Hope though the Atonement of Jesus Christ as an Antidote to the Denethor Syndrome

Posted on by nathanwritesstuff

In J.R.R. Tolkien’s classic fantasy trilogy, The Lord of the Rings (LotR), the character Denethor is an inheritor of a powerful, but dangerous magical artifact, a palantir. The palantir were a set of crystal balls that allowed the user to browse images from anywhere around the world and to chat with other people who also had palantir. Unfortunately, Sauron, the supreme representative of evil in the LotR, had a palantir and used it to feed Denethor fearful images. Denethor’s fears and anxieties, constantly fed and updated by Sauron, “overthrew [Denethor’s] mind.” (1) Denethor not only decides to accept the false futures on his magic feed, but also attempts to kill his own son to bring one of these fears to life.

This story, although only fantasy, is tragically moving to read. This misery of avoidable despair becomes even more poignant as we observe the exact thing happening to so many of us today. Like Denethor, many of us have access to a seemingly magic artifact that feeds us information through a glass surface. As humans, we are often drawn to sensation and tragedy; accordingly, our social media and news feeds increasingly feed us more sensation and tragedy slowly educating our choices. Soon we willingly search out doom and gloom. The internet has dubbed this condition, “doomscrolling.” (2) Like the situation in the LotR, Satan has access to our magical devices too and as taught by Lehi, “[the devil] seeketh that all men might be miserable like unto himself” (2 Nephi 2: 27). He wants us to be afraid; he wants us to be depressed.

Like Denethor, our increased access to information can convince us that we are wise and far-knowing. We may believe that we are preparing for a current or future threat, but when we are confronted with fears that we are unable or unwilling to do anything about, our fears won’t only not help us, but will surely hurt us. Fear leads to failure, is a principle culled from a prophecy by the prophet Joseph Smith: “men’s hearts shall fail them; for fear shall come upon all people” (D&C 88:91). Fear is a tool of the adversary, not the Lord. “For God hath not given us the spirit of fear; but of power, and of love, and of a sound mind” (2 Timothy 1:7). Power, love, and a sound mind are gifts we should seek from the Lord.

We have to use the word to check the information from the world, the internet, or our social media feeds. Our prophet counseled us, “I plead with you today to counter the lure of the world by making time for the Lord in your life—each and every day. If most of the information you get comes from social or other media, your ability to hear the whisperings of the Spirit will be diminished. If you are not also seeking the Lord through daily prayer and gospel study, you leave yourself vulnerable to philosophies that may be intriguing but are not true. ” (3)

Unfortunately, the feeling of despair is so thick today you can feel it. Everyone is talking about how terrible the world is, and almost no one is talking about how great it is. Is our situation really as bad as the internet depicts, or as Satan wants you to think it is? No. It is not. Yet, regrettably, even our youth, the ones who have the most to be excited about for the future, are afraid; they are depressed. A recent study from BYU highlights this growing fear in our youth, “anxiety and depression is becoming increasingly prevalent among young adults in the US. with both disorders increasing by 63% from 2005 to 2017.”

Sadly, social media platforms, the very tools used to connect us, also isolate us, which leads us to anxiety and depression. This same study finds that “young adults who use 7 or more social media platforms are statistically 3 times more likely to experience increased levels of depression and anxiety than young adults who use 2 or less. Although more research needs to be done. individuals may be up to 46% more likely to have depression if they are using social media more than 60 minutes per day.” (4) Our prophet is aware of this phenomenon and has taught: “The Lord has declared that despite today’s unprecedented challenges, those who build their foundations upon Jesus Christ, and have learned how to draw upon His power, need not succumb to the unique anxieties of this era.” (5) It is beneficial to realize that people are unique with unique problems that require individually-tailored solutions.

