Trials of Faith

 Once, before time began, a most remarkable king determined to build a city. It would be magnificent! But he did not intend to build it alone. 

He invited his friends to come with him once his plans were drawn up; they followed him to the mountain he had chosen. He laid the cornerstones, showed them his blueprints, and they went to work with him, building his city's foundation. 

The king and his friends built with their own hands and their own sweat and their own blood a foundation large enough for everyone who might ever want to live there. 

It was the labor of a lifetime, for he intended the foundation of his city to last through the ages. He built it of stone; it would be immovable, a sure foundation.

The king’s final act before the end of his work was to plant a tree at the heart of the city. 

Once the city’s foundation was finished, the king instructed his friends to go out and find anyone who wanted a house of their own to come and build it on the foundation they had laid. He was going away to a far country, he told them, but he would return in a far-off day, when the tree he had planted bore both fruit and flower. Until then, whoever built on the foundation of his city would become citizens of his kingdom.

However, he warned them to tell all who came to build that their houses would be tested when he returned, for a great fire would precede his coming. He told his friends to gather beneath the branches of the tree to wait for him.

The king gave his friends the blueprints for his city before he left, walking alone further into the mountains, far beyond the places where other men were able to go. His friends did not mourn his going, but dispersed out into the world to invite all who wished to come and build on the foundation the king had left for them. 

Many did not wish to leave their own comfortable homes and ways of life, and as the king had instructed, they were left alone to live as they saw fit.

Some returned with the king’s friends to see the foundation of the city, but when they saw the steep, difficult road and the hard mountain stone, they, too, turned away.

Still others climbed the mountain, saw the foundation and the tree, read the blueprints, and decided to build their houses there. Some built their houses of stone, like the foundation; some of metal; others built their houses with brick or wood, and the king’s city grew. 

The friends of the king taught the newcomers the ways of the city, and it prospered despite its remote location. They began to become a people set apart, citizens of a kingdom whose king they had never seen.

Then one day a young boy saw fire in the mountains to the east, a fire that made the sky glow red and sullen even at night. The fire spread to each mountaintop until it surrounded the king’s city. The king’s friends remembered his warning that the city would be tried by fire. 

By the time the people tried to escape, all roads and passages had been blocked by flames red as blood. Only then did the king’s friends remember his instructions to gather to the tree, which had grown so tall that its leaves seemed to brush the vault of the heavens, and so wide that all who lived in the city fit beneath it. They looked, and saw both fruit and flower, and their fear left them as they gathered beneath its sheltering branches. The fire with its spiraling sparks and howling destruction did not touch so much as a leaf of that tree, and its fruits fed those who sought its shelter, and from its roots a spring trickled, quenching their thirst.

True to the king’s word, the city burned. For three days and three nights, it burned. There was a terrible wind that stoked the blood-red blaze, which burned brighter and hotter until it was incandescently white. Many houses built of lesser materials became dust drifting away in the wind, and slag and dross coated what remained.

Rain came after the third night of fire, and washed the soot and charcoal, slag and dross away. The people did not yet dare to leave the shelter of the king’s tree.

The king’s friends waited eagerly all that night for his return, and come he did, down from the eastern mountains where a young boy had first seen the fire, just as the first light of dawn began to spread down the mountain’s slopes. He came with the glorious blaze of sunrise, and the citizens of his kingdom waited for him beneath the tree he had planted, and marveled at the city and its foundations, which now shone with glory.

The king was crowned with a wreath of the tree’s flowers, and his welcome feast was its fruit. The people of his city knew their king, because the fire that had announced his coming had changed them so that they were like him — friends though they had never met.

The king gave a name to that city; it was called Zion.

Helaman warns us: “remember, remember that it is upon the rock of our Redeemer, who is Christ, the Son of God, that ye must build your foundation; that when the devil shall send forth his mighty winds, yea, his shafts in the whirlwind, yea, when all his hail and his mighty storm 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.”

There is no ‘if’ about the winds and hail and mighty storm that the devil will throw at us. We may stand in its eye for a moment, but the world’s sorrows will not pass us by; the fire will not stop burning until there is no more fuel. We will weather that storm only if we stand on solid ground: the rock of our Redeemer. 

In 1 Corinthians 3, Paul gives us an extended metaphor:

“For we are labourers together with God . . . ye are God’s building.

“. . . As a wise masterbuilder, I have laid the foundation, and another buildeth thereon. But let every man take heed how he buildeth thereupon.

“For other foundation can no man lay than that is laid, which is Jesus Christ.

“Now if any man build upon this foundation . . .

“Every man’s work shall be made manifest: for the day shall declare it, because it shall be revealed by fire; and the fire shall try every man’s work of what sort it is.

“If any man’s work abide which he hath built thereupon, he shall receive a reward.

“If any man’s work shall be burned, he shall suffer loss: but he himself shall be saved; yet so as by fire.

