Hanging on by a "Stem"

We just recently moved to Idaho Falls about 2 months ago and we were excited to discover an apple tree in our back yard.  I grew up next to my Grandma's apple orchard and remembered all the apple pie, applesauce, and apple juice produced from the apples on those trees.  I am excited to let my kids be a part of pruning, picking and producing yummy "eats" from our apple tree. 

Well, little did we know that if the apples aren't picked in the fall, they create a mushy-gushy mess on the ground beneath the branches they once called home! YUM!  It was going to snow a lot in the coming days, so I knew we needed to get the apples up quick before they were buried forever. So, the kids and I got to work picking up and throwing away load after load of rotten, bruised apples.  All the while I was thinking, "these could have made so many pies, dumplings, and carmel apples if they would have hung on to their branch just a little bit longer.  I could have saved them from their new worm-infested dwelling."

We cleaned the mess just in time before the first snowfall of the year, and OH BOY was it ever a snowfall.  Over 8 inches in 2 days!  We were welcoming winter at the first of November!  During breakfast one morning we were admiring the wind and snow outside when I glanced over at the apple tree.  There hung a beautiful red apple on one of the lower branches, clinging for dear life as the wind and snow bellowed around it.  

I quickly drew my kids attention to it and tried to teach them a life lesson.  "Look at the strong apple hanging on to the branch in the mean storm.  Sometimes we need to be like the apple, strong and valiant."  I can only go so deep with a 2 yr. old and a 3 yr. old.  The kids went on eating their breakfast, but I kept watching....admiring....and pondering the strength of that apple.  I could immediately feel the spirit testifying to me "hold on in times of trial."  The scripture Helaman 5:12 came rushing to my thoughts:

12 And now, my sons, remember, remember that it is upon the ^arock of our Redeemer, who is Christ, the Son of God, that ye must build your ^bfoundation; that when the devil shall send forth his mighty winds, yea, his shafts in the whirlwind, yea, when all his hail and his mighty ^cstorm shall beat upon you, it shall have no power over you to drag you down to the gulf of misery and endless wo, because of the rock upon which ye are built, which is a sure foundation, a foundation whereon if men build they cannot fall.

In a world full of Satan's "mighty winds", we can hold fast to the gospel.  I pray everyday that my family and I can be strong, with firm testimonies, so when adversity comes bellowing around us, it shall have no power over us.  We can be strong like the apple. We can hold on in times of trial.  The Lord has great things in store for us if we can hang on long enough and endure it well.