For example, my father and I dealt with fear and anxiety differently. Fear motivates him to action and I admire his courage. In contrast, fear demotivates me; it paralyzed me. I have unknowingly struggled with anxiety my whole life. What I have to do is rid myself of fear first. I have found that humbling myself before the Lord and surrendering to him helps me conquer fear. After Christ’s atoning power helps me dispel my fear, I can move. And so, in the words of Moroni, I say “I would commend you to seek this Jesus of whom the prophets and apostles have written” (Ether 12:41). Faith in Jesus Christ will give us hope.

Alma taught: “faith is not to have a perfect knowledge of things; therefore if ye have faith ye hope for things which are not seen, which are true” (Alma 32:21). Faith and hope are connected in this definition. The apostle Elder Neal A. Maxwell expounded upon this connection, “Faith and hope are constantly interactive and are not always easily or precisely distinguished…Yet in the geometry of the restored theology, hope corresponds to faith but sometimes has a greater circumference. Faith, in turn, constitutes ‘the assurance of things hoped for’ and the proof of ‘things not seen’ (JST, Heb. 11:1; see also Ether 12:6). Thus hope sometimes reconnoiters beyond the present boundaries of faith, but it always radiates from Jesus.” (6) Jesus is the center of our faith, our faithful acts create a radius as we confidently walk the “straight and narrow” out from him towards the circumference of our hopes’ edges.

Our hopes are strengthened as our faith increases in Christ. Jacob instructed his people, “we search the prophets, and we have many revelations and the spirit of prophecy; and having all these witnesses we obtain a hope, and our faith becometh unshaken” (Jacob 4:6). As we study the gospel, we find that the most important victory has already been won; Christ broke the chains of sin and death. When we meditate on Christ’s atonement, the spirit can increase our awareness of the resurrection’s reality. We will begin to hope more fully for the moment when we will meet Him. We might begin to “look forward with an eye of faith, and view this mortal body raised in immortality, and this corruption raised in incorruption, to stand before God” (Alma 5:15). We might imagine the Lord saying to us in that moment, “ye shall have eternal life” (2 Nephi 31:20). This moment should excite us!

As our “confidence [waxes] strong in the presence of God,” we will be more confident in our day to day lives too. Because of Christ’s resurrection, we will be able to have hope even when it is hardest to hope. Near the end of the LotR series, when darkness seemed poised to overcome the world, some found hope through one of the three types of Christ in the story. The resurrection of the wizard Gandalf in the following vignette helps two soldiers after they beheld one of the supernatural enemies flying over their head.

“‘What was that?’ Asked Beregond, ‘You also felt something?’

‘Yes,’ muttered Pippin. ‘It is the sign of our fall, and the shadow of doom, a Fell Rider of the air.’

‘Yes, the shadow of doom,’ said Beregond. ‘I fear that Minas Tirith shall fall. Night comes. The very warmth of my blood seems stolen away.’

For a time they sat together with bowed heads and did not speak. Then suddenly Pippin looked up and saw that the sun was still shining and the banners still streaming in the breeze. He shook himself. ‘It is passed,’ he said. ‘No, my heart will not yet despair. Gandalf fell and has returned and is with us. We may stand, if only on one leg, or at least be left still upon our knees.’” (7)

As it was for Pippin, so can it be with us. Our testimonies of Christ and His resurrection can sustain us in our trials and challenges. It can bring us hope. We know how our stories end. We know who wins. All our trials will end and we will enter into His rest. Because of Christ, we can also know what we are supposed to be doing right now. And having this knowledge can bring us confidence and hope. The prophet Joseph Smith taught, “such was, and always will be, the situation of the saints of God, that unless they have an actual knowledge that the course they are pursuing is according to the will of God they will grow weary in their minds, and faint.” (8) We are entitled to know by revelation what the Lord’s will is for us specifically. This is how we “live by every word that proceedeth forth from the mouth of God” (D&C 84:44).

