Families are FOREVER.

I never thought that the beginning of this new year, I would lose someone so close to me. I haven't lost anyone close to me since I was 16 years old.

Losing someone close is always a difficult time and experience. My Nana Maria passed away 1/7/2014 due to health complications. She had diabetes, had a leg amputated due to it and lost her vision. The last few months of her life, she had dialysis done daily and couldn't eat or drink much. This is not a way, I had envisioned my aunt living her life. I am sad that I didn't get to officially say good-bye to her, but I know she will always be in my heart. I know, she is in a better place where she is not suffering anymore. She is with our Heavenly Father again. She is reunited with her parents and others who have left us behind. Only Heavenly Father knows why and when He takes His children back to His presence. Some day, we will understand that reasoning.

All I can think about is the gospel. We have the Plan of Salvation and the Atonement in our lives and how important and how powerful they are. I feel totally lucky and grateful to have such knowledge. We lived with our Heavenly Father before we came to this earth. We came to Earth because the Lord trusted us to do the right thing and to test our faith in Him. Not only that we came to Earth to gain a body and to learn new things and follow His teachings. By allowing us to have a body we will be able to receive the ordinances of the gospel. Therefore, leading us to be perfected unto Him. We have to learn to love and forgive like the Savior did. Both the Atonement and the Resurrection of our Savior help make our physical death a temporary occurrence.

Even when our physical body dies, our spirits do not die as well. Our spirit will continue to live on. Since my aunt was not a member of the church, right now she is receiving the lessons of the gospel in the spirit world. It breaks my heart that I did not fulfill my missionary duty to the fullest I didn't ask her to take the discussions with the full-time missionaries. I did invite her to the ward activities and she felt the spirit there. It is my only regret that I have with her because our relationship overall was great. It hurts me and I am disappointed in myself. I know there is not much I can do for her now until I can perform her ordinances in the temple.

Eventually, my Nana Maria will be resurrected as a perfect being with her perfect body with no sickness. Both her physical body and spirit will be reunited once again. I am absolutely sure she will love having a body with NO sickness. This will be possible through the loving grace of our Heavenly Father. I know we will see her again, because families can be together forever. This is such a comfort to me.

I love the perspective that I have received through the gospel about death, love, and family. In the True to the Faith manual, there is a paragraph that states the following: "Even as you mourn at the death of loved ones, you can receive comfort in the promise of resurrection and in the assurance that families can be together forever. "You can see the great reason of sorrow, and also of rejoicing-sorrow because of death and destruction among men, and joy because of the light of Christ unto life"-Alma 28:14

In the end, the lesson that I learned was the importance of sharing the gospel with those we love and others whom we may not know. At times, it may be a difficult thing to put our believes out there due to our fear of being rejected and ridiculed. It is important to keep in mind that all good things come from Christ and through Him we can do anything he asks of us. In the book of Nephi, " I will go and do the things which the Lord hath commanded." (1 Nephi 3:7). Thinking of this it is important to understand why the age to become a full-time missionary has decreased because our fellow brothers and sisters need us to share the restored gospel of Jesus Christ with them. Our Heavenly Father needs us to do that for Him because of His faith in us to become more like Him.