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. 

Al Caminar con Dios y La Imaginación Espiritual

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José Smith enseñó que en el jardín, “[Adán] recibió instrucciones, y anduvo y conversó con [Dios], como un hombre habla y se comunica con otro…” (1) Esta imagen de andar con Dios es muy poderoso para mi!

Recientemente tuve una experiencia de caminar con Dios. Recientemente tuve la oportunidad celebró La Pascua. Por “Anastasi,” una celebración por la Resurrección de Jesus, hay una llama de Jerusalem que fue traído a Grecia y esa llama se uso para encender a todos las velas en todas las iglesias en Grecia. Recibí esa llama en una vela pasado por la congregación durante “Anastasi.” Después tenia el desafío de caminar a mi hotel con el fuego. El viento no soplaba violentamente, pero si intenté a caminar de prisa, o no cubrí bien la llama con la mano, o mantuve la vela demasiado lejos de mi cuerpo, la llama bailaba e iba a apagarse. Sentí que esta llama fue un símbolo de mi fe en Cristo. Al caminar cuidadosamente, mi atención fijado en la condición de la llama, pensé, “¿cuido yo mi testimonio con la misma nivel de atención que estoy dando a esta llama?” Y esta experiencia caminando con la llama era una oportunidad de caminar con Dios!

Habían otras veces cuando estaba a solas caminando y pensando acerca de la vida, me imaginaba que Dios estaba conmigo caminando. Este pensamiento me daba un montón de paz. Pueden imaginar el gozo que podríamos sentir, si Dios caminaba con nosotros en realidad como lo hizo con Adán y Eva. Infortunadamente, la situación por Adán y Eva cambio después de la caída. Las escrituras nos explica que “Adán y Eva, su esposa, invocaron el nombre del Señor, y oyeron la voz del Señor que les hablaba en dirección del Jardín de Edén, y no lo vieron, porque se encontraban excluidos de su presencia” (Moisés 5:4).

Aunque nosotros todavía viven en un mundo caído, Dios no espera que permanezcamos caídos y excluidos de su presencia. De hecho, después de la caída, había dos personas, Enoc y Noé, de quien las escrituras dicen que caminaron con Dios (2). Es decir, que ellos ya no eran excluidos de su presencia. Quizás ustedes recuerden de la vida del hermano de Jared, quien vio al Señor. Cuando Cristo se le mostró al hermano de Jared, dijo a el, “eres redimido de la caída; por tanto, eres traído de nuevo a mi presencia” (Éter 3:13). Esta es nuestra meta, vencer este mundo caído y regresar a la presencia de Dios.

Por medio de su hijo amado, Dios nos ha dado un método de ser redimido de la caída y regresar a su presencia. Este método simplemente requiere que seamos humildes y tengamos fe en El. Jesus nos invita, “[caminen] en la mansedumbre de mi Espíritu.” Este es un camino que empieza con nuestras debilidades. Escuchen por favor a las siguientes palabras del Salvador:

Y si los hombres vienen a mí, les mostraré su debilidad. Doy a los hombres debilidad para que sean humildes; y basta mi gracia a todos los hombres que se humillan ante mí; porque si se humillan ante mí, y tienen fe en mí, entonces haré que las cosas débiles sean fuertes para ellos (Éter 12:27).

En la ultima Conferencia General Elder Hamilton nos enseñó acerca de esta escritura en Éter: “Observemos más detenidamente lo que el Señor nos enseña. Vemos que primero dice que da a los hombres y a las mujeres debilidad —en singular—, lo cual es parte de nuestra experiencia terrenal como seres caídos o carnales. Nos hemos vuelto hombres y mujeres naturales debido a la caída de Adán, pero mediante la expiación de Jesucristo, podemos vencer nuestra debilidad, o naturaleza caída.

Luego dice que Su gracia es suficiente y que si nos humillamos y tenemos fe en Él, entonces Él ‘har[á] que las cosas débiles [en plural] sean fuertes para [nosotros]’. En otras palabras, a medida que primero cambiemos nuestra naturaleza caída —nuestra debilidad—, entonces podremos cambiar nuestro comportamiento, nuestras debilidades.” (3) Así vemos que nuestra debilidad, al fin, no es una debilidad verdadera, sino más bien es un paso importante para nuestro progreso a regresar a las presencia de Dios. Pablo lo dijo bien, “cuando soy débil, entonces soy fuerte” (2 Corintios 12:10).

