Finding Her Faith as a New Single Member of the Church: Erica Steed’s Story

In this weeks episode, Erica Steed shares her story of how she is finding her way as a new, single sister in the church, and how she’s had to battle misinformation and false doctrine along her journey.

*** Please help us spread Erica’s light to the world by SHARING her story.  You never know whose life you will impact for good. ***

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And, if you have a faith-promoting or inspiring story, or know someone who does, please let us know by going to https://www.latterdaylights.com/contact/ and reaching out to us.

Below is a full transcript of this episode:

Scott Brandley
Hi everyone. I’m Scott Brandley.

Alisha Coakley
And I’m Alisha Coakley, every member of the Church has a story to share one that can instill faith, invite growth and inspire others.

Scott Brandley
On today’s episode, we’re going to hear how one woman’s struggle to find her place in the church has taught her how to use the gift of discernment to separate culture from the gospel. Welcome to Latter-Day Lights.

Everyone, thank you so much for joining us today on another episode of Latter-Day lights. We’re excited to introduce to you today our guest, Erica steed. Erica, thank you so much for hopping on this podcast with us.

Erica Steed
I am so glad y’all let me be here. Thanks for letting me in for an episode.

Alisha Coakley
Of course, no problem. Thank you for reaching out. So we actually, to our listeners, I put a post up on one of I don’t even know which group it was on one of our groups that were on. And I was just like, hey, yeah, something on Facebook. And I’m like, Hey, guys, like I’m looking for more stories. So if anyone wants to be on a show, you know, let me know. And Erica reached out and we got connected. And here she is super easy, right?

Erica Steed
I mean, I thought it would more be more difficult. But…

Alisha Coakley
I know it’s awesome. So thank you so much. We we love I mean, Scott, and I love any of our guests that we have come on, but it’s always fun to be able to get guests that like neither one of us know, you know, it’s always nice to be able to build new relationships and hear new stories and stuff. So thank you for that. So, Erica, why don’t you tell everybody a little bit about yourself?

Scott Brandley
Okay, so I joined the church officially November of 2020. So I came in at a very awkward time for not only the church but everybody in the whole world. Let me see. I’m 30 I am single. No, no kids biologically yet, but every student I’ve ever had knows that I am mom. Okay, I am a musician. I’ve had multiple music callings in the church so far. I am a crafter, mainly knitting. It’s on me all the time.

Alisha Coakley
Like, are you gonna knit during our show?

Erica Steed
I am a nerd like that man.

Alisha Coakley
Oh my goodness. So fun!

Erica Steed
Yeah, I’m like that major nerd sort of fantasy sci fi type of girl. I’ve got a cat. I, I’m an only child. My family is sort of a bit all over the place all over the country. So but but here in my town, it’s just me and my parents and one or two other family members and that’s really it. So…

Alisha Coakley
And where’s your town.

Erica Steed
I am in Nacogdoches, Texas, that is Longview, Texas stake. I’m sort of in the middle of the Dallas Shreveport Houston triangle. Okay, so, eastern Texas, sort of almost the Louisiana.

Alisha Coakley
Okay, so you’re gonna be knitting a cowboy hat then is that right?

Erica Steed
Maybe it’s cheesehead because packers are the only way to go?

Alisha Coakley
Okay, okay.

Scott Brandley
All right. Well, we’re excited to hear some more about your story. So why don’t you take it away?

Erica Steed
So I, like I said, I’m a convert to the church. I actually had a Spanish teacher in high school, who is now currently on my stake presidency, who he’s been a member his whole life. So I sort of vaguely knew of the church. But it was not long before the pandemic started. Actually, I had met a set of missionaries after a very interesting religious journey. I grew up in a First Church of the Nazarene, which taught me a lot of what not to do in religion. I went atheist from about the age of 15, to about the age of 24-25. I then decided I was going to be Catholic. So an entire other swing in the pendulum direction. And it was while I was heavily practicing Catholic, that I met a pair of sister missionaries randomly at my public library, and my first thought was, oh Gosh, the Utahn’s. My second thought was, it is Texas in the middle of July get these poor nametag babies out of the heat, you know, at the library, and, you know, they started Asking me like all these questions, I had plenty for him back like, Okay, what do y’all really think of Warren Jeffs? What’s with the skirts? Like what’s with a lot of that, like, so why do y’all use the Book of Mormon and so the Bible again, right, and I was that person. I found out much later that the junior companion of that set had flown in from Provo on Monday out of the MTC, I met her on Tuesday.