This is my favorite part about the story of Ammon and the servants at the water of Sebus. Ammon is confident and full of so much hope, he can see opportunity in trials. He is this way because of revelation. He knows what God wants him to do. His father, king Mosiah, prayed and received direction from the Lord (Mosiah 28:6-7). Ammon and his brothers were sent by revelation (Alma 17:11) to the Lamanites and they were given promises (Mosiah 28:6-7). When difficulties arose, Ammon was not shaken, because he knew he was on the Lord’s errand. His confidence compared to the other servants at the waters of Sebus is so stark, it is comical.

Therefore, as Ammon and the servants of the king were driving forth their flocks to this place of water, behold, a certain number of the Lamanites, who had been with their flocks to water, stood and scattered the flocks of Ammon and the servants of the king, and they scattered them insomuch that they fled many ways. Now the servants of the king began to murmur, saying: Now the king will slay us, as he has our brethren because their flocks were scattered by the wickedness of these men. And they began to weep exceedingly, saying: Behold, our flocks are scattered already. Now they wept because of the fear of being slain. Now when Ammon saw this his heart was swollen within him with joy; for, said he, I will show forth my power unto these my fellow-servants, or the power which is in me, in restoring these flocks unto the king, that I may win the hearts of these my fellow-servants, that I may lead them to believe in my words. And now, these were the thoughts of Ammon, when he saw the afflictions of those whom he termed to be his brethren. (Alma 17:27-30)

Our experiences living by revelation will also give us faith and hope. When we have proven how “faithful” the Lord is to His servants (1 Corinthians 10:13), us, we will also become more faithful to Him. These experiences with God can inform our hopes, so when new trials come upon us, we can see them as opportunities to manifest God’s power. We can also see this at work in the story of the young shepherd David. When he sees the giant Goliath defying the armies of the Lord, he volunteers. He knows that the Lord will deliver him. He has history with the Lord. When Saul expressed doubts about sending a youth out to battle Goliath, David rehearsed two experiences when the Lord delivered David from harm: once against a lion and once against a bear (see 1 Samuel 17:34-37).

We too can compile our past successful experiences with the Lord into a portfolio of sorts, to bring out when we need to encourage ourselves or others. In this way, we can “be ready always to give an answer to every man that asketh [us] a reason of the hope that is in [us]” (1 Peter 3:15).

However, even with the memories of our previous successes, sometimes when we face Goliaths, we can still “misread” the situation. In fact, the scholar Malcolm Gladwell has argued that we may even be reading the David and Goliath conflict all wrong. (9) David with his sling actually had the advantage on that battlefield. A stone in the right person’s sling could have the equivalent “stopping power” of “a fair-size modern handgun.” Goliath has brought a sword to a metaphorical gun fight; it is actually the giant who should be terrified, not David. Gladwell reminds us that “the powerful and the strong are not always what they seem.”

The story of David teaches us repeatedly to look beyond the surface (1 Samuel 16:1-13). In this story, we can see ourselves as David, but we can also see Jesus as David. When we are up against giants in our lives, like the Israelite army, we can become scared. We may even doubt that Jesus has the power to deliver us from our challenges. But in the same way that David had the obvious and clear advantage over Goliath from the beginning, we can misread our own situations and forget that Christ is God. And “with God nothing shall be impossible” (Luke 1:37). He is “mighty to save” (2 Nephi 31:19). We can trust Him and have a “perfect brightness of hope” through his atonement (2 Nephi 31:20).

ENDNOTES

(1) J.R.R. Tolkien, The Return of the King (New York; Houghton Mifflin Company, 1994), 838.

(2) https://www.polygon.com/platform/amp/lord-of-the-rings/22353128/denethor-lotr-movies-story-doomscrolling

(3) Russell M. Nelson, “Make Time for the Lord,” (October 2021).

(4) https://scholarsarchive.byu.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1018&context=ballardbrief

(5) Russell M. Nelson, “The Temple and Your Spiritual Foundations,” (October 2021)

(6) Neal A. Maxwell, “Hope through the Atonement of Jesus Christ,” (October 1998).

