The Power of Prayer

Last Wednesday was pretty rough. I fell on my art case and bruised my hip really bad, and I was in a lot of pain. Of course, that's when my parents decided to leave for a few hours and leave me in charge of three of my younger siblings. Karie (my 5 year old little sister) was throwing a fit, crying and screaming at the top of her lungs, so I decided a bath would calm her down. I sent up Ethan (my 11 year old brother) to start the bath while I calmed her down and set out her pajamas to change into. A few minutes later, Ethan came rushing into the room with a panicked expression and said frantically, "Aubrey, I started the bath and it won't stop!"

I rushed upstairs to find the tub almost overflowing. The knob had broken and it was impossible to turn off the water. We finally figured out how to turn off the water to the entire house, but not in time to stop the bathroom from flooding.

I was so stressed out at this point, what with Owen and Karie screaming that we were all going to drown, and Ethan panicking and the pain in my leg, so I closed my eyes for a split second and said a little prayer in my mind. "Heavenly Father, please help everyone to stay calm while I fix this."

I corralled the kids in my room and started mopping up the mess of water in our bathroom.

That's when the power went out.

It was late, so everything was plunged into darkness. The kids started screaming again, and the floor was still soaked with water, and at this point I was in so much pain it was hard to hold back the tears. I quickly whipped out my iPod, using the glow of the screen to find all the flashlights in the house. I brought them into my room and shut my door behind me so all the light was trapped in my room with the kids. I took one light and again went to start mopping the floors. I closed my eyes again, saying another little prayer. "Heavenly Father, please let everything else be okay, I'm not sure I can take much more after this."

About an hour later, all the water was cleaned up, my parents came home and the power came back on, and it seemed like all was well.

Until the phone rang. A family friend had fallen, and he probably wasn't going to live much longer. That completely shut me down.

As I sat in my bed that night, crying over everything that happened, I simply got out of bed, knelt down and started to pray. Immediately, it felt like someone had wrapped their arms around me and was holding me. I heard a little voice whisper, "It's going to be okay." Over and over again. "It's going to be okay."

I want to testify that the power of prayer is real. Sometimes things don't always work out like we want to. Sometimes when we pray for something, it doesn't happen, but we can't let that diminish our faith that prayer really does work. Some days you'll get trial after trial after trial and you'll think you can't go any longer, you'll think that your prayers aren't being heard, but I promise that Heavenly Father is listening. My friend Nick tells me constantly that God gives the hardest battles to his strongest soldiers. D&C 121:7 says, "My son, peace be unto thy soul; thine adversity and thine afflictions shall be but a small moment." I just want you all to know that everything is going to be okay, and everything will work out, no matter how messed up or stressful your life is.

With love,
     Aubrey Lou