Alisha Coakley
Oh, poor girl.

Erica Steed
Yeah, I know.

Alisha Coakley
She was thrown in there, huh.

Erica Steed
And through a lot of lot of stuff with missionaries over about a year and a half period. You know, it took me a while to sort of get comfortable with the Gospel before I ever even was baptized. I just had a lot of sort of religious baggage mixed with wrong information. Three of my favorite things I was told by parents of missionaries, were number three, you know, single people don’t get into heaven, right? Which was then corrected you Oh, you get into heaven. You just don’t get into the celestial kingdom as a signal. So which had to be completely corrected by members? Number two, was a pair of elders. I’d asked, okay, why are women good enough for the priesthood? They’re like, Oh, you know how women are blessed with the physical ability to give birth right? And like multimedia, obviously, because of that we men deserve everything else. Oh, my gosh. And one of my absolute favorites was a pair of sisters. The first time they introduced the concept of the temple. I was used to things like cathedrals and basilica’s from the Catholic faith where you do different things, but you can still have a Sunday Mass. Right? And I’m just asking, like, Okay, what’s go like, what is this temple like the I’ll do Sunday service and it like, how is this different? Like, when do you go? Where’s the closest one? And one of the sisters just looks at me with almost pity on her face? And she’s like, Oh, Erica, you’re not good enough for the temple.

Scott Brandley
Wow, okay.

Oh, just lots of misinformation before I even got in. So even when I was baptized, I sort of entered feeling like a third class citizen, just to thoroughly the doctrine. But okay, I don’t go to heaven unless I get married. So if I die in a car wreck today, I have no hope. I’m a single childless female convert, who never went on a mission. And the things just kept stacking up. And I have had members of my word that like, one time I had somebody asked, How do you not know who Harold B. Lee is? I’m sorry, treat me like I’m a baby Mormon. Although what I’m doing, right? And they’re like, Well, how are you? Like, how are you a member of the church and you don’t know Harold dealing? Like, and just so many things where I’d get eight different stories from 11 different people, you’ll come up on my endowment, nobody could seem to get their stories straight on. What’s pandemic? What’s not. What am I allowed to do with the limited temple recommend? Can I see my friend getting down or not like what can I do and not do? And the confusion mixed with the weird cultural things? I did not know what I was doing. And I do not really have people that understood, I feel like they met Well, I feel like they wanted to. But either they’d been members their whole life back to Great great granddaddy Brigham Young, or they had been convert so long, that they forgot what it was like. They didn’t remember. And it’s like, you’re they’re so busy hearing me that they don’t hear me. Yeah. So it was hard. It’s still hard.

So how did you overcome some of those that misinformation and and still have still move forward towards that baptism and towards being a member What kept you going even though you had some of those things happen?

Erica Steed
I mean, once I’ve, I’ve finally clicked in a relationship with heavenly father it was. It made it easier, not easy, easier, but have having that sense of Revelation and doctrine mixed together to be able to fight the culture. It’s like, Oh, that is not what I’m being told dad did not say that. No, thank you. So not having that definitely helped and finding ways also to narrow my circle. You know, not necessarily trusting everybody, like knowing who is giving me accurate information, like knowing the valid websites to find things on, like having those resources to be able to shift and narrow my focus, as well. Right. Okay, so

Scott Brandley
You were, you were able to overcome some of those early objections, right? Still got that revelation, and you knew it was still the right thing to do. Right. And so you got baptized and, okay.

Alisha Coakley
So, so did you have any type of support, like right away joining the church who were giving you, you know, right information and, or was that something that came later on?

