This is the first step in creating a magazine article. For this project we were supposed to start my writing an inspiring story for the a church magazine and choose some pictures to go along with it. I choice the New Era since I am still a high school student and that magazine is targeted towards my age group. I wrote about an experience that that I had at a Space camp before my senior year. Kids will be able to relate because it is a story about people their own age. Hope you enjoy!!
The Final Frontier
The summer before my senior year of high school, my friend Justin talked me into taking part in the Idaho Science and Aerospace Scholars program. We had to complete an awful online class that taught us all about NASA and the history of space travel. It was one of the worst classes I have ever taken. After the class was over, we both qualified to go to a week long summer camp held at Boise State University. When all of our other friends heard we were going, it was instantly dubbed a “nerd” camp and it kind of was; the center focal point of the camp was planning a mission to mars. Don’t get me wrong, it was an incredible week and I learned so much, but in the end I was more thankful for the spiritual knowledge that I gained then the scientific knowledge.
For part of the week at camp, we flew to California to visit NASA Ames Research Center. We met with many different members in the NASA organization from people who train astronauts to people that design the spaceships. We toured all of the facilities and we got to see the largest wind tunnel in the world. Another cool experience that happened while we were there was the New Horizons space probe flew by Pluto. We were actually at a NASA facility when some of the first pictures of the best known dwarf planet in our solar system were seen.
It was amazing to see how the different parts of one of the most technologically advanced organizations in the world worked. It was amazing to see the pictures of Pluto and feel the sense of pride in the room. It was then that I realized how much more information about the universe and beyond our solar system there really is to learn.
The best part of the day came later that night at dinner. Justin had struck up a conversation with one of the other kids at the camp about religion. As they were talking, Justin would ask me for some help with a couple of the scriptures he was trying to remember. At one point, I started talking about Joseph Smith and about the first vision. After we had been talking for a while, David, another kid from our camp, walked up and started asking questions. My friend continued his conversation with the first kid, and I turned to talk to David.
After he asked me a couple of questions about the gospel, David told me that he was a member of the church but that he had been inactive for a few months. He was having trouble with feeling the spirit. He just couldn’t believe that people would come to tears and be completely overwhelmed when they felt the spirit. He didn’t think he had ever felt it before. But then he told me that something was different about that day at NASA. He told me that he had been listening to us talking to that other kid and when he heard me talking about Joseph Smith, the spirit almost engulfed him. He was still trying to process what he was feeling and understand what was going on. We talked for a little while and then I left him to think about what he was feeling.
I walked away stunned that me, a 17-year-old kid from a small town in Idaho, could have such an influence on someone else. We were there to learn about science and I ended up helping someone else learn more about the Gospel. On the last day of camp, right before I was leaving to go home, David came and talked to me. He shook my hand and thanked me for talking to him earlier in the week. I challenged him to go back to church on Sunday and he promised me that he would.
As I thought back about that experience, I started to compare space travel and the gospel. I was at a camp learning all about the technology of the future and how NASA is planning an actual mission to Mars. They are planning a mission towards what the world views as the final frontier. But what about the real mission we are here on earth to accomplish? In the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints, we are blessed with the knowledge of the true final frontier. We know that after this life we will live in heaven with a loving Father. We will be eternal beings with knowledge of the things that we can’t even understand in our current state of mind. We will be with our families forever and we will live forever. That is the mission to the final frontier that I am looking forward to.
Here are some sketches (top is my favorite):
Here are the Images I am planning on using:
Image sources:
Pluto- http://www.nasa.gov/image-feature/pluto-dazzles-in-false-color
Pics of me- https://www.facebook.com/Idaho-Science-and-Aerospace-Scholars-163878680351541/
Ginger Power 