“Know ye not that ye are the temple of God, and that the Spirit of God dwelleth in you?

“If any man defile the temple of God, him shall God destroy; for the temple of God is holy, which temple ye are.”

We decide each day what material we build our house with, and upon what foundation. If we build wisely, we build upon the rock of our Redeemer, and what we build will be eternal. 

Why do we build on this foundation, and not another? And how can we be sure that it is the right foundation to build on?

For myself, I began to build my life on my Redeemer’s rock because I was born into a faithful family. However, no matter how faithful my parents are, their faith could never be the foundation on which I build; they showed me by example how to build my own life on the only sure foundation, and it is up to me to do that work. 

Faith is work, and that work is difficult. Without a plan, that work fails to be fully realized. 

In Hebrews 11, Paul writes, “Now faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen. . .

“But without faith it is impossible to please him: for he that cometh to God must believe that he is, and that he is a rewarder of them that diligently seek him.”

To have faith, we must also have vision. This is what the prophets try to show us: the path we walk, our companion on the road, and our final destination. 

Paul writes in Hebrews 10: “Let us hold fast the profession of our faith without wavering; (for he is faithful that promised;) 

“Cast not away therefore your confidence [in Christ], which hath great recompence of reward.

“For ye have need of patience, that, after ye have done the will of God, ye might receive the promise.

“For yet a little while, and he that shall come will come, and will not tarry.

“Now the just shall live by faith.”

We all live our lives with faith in something, but unless we put our faith in the right things, we will never become what we have the potential to become. Said Paul to the Hebrews:

“The Spirit itself beareth witness with our spirit, that we are the children of God:

“And if children, then heirs; heirs of God, and joint-heirs with Christ; if so be that we suffer with him, that we may be also glorified together.

“For I reckon that the sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared with the glory which shall be revealed in us.”

This is what prophets ancient and modern tell us: that we shouted for joy at the opportunity to come to earth and be embodied, and yes, to suffer and sorrow in mortality so that we could grow into something remarkable. 

Said Moroni: “I would show unto the world that faith is things which are hoped for and not seen; wherefore, dispute not because ye see not, for ye receive no witness until after the trial of your faith.”

I testify with Isaiah of old that, “[Jesus the Christ] shall see of the travail of his soul, and shall be satisfied: by his knowledge shall my righteous servant justify many; for he shall bear their iniquities.”

“Wherefore (says Paul,) seeing we also are compassed about with so great a cloud of witnesses, let us lay aside every weight, and the sin which doth so easily beset us, and let us run with patience the race that is set before us,

“Looking unto Jesus the author and finisher of our faith; who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising the shame, and is set down at the right hand of the throne of God.”

In the name of Jesus Christ, amen. 

The Perfected Harvest

 This is the talk I gave June 18th, 2023.

In the most recent general conference, there were several talks that caught my attention. I will quote most extensively from Vern P. Stanfill’s “The Imperfect Harvest”, as his story was what tied the whole conference together for me.

He began his talk with a striking word picture: As a boy helping with the harvest on his family farm in Montana, he watched as the combine his father used left some grain along with the chaff. He presented his findings to his father, who said:

“It is good enough and the best that this machine can do.”

Not really satisfied with his explanation, [he] pondered the imperfections of [that] harvest.

“A short time later, when the weather turned cold in the evenings, [he] watched thousands of migrating swans, geese, and ducks descend onto the fields to nourish themselves on their long journey south. They ate the leftover grain from [their] imperfect harvest. God had perfected it. And not a kernel was lost.”

Our Savior Jesus Christ, at the beginning of his ministry, gave the Sermon on the Mount. After a list of blessings, he gave Israel His higher law, which culminated in the command, “Be ye therefore perfect, even as your Father which is in heaven is perfect.”

Later, during His ministry to the Nephite people in Bountiful, he repeated this command, with a slight variation: “I would that ye should be perfect even as I, or your Father who is in heaven is perfect.”

This suggests several things: One, that we cannot become perfect without a change to our fallen physical state; and two, that we cannot possibly attain perfection on our own merits. It is only through the sacrifice of our Savior and the merciful plan of our Father in Heaven that we can fulfill this commandment.

For many years now, we have heard the phrase ‘the covenant path’ from our leaders, especially President Nelson. This path has been instituted and restored to help us realize our full potential through the grace of Jesus Christ. The goal is for us to change so completely that we can return to and enjoy God’s presence in celestial glory.

So, how do we effect this change?

Change is repentance; it is a turning of one’s heart back to God. It is a willingness to submit to His will and timing, rather than trusting in our own strength to see us through to the end.

In 2nd Nephi 4:34-35, Nephi ends his psalm to the Lord by saying, “I will not put my trust in the arm of flesh; for I know that cursed is he that putteth his trust in the arm of flesh. Yea, cursed is he that putteth his trust in man or maketh flesh his arm.