Hay otra manera en que una debilidad nos da fuerza. La fe, en un nivel básico es una debilidad porque es limitada. Según su definición de Alma, “La fe no es tener un conocimiento perfecto de las cosas; de modo que si tenéis fe, tenéis esperanza en cosas que no se ven, y que son verdaderas” (Alma 32:21). Aunque la fe es un conocimiento limitado y es ciega, y entonces se parece que es una debilidad, en realidad, es una fuerza. Al “ejercitar [nuestra] fe para arrepentimiento” (Alma 34:17) llegaremos a ser mas fuerte en maneras que el mero conocimiento no puede hacer. De hecho, tenemos que andar en fe, antes de andar con Dios.

Pablo enseñó que “por fe andamos, no por vista” (2 Corintios 5:7) y cuando andamos por fe estamos “and[ando] en el Espíritu” (Galatas 5:16). Tener fe es tener más acceso al Espíritu Santo, quien testifica de Cristo. Es por medio del Espíritu que podemos ver Dios “con el ojo de la fe” (Alma 32:40) —en singular— en preparación por el día en que lo veremos “con [nuestros] propios ojos” (Éter 12:19) —en plural. Es posible que el ojo de la fe es singular, porque el objeto de nuestra fe, Cristo también es singular. Alma enseñó, “hay otro modo o medio por el cual el hombre pueda ser salvo, sino en Cristo y por medio de él” (Alma 38:9). Así fue el progreso del hermano de Jared y muchos otros, según Moroni:

Y hubo muchos cuya fe era tan sumamente fuerte, aun antes de la venida de Cristo, que no se les pudo impedir penetrar el velo, sino que realmente vieron con sus propios ojos las cosas que habían visto con el ojo de la fe; y se regocijaron (Éter 12:19).

Alma considera el ojo de la fe equivalente con nuestras imaginaciones espirituales. Cuando Alma pregunta a su gente, “¿Miráis hacia adelante con el ojo de la fe y veis este cuerpo mortal levantado…para presentaros ante Dios…?” Alma también pregunta “¿Podéis imaginaros oír la voz del Señor…diciéndoos: Venid a mí, benditos?” Y “¿podéis imaginaros llevados ante el tribunal de Dios…? (Alma 5:15-18) ¿han imaginaron ustedes este escenario antes? ¿El día en que nosotros estamos arrodillados ante el Señor? La imaginación espiritual es un instrumento eficaz para el arrepentimiento. Nuestro Profeta, Presidente Nelson, han dicho, “El caminar por la senda de los convenios, en combinación con el arrepentimiento diario, aviva el ímpetu espiritual positivo” (4).

En el tiempo del Nefita Jarom, los profetas, los sacerdotes, y los maestros enseñaron a la gente “persuadiéndolos a mirar adelante hacia el Mesías y a creer en su venida como si ya se hubiese verificado.” (Jarom 1:11). Así que los Nefitas imaginaron que el Mesías ya vino a ellos, y se ajustaron sus comportamientos según esta realidad imaginada. El Espíritu puede guiar nuestras imaginaciones para que nos sentamos la realidad de un encuentro con Dios. ¿Han tenido ustedes algunas oportunidades de sentir la realidad de Dios?

Me recuerdo cuando era un joven, a veces durante las oraciones de my padre, me sentí que Dios realmente estaba en el cuarto con nosotros. En estas ocasiones pensé que si abriera los ojos yo vería a Dios. Así me sentía que Dios estaba tan cerca a nosotros. Y a veces cuando leo las escrituras con el Espíritu, me siento como estoy recibiendo las escrituras por la primera vez, es decir estoy el que recibe la revelación originalmente. Es como si “es [su] voz la que [me] las declara” (DyC 18:35). Y según las palabras de Doctrina y Convenios sección 18, “[puedo testificar] que [he] oído [su] voz y que [conozco sus] palabras” (DyC 18:35).

Testifico como Alma que “hoy es el tiempo y el día de [nuestra] salvación” y “es cuando el hombre debe prepararse para comparecer ante Dios” (Alma 34:31-32). Si andamos por la senda de los convenios, “hasta al fin,” podremos oír la voz del Padre diciéndonos: “Tendréis la vida eterna” (2 Nefi 31:20). Espero que todos nosotros podamos imaginar esta escenario, pero te garantizo que ninguno de nosotros podemos imaginar todo lo que Dios nos dará en esa ocasión. Por que, “Cosas que ojo no vio, ni oído oyó, ni han subido al corazón del hombre, son las que Dios ha preparado para aquellos que le aman” (2 Corintios 2:9).