Scott Brandley
I mean, I had a few at first, I had, that one Spanish teacher of mine who was in my ward, who happened to be the one to baptize me. Had him and his wife, I had a few other people in the very beginning, very small circle, until I sort of start gauging people. And, you know, sort of telling me, okay, now she does this, but he does that. No, that’s not what that means at all. tone it back, you know, come here. So having those sort of five or six people up front to be able to buffer some things off have really helped. Nice. Okay. Cool.

Alisha Coakley
So once you get baptized Oh, sorry. Go ahead, Scott.

Scott Brandley
I was gonna say, sometimes it just takes that one or two special people in your life, that, you know, that make all the difference. Right.

Erica Steed
Right.

Scott Brandley
So that’s awesome.

Alisha Coakley
So you mentioned before that, you know, one of the things that was really hard for you in joining the church was that you’re, you know, you’re 30, you’re single, you don’t have any biological children. Did you? Did you find that there? Are other women in the church who are actually quite like you who are in kind of those that similar spot? Were you able to make friends with them? You know, how does? How does that work for you now? Because you’ve been a member for a couple years now. Right? Like we’re coming up on your two year anniversary? Correct?

Erica Steed
Right.

Alisha Coakley
How did that help?

Erica Steed
I mean, in my area, I mean, we’re a smaller area, my town is about 30,000 people, and we only have a few, I don’t know, to 300 active members in my ward. So there’s like a lot of the singles in my ward are, you know, 50s, 60s, 70s, divorced, widowed kids my age, like, there are one or two who just never got married, but they’re in their 60s. So like, Fine, like a lot of the ones that aren’t married are either 30 years older than me or 15 years younger. So I’m trying to sort of find my place of, you know, okay. I don’t have kids like y’all, you, okay? I don’t have these experiences under my belt like y’all do, like my 30 plus SA group is pretty much all 20 something 30 something years older than me. So I’m still trying to sort of find that comfort zone.

Alisha Coakley
Gotcha. So have you done anything to look out online? Because I know, I know, especially we were saying like with technology, right? Like, it opens so many doors of possibilities. Has that been something that you’ve looked into at all is is trying to find people more in your situation from maybe like Facebook or something like that?

Erica Steed
I’ve used it some but it’s been difficult to figure out like, what is authentic? What is not the trolls trying to get in and like poke holes in the doctor, you know, it’s like, people like I’m two hours and change from Houston, three hours and change from Dallas, an hour and a sudden from Shreveport. So a lot of these big areas with a bunch of singles. You know, it’s a bit of a drive.

Alisha Coakley
Yeah, right. Yeah. Gosh, that can be so tough. Well, so what have you done to kind of make yourself fit then in your small area, your smaller ward? What are some of the things that you’ve figured out that are good truths to concentrate on?

Erica Steed
So having the Music callings have been really interesting. Like I ended up having a music minor coming out of college. So being able to put some of that to use and be able to sort of speak to people that way, like a lot of people have started conversations over Oh, my goodness at him was gorgeous. Like, you know, if that’s one of my favorites, that reminds me what, and it’ll sort of start these natural conversations with some people that I might not have reached out with. And then interestingly, sort of family history stuff in temple stuff is sort of tried to go to talking to people about that, and like talking with their struggles with that is like trying to find those connections towards like, yeah, you might be married with six kids, or you might be 57, and divorced, but like, we all have the temple stuff, we all have, like, trying to find those little blips of sameness have any sort of help.

Alisha Coakley
So did you have an interest in any type of family history before you join the church? Or was that something that the church kind of brought out in you?

Erica Steed
I mean, the church really brought it out. It’s like, you know, I was one of those people. It’s like, I have my parents, I have my grandparents, maybe some great aunts and uncles like, but, you know, it’s like, I had my immediate genetics fear, but, you know, the sort of family history idea was something new upon joining the church that is like, No, I sort of like, almost felt like Macaulay was it Macaulay Culkin or Hailey Joel-Osment in the in the sixth sense. It’s like we do what to dead people. Oh. Hang on. Sort of like your what exactly temple work is. And it’s like, how are you supposed to describe your temple work for the dead when you can’t even talk about temple work for the living? Because I haven’t began my endowment yet, I can’t tell you. So how am I supposed to understand temple work? We’d love to talk about it. Okay. Yeah. Okay, do I know.