“Yea, I know that God will give liberally to him that asketh. Yea, my God will give me, if I ask not amiss; therefore I will lift up my voice unto thee; yea, I will cry unto thee, my God, the rock of my righteousness.”

Christ Himself said, “Come unto me, all ye that labour and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest.

“Take my yoke upon you, and learn of me; for I am meek and lowly in heart: and ye shall find rest unto your souls.

“For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light.” (Matthew 11:28-30)

A yoke is a bar of wood that joins two beasts of burden together at the neck. It allows a team of horses, oxen, or mules to pull far more weight than they could alone, provided they pull in tandem.

As Camille N. Johnson said in her talk “Jesus Christ is Relief”:

“It’s the great deceiver who wants me to hide from God, to turn away from Him, to go at it alone.

Brothers and sisters, I can’t go at it alone, and I don’t need to, and I won’t. Choosing to be bound to my Savior, Jesus Christ, through the covenants I have made with God, ‘I can do all things through Christ which strengtheneth me.’

Covenant keepers are blessed with the Savior’s relief.”

When the people of Alma were in bondage, they cried for relief. When they were oppressed to the point that they could not even pray aloud, He visited them with the assurance that He would honor the covenants they had made with Him: “Lift up your heads and be of good comfort, for I know of the covenant which ye have made unto me; and I will covenant with my people and deliver them out of bondage.

“And I will also ease the burdens which are put upon your shoulders, that even you cannot feel them upon your backs, even while you are in bondage; and this will I do that ye may stand as witnesses for me hereafter, and that ye may know of a surety that I, the Lord God, do visit my people in their afflictions.”

“And now it came to pass that the burdens which were laid upon Alma and his brethren were made light; yea, the Lord did strengthen them that they could bear up their burdens with ease, and they did submit cheerfully and with patience to all the will of the Lord.”

According to the Lord’s promise, they were released from bondage in a miraculous manner, but the first thing the Lord did was increase their capacity to bear their burdens.

This is not a concept that is popular in our world today. Suffering is considered the ultimate evil, and it is assumed that any kind of suffering or distress should be immediately taken away or left behind or numbed with medication. But suffering is exactly what Christ asked us to do when he said, “If any man will come after me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross, and follow me.

“For whosoever will save his life shall lose it: and whosoever will lose his life for my sake shall find it.

“For what is a man profited, if he shall gain the whole world, and lose his own soul? or what shall a man give in exchange for his soul?

“For the Son of man shall come in the glory of his Father with his angels; and then he shall reward every man according to his works.”

And what works should those be?

For those following Jesus Christ on the covenant path, any thing that turns us toward Christ is a good work. But it must be done with the right desire.

Bonnie H. Cordon gave some excellent examples in the last general conference:

“. . . as we choose to seek Christ, the Spirit will witness of Him in many different situations. These witnesses of the Spirit occur as we fast, pray, wait, and continue forward. Our closeness to Christ grows through worshipping frequently in the temple, repenting daily, studying scriptures, attending church and seminary, pondering our patriarchal blessings, worthily receiving ordinances, and honoring sacred covenants. All of these invite the Spirit to enlighten our minds, and they bring added peace and protection. But do we honor them as sacred opportunities to testify of Christ?

I have attended the temple many times, but when I worship in the house of the Lord, it changes me. Sometimes while fasting, I find myself simply going hungry, but other times, I feast on the Spirit with purpose. I sometimes have mumbled prayers that are repetitive and routine, but I have also come eager to receive counsel from the Lord through prayer.”

As we turn to the Savior in every aspect of our lives, we will become more able to walk the covenant path. As we testify of Him through our actions, we become His disciples in Spirit and in truth, no matter how imperfectly we walk the covenant path.

As W. Mark Bassett said, “[T]he Savior expects us to do all we can do, and He will do what only He can do.”

Covenants give us strength through Christ to do the impossible: to become perfect in Him. Vern P. Stanfill said,

“The Savior stands ready to accept our humble offerings and perfect them through His grace. With Christ, there is no imperfect harvest. We must have the courage to believe that His grace is for us—that He will help us, rescue us from the depths when we falter, and perfect our less-than-perfect efforts.

“In the parable of the sower, the Savior describes the seeds that are planted in good ground. Some produce a hundredfold, some sixty, and others thirty. All are part of His perfect harvest.”

Remember that in the parable of the talents, the servants who put their master’s money to good use received a double portion, while the servant who hid his master’s talent with the intent to return it had it taken away. It was not the amount of money that the servants earned that pleased their master, it was their effort.

Our Savior doesn’t care about the size of our offering; He only cares whether we have planted a seed and tended it with care. What he wants is our effort, because perfection comes only through His grace, but His grace has to have something to work on.

