll just have to wash them all over again, and mostly that you have to say what you want otherwise he's not going to know. But the hardest thing I've had to learn in the past nearly 10 months of marriage (I know, veteran status, no big deal) is how to live on faith. Lately I've been reading The Infinite Atonement by Tad R. Callister, and the whole thing is incredible by the way, but yesterday I came across a quote that really hit me:

"Does not each of us confront those moments in life when faith and the reason of the world are seemingly incompatible and we must choose between the two? We find ourselves at a spiritual crossroad-one path paved with the knowledge and reason of man, the other paved with faith in God."
  
The whole chapter is about the depth of the atonement, about just what exactly it covers, and in his much more eloquent way of writing, Tad expresses that it covers everything, every little thing and every big thing, every thing. He separates it into categories to make it easier to understand from "suffering caused by sin" to "suffering related to weaknesses"  and many more but the one I had never thought about was that the atonement covers "suffering or anxiety necessitated by the exercise of faith." He goes on to talk about how so many of the prophets came to those moments mentioned above where reason and faith were at a complete impasse, they had to choose one or the other. For example with Moses leading the children of Israel out of Egypt and straight in to the Red Sea, or with Nephi heading in to get the plates of Laban with no plan and two failed attempts.

So I started thinking... what if they hadn't had the faith? 

What if when Christ told Peter to cast in his net one more time after the long night of emptiness he just couldn't do it? Would they have starved to death? Probably not. 

What if Moses had been like "Oh geez there's a massive ocean in the way I guess we better turn to the right instead." Would they still have escaped from the Pharaoh? Maybe so.

They might have been just fine, but then they would have missed the miracle! Why would you want to turn right and listen to reason, when instead, with faith and with Christ you could have the Red Sea open up for you and walk through on dry ground?

With graduation approaching I have been caught up in a mess of anxiety and worry about the path we've chosen. In one sense, its not a sure path. We have no guarantee about a job in December or where we'll be living, we won't know anything until we get (hopefully get!) a phone call that will determine our future. If we had any reason at all, we'd pick something else. We'd go to grad school and pursue a career where we can be in charge of all of those things ourselves and didn't have to wait to be told. But I see now that this is one of those moments for us. We've been so prayerful about the path we've chosen and now it comes down to reason or faith. And we could pick reason and probably be just fine, but then we'd miss the miracle. I don't know what that miracle will be for us, but I do know I want to be there to see it. So I'll choose faith and all the anxiety that comes with it. And in the mean time all I have to remember is that the atonement covers that too.

Thanks Tad.