Alisha Coakley
So now, have you gone through the temple? Have you gotten to that point where you’ve been able to do some baptisms and stuff? Or have you gone through and got your endowments? Are you there yet?

Erica Steed
Yeah, I got my endowment this past December. Ah, awesome. Nice. It was a rough experience.

Alisha Coakley
Yeah, they’re not always they’re not always super spiritual at first. Sometimes it’s just overwhelming and you’re just like, What the heck.

Erica Steed
I ended up like having a panic attack in the celestial room at mine because I was. And there was a lady who went with me who like she’s like, Erica, I know why you’re having a hard time. I’m like, please tell me why. Like, I don’t understand. And she’s like, hunny it’s because you brought Satan into the temple with you.

Alisha Coakley
My Are you kidding me? What is with members in Texas? Y’all come on.

Erica Steed
People wonder why I struggle? Okay. Yeah, so I like I’m like, first of all, I did not think I was that powerful. But thank you all I thought he was helpful grounds. So like, I did not want to go back for the longest time. Yeah, but I did. And I ended up like finding a bunch more peace in it, but also so much overwhelm. Because as a single woman, there are no sons, no brothers, like, my dad’s not a member. Like, you know, I’m sitting here with like, all these man reservations. And I was like, how am I supposed to do any of this? Like, it’s supposed to work? Right? Like, I’m already behind. On this stuff. I like the female initiatories and endowments, Married sealings like bringing in both genders of baptisms. Like I’m already behind. How am I supposed to get any of this man work done on like, I’m sitting here on my little single Island. Like, what? How’s this supposed to get done? If people like some of the temple like that’s what I did. I just had to give up. I’m like, What do you mean give up? Like, those are your human people. You know, they’re the reason you’re here what you mean give up? Right? No. Yeah.

Alisha Coakley
You know, I remember so I don’t know how, you know if you’ve listened to any of the other episodes or anything like that from our show before. But I remember even though I wasn’t single, and I, you know, I had children, my husband wasn’t a member for a very long time for the first 13 years of our marriage, and I grew up in a family that was very, very inactive. And so my parents, it took them 40 years to get to the temple, right. And so I remember sitting in the celestial room sometimes are going through and doing work. And even though you know, I wasn’t in the same boat as you, I can empathize with how it must have felt to because I do remember looking around, and I would see all these couples, you know, or I would see these families who were there with their missionary that was going to go off on a mission, or, you know what I mean? Like, it just, it seems like, there was so much love and familial support. And then here I was, you know, and I was all by myself. And it was, so it was like, you know, I’m here, and I feel peace. And I know, I’m where I’m supposed to be. But it’s so heartbreaking. At the same time, it was like this constant reminder of what I didn’t have, you know, and it really, it was so painful. But I do remember, one of the things that kind of helped me to shift was to think about, like, I don’t know anybody else’s story in the temple either. I don’t know, if that couple sitting there just made it to the temple for the first time. You know what I mean, I don’t know if that woman that over there, he has been a widow for 50 years. And, you know, even though she looks happy, and she has all of her friends around her, you know, maybe internally like she is struggling too. And, and I just kind of I kind of thought, you know, if I can just have my Heavenly Father help me to see all these other people in his eyes, maybe it would help me to, like, take all of the focus off of like, what I’m still waiting for, you know, and that ended up helping out a lot to the point where I started craving the temple, you know, like, I would get to the point where like, I was like, oh, I need this in my life, I need to go, I need to be there. And then I started being more open. And I would like sit with someone who was by themselves, or you know what I mean? Like, I tried to, like, Get out of my comfort zone. And instead of waiting for someone else to come over to me, I was like, You know what, I gotta go sit down and go over them. So that seemed to help me a lot. Was there anything that sort of helps you to keep going? Was it just that drive to get the work done?