(7) J.R.R. Tolkien, The Return of the King, 749.

(8) Joseph Smith Jr., Lectures on Faith, 6:4-7.

(9) Malcolm Gladwell, David and Goliath: Underdogs, Misfits, and the Art of Battling Giants (New York: Little, Brown and Company, 2013),6.

(10) Gladwell, David and Goliath, 11.

(11) Gladwell, David and Goliath, 14-15.

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Yet It Pleased the Lord to Bruise him (Isaiah 53:10)

Posted on by nathanwritesstuff

As narrated in holy writ, Christ’s suffering in Gethsemane and death in Golgotha are traumatic to read; these are moments fraught with a perturbing welter of emotions: poignant grief, calming peace, fearful anxiety, quivering joy, suffocating guilt, and tearful gratitude. The “awful arithmetic of the atonement” is an incomprehensible calculus for humans1. Truly, “how sore,” “how exquisite,” and “how hard to bear,” “[we] know not” (D&C 19:15). As unfathomable as it is to contemplate Jesus’ atoning experience, it may also lay beyond our capacities to empathize with the Father during these moments. 

In the case of Christ, modern revelation has given us a first-person account from the Savior about his torment in D&C 19; however, there isn’t very much in scripture, modern or ancient, to describe the Father’s experience observing the death of his “only begotten Son” (John 3:16). There is at least one scripture that describes a sentiment that contradicts the natural response that a human reader may imagine for the Father. In Isaiah’s poetic prophecy of Christ’s atoning anguish, the emotion attributed to the Father during His son’s suffering was pleasure and satisfaction: “Yet it pleased the Lord to bruise him”2 and “He shall see of the travail of his soul, and shall be satisfied”3 (Isaiah 53:10 and 11). What Isaiah’s prophecy seems to suggest is that Heavenly Father was proud of his Son; He was pleased with Jesus’ choice to sacrifice for humanity, and satisfied with Christ’s salvific suffering. This sentiment is also shared at Christ’s baptism, “This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased” (Matthew 3:17). 

Although it is often assumed that Heavenly Father suffered4 as He witnessed Christ “[pour] out his soul unto death” (Isaiah 53:12), I feel it is instructive to hypothesize this alternative view suggested by Isaiah. If the Father felt proud of Jesus during His terrifying travails, the feeling exuded by the Father was likely a confidence in his son, who was proving that he “[was] mighty to save” (Alma 7:14). Perhaps, it might be helpful at times to imagine a God who is confident in me as well, when I go through my human-sized sufferings or face my seemingly Goliath-sized temptations. I think part of understanding God’s confidence in us comes through discovering that although we don’t “know the meaning of all things,” we can know that “[God] loveth his children” (1 Nephi 11: 15). The discovery of God’s love for us can improve our confidence in him and in ourselves.

It is easy to become bitter during an especially long series of trials and think, “haven’t I done enough?” “Why is God still testing me?” It may be comforting at those times to avoid thinking of God as someone trying to “prove [us],” and instead imagining a Father who is watching us, confident that we can handle our current trials or temptations (Abraham 3:25). The goal of our tests, ultimately, is not for him to learn what we will do, he already “know[s] the end from the beginning” (Abraham 2:8), but for us to “prove ourselves”5 and find faith in Him. In a sense, we are actually proving God through our ordeals, to learn that “God is faithful” (1 Corinthians 10:13) even when we are not faithful to Him. It is also through our trials that we can feel God’s confidence in us and therefore gain confidence in Him, His processes, His plan, and even in His “presence” (D&C 121:45). 

Our life is less about us performing perfectly in our trials and more about us relying on Christ’s atoning power to help us overcome our trials. As we humbly “apply the atoning blood of Christ” we will find “[his] grace is sufficient for [us]” (Mosiah 4:2 and Ether 12:27). Although our life may lead us into situations where the “elements combine to hedge up the way” (D&C 122:7), we can find comfort in knowing that the Lord is with us cheering us on, much like he did for Jesus. 