Esta publicación es parte de un discurso dado en Mayo 2022.

(1) Enseñanzas de los Presidentes de la Iglesia: José Smith, capítulo 2

(2) En el antiguo testamento, Enoc y Noé también fueron traídos de nuevo a la presencia de Dios, pero las escrituras describen esta situación así; “caminó Enoc con Dios” (Génesis 5:22) y “con Dios caminó Noé” (Génesis 6:9).

(3) Kevin S. Hamilton, “Entonces haré que las cosas débiles sean fuertes” April 2022 o https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/study/general-conference/2022/04/28hamilton?lang=spa

(4) Presidente Nelson, “El Poder de Ímpetu Espiritual,” Abril 2022 o https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/study/ftsoy/2022/05/04-the-power-of-spiritual-momentum-excerpts?lang=spa

The End Worth Enduring for

Posted on by nathanwritesstuff


“Endur[ing] to the end” is the critical last leg of our overall journey to salvation (3 Nephi 15:9). When we talk about it; however, we often focus on endurance, as if white-knuckling the “rod of iron” was tantamount to enduring to the end. In actuality, understanding what the end is empowers us to “stand still” when “all things shall be in commotion” (D&C 123:17 and 88:91).

Often our present problems can find relief through simply knowing that death is not the end. Christ “[is] the…life” that made immortal life possible for us (John 14:6). Christ’s infinite atonement not only extends our individual stories passed the finality of death, but also allows us to attain to a “knowledge…of the world to come” (Jacob 4:12, see also Mosiah 5:3). Our “hope and views” of the resurrection can allow us to face trials, suffering, and especially death knowing that they only last a “small moment” and ultimately we will “find rest to [our] souls” (Alma 27:28, D&C 121:7, and Alma 37:34).

Despite a growing knowledge of the resurrection, when we are caught in one of life’s “mighty storm[s]” (Helaman 5:12), the end we tend to care about most is the end of our immediate sufferings. Trapped within the confines of our present circumstances, we are unable to see that there is “a way” prepared for us to “escape” (1 Corinthians 10:13). Christ “[is] the way” (John 14:6). His infinite atonement is the only way to escape the chains of the finite now to see “things as they really are, and…as they really will be” (Jacob 4:13).

Our faith and anxiety can qualify us to know what “things should happen” (Jacob 1:5); however, even knowing how something will occur does not necessarily trivialize the experience of living through it. Christ, who knew cognitively before hand what his suffering would be like was still “astonished” when his suffering began in the garden of Gethsemane [1]. Because of Christ’s astonishing sorrow we can also be astonished at how personal a figure Christ can be in the path out of our own sufferings.

Christ himself said “I am…the beginning and the end” (Revelation 21:6, italics added for emphasis). Christ is the end worth enduring to and his grace supplies the power we need to reach him. It is our knowledge of Christ and our personal relationship with him that brings fuller purpose to our mortal pains and additional power to meet our trials. The spirit allows us such an intimacy in our relationship with Christ that we can “look forward unto the Messiah, and believe in him to come as though he already was” (Jarom 1:11). We can begin to glimpse him with an “eye of faith” and be “glad” (Ether 12:19; John 8:56).

Sometimes it is during suffering’s suffocating grip that we come to know Christ most intimately. His nearness can distance us from our pain, so that we can see our trials differently. At these moments, we can more easily enter into a Gethsemaneic mindset, where we are willing to accept the Lord’s will over our own. And having emptied out our wills, we will have more room for more of God’s power to do what was previously impossible. Here our sufferings can find their end in Christ, where his will can drive us to “finish[…]” our trials in a way that can also add finishing touches to us (D&C 19:19). Our submission allows the Lord to use our trials as tools to engrave his image in our countenances (see Alma 5:19). In the end, we will see him and we “shall be like him” (Moroni 7:48). He is the end we endure life’s pains to reach and the end we can become. He is worth it and so are we.