Erica Steed
I mean, it was partly that I’ve got a couple of people in my stake, who one of them is a ordinance worker in the Houston temple. And I’ve got another friend who lives about an hour for me who he is a shift coordinator in the Dallas temple. So like having them to be able to bounce off of like having developing these relationships with ordinance workers from going it’s like, we don’t know each other’s names, like, we just know your other’s faces like you. Yeah. I don’t have that. But like, I started talking to other people around me like in my ward and in my stake, like, How do y’all people get this done? Like, y’all have been in the church for a minute, like, how do you all do this? Like, how, how does this play out for you? And I started meeting people in very similar boats. It’s like, you know, most of my family’s inactive, and I’ve been divorced 15 years, and my spouse was never a member. I can like, I’ve been single for a while I can’t. I’ve been only in the church for five years. Like, I can’t get any woman names done as a single man. Like, I started finding more and more people that were sort of in my position, and I’m like, you know, it made me start thinking, like, I started once or twice took names for a couple of the guys in my church, like, give me your woman, like, Give me something like your woman. Like, they’ll start handing him over and it made me start thinking it’s like, we need to be doing something. And I had an experience fairly recently, about little, almost a month ago, now that I had this like stack of baptisms, like I was maxed out at 300 reservations, you know, 110, baptisms that needed doing, like, like 70 of them were men. And I’m just like, I don’t know, I don’t know. And a few weekends ago, I got to the Houston temple and I just brought like, stack of stuff when it gets done gets done is going to happen. I’ll keep the ziplock bag and I walk A couple of days before, a family that I know from my board took about 15 of my baptism like, okay, great. That’s about that much. I go into the Houston temple, like into the baptistry. And I’m like, okay, look, help, like, know how to do this, but Help. I happen to come across a group from a couple of wards near Houston. And, like, one of the male leaders comes up to me, and he’s like, You got names? Like, yeah, yeah. And he says to all his kids, he’s like, okay, all like 30. Y’all start taking names? Wow. Like, we’re allowed five. If you didn’t bring any go get five, if you only have two grab three more, because you’re allowed five. Wow. That was about another 65 off my plane. I had a random person online that I still have not met in person. She said her husband and kids to the temple at the same time. And she’s like, she said, get what’s leftover? I haven’t heard about the other 45 they were done within 72 hours. Oh, man. So within about a 90 Sit like four or five day period, over 100. baptisms gone.

Alisha Coakley
Wow.

Erica Steed
Total strangers.

Alisha Coakley
That is phenomenal.

Erica Steed
I mean, a couple from the next town over be like, You know what? Give me your marriage sealings. Give em here like, and give me all 96 man initiatory’s you have.

So I started thinking it’s like, if that’s, you know, random strangers one time, and one or two families from my area. For me? What can we do for the rest of us? Right? The divorced ones who never had a chance. The ones like me who’s like, I’ve got 100 and something man reservations that I’m never gonna get done. And started drafting a proposal. And I started getting the messages with my state president. And I’m like, Look, we need to do this. We need trips for the men so they can take man names for the woman like me, we need woman trips that bring woman names for the men like me. We need teenage trips, where every like people can print off their baptisms. Give them to the kids. You know, it’s like, you’re for six hours, what gets done gets done. Because we can’t sit here and say we love our neighbor. If we pretend our neighbor doesn’t have any means, right? Like we’re like in my area, Houston temples, about two and a half, three hours away. And that’s the closest, Dallas is about three and a half. Lubbock nine, San Antonio is five to six. Baton Rouge is six. And that’s our closest five Mm hmm. We’re sitting here saying we will Oh, like they didn’t announce us a temple in East Texas again. Are we doing anything about it? Are we are we doing any work? Just doing the work for people like me like you’re we’re gonna get a temple and so much more is gonna get done. We just have to actually like show Salt Lake we’re serious. Yeah, like we get anymore we actually have to like do something.