I end with Moroni’s final plea:

“[C]ome unto Christ, and be perfected in him, and deny yourselves of all ungodliness; and if ye shall deny yourselves of all ungodliness, and love God with all your might, mind and strength, then is his grace sufficient for you, that by his grace ye may be perfect in Christ; and if by the grace of God ye are perfect in Christ, ye can in nowise deny the power of God.

“And again, if ye by the grace of God are perfect in Christ, and deny not his power, then are ye sanctified in Christ by the grace of God, through the shedding of the blood of Christ, which is in the covenant of the Father unto the remission of your sins, that ye become holy, without spot.”

I know that as we accept our Savior’s invitation to follow Him and to walk His covenant path, we will, in the end, become part of His perfect harvest, gathered into His temple garner, in the company of all the saints who have followed Him through the ages. We will become His sons and daughters, called by His name, and we will at last come safely home. In the name of Jesus Christ, amen.

A talk.

     I gave this talk in a recent stake conference - which was the most terrifying experience of my life, as I'm very much an introvert and hate being the center of attention. But I didn't faint at the pulpit or otherwise cause a scene. Well, maybe a little bit of a scene. It was a fire-breathing kind of talk. If you read it, you'll see.

God’s Word through Prophets

 

Hello! Unfortunately for you all, I do not have the gift of Moroni, who was mighty in speaking. I can write, however, so I pray that the Spirit will carry the Lord’s message to you today, even if I’m not the best messenger.

 

“O Lord . . . Thou are stronger than I, and hast prevailed: I am in derision daily, every one mocketh me . . . Then I said, I will not make mention of him, nor speak any more in His name. But His word was in mine heart as a burning fire shut up in my bones, and I was weary with forbearing, and I could not stay . . .”

So spoke Jeremiah after he was beaten and put in stocks for bearing an unpopular message to the people of Jerusalem: that of the impending Babylonian captivity. This was not the first time he would receive abuse for the message he carried, nor would it be the last. Think of it — God’s word burns in a prophet’s heart with such intensity that they cannot stay silent.

Prophets are called by God to lead each dispensation of gospel knowledge. In every age, the message is the same: Repent. Keep God’s commandments, and make covenants with Him. No matter what sorrows the world holds, they will be swallowed up in the joy of Christ, so learn of Him. Become like Him. Prepare for the day when you will return to Him. Each prophet teaches us truths about the Plan of Salvation, because that is the message of God to man — the good news — the Gospel of Christ.

Yet no matter how good the news, it has often been unpopular. Enoch’s success notwithstanding, nearly every prophet has suffered, and many died, for proclaiming the message God has given them. On the face of it, their success rate is abysmal. So why does the Lord continue to send prophets out into a world that is so hostile to their message?

As Jesus told the Pharisees and scribes, when they asked why he ate with sinners, “They that are whole need not a physician; but they that are sick. I came not to call the righteous, but sinners to repentance.”

Unfortunately, ‘the wicked [take] the truth to be hard’. It hurts to be told that you’re wrong! It’s uncomfortable to think that you might have to change the way you live. Much easier to believe that the one telling you is wrong, hateful, even evil. Samuel the Lamanite had some things to say about that attitude. I quote at length:

“[W]o unto this people, because of this time which has arrived, that ye do cast out the prophets, and do mock them . . . and do slay them . . . even as they did of old time.

“And now when ye talk, ye say: If our days had been in the days of our fathers of old, we would not have slain the prophets; we would not have stoned them, and cast them out.

“Behold ye are worse than they; for as the Lord liveth, if a prophet come among you and declareth unto you the word of the Lord, which testifieth of your sins and iniquities, ye are angry with him, and cast him out and seek all manner of ways to destroy him; yea, you will say that he is a false prophet, and that he is a sinner, and of the devil, because he testifieth that your deeds are evil.

“But behold, if a man shall come among you and shall say: Do this, and there is no iniquity; do that and ye shall not suffer; yea, he will say: Walk after the pride of your own hearts; yea, walk after the pride of your eyes, and do whatsoever your heart desireth—and if a man shall come among you and say this, ye will receive him, and say that he is a prophet.

“. . . O ye wicked and ye perverse generation; ye hardened and ye stiffnecked people, how long will ye suppose that the Lord will suffer you? Yea, how long will ye suffer yourselves to be led by foolish and blind guides? Yea, how long will ye choose darkness rather than light?”

While we may not literally cast stones at the prophets of our day, when they make statements in their prophetic capacity that go against our personal or political beliefs, do we mock them? Do we murmur? Do we prefer to listen to the easy message that aligns with the world’s views rather than upholding unpopular truths?

President Nelson invited us in the first session of last April’s General Conference to ponder what debris we might remove from our lives. I’d like to suggest a few ways of thinking that are unhelpful for disciples of Christ.

Nephi warns us: “[In our] day shall [Satan] rage in the hearts of the children of men, and stir them up to anger against that which is good.