Endnotes

  1. Neal A. Maxwell, “Willing to Submit,” April 1985. 
  2. In Hebrew, the verb חפץ means to “delight in” or “have pleasure in.” Francis Brown, S.R. Driver, and Charles A. Briggs, The Brown-Driver-Briggs Hebrew and English Lexicon: Coded with Strong’s Concordance Numbers (Peabody, Massachusetts: Hendrickson Publishers, Inc., 2003), 342-343. 
  3. In Hebrew, the verb שבע means to “be sated, satisfied, surfeited.” The Brown-Driver-Briggs Hebrew and English Lexicon, 959-960. 
  4. https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/study/new-era/1976/01/classic-discourses-from-the-general-authorities-the-sacramental-covenant?lang=eng “In that hour I think I can see our dear Father behind the veil looking upon these dying struggles until even he could not endure it any longer; and, like the mother who bids farewell to her dying child, has to be taken out of the room, so as not to look upon the last struggles, so he bowed his head, and hid in some part of his universe, his great heart almost breaking for the love that he had for his Son.” 
  5. “Now is the time to prepare and prove ourselves willing and able to do all things whatsoever the Lord our God shall command us.” (Elder David A. Bednar, “We Will Prove Them Herewith (Abraham 3:25),” October, 2020. 

Act of Faith-Ammon and the Struggle at Sebus

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If you have grown up in The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints, there are a few select stories from the Book of Mormon that you will know. You just will. The story of Ammon and his literally disarming conflict at the waters of Sebus is one of them. This story’s adventure is so dramatic, it is easy to overlook the lesson on faith that Mormon, the main editor for the Book of Mormon, is highlighting with this story.

The Nephite missionary Ammon went with his brothers to preach to their enemies, the Lamanites. Ammon’s first assignment from the Lamanite King Lamoni was to watch the sheep with some other servants. Unbeknownst to Ammon, this task was going to be anything but an idyllic shepherding scene from a romance painting. As they are out shepherding, another group of Lamanites scatter the sheep. Ammon is quickly made aware that losing sheep was an offense punishable by death. The difference in the reaction of the servants and Ammon is so contrasting that it is almost comical.

“Now the servants of the king began to murmur, saying: Now the king will slay us, as he has our brethren because their flocks were scattered by the wickedness of these men. And they began to weep exceedingly, saying: Behold, our flocks are scattered already. Now they wept because of the fear of being slain…” (Alma 17:28-29).

I have never been in a situation where I could be put to death for something I have done, so I can only imagine reacting similarly. Fear is a powerful force and it is contagious, but for some reason Ammon is not only immune to their traumatic terror, he seems to be emboldened by it. His reaction is unexpected, to say the least.

“Now when Ammon saw this his heart was swollen within him with joy; for, said he, I will show forth my power unto these my fellow-servants, or the power which is in me, in restoring these flocks unto the king, that I may win the hearts of these my fellow-servants, that I may lead them to believe in my words” (Alma 17:29).

Ammon goes on to rally the other servants to gather the sheep again. When the raiders return, Ammon unhesitatingly contends with them and miraculously overcomes them in a armed conflict resulting in an armful of severed arms and some casualties from a sling. This act initiates a series of events culminating in the miraculous conversion of thousands of Lamanites. Somewhere in between the action adventure and the forcefulness of the protagonist’s larger-than-life character, Mormon is trying to teach us something.

Likely concerned that the reader could get the wrong message and simply believe that Ammon innately was just a brave person or did not feel fear, Mormon includes the reaction of King Lamoni to this dramatic event. After the king hears how Ammon took on a dozen armed combatants single handedly, he concludes that Ammon is more than human. Lest readers also come to a similar conclusion, Mormon supplies Ammon’s own words to refute this, “I am a man” (Alma 18:17, 34); just a man. Mormon later offers an explanation from Ammon, “I am nothing; as to my strength I am weak; therefore I will not boast of myself, but I will boast of my God, for in his strength I can do all things” (Alma 26:12).