Endnotes

[1] “Later, in Gethsemane, the suffering Jesus began to be ‘sore amazed’ (Mark 14:33), or, in the Greek, ‘awestruck’ and ‘astonished.’ Imagine, Jehovah, the Creator of this and other worlds, ‘astonished’! Jesus knew cognitively what He must do, but not experientially. He had never personally known the exquisite and exacting process of an atonement before. Thus, when the agony came in its fulness, it was so much, much worse than even He with his unique intellect had ever imagined!” (Elder Neal A. Maxwell, “Willing to Submit”, Ensign, May 1985) https://www.lds.org/general-conference/1985/04/willing-to-submit?lang=eng This idea is also hinted at in Alma 7: 11-13.

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Voices from the Dust: Part One

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When the Book of Mormon came to light in the early 1800’s, literally from out of the earth, it fulfilled poetic prophecy that it would be a voice from the dust (see Isaiah 29:4) [1]. The Book of Mormon is actually a record of many unique voices crying as one that Jesus is the Christ. As a receptacle of a legion of voices, the Book of Mormon is an intimate book.

Recently I was on a work trip. On one of my calls home, my daughter answered my wife’s cell phone, I quickly greeted her by name. She quizzically replied, “how did you know it was me?” I said simply, “I know your voice.” Our family relationships are personal and intimate. We know each other in ways no one else will know us.

When I say the Book of Mormon is an intimate book, I mean it is intimate like how we are intimate with our families. When you read it, you can clearly see that it is meant to be intimate and personal.

In the opening chapter, Nephi, the first author, in our extent Book of Mormon, tells us his name, what language he is using, how he is writing his record, when his story takes place, and why he is writing. All the major authors and editors are also personal [2]. They are aware of a future audience that in some cases they have seen in vision. They write to you and me. Hearing a personal voice is a unique situation for a reader of an ancient text. It is something that should be appreciated in the Book of Mormon.

Because each of the Book of Mormon authors and editors are so personal, they are easily discernible and individualized. In fact, in certain cases, they are so unique, their singular voices appear to scream out at us from the pages of the Book of Mormon. For example, you can quickly differentiate a new tone when you move from Nephi to his younger brother Jacob [3], who is one of my favorite authors in the Book of Mormon.

John S. Tanner has explained some of the unique qualities of Jacob’s voice. In his recorded speeches, Jacob is “intimate, vivid, vulnerable. He used words about feelings—like anxiety, grieve, and tender—more frequently than any other Book of Mormon writer. For example, half the book’s references to anxiety occur in Jacob, and over two-thirds of the references to grieve and tender (or their derivatives), as well as shame, are Jacob’s. He is the only person to have used delicate, contempt, and lonesome. Likewise, he is the only Book of Mormon author to have employed wound in reference to emotions; and he never used it, as everyone else did to describe a physical injury. Similarly, Jacob used pierce or its variants frequently (four of the ten instances in the Book of Mormon), and he used it exclusively in a spiritual sense.”[4]

Jacob is an emotive wordsmith. Consider “the concrete words in the phrase: ‘Instead of feasting upon the pleasing words of God [they] have daggers placed to pierce their souls and wound their delicate minds’” (Jacob 2:9). Or consider, “The sobbing of their hearts ascend up to God…Many hearts died, pierced with deep wounds” (2:35)[5]. Jacob’s singular sayings are so significant they are echoed by later voices of the Book of Mormon[6]. Jacob’s willingness to be vulnerable with his feelings allows us to develop a personal connection with him.

As intimate a speaker as Jacob must have been, he is not the only Book of Mormon author who is personal with the reader. Mormon, who is often the detached editor, also has moments of personal engagement with the reader, where his singular sentimentalities whisper around the ink to us. For example in Mosiah chapter 18, as Mormon describes a critical moment in the history of the Nephite people, he mentions the name Mormon no less than 12 times. Here is verse 30 as an example:

“And now it came to pass that all this was done in Mormon, yea, by the waters of Mormon, in the forest that was near the waters of Mormon; yea, the place of Mormon, the waters of Mormon, the forest of Mormon, how beautiful are they to the eyes of them who there came to the knowledge of their Redeemer; yea, and how blessed are they, for they shall sing to his praise forever.” (Mosiah 18:30)

This seemingly excessive repetition of the name Mormon is not an error; it is an individual, personal, and even desperate attempt on Mormon’s part to reach out thousands of years to tell the reader, “I was a real person. This is the origin of my name”. Mormon who knew of the impending destruction of his own people, also knew that his record would be preserved for another people far into the future. In the same way that this sacred place called Mormon could have been so significant that a family would name their son Mormon some 500 years later (Mormon 1:5), so too can the words of the Book of Mormon affect the lives of modern readers with similar poignancy.