“And others will he pacify, and lull them away into carnal security, that they will say: All is well in Zion; yea, Zion prospereth, all is well—and thus the devil cheateth their souls, and leadeth them away carefully down to hell.

“And behold, others he flattereth away, and telleth them there is no hell; and he saith unto them: I am no devil, for there is none—and thus he whispereth in their ears, until he grasps them with his awful chains, from whence there is no deliverance.”

So: What truths stir us up to anger? What rage has he set in our hearts?

God’s law is now seen as hateful in society. Every sin is seen as self-affirming. Pride is literally paraded, lust celebrated, wrath justified. Moral relativism pervades our culture, so who dares to define sin and condemn it? Prophets and apostles are given a divine mandate to do so.

How has our enemy pacified us? Are we so comfortable and safe that we would be unwilling to suffer for our beliefs? Elder Christofferson recently asked us what gospel principles we would be willing to die for. What gospel truths are worth defending to the point of losing followers on social media, losing a job, or possibly even losing your life? Think about it now, because the time is coming when you will need that kind of conviction.

Now, what of the devil’s flattery? The idea that there is no hell and no devil is older even than Nehor, who taught people just that in Alma’s day.

Aleksander Solzhenitsyn, who survived the gulags of the Soviet Union, once said, “I recall hearing a number of older people offer the following explanation for the great disasters that had befallen Russia: ‘Men have forgotten God; that’s why all this has happened.’” I would submit that not only has our society forgotten God; they have also forgotten Satan, or rather, they have forgotten what he truly is, and what he truly wants.

This is hardly unique to our society. But it is indeed dangerous to forget that we have an enemy who is actively working against us — and that he has had all the time in the world to perfect his art. He is using every last strategy now, in the final moment.

So how do we, as President Nelson said, “create counterstrategies and proactive plans” to combat Satan’s tactics?

One of the best is to question everything — faithfully. Some questions to ask about your questions: Where does this belief come from? What do the scriptures teach on this subject? Does my view differ from God’s view? And am I willing to change if it does?

Also, is the answer to my question situated in the proper context? Too often in this age of instant reaction and ten-second sound bites, we are hasty in judgment. Exhibit A: Elder Holland’s recent speech to the BYU faculty. He had some strong words for them, over several specific issues. In no way were his words inconsistent with what prophets and apostles have been teaching for years. But a few short lines, lifted out of context, circulated on social media. Suddenly, everyone had an opinion. Clickbait headlines proliferated. And almost nobody bothered to watch the whole talk — readily available in the Church Newsroom.

As we prepare for General Conference next week, let us consider that the Lord gives us two lines of communication. There is revelation for the Church, given through those with authority — and there is personal revelation, given just for us. Both have vital roles to play in our lives, but let us remember that those we sustain as prophets, seers, and revelators are just that. They are watchmen, warning us of dangers ‘yet afar off”.

Elder Maxwell once said, “Now we are entering times wherein there will be for all of us as Church members, in my judgment, some special challenges which will require of us that we follow the Brethren. All the easy things that the Church has had to do have been done. From now on, it’s high adventure, and followership is going to be tested in some interesting ways . . .”

As we seek to follow the prophets, let us remember their purpose: to point us toward Christ. Let us not only listen to their words; let us experiment on them. If we are faithful, I believe we will find peace in times of trouble and strength in our trials, so that we can say, as Paul, “I have fought a good fight, I have finished my course, I have kept the faith.”

In the name of Jesus Christ, amen.

Huh.

    Well, it's been a while since I actually wrote anything here. I've been busy with, y'know, writing stories. Of which I actually published one - you can find it on Amazon in the Planetary: Neptune anthology at this link: https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0856TLV47?ref_=dbs_m_mng_rwt_calw_tkin_9&storeType=ebooks It won Honorable Mention in the Writers of the Future contest, so apparently some people like it.

     Maybe I'll post the occasional thing here again. Or it might be another three or four years, who knows.

Surrender

I sought Him, in long nights and through my days
In slow deliberate study and in prayer,
I sought Him, through the painful endless ways
Of my own raging mind,
And in the private space of fears,
Despite my poor unworthiness, I strove
My weakness to return
To He who all things knows.
In infant hope I pled
My sins he’d take away
The weight of my great load
Of human wreckage, to uphold.
And only when my voice had ceased to cry
Could I hear His — sweet stillness mild —
“My grace I give to those who ask
But thou, O daughter,
Gave no space in asking for reply” —
And I bowed down my weary head
In stillness and in silence
For to listen to His tread,
The molding of my will to His,
That taught my contrite heart to turn
And heal the sundered past
And then my load was gone at last.

