It has been so fun to get to know the wonderful women that are floating around out there in the blogosphere.  Can you believe that we’ve met over forty amazing women? I have been impressed, uplifted, and inspired as I’ve read about your families, your testimonies, and your trials.  I can sincerely say that many times, getting to know you has helped restore my faith in humanity because you are evidence that God’s work and priorities are still rolling forth even when we see headlines every day of the moral decline of our society.  That reassurance has strengthened me.  Thank you.

This will be the last week of the Find-A-Friend Friday feature here on Diapers and Divinity because even though it has been such a satisfying run, I’m just a little burnt out.  I think there may be a handful of people left who had indicated interest in participating, and I hope you can forgive me if you still had not been picked by random.org.  I’ve found myself having so much less time at home than I enjoyed during the summer months or in the years before my children started going to three different schools and I became their bus.  I’m just struggling to get everything done, so I need to let some things go.  I’ll still be around, but with the exception of General Conference Book Club, I’ll just be a lot less structured.

So, I have one last friend I want to talk about before FFF officially signs off.  In fact, he’s part of the reason I need to make more time for myself.  His name is Jesus Christ.  He’s my brother, my Savior, and my very best friend.  No one knows me better than he does, which makes it all the more miraculous how much he loves me.  You probably know him too, and that’s one of the coolest things about him– his ability to love each of us with infinite intimacy.  One of my favorite classic talks that I’ve returned to often is the first conference talk given by Elder James E. Faust when he was called into the Quorum of the Seventy.  It is called “A Personal Relationship with the Savior.”

“We should earnestly seek not just to know about the Master, but to strive, as He invited, to be one with Him (see John 17:21), to “be strengthened with might by his Spirit in the inner man” (Eph. 3:16). We may not feel a closeness with Him because we think of Him as being far away, or our relationship may not be sanctifying because we do not think of Him as a real person.”

He then goes on to speak of five simple things that we can do to grow closer to the Savior:

First: A daily communion involving prayer.

Second: A daily selfless service to another.

Third: A daily striving for an increased obedience and perfection in our lives.

Fourth: A daily acknowledgment of His divinity.

Fifth: A daily study of the scriptures.

The common thread in each ingredient is the word “daily.” I’m ashamed to admit that in all my busy-ness, I’ve let some of these things slide, and I can feel it start to wear on me.  I need to regain the strength that comes from putting Him first, my truest friend.  President Faust declared it so beautifully:

“It is my testimony that we are facing difficult times. We must be courageously obedient. My witness is that we will be called upon to prove our spiritual stamina, for the days ahead will be filled with affliction and difficulty. But with the assuring comfort of a personal relationship with the Savior, we will be given a calming courage. . . .  I know and I testify with an absolute awareness in every fiber and innermost recess of my being that Jesus is the Christ, the Messiah, the Divine Redeemer, and the Son of God. May we be obedient to His wish, ‘Come unto me thy Savior’ (D&C 19:41), I pray humbly in His holy and sacred name. Amen.”

I feel confident that if I can put these steps more fully into practice, I’ll never have wait for Fridays to find a friend.  This finale post is an invitation to join me in getting to know the most perfect Friend a little better every day of the week.  We all need Him.