Not only is the Book of Mormon intimate in the way it is written, but it is intimate in how it describes Christ and his infinite atonement. In fact, the popular Mormon term “infinite atonement” is first found in the Book of Mormon, coined by the prophet-poet Jacob (2 Nephi 9:7). The Book of Mormon doesn’t just describe Christ to you, you discover Him with the authors. You are there as the first prophets in the Book of Mormon pray to God and are shown Christ and learn of His atonement.

In the opening chapter, you discover Christ with Lehi, the first Book of Mormon prophet, as “the One descending out of the midst of heaven” (1 Nephi 1: 9). Lehi sorrows as he sees in vision the future destruction of Jerusalem, but he also sees the mercy of God, Christ’s atonement. And Lehi’s “soul did rejoice, and his whole heart was filled” (1 Nephi 1: 15). You are a fly on the wall when Nephi, Lehi’s son, has a vision of Jesus, his birth, his ministry, his suffering, and death (see 1 Nephi 11).

Originally, Christ is referenced only as the Messiah, the anointed one in Hebrew, in the beginning of the Book of Mormon (600 years before Christ). As a reader, you are a covert witness when Jacob discovers another name for the Messiah, because he shares this moment with us. He writes “it must needs be expedient that Christ-for in the last night the angel spake unto me that this should be his name-should come among the Jews” (2 Nephi 10: 3). I remember as a youth coming upon this sacred scene for the first time and sharing this moment with Jacob. From this moment onward, the Book of Mormon authors talk of Christ, rejoice in Christ, preach of Christ, prophesy of Christ “that [their] children may know to what source they may look to for a remission of their sins” (2 Nephi 25: 26).

Some of these moments with Christ are so personal, you feel like an intruder of sorts loudly crashing through a jungle of a narrative before coming upon a private scene. Even if we are a “mood apart” from the intimate scenes frequently painted in the Book of Mormon [7], our mood can be linked to the text by an additional personal voice. The spirit’s voice creates the farthest reaching link to the intimacy of Christ’s love portrayed in the Book of Mormon. Despite all the textual evidence that begs the reader to adopt the idea that the Book of Mormon is an authentic ancient record, it is the voice of the Spirit that orchestrates the union of the book’s individual voices to testify of its own authenticity in the heart of the reader. It is the spirit’s singularly personal voice that witnesses to each individual of all truth.

Notes:

[1] This phraseology from Isaiah 29:4 is also found in 2 Nephi 26:15; 2 Nephi 27: 13; 2 Nephi 33:10; Mormon 8:26.

[2] There is a lot of literature that talks about the voices of the Book of Mormon, but one of my favorite books about this is Grant Hardy’s Understanding the Book of Mormon: A Reader’s Guide (New York: Oxford University Press, Inc., 2010).

[3] For an interesting comparison of Nephi and Jacob, see Marilyn Arnold, “Unlocking the Sacred Text”, Journal of Book of Mormon Studies, 8.1, 1999, p. 52 or click here.

[4] John S. Tanner, “Jacob and His Descendants as Authors,” in Rediscovering the Book of Mormon (Salt Lake City, Utah: Deseret Book Company, 1991), p.59 or click here.

[5] Tanner, p. 59.

[6] see John Hilton III, “Jacob’s Textual Legacy”, Journal of the Book of Mormon and Other Restoration Scripture, 22. 2 (2013), p. 52-65 or click here.

[7] The phrase “mood apart” is from a Robert Frost poem not surprisingly entitled, “A Mood Apart” in The Poetry of Robert Frost: The Collected Poems, Complete and Unabridged, Edward Conner Lathem, Ed. (New York: Henry Holt and Company, 1969), p. 385.

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This is a semi-academic post; it does not document the extent of what is known on this subject nor explicate ideas previously unknown. For the real scholarship work being done on the Book of Mormon, please check out the publications of the Neal A. Maxwell Institute for Religious Scholarship or click here. There are many groups engaged in scholarly research on the Book of Mormon, I am just partial to this group. I also like the Interpreter, click here.