Faith is supposed to be the focus here, not Ammon. It is important to ask on what Ammon was basing his faith? If faith is a “hope for things which are not seen”, we should ask what were the promises Ammon was hoping would come true? Mormon inserted these promises within the narrative, so that this story could teach us about an active, revelation-based faith.

Promise one:

After Ammon and his brothers informed their father Mosiah regarding their intention to go to preach to the Lamanites, Mosiah inquired of the Lord and received this revelation:

“And the Lord said unto Mosiah: Let them go up, for many shall believe on their words, and they shall have eternal life; and I will deliver thy sons out of the hands of the Lamanites” (Mosiah 28:7).

When Ammon went to confront the raiding party of Lamanites, he did so, believing that he would be delivered by the Lord. This promise is not specific enough; however, to guarantee that he would not be harmed though. This scenario could have played out very differently for Ammon. Instead, Ammon could have been brutally beaten up, almost killed, and left for dead. The servants then, might have delivered the severely injured Ammon to the king with an account of his bravery and dedication to the king’s service. The king, impressed by Ammon’s commitment and moved with pity by his plight, might have been humbled to the point of curiosity. This could have become Ammon’s opportunity to preach the word to a prepared king. Either of these scenarios might have worked as an act of faith and could have led to the miraculous conversion of the Lamanites.

Mormon, our action-adventure tour guide, does not inform the reader, what Ammon knew. Instead, Mormon reminds the reader of this first promise through a comment on what the marauders did not know (see Alma 17:35). Of course, simply the promise that he would be “deliver[ed]…out of the hands of the Lamanites” does not explain Ammon’s extreme reaction to the scattering of the flock, when “his heart was swollen within him with joy”. This response is also beyond mere enthusiastic optimism, this is the response of someone whose hopes are about to be realized. This kind of intense satisfaction might be expected from someone who has just won a gold medal in the Olympics or a lottery jackpot.

Mormon inserts more information into the narration in the form of another promise as a way to assist the reader understand Ammon’s motivation.

Promise two:

Upon entering the land of the Lamanites, the missionary party prayed and received this revelation:

“Go forth among the Lamanites, thy brethren, and establish my word; yet ye shall be patient in long-suffering and afflictions, that ye may show forth good examples unto them in me, and I will make an instrument of thee in my hands unto the salvation of many souls.” (Alma 17:11)

Due to this revelation, Ammon was looking for adversity to strike. He knew that right behind the trial would be an opportunity to accomplish his heart’s desire, salvation for his brethren the Lamanites. This was a cause he was willing to give his life for, a cause he had faith would succeed. He had promises from God. He had faith based on revelation. Mormon cleverly contrasts Ammon’s faith with the other two groups of Lamanites: the raiding party who did not know about the promises, were not afraid, but should have been; and the servants who also did not know about the promises, were afraid, but did not need to be.

If we are not constantly seeking revelation, a trial may catch us unprepared as well, and we will either fear unnecessarily or act too confidently. Like Ammon, our faith is a key for unlocking miracles, but our trials generally provide the torque necessary to turn the key. Because Ammon acted on faith, the atonement enabled him to act beyond his natural powers. This additional power is defined as “grace” in the Bible Dictionary, and it is a tender mercy accessible because of Christ’s atonement. Faith precedes the miracle, but is also a miracle itself, because both are driven by atoning power. Christ is the object of our faith and its source.