Alisha Coakley
Right. You know, it’s funny because I’m I’m so like, I’m just like, oh my gosh, is so similar. I’m in this tiny little town called called Elko. We have about I think 25,000 people, and we’re getting a temple. And like you, we have one in Twin Falls. That’s two and a half hours away. We have one in Utah. Well, it would have been at Salt Lake would have been our, our temple, but because of the renovations and all that stuff, like it’s not anymore. And so like we have those far distances, and we actually had President Hinckley come I believe it was President Hinckley. I want to say it was around the year 2000 ish. And he had promised that if we brought the names if we did our family history, that there would be a temple in Elko and I remember last year when it was announced it like there is no greater feeling than hearing that your area’s gonna get a temple especially when you’ve been so far away from them. So far away. You know, I was spoiled rotten. When I lived in Ogden, I had a temple that was like seven minutes down the road for me. But originally I grew up in Florida and so my closest Temple was Orlando and that was three and a half hours away. So I I empathize. It is so hard. It is so hard but you know, being here in Elko, the law last few years and just seeing like, we’ve we’ve had these like challenges amongst our wards and stuff. We actually did this one, it was great. It was so fun. We did a generational challenge. So we had like, the millennials versus the boomers versus Gen X, you know, or whatever, whatever generation is. And we tried to see who could do the most indexing, right. And it was so fun. I mean, there was no prize, there was no anything other than bragging rights, right? We brought it in. But but it was so fun. And we ended up indexing in one month, more names than had been indexed in the entire year prior in that crazy, like so. And that was just our ward, right. And so there’s special promises like that our heavenly father makes to us. And you’re right when we show up, and we do the work, and we do our family history, and we bring those names to the temple. And we help others to bring their names to the temple. All of that will show Heavenly Father, like, hey, we need a temple of our own, we’re going to keep it busy enough, we’re going to keep it going. So that’s so cool, though, that you you know that you’re kind of like starting this initiative to get more temple work to be done. And I love the idea of like separating into groups, because I think there’s something special about connecting with other people who have something in common with you, whether it’s like a men’s trip and a women’s trip and, you know, maybe one for just families or one for just youth or whatever. Like, I definitely think that there’s power in that. And it’s just, it’s so cool. It’s so so cool. So good job.

Scott Brandley
When I was when I was the bishop, I actually had some single sisters give me names. And I got the youth involved a couple times. I did some myself. So it just yeah, it’s just got to be innovative, right?

Erica Steed
Yeah, it’s been this problem for me. Like I’ve asked people in my ward, like I’ve, so I’ve had the one family do baptisms once. I think I’ve had one or two women taking it down at once. And that’s a like, I would ask men, like members that are like bringing their kids on a ward trip for baptisms. I’m like, Can y’all like kids take one of my names, like one name per kid, like, please. And I sorry, we have our own? Yeah. What you’re just three weeks. Okay. Okay. Yeah. It’s like, don’t ask me again, like, you know, just because, you know, I’m like, and I don’t want to be that way. Because the work needs doing. Like, we need to help each other. Like, you know, we say we love each other, and we’re following Jesus, like, what Jesus turned my tempo work away?

Alisha Coakley
Well, I’m gonna tell you, Erica, if you want to send me any names, we will get names done. We’re still pretty far, we’re still two and a half hours away. But we go enough to Idaho and Utah and stuff like that. I will bring names if you if you need to send any my way.

Scott Brandley
You know, what I liked about you, Erica, is even though you had a rough start, right? You had the faith. And, and the, you know, the willpower. I don’t know if that’s right word, but like to just stick in there and keep going forward. I think if if I were to name this podcast, I’d probably say like faith in progress or something like that, right? Because you’re, you’re still very new to the church, and still trying to figure things out. But you have that faith to keep going and keep progressing. That’s really cool. And I I’m glad that that we were able to do this podcast with you, because I think people need to know that. None of us have it all together. Right? We’re still trying to figure it out. And sometimes. Well, I mean, I do, I don’t know about Scott. Together, sometimes it’s good to hear that we don’t have it all together yet. And we’re still figuring it out. Right? So that takes courage to get on the podcast and not necessarily know that everything’s figured out yet. That’s still a good story. And it’s still important to tell,