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.

Cell of Our Own Self-Esteem

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Sometimes we incarcerate ourselves in the cell of our own self-esteem. We take our fears, insecurities, and sorrows and project them upon the actions and words of others including God. We read our own guilt into the silent glances of others and they appear to be judging us. We may feel that God is angry at us, when really we are angry at ourselves. We can become so defensive over our own issues that no matter the real motives behind what anyone else does or says, all we will see is offense. Like bars, these feelings prevent us from having real relationships, because we don’t see things or people “as they really are” (see Jacob 4:13), we see them as we are.

Seeing the world through the cell of our own self-esteem makes it difficult to see anything but ourselves. As we put ourselves in front of the correct focus it won’t matter how much light we have in our life, the world outside of us will blur from our developing myopia. Our own concerns are sharply in focus and overshadow everything else. In this way, it can become nearly impossible to see the sufferings or triumphs of those closest to us, because we cannot see past the bars of our own overinflated issues. We cannot be there for others, and it seems like no one is there for us. This extreme nearsightedness may also be termed as spiritual blindness, where we “walk[…] in darkness at noonday” (D&C 95:6).

Spiritual blindness is not a malady that is inflicted upon us, but something we do to ourselves; it is the equivalent of walking around with our eyes shut. This is not only foolish, but dangerous! Fortunately, it is part of Christ’s prophesied mission to “Go forth to them that sit in darkness” (1 Nephi 21:9), and he can free us from ourselves by revealing himself to us. If we allow Him into our lives, we will see His “goodness”, which should “awaken[s] [us]” to a deeper sense of the divine (Mosiah 4:5, see also Mormon 2:13).

Depending upon our circumstances, coming to know God can be an arresting, life altering, and a sudden stop on our own road to “Damascus” (see Acts 9). Sometimes repentance, our turning to him, can be as uncomfortable as the impact of a wrecking ball, a “mighty change” that can cause the walls to the cell of our own self esteem to “[fall] down” (Alma 5:14 and Joshua 6:20). It may also feel like a eucatastrophe, which J.R.R. Tolkien defined as a “sudden joyous turn”, a joy “beyond the walls of this world, poignant as grief” (*).

Although repentance is often portrayed in dramatic one-time occurrences in scripture, for many of us this mighty change happens, almost imperceptibly, in the “process of time” (Moses 7:4). The experience of coming to know Christ and His atonement through repentance and reconciliation is a singular experience meant to be experienced regularly. It is a personal experience of such spiritual intimacy that in the Book of Mormon it is phrased as having “tasted of His love” (Mosiah 4:11).

It probably does not need to be said, but to taste something you put it in your mouth, you touch it with your tongue. This is the poetic way of referencing how personal and intimate our relationship with God can be. It is also exactly what we do every week at the sacrament. We take the bread, a symbol of his body, and we take the water, as a symbol of his blood, and we eat and drink them in remembrance of Him. The portions are small, but enough for us to “feast upon his love…forever” (Jacob 3:2). Through the sacrament, we memorialize the day when, or perhaps more likely the process of time through which, “Christ hath made us free” from ourselves (Galatians 5:1). We can then step out of our self-esteem to love and be loved.

Endnotes

* J.R.R. Tolkien, “On Fairy-Stories,” in The Monster and the Critics and Other Essays (London: HarperCollins Publishers, 1997) 153-157.

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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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A Burning Fire Shut Up in My Bones

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Samoan Fireknife Dancers (1)
The Samoan fire-knife dance is a symbol of strength and fiery perseverance.
It can be hard to follow the Lord. At times it is easy to become “weary in well-doing” (Galatians 6:9). The gospel, as described in scripture, is pure and simple, until you try to live it. Life seemingly transforms elegant doctrine and principles into complex conundrums and sticky situations. In short, the gospel can get messy. For example, it is easy to love your enemies, when you don’t actually have any, but as soon as a loved one betrays you, a co-worker figuratively stabs you in the back, or a crazy driver cuts you off in traffic that principle gets exponentially harder to live. With the proper amount of pressure, we can grow faint and consider a full stop in our discipleship, but, a lot like the tragic prophet Jeremiah, we can also learn how to find strength for those times when we are without.