Mormon uses the story of Ammon and others to define what an active faith could be. Ammon proactively sought revelation, received promises from God, very specific promises without specific details, and he acted on them. Active faith begins with seeking first the will of God. We approach him in prayer continually to ask him to reveal his will to us. We seek out personal revelation in daily scripture study. As he reveals his will to us, and we act upon his words. His revealed will to us becomes “the substance of things hoped for” by our faith (Hebrews 11:1). His revealed direction in our lives is the promises we will have faith in; it is the context to an active faith.

Ammon’s active faith led to this act of faith, and his trust in revelation revealed a miracle. The Book of Mormon encourages us again and again to do the same.

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Admiration, Emulation, and Memorialization

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My prized April 1997 issue of the Ensign, the official publication of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints, limply lays in my appreciative hands, time-tattered and weathered by touch. In hindsight it seems providential that by opening this magazine almost a couple decades ago, I would be opening up a new path in my life leading to a greater appreciation for and a more intense interest in the atonement of Jesus Christ. The soaring sensation of having my unvoiced questions about life, suffering, and the Savior answered by a stranger was a startling discovery that is made new again every time I pick up this old copy.
 It was the article “Enduring Well” in that 1997 Ensign that fundamentally altered my perception of the gospel and the tenor of my developing discipleship to Christ. The author, Neal A. Maxwell, has always been a stranger in the sense that I never met him, but his influence upon me, starting with this masterfully written article, has had the impact of a close friend.

Elder Maxwell, Elder is a title for a general leader in the LDS church, made me responsible for my own trials:

“Rather than simply passing through trials, we must allow trials to pass through us in ways that sanctify us.” -Elder Maxwell, “Enduring Well”

I can expect trials, prepare for them, and understand the purposes for them:

“So often in life a deserved blessing is quickly followed by a needed stretching. Spiritual exhilaration may be quickly followed by a vexation or temptation. Were it otherwise, extended spiritual reveries or immunities from adversity might induce in us a regrettable forgetfulness of others in deep need.”-Elder Maxwell, “Enduring Well”

I gained greater appreciation for Christ’s suffering through the perceptive and wisdom-concentrated phrase the “awful arithmetic of the Atonement”(Elder Maxwell, “Enduring Well”). On multiple occasions, the implications of this phrase have yanked the reins on my otherwise galloping thoughts and forced me to ponder in reverence the infinite suffering of the savior.

Since 1997 I have been a voracious consumer of Elder Maxwell’s writings, particularly his official sermons from the Church. Soon my admiration of his literary aptitude turned to emulation as I started a journey to find my own style with his as my training wheels. Eventually, my emulation of his language became my memorialization of his world of words that went dark upon his death in 2004.

I don’t see myself as the successor of his literary legacy; his legacy is his own. I also don’t feel like my attempts to write like Maxwell necessarily make the statement that I write as good as Maxwell; I don’t. I am just giving credit to a stranger that helped me find my voice and use it in the praise of Christ. The tag I use to highlight the posts that have benefited from Maxwell’s inspiration is “writing like Maxwell”.

This is the first part in a series of essays written to remember Elder Maxwell through narrating my journey to write like him. The posts in this series will have the tag “write like Maxwell”.

For more information about Elder Maxwell, see the biography:

Bruce C. Hafen, A Disciple’s Life: The Biography of Neal A. Maxwell (Salt Lake City, Utah: Deseret Books, 2002).

A very comprehensive list of Elder Maxwell’s writings can be found here, at the website Radio Beloved.

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The posts on nathanwritesstuff.com are neither official publications of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints nor approved statements by the Maxwell family. I esteem both groups, but represent neither party in an official capacity.

The Power to Get Back Up Again

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We live in a fallen world and so we encounter failure. We try to “take up the cross, and follow [Christ] (Mark 10:21), but fall again and again. Sometimes we get tired. We may feel it is too hard. We may begin to think that our failures are not mistakes, but we are, that we fail because we are failures. This is exactly what Satan would like us to think. When we recognize that we have failed in some aspect of the gospel or we have sinned, we may come in contact with two different types of sorrow: the “sorrow of the world” (2 Corinthians 7:10) also described by Mormon as the “sorrowing of the damned” (Mormon 2:13), or “godly sorrow” (2 Corinthians 7:10).

