Today has been an exceptionally blessed day, and I say this literally. I'm not sure if I have ever felt such instant and extreme love and sense of welcome from a group of strangers in my entire life. Frankly I'm not sure if I have felt this uplifted so deeply so consistently in one day for some time.
This morning I woke up pretty early, much earlier than I needed to. I had my first church meeting today with the London North ward. I was a bit nervous - which now that I come to think of it may have been a reason as to why I woke up early and couldn't fall back asleep - but I have a feeling it has more to do with jet lag than butterflies There were only a few baby butterflies to begin with. But nevertheless I woke up around 6 this morning. Decided to take a shower and watch a bit of Netflix to pass the time. (I watched some of a British movie called Starter for Ten who had a lot more of my favorite actors than I had anticipated which was kind of fun.) Around 8:45, about four of us set off to travel to our church building.
It was much farther north than we had been. If you look at a tube map it was in zone 3, which we had yet to touch. Our tube stop destination was called East Finchley, so I can only assume that is the name of the area we were in. But travelling was a lot more complicated than we had imagined. But we did make it, and goodness was it worth it. We made it in time for the passing of the sacrament just barely. I woman came up with lovely children and she asked us if we were the BYU students. She then welcomed us and said that we were in the best ward. I'm pretty positive she is right.
We went into the chapel after the Sacrament was done being passed. Without meaning to sound racist, it was absolutely wonderful to see so many colors in one room. It truly was like a sampling of the earth with all of the countries/ethnicity present. The diversity was fantastic - it made me recognize just how much I love diversity and how absent it is during my schooling. This meeting the Bishop and his wife spoke as they were leaving with their family to move to Australia that coming week. The Bishop's wife gave an absolutely lovely talk about not discounting spiritual experiences if they aren't grand ones, or waiting for the grand ones and just missing the simple beauties of life. She likened it to her seeing a group of tropical parakeets here in England and how whenever she would go back to the that spot she would always look for them instead of watch her children playing or take in the beautiful view of far-off London in the valley below her. It was a great talk
In between talks the Elders sang Nearer My God To Thee and it was quite beautiful! I didn't cringe once. Which is not usually the case in my experience at church services. So I was quite pleased :) Every performance is always from the heart, but not exactly on pitch. But this performance was both. Anyway, the two talks were absolutely lovely. It was quite moving how much these two people loved the ward, they were both very emotional, but the most moving part about it was how everyone else was just as emotional. What i loved about it was that the family was an American family, but as I looked around, an Elderly English couple were wiping away tears, while to my right a middle aged Albanian woman was crying and behind me several black women, young and old, were drying their eyes as well.... It was wonderful to see all of these different ages and races all together as one. There was so much love in that building. You could just tell that everyone there loved everyone and that race nor age nor social status was of no consequence to their degree of affection towards one another.
After the meeting everyone came up to welcome us or at least introduce themselves. And I mean EVERYONE. I can't recall how many came up or who they all were because there were so many. But I do recall Sis. Rainley. She was an older woman with a giant, bright smile who came up to each of us, held our faces in her hand(s) and shook our cheeks saying "oh darlings, aren't you just lovely!" and going on in this similar manner. She introduced herself, saying "just think of the rain" (pointing and miming rain from the sky) and then lee (with a flourish of her hands)." She kept welcoming us and just showering us with praise and love. There were quite a few people who did this. Everyone I talked to looked at us and welcomed us with such deep and honestly, I feel like undeserved love. They literally think of us and love us as angels that came from Heaven to them. (And I'm not coming up with this - it was told to us.) But honestly I don't think I've ever been so welcomed or loved in my life. It may have been my favorite day of church ever. I've often heard people say that they've gone to other wards and been super welcomed and felt just at home etc, etc, and I've always thought that was just exaggeration. But I've recognized now that this DOES happen, and that is exactly how I felt. It was marvelous.
After the meetings for the day we were told to go to the primary room - there was ice cream for everyone! WHAT?! Seriously though, this ward is THE greatest ward. It was such an awesome church service :)
Once we were back at the flat we had a fireside, given by the Stake President. He was pretty young to be stake president, but I don't think anyone minded. He sounded like Tom Hiddleston lol :) So that was nice. But it was such a fantastic fireside. Some of the things I took away from it were this:
- I'm living down the street from a 500 million dollar home, the most expensive in all of London. I should feel very lucky and recognize this chance will most likely not come again
- Open up my heart and let this city change me
- Take time to be with yourself, go for a walk, and let this city heal me
He basically said everything that I wanted and needed to hear. It's kind of crazy but I am already in absolute love with this city - and I'm already dreading leaving. but I will be putting these thoughts behind me because I have six more glorious weeks in Europe!
Can't wait to see what next week has in store for me.
Cheers and Happy Sunday!
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