The Lord called Jeremiah to preach to a people who would not listen to him. He “[was] in derision daily” and mocked by “every one” (Jeremiah 20:7). His harsh message of repentance brought him into conflict with the most prominent people of power in his day. At one point Jeremiah felt that he had suffered enough, he declared, “I will not make mention of him, nor speak any more in his name” (Jeremiah 20:9). He was just going to stop, until he found that he could not.

He explained “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.” (Jeremiah 20:9). Jeremiah found that he could not stop as easily as he thought. The fiery insistence of the word overpowered his failing will. This is not an example of the Lord merely forcing someone to do his will against theirs; instead, this burning fire was a power reserve Jeremiah had stored for himself.

The word did not find its way into Jeremiah’s heart by accident, he had planted it there. He wrote in a previous chapter, “Thy words were found, and I did eat them; and thy word was unto me the joy and rejoicing of mine heart” (Jeremiah 15:16). Jeremiah’s love of the word had given him light in his darkest hour and rekindled his faith in his time of doubt.

We also can populate a similar power reserve within us, when we relish God’s individualized, simple, and sublime revelations. Our love of the word, the Lord’s revealed will to us, can qualify us for additional power to persevere when our circumstances become severe, when living the gospel gets messy, or when our hopes shatter before our eyes.

The emphasis of our own role in this process is mainly for motivational purposes, because our efforts, no matter how critical, are merely the preparation of an altar, the fire has always “fell” from heaven (see 1 KIngs 18:38). Christ brings the word to life, and with our consent he can power us like “a burning fire shut up in [our] bones” to work miracles in his name.

Thank you to my Uncle Adolf in Samoa for providing the picture of the Samoan entertainer with the fire-knife. According to my dad, one of the ways of referring to this routine in Samoan is gaifi ailao. 

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“The Wind Bloweth Where It Listeth”: Following the Spirit

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In the Gospel of John we read:

The wind bloweth where it listeth, and thou hearest the sound thereof, but canst not tell whence it cometh, and whither it goeth; so is every one that is born of the Spirit (John 3: 8).

Here Jesus imaginatively employed the mysterious movement of the wind to elucidate the apparent elusiveness of the spirit. While we struggle to understand the Spirit’s movements—i.e., “whence it cometh, and whither it goeth”, the Spirit knows where it comes from and where it goes. Thus, ideally, we can trust the Spirit and exchange our desired destination for His.

But realistically, man is not always willing to part with his willfulness. The “natural man” is, after all, the natural “enemy of God”. He does not “yield to the enticings of the Holy Spirit” (Mosiah 3: 19), but goes astray pursuing what he thinks is “his own way” (Isaiah 53: 6). And “his own way” it may be, at least in the beginning. But every step he takes away from the strait and narrow, is a step off the refuge of the rock of the gospel, and soon he will know what it means to be exposed to the forces of nature. For Satan’s storm will come with its “harrow[ing]…whirlwinds” and he shall “be driven with fierce winds whithersoever the enemy listeth to carry them” (Alma 26: 6). The natural man left to himself is just a natural disaster waiting to happen.

Man’s stripping off the armor of God for more unrestrictive movement, in the end just becomes a uniform change. Of course, the armor Satan provides is the type of chain mail that does not protect, but instead connects you to his misery, which is described as awful. And being bitter from sipping the bitter cup, the natural man wants nothing more than “to kick against the pricks, to persecute the saints, and to fight against God” (D&C 121:38). The natural man does not become an enemy of God, just because he does not yield to the spirit, but because he yields to the quintessential enemy of God, “that awful monster the devil” (2 Nephi 9:19).

Sadly, Satan’s hold on man is so widespread, that this enmity with God is considered natural. Satan, the father of lies, is the world’s greatest salesman and advertiser. Who else could take fire and brimstone and package it as prime real estate? He is not only persuasive, but pervasive to the extent that there are few places you can go to escape his noisy sales pitches and eye-catching advertisements. Truly, with the enemy combined there are loud voices everywhere saying; “lo here or lo there”. Amidst this rowdy ruckus how are we ever to hear the still small voice?

We must often leave the world and go “into the wilderness to be with God” (Matt. 4: 1, Joseph Smith Translation). Sometimes this wilderness is no further than a finger movement to turn off some type of electronic device and sit in silence. We may be surprised at the many things that only silence can say.