The days moved on, I soon forgot
That voice which held all still
A wall ‘gainst mortal hubris which
Had foamed around me as the tide
Of weakness and of fear and pain
And all in asking came to Him again.
My pleadings were as anguished as poor Job’s,
Yet nothing was my answer then
As many times as learning, skill, and strength
Would bring me closer to the truth, I’d think,
Still farther from me was the one I sought,
As I forgot to silence all my thought —
In wisdom wide, in knowledge great,
I strove for answers to my questions sate,
And yet no answer came until
My pride was humbled down into the dust
Of which each man was made,
To which each man returns.
As ashed ambition, burning no more bright,
Was brought to nothing in a single night
When darkness deep showed all futility
That was not His, was of no worth to me.
In silence and with greater weight
Of ego like a pall
Still pressing on me, yet I let Him in
To see my poor reduced estate,
And then His voice, yet tender and yet mild,
At last returned — and said, “My sorrowing child,
I never thee forsook, nor will I yet forsake,
For as thy soul is precious to me will I take
Each pride and pain of thine upon me now,
As ever I have done for those who ask,
My grace is with thee in all things you lack.”

Soon time fled on again apace,
And all my memories erased
Of grace so given all despite my worth,
Of knowledge found and peace and mirth —
And once again I failed and fell anew,
In deep frustration cursed my mortal state
That caused such guilt in action wrong
Which I should yet control,
Control could not, but sought out sins anew
That I had banished, which yet laid in wait,
To taunt me in my weakened state —
I wept to think the wrongs I’d done
Were visited on Him whose love I sought,
And sorrowed for the sins I wrought
As prison bars, a cage that closed
With each successive day more strong —
I fell — I fell — so long
Into the darkness of my mind
Traversed with blinded clarity
My heart, its brokenness made plain.
I prayed again
Fell down upon my knees prostrate
And laid before Him all my fallen state
His voice came clear — “Your sin I see,
But even that is naught to Me.
The price was paid, your pain is mine
I bore it long ago, and time
Will turn once more your scarlet into white
Flee not from me, turn not aside
From that which I have asked of Thee,
Be faithful, I will always faithful be.”
To those who trust, who ever trust in Me.”

The Mother of All Living

   The following is a talk I gave in church for Mother's Day . . . reluctantly.

 Moroni, speaking to the Lord as he compiled the Book of Mormon, lamented that, “. . . Thou hast not made us mighty in writing; for thou hast made all this people that they could speak much . . . Thou hast also made our words powerful and great, even that we cannot write them; wherefore, when we write we behold our weakness, and stumble because of the placing of our words . . .”
   Unfortunately, the Lord has seen fit to give me exactly the opposite weakness. I can write well enough to get my point across, but I am not great at public speaking. Also, I was asked to give a Mother’s Day talk to a congregation that has few mothers in it, and the topic assigned was something along the lines of ‘a mother from the Bible’. Finding a way to make this relevant to a young single adult ward is definitely on a whole different level of difficulty. Thank you, Brother Peterson, for this humbling experience.
   I pray that the Spirit will help you — and me — to learn something today.