Erica Steed
right? You know, when people ask me, it’s like, how do you have it this much together? It’s like, Honey, I have exactly zero of the things together. Like Like, I just like hope that you know, like, I am trying to be as intentional as possible, like, doing prayer reading my scriptures. Like, when God pokes you with something like Pay attention like it it might not makes sense right now I’m still getting pokes. Or it’s like a bad one. Like, and there’s still so much with me trying to get these temporal trips with my stake. It’s like, you know, I don’t even know what’s happening, like, nothing like no balls are even rolling yet. Like, I write, like, I have no idea how this is gonna go. Like, my thing could not even happen the way it’s, it’s in my head that it’s gonna happen. Like, you know, I’m hoping, no, I had a time recently, like, where I got this impression like, this man is supposed to give you a blessing. So I text his wife and I’m like, Look, can I borrow your husband get a blessing like, like, you know, a couple of weeks of trying to coordinate schedules, and she’s like, look, he can’t do it. I’m gonna get you hooked up with with the elders quorum president, like, okay, that’s not, that’s not the vibe I got. But okay. And his blessing ended up being better than the one I I would have had in the first place. So little things like that to Burt that proved to me, it’s like, you know, I was still obedient. I still did the right thing. Like I followed the lawn. And it ended up looking completely different as like, I was sitting there sort of in the middle of it is like, what you said, call them? You said talk to them. It’s like a new dead. And that got you what you needed. Yeah. So,

Scott Brandley
So many times when I was a bishop, that happened to me so many times, I’m like, Why did you prompt me to do that, when that didn’t work out. But something always happened that I didn’t see coming. And I’m like, wow, okay. I guess you do know what you’re doing.

Erica Steed
It’s like, you’re God or something. Let’s like,

Alisha Coakley
it’s like, you know, everything.

Erica Steed
It’s like, you’re the deity of the universe. Yeah. Yeah,

Alisha Coakley
well, and I can see how it can be so frustrating. Sometimes. I mean, it to me too, right. Like, sometimes it’s so frustrating when things don’t happen in our time. But Heavenly Father is just sitting back there, you know, he’s just drinking his hot chocolate, I’m sure. And he’s just like, it’s okay, chill out, I got this, like, I’ll get around to that, when I’m good and ready, you know, like, everything will be fine. You just keep doing what you’re gonna do you keep showing up. This is one thing that, that Scott actually, I remember, he gave this talk in sacrament years ago, and it was all about showing up. And it was like, such a, like, if you have that talk, you should totally send it to me. Because it was so good. And it but the whole point of it was just like you just keep showing up, you keep doing and doing and doing until the job gets done, right. Like you just keep promising and and proving to your heavenly Father, look, it’s might be a little messy, it’s probably going to fall apart in some areas here and there, I’m not going to be perfect at it. And, and in my terms, I’m definitely going to be 15 minutes late, but I’m gonna keep showing up. You know, and I love that you’re doing that, that even though it was confusing, and even though you had some really horribly wrong things said to you, and again, like you had mentioned, they probably weren’t trying to intentionally hurt you or give you misinformation. But I think that sometimes that’s what we do as people like we’re so afraid to tell people I don’t know, we’re so afraid to not have the answer that we just make crap up in our head. And we’re just like, oh, this sounds good enough, or we get so caught on our own ideas and our own theories that we don’t even bother to go and check them against what the church is teaching. You know what the gospel really is. And it’s hard. I mean, distinguishing between culture and gospel doctrine is so hard sometimes. So

Erica Steed
you know, and that’s what that was one of my favorite things I first learned as a as an educator, it’s his like, there’s something magic when you tell these little faces look it up. I don’t know. I don’t know anything. Like, you know, they put me up here because I’m supposed to be an adult, but I don’t know anything. And there’s something about like, I’ll figure it out for you. And they’re just like, Oh, okay. Yeah, like, there’s no there’s times in the church where, like, when people ask me questions, I’m just like, I don’t know. Like, let me figure out some stuff and I’m, I’m gonna come back to you and it’s like, that that has helped so much like finding the people that care about getting it right. That cares about like making sure that information is there, but just also knowing like the connection you have to your own discernment and own personal revelation and being able to pray and take it straight to God and be like, Okay, I’m having some confusion. I don’t know what’s happening like, Yo, can you steer me to a way? Can you point me to something and being able to sort of have hopefully at the end of it, the trust and the faith to sit through the pins and needles in the stomach turning in the weirdness and the thought you said this was going to work and the, you know, the complications to just at the end of the day, like, realize that you didn’t like it. I forget it. I think it’s the Rolling Stone. You can’t always get what you want. But you’ll find sometimes you get what you need.