Then again there are many who after expending much effort towards contacting the spirit are left baffled at the spirit’s elusiveness. Even so, let us not confuse elusiveness with aloofness. For God is very concerned about us to the extent that he has “the very hairs of [our] head[s] numbered” (Matt. 10: 30). I think that sometimes we confuse the promise of “always hav[ing] his spirit to be with [us]” (Moroni 4: 3) with the Spirit always waiting upon us or with the Spirit always speaking to us.

We cannot expect the spirit to answer at our beck and call, for it is us that must always be willing to be “led by the spirit, not knowing beforehand the things which [we] should do” (1 Nephi 4: 6). And perhaps we are meant to be baffled and to feel lost at times, but this does not mean the spirit is not with us. Perhaps, we are just having a Spirit-supervised moment where we are meant to understand that “man doth not comprehend all the things, which the Lord can comprehend” (Mosiah 4: 9), and must wait for his arm to be revealed (see D&C 123: 17).

Although we should not expect constant revelation, we are expected to be constantly ready for revelation, so that when it comes we are in a position to receive it. This requires us to be worthy. We all know that “the Spirit of the Lord doth not dwell in unholy temples” (Helaman 4: 24). So if we have been wounded by sin, we must seek out the savior to be made whole again. The flaws or missing pieces in the armor of God that allow Satan’s fiery darts to pierce us are not existent in their original design, but occur due to our lack of maintenance or misusage. Continual repentance is a big part of maintaining our armor’s integrity. This way we can heal the wounds from past sins as well as mend the chinks in our armor, so we will not succumb to the same temptations in the future. A suit of armor that is whole is required to keep our souls holy.

Although everyone has the ability to feel the spirit, not many people develop this ability into a highly trained skill, and thus become highly sensitive to the Spirit. In fact, two of our best training exercises, scripture study and prayer are often under utilized both in frequency and in intensity. These exercises require us to regularly reach past our past spiritual plateaus to new peaks of spiritual awareness. This is true particularly of prayer.

Sometimes prayer can seem like a hit or miss phenomena. If we feel something is lacking, we should work on our prayer. We need to realize that “prayer is a form of work” (Bible Dictionary, 753), it is not supposed to be done effortlessly and by rote. Furthermore, we sometimes forget the purpose of using Christ’s name in prayer. According to the Bible Dictionary, “We pray in Christ’s name when our mind is the mind of Christ, and our wishes the wishes of Christ…we then ask for things it is possible for God to grant” (Bible Dictionary, 753).

Prayer is not primarily a dialogue where we offer our list of wants and wait to hear if they are accepted. It is however a spiritually submissive activity from the start, where we seek the will of the Lord well before we rattle on about this blessing or that blessing. In prayer the “Spirit also helpeth our infirmities: for we know not what we should pray for as we ought: but the Spirit itself maketh intercession for us with groanings which cannot be uttered” (Romans 8: 26). According to Doctrine and Covenants 50, when we are holy, “[we] shall ask whatsoever [we] will in the name of Jesus and it shall be done. But know this, it shall be given you what you shall ask” (D&C 50: 29-30). Accordingly, our prayers are major opportunities to recognize and follow the Spirit.

But desire or will, in the end, is much more important than technique or ability. That is why the natural man falls short; he is unwilling to surrender his will to the father, because he sees it as a defeat, and it is—the defeat of the natural man that makes possible the birth of a spiritual man or woman. This defeat or surrender should happen in our prayers. Consequently, the purpose of mentioning phrases like “thy will be done, in earth as it is in heaven” (Matt 5: 10) is for us. God’s will will be done whether we pray for it or not. But our praying for His will to be done, establishes an atmosphere during our prayer that makes it possible for us to know His will and be a part of it being done. Our prayers should be less about us telling God about our will, and more about us searching for His will and submitting ours to His.

Obviously it is okay to express ourselves to a loving Heavenly Father, but when we cry out for our will to be done, we should remember the “nevertheless” from Gethsemane. For it was not Christ’s will that was done in the garden, but Heavenly Father’s. Christ’s submission in the garden did not diminish Christ’s manliness, but rather makes him the kind of man that all mankind should follow. And when we follow his voice and his example, we are following the Spirit and are just like the wind…

The wind bloweth where it listeth, and thou hearest the sound thereof, but canst not tell whence it cometh, and whither it goeth; so is every one that is born of the Spirit (John 3: 8).

A lightly edited excerpt of a Sacrament meeting talk originally delivered in 2010.

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