The sorrow of the world comes from Satan, it is designed to crush us under its weight. This weight is unproductive and deliberately debilitating, because “[Satan] seeketh that all men might be miserable like unto himself” (2 Nephi 2:27). He wants us to feel like him, like we are damned, and there is no way out. The sorrow of the world is paralyzing, but Christ has “overcome the world” (John 16:33), including its sorrow, so that he could give us a different way.

Christ’s way allows us to feel hope even in the midst of our sorrows. Unlike the sorrow of the world, the weight of “Godly sorrow” is meant to be lifted, so we can become stronger and better. Godly sorrow leads to repentance and links us to the power of an “infinite atonement” (Alma 34:12), which is the power to get back up when we fall, no matter how far or often. Part of the significance of having an “infinite atonement” is to teach us about infinite forgiveness, infinite healing, and God’s infinite love, which “faileth not” (1 Corinthians 13:8). The painful process of the atonement is itself an example of the power we can have over sorrow and sin.

The account of Christ’s agonizing atonement in the garden of Gethsemane progresses through a simple sequence of actions. The narrative in the book of Matthew reads, “and he went a little further, and fell on his face, and prayed, saying, O my Father, if it be possible, let this cup pass from me: nevertheless not as I will, but as thou wilt” (Matthew 26:39, italics added for emphasis). The scholar Kent Brown* has taught that the three main verbs “went”, “fell”, and “prayed” as narrated in all the synoptic gospels use the imperfect tense in the Greek original. This tense is used to describe either an action that was customary, something someone used to do, or an action that was iterative, something done repeatedly. The intended meaning here is that Jesus repeatedly went forward, fell down, and cried out for the pain to stop. This cycle was repeated over and over again as he suffered for our sins and sorrows.

The critical verb that is absent, but implied in this sequence of suffering is that he got up. Jesus fell down repeatedly, but he also got up again and again, and so can we. We will fall and fail, often and hard, but we don’t have to stay down, we can get up. We can always rise from the ashes of our mistakes through Christ’s enabling atonement.

References

*From the documentary, “The Messiah: Behold the Lamb of God”, produced by the Neal A. Maxwell Institute for Religious Scholarship, accessed on May 17, 2016 http://messiahjesuschrist.org/episodes/atonement. The script, also available on line, has the following commentary from Professor Kent Brown:

“So Jesus arrives with the eleven. Judas has already separated himself. They come inside the garden, somewhere on the lower slopes of the Mount of Olives. He leaves eight near the gate, near the entryway, and takes three with Him farther into the garden. These are Peter, James, and John, those who have been with Him from the earliest days after He began to call the Twelve.

There are two basic things to notice about this. The first is the intensity of the suffering which now descends upon Him. And he, He says to the three that He is sorrowful even unto death. The weight of our sins, our mistakes, falling on a sinless man, in such enormity, brings Him to the point at which He wishes that He could push this away. He leaves them there, He goes farther into the garden and prays. And this is the second part. Each one of the synoptic gospels repeats his actions in the imperfect tense in Greek, which is the tense of customary action: he used to do this, she used to do that. And it also has to do with iterative action, repeated action. So that we read that Jesus went forward and fell and prayed, went forward and fell and prayed, went forward and fell and prayed.

This series of repeated actions that the verbs convey to readers indicates the intensity of the suffering He’s going through. He doesn’t just pray once. He must have straightened Himself up and trying to relieve Himself in some way, went forward and prayed again. This is a scene which is compelling to me, and tells me just in the way that it’s written, that Jesus suffers deeply, unfathomably at this moment, for you and for me.”

(http://messiahjesuschrist.org/messiah-the-narrative/messiah-script-episode-5/messiah-script-episode-5-part-2)

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