   Before time began, or the world was created — so Abraham tells us — God stood in the midst of the intelligences which he had organized and saw that among them there were many of those whom he called “the noble and great ones”. Of these, there were many great men and women present. He saw that these souls were good, and he said, “These I will make my rulers.”
From these ‘noble and great ones’ he foreordained many to specific roles, and called a heavenly council where he proposed a plan by which each of us would be made like him. This would require us to gain a physical body, subject to death and the imperfection inherent in mortality. We would forget all that we knew about our Heavenly Father, in order to find out for ourselves whether we would be willing to follow him by faith.
   A Savior was appointed, our Elder Brother, whose sacrifice would bring about an eternal Atonement, allowing us to return home in spite of the sins and mistakes God knew we would inevitably make. Through Christ’s resurrection we would also someday be resurrected, our mortal bodies raised to incorruptible immortality. Through our faithfulness, we would become part of our Heavenly Parents’ eternal family, sealed by the power of the priesthood which our Father would grant us.
Together with our Heavenly Father, our Savior and the rest of those noble and great ones “[went] down . . . And [made] an earth whereon [we might] dwell . . .”, a world created as a testing ground for those who had kept their first estate. Though the mortal experience would include pain, suffering, sorrow, and death, God created this earth with its abundance of beauties to remind us of His presence. As Alma wrote, “. . . all things denote there is a God; yea, even the earth, and all things that are upon the face of it . . .”
   When the creation was finished, the book of Genesis records that, “. . . The Lord God planted a garden eastward in Eden . . . And out of the ground made the Lord God to grow every tree that is pleasant to the sight, and good for food; the tree of life also in the midst of the garden, and the tree of knowledge of good and evil.” He then gave this garden to Adam and Eve, and granted them stewardship over Eden. His first commandment to them was to multiply and replenish the earth. He then warned them that if they wanted to stay in Eden, they must not eat the fruit of the tree of knowledge of good and evil, or they would die.
   It is here that modern revelation diverges from the multitude of narratives and explanations given previously. The world sees Eve as weak and foolish, easily tempted and without foresight or good sense. If only she hadn’t eaten the fruit! Theologians lament and churches condemn, seeing the first woman as an unfortunate afterthought, one which brought ruin on the human race before it had properly begun.
But one of the many things that has been restored to us is the plan of salvation and exaltation. In its proper context, Eve’s choice was fortunate and her actions necessary.
   Lehi tells us that, “. . . If Adam (and Eve) had not transgressed [they] would not have fallen, but [they] would have remained in the garden of Eden. And all things which were created must have remained in the same state which they were after they were created; and they must have remained forever, and had no end. And they would have had no children; wherefore they would have remained in a state of innocence, having no joy, for they knew no misery; doing no good for they knew no sin. But behold, all things have been done in the wisdom of him who knoweth all things. Adam fell that men might be; and men are, that they might have joy.”
   Scripture tells us that God walked in Eden. Surely he spent time with Adam and Eve and taught them much about the world they found themselves in, preparing them for the roles they had agreed to but forgotten as their souls were veiled in flesh. There is no record of what exactly Eve remembered of the Plan before she spoke with the serpent. However, there are hints of her struggle to reconcile God’s first commandment with His second, even as Satan came to tempt her. Moses records that, “. . . He sought also to beguile Eve, for he knew not the mind of God . . .” In other words, the Fall was intended, not a desperate last-ditch fix of a terrible mistake, and was necessary to our Heavenly Father’s plan of salvation.
   Then-Elder Dallin H. Oaks said it this way: “When Adam and Eve received the first commandment, they were in a transitional state, no longer in the spirit world but with physical bodies not yet subject to death and not yet capable of procreation. They could not fulfill the Father’s first commandment without transgressing the barrier between the bliss of the Garden of Eden and the terrible trials and wonderful opportunities of mortal life.
   “For reasons that have not been revealed, this transition, or “fall,” could not happen without a transgression—an exercise of moral agency amounting to a willful breaking of a law. This would be a planned offense, a formality to serve an eternal purpose.
   “. . . It was Eve who first transgressed the limits of Eden in order to initiate the conditions of mortality. Her act, whatever its nature, was formally a transgression but eternally a glorious necessity to open the doorway toward eternal life. Adam showed his wisdom by doing the same. And thus Eve and ‘Adam fell that men might be’.”
   Eve’s choice to partake of the fruit of the tree of knowledge has been portrayed by the world as the easy deception of a thoughtless, impulsive woman, but there is some textual evidence that this is inaccurate — indeed, that it is slander. “Hebrew scholar Nehama Aschkenasy points out that the original Hebrew word that was translated as beguiled is a rare verb that has rich and connotative meanings. ‘Beguile’ suggests Eve underwent a deep internal process; she weighed, pondered, and reflected upon the ramifications of partaking of the fruit before she did so. The King James translators, themselves inheritors of the original sin cultural bias, used the word almost exclusively to mean deceived. They did not capture the original richness of the word.”
What does this change? Much.
   If Eve chose to partake not because of Satan’s urging but because of her own careful consideration — if Satan’s attempted persuasion to sin was instead a catalyst for deep contemplation on the reason for God’s conflicting commandments, it seems to me that she understood the consequence of her action, and chose to embrace it with faith in God. She didn’t know yet if her husband Adam would be willing to follow her in the Fall, but she was willing to act without a perfect assurance that everything would work out the way she hoped. That must have taken an incredible amount of courage.
   Sheri Dew, in her talk entitled “The Mother of All Living”, confirms this view: “Eve set the pattern. In addition to bearing children, she mothered all of mankind when she made the most courageous decision any woman has ever made and with Adam opened the way for us to progress. She set an example of womanhood for men to respect and women to follow, modeling the characteristics with which we as women have been endowed: heroic faith, a keen sensitivity to the Spirit, an abhorrence of evil, and complete selflessness. Like the Savior, “who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross,” Eve, for the joy of helping initiate the human family, endured the Fall. She loved us enough to help lead us.”
   Thankfully, Eve persuaded Adam to follow her in the Fall, thus blazing the path that countless generations would follow. They worked together to fulfill all of God’s commandments to the best of their mortal ability, trusting in the promise of a Savior who would come to redeem them and their children from the corruptibility that the Fall had introduced, both physically and spiritually.
   Eventually, Eve came to rejoice over her decision, saying, “Were it not for our transgression we never should have had seed, and never should have known good and evil, and the joy of our redemption, and the eternal life which God giveth unto all the obedient.” Though our first parents were not immune to the sorrows of life — among other things, having one of their sons commit the first murder, and watching many of their children choose to follow Satan’s enticements — still they found  joy and peace in mortality, despite the effects of the Fall.
   This new understanding of Eve’s role in the Fall, given to us by revelation, has much to teach us about how to approach the decisions we face at this pivotal period of our lives.
   The first principle we can draw from her experience is that of trust in the Lord. Eve, though she had no real concept of good and evil, trusted that God had her best interests at heart. When she chose to, as President Oaks said, “[transgress] the limits of Eden’, she did so because she believed that God would not ask her and Adam to do something they could not in their current state — namely, to bear children — unless there was some way to change their possibilities.
   Sometimes our Heavenly Father asks us to do things that we can’t yet see the reasons for. When we choose to trust Him and do them without knowing why, the answer often comes, though much later than we would  hope. Take the example of President Nelson, who heard a seemingly throwaway line in a talk about learning foreign languages. He decided to learn Mandarin (which is, incidentally, a very difficult language to learn), and practiced diligently. He has since strengthened ties with the Chinese people in ways that he could not have possibly foreseen when he began that project!
When we trust in the Lord and lean not to our own understanding, I testify that he will direct our paths.
   The second principle we can learn from Eve is that sometimes we must make a decision without all the information, or even with incorrect information, and trust that the Lord will see the desire of our heart and honor it. As I have mentioned, there is some evidence that Eve did not partake of the fruit impulsively, but instead pondered the decision carefully before she acted. Satan may have beguiled her, but this does not mean that she was deceived. Eve likely believed Heavenly Father when He said that they would surely die if they ate of the fruit of the tree of knowledge, but she also trusted that knowledge of good and evil was important enough to risk death, even spiritual death. In Eden, there had been no chances to grow and progress, and I believe it was for this reason that the scriptures say that Eve “. . . saw that the tree was good for food, and that it became pleasant to the eyes, and a tree to be desired to make her wise . . .”
   Eve’s choice was ultimately correct, not because it had no consequences, but because it did. Yes, everyone will die physically — there is a 100% mortality rate for all of us eventually. But we can choose whether we will live or die spiritually. As Alma explained, “there was a space granted unto man in which he might repent; therefore this life became a probationary state . . .”
   We are all on a journey. There is a path, the strait and narrow way of which many prophets have spoken. Sometimes we may wander off the path for a while, but it is always possible to return, thanks to our Savior’s Atonement. When we repent, we can change the consequences of our evil action and turn back. This is not to say that all consequences for our actions will vanish, but they can be turned to our good when we allow the Savior to change us. There are no sins we can commit, except denying the Holy Ghost, that can possibly lead us farther from the way home than our Savior can reach. He can turn all sorrows to joy if we are willing to let Him. This is only possible because of the Fall that Eve set in motion, for without the Savior’s atoning sacrifice, we would all be lost, or forced to remain forever in the state we were in.
   Orson F. Whitney once said, “The fall had a twofold direction—downward, yet forward. It brought man into the world and set his feet on progression’s highway.” When we believe this and act accordingly, trusting in the Lord, we will be able to make decisions as Eve did, through careful consideration, seeking inspiration and guidance, but not waiting forever for the perfect moment to act, or complete knowledge of all of the consequences.
   I testify that because of the Fall, we have come to this earth to fulfill the plan of salvation in our own lives. I testify that Jesus Christ is our Savior and Redeemer, and that through His Atonement we can return to our Heavenly Parents someday — that the resurrection of Christ is a reality, and that because of Him we can have eternal life and joy in our redemption. I say this in the name of Jesus Christ, amen.