Alisha Coakley
Yeah, exactly.

Scott Brandley
And God doesn’t give us what we need. We just have to have the faith, because we’re on his timetable. Right. So Alisha, I can’t believe you remembered that talk, man. That’s good that somebody actually listened to me.

Alisha Coakley
Okay. It stood out. And I have shared bits and pieces of it a million and a half times. I mean, like, I don’t even give you the credit, Scott. I just like, make people think I came up with it. No, it was, it was such a good talk. It just stood out to me so much. So it’s probably all for me, that’s probably why nobody else remembers it. Like, it was like Heavenly Father was like, Alisha. Yeah, but yeah, it was a great talk.

Scott Brandley
So Erica, do you have any final thoughts that you’d like to share, before we wrap things up?

Erica Steed
Um, I would just say that, for one thing, you’re not as alone as you think you are. There is always going to be somebody in some sort of similar enough situation. And whether you find them at a chili cook off, or in the temple, or, you know, because they randomly sat next to you at choir practice, it’s like, you’re never quite as alone as you think you are. And if you just keep trusting and believing and reaching out to God, and sometimes allowing yourself to throw a fit, and be like, I don’t like it. Yeah, like just having the hope and the perseverance to just keep trying, that eventually, you are going to get what you need. And God knows he very intimately and personally, and you will always get exactly what he intends for you to have and exactly what?

Scott Brandley
Well, Erica, thank you so much for being on the show today. And we wish you all the best as you continue on that journey of faith. And, you know, you’re just like you said, you’re just a little baby and in the faith, right, but you’ve already grown so much. And you’re an inspiration to me, and, and I’m sure you’ll be an inspiration to people that that need to hear this message. So thanks again.

Of course, happy to be here.

Alisha Coakley
Yeah, and feel free to, you know, let us know how things go. And we will do a check in in about a year or a year or so and see if you’re able to get your your stake to kind of implement these, you know, men’s only trips and women only trips and things like that definitely keep us updated. And let us know how it goes. I think it’s a great idea. I think we should totally implement it like everywhere. I think it would be great.

Scott Brandley
Definitely, we’re gonna have to see progress, you know, sort of coming back things off a COVID. And like coming off of the weirdness in some places, but hopefully, you know, it’s something that can be worked on and tweaked in the refining can just keep going on it and it’ll end up how it’s gonna end up. Awesome.

Alisha Coakley
Well, thank you again, Erica, thank you to our listeners for tuning in this Sunday. And for, you know, hearing this story, make sure that you guys if you have a story like Erica has, if you have some personal experiences that have really helped you to grow and to develop your own testimony, reach out to us, you can head over to LatterDaylights.com and you can submit a little form at the bottom of the page. If you know someone who might be a really great guest on this show someone whose story you kind of know about. Please, please, please be sure to let us know we’re all over social media. Like I said, you can go to LatterDayLights.com And you can submit this short little form. It’s not painful. It’s not scary. Right Erica?

Scott Brandley
They only take your bone marrow on the third visit. So

Alisha Coakley
Just a little bit

Scott Brandley
Well, and if you guys are on YouTube, if you’re watching us on YouTube, make sure you subscribe so you can get alerts. Next time that we do a podcast which is usually every Sunday morning. And same thing with like Apple, you know, if you’re listening to the podcasts on Apple, you know, subscribe there and make sure to rate our podcast podcasts as well. That helps us show up and get more people to watch. So, once again, thank you so much for being here. And thank you, Erica, for for having this courage to share your light and we will talk to you guys next week with another episode. Thanks!

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