Rain

   It's interesting how rain affects me. In the winter, on those rare occasions that it's actually warm enough to rain, a day of clouds and drizzle makes me long to curl up in bed and shut out the world, and if I had things to do, so what? They'll get done eventually. Winter rain is an excuse for sleep almost as much as snowstorms are - but really any excuse will do in winter, which, it seems to be forgotten, used to be a time of slow unhurried rest.
   In spring, rain no longer seems so dreary; instead, it makes everything feel finally clean as all the detritus of winter washes away. Strangely enough, the whole feel of a rainstorm changes with the change of seasons, no matter how much rain comes down in what amount of time. Every sharp edge feels softer, and it puts me in a contemplative mood (thus this post). This is the season in which rainstorms drive me to a cozy book-and-blanket nest instead of hibernation. Something about the sound of rain in spring makes every story more real somehow. Perhaps it's because the stories of the slowly waking world are coming back to life.
   When summer comes, with its thunderstorms and loud atonal raindrops and the petrichor smell of dust and parched plants rejoicing, my first urge is to stand and watch and feel the power of the storm in my bones . . . until I've had enough, at which time I'm grateful for a house to retreat to and a solid roof over my head. Summer rainstorms compel me to listen, to pay attention to the power and fury that nature can command; it can hardly be ignored, when thunder resounds like Titans clashing in the mountains that loom above my home.
   Autumn rains are bleak and colorless, washing away the last remnants of a seasonal splendor, bleaching everything brown in preparation for the winter's thick, silent shrouds of white. Again this is a season for stories, but for endings, not beginnings, for quietly letting go, for putting things to rest, assured that when spring comes once more, the soft implacability of rain will come again, in yet another way and meaning.