I hadn't heard this live. In fact, it was just shared online by someone recently, and I really appreciated it.
That We Might “Not … Shrink” (D&C 19:18)
David A. Bednar
Of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles
CES Devotional for Young Adults • March 3, 2013 • University of Texas Arlington
I am grateful to participate in this devotional with young people of the Church from all over the world. I love you and appreciate this opportunity to worship together.
Susan has spoken and testified of important principles, and each of us will be blessed and strengthened as we apply consistently her teachings in our daily lives. Susan is a righteous woman, an elect lady, and the love of my life.
I have pondered and earnestly petitioned our Heavenly Father to know how I might best be able to serve you tonight. I pray the power of the Holy Ghost will be with each of us—that we may think what we need to think, feel what we need to feel, and learn what we need to learn so we can do what we know we should do and ultimately become what the Lord yearns for us to become.
A Devoted Disciple and an Example of Not Shrinking
Elder Neal A. Maxwell was a beloved disciple of the Lord Jesus Christ. He served as a member of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles for 23 years, from 1981 to 2004. The spiritual power of his teachings and his example of faithful discipleship blessed and continue to bless in marvelous ways the members of the Savior’s restored Church and the people of the world.
In October of 1997, Sister Bednar and I hosted Elder and Sister Maxwell at Brigham Young University–Idaho. Elder Maxwell was to speak to the students, staff, and faculty in a devotional assembly. Everyone on the campus eagerly anticipated his visit to the university and earnestly prepared to receive his message.
Earlier in that same year, Elder Maxwell underwent 46 days and nights of debilitating chemotherapy for leukemia. Shortly after completing his treatments and being released from the hospital, he spoke briefly in the April general conference of the Church. His rehabilitation and continued therapy progressed positively through the spring and summer months, but Elder Maxwell’s physical strength and stamina were nonetheless limited when he traveled to Rexburg. After greeting Elder and Sister Maxwell at the airport, Susan and I drove them to our home for rest and a light lunch before the devotional.
During the course of our conversations that day, I asked Elder Maxwell what lessons he had learned through his illness. I will remember always the precise and penetrating answer he gave. “Dave,” he said, “I have learned that not shrinking is more important than surviving.”
His response to my inquiry was a principle with which he had gained extensive personal experience during his chemotherapy. As Elder Maxwell and his wife were driving to the hospital in January of 1997, on the day he was scheduled to begin his first round of treatment, they pulled into the parking lot and paused for a private moment together. Elder Maxwell “breathed a deep sigh and looked at [his wife]. He reached for her hand and said … , ‘I just don’t want to shrink’” (Bruce C. Hafen, A Disciple’s Life: The Biography of Neal A. Maxwell [2002], 16).
In his October 1997 general conference message, entitled “Apply the Atoning Blood of Christ,” Elder Maxwell taught with great authenticity: “As we confront our own … trials and tribulations, we too can plead with the Father, just as Jesus did, that we ‘might not … shrink’—meaning to retreat or to recoil (D&C 19:18). Not shrinking is much more important than surviving! Moreover, partaking of a bitter cup without becoming bitter is likewise part of the emulation of Jesus” (Ensign, Nov. 1997, 22).
Elder Maxwell’s answer to my question caused me to reflect on the teachings of Elder Orson F. Whitney, who also served as a member of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles: “No pain that we suffer, no trial that we experience is wasted. It ministers to our education, to the development of such qualities as patience, faith, fortitude and humility. All that we suffer and all that we endure, especially when we endure patiently, builds up our characters, purifies our hearts, expands our souls, and makes us more tender and charitable, more worthy to be called the children of God … and it is through sorrow and suffering, toil and tribulation, that we gain the education that we come here to acquire” (quoted in Spencer W. Kimball, Faith Precedes the Miracle [1972], 98).
And these scriptures concerning the Savior’s suffering as He offered the infinite and eternal atoning sacrifice became even more poignant and meaningful to me:
“Therefore I command you to repent—repent, lest I smite you by the rod of my mouth, and by my wrath, and by my anger, and your sufferings be sore—how sore you know not, how exquisite you know not, yea, how hard to bear you know not.
“For behold, I, God, have suffered these things for all, that they might not suffer if they would repent;
“But if they would not repent they must suffer even as I;
“Which suffering caused myself, even God, the greatest of all, to tremble because of pain, and to bleed at every pore, and to suffer both body and spirit—and would that I might not drink the bitter cup, and shrink—
“Nevertheless, glory be to the Father, and I partook and finished my preparations unto the children of men” (D&C19:15–19).
The Savior did not shrink in Gethsemane or on Golgotha.
Elder Maxwell also did not shrink. This mighty Apostle pressed forward steadfastly and was blessed with additional time in mortality to love, to serve, to teach, and to testify. Those concluding years of his life were an emphatic exclamation point to his example of devoted discipleship—through both his words and his deeds.
I believe most of us likely would expect a man with the spiritual capacity, experience, and stature of Elder Maxwell to face serious illness and death with an understanding of God’s plan of happiness, with assurance and grace, and with dignity. And he surely did. But my purpose today is to bear witness that such blessings are not reserved exclusively for General Authorities or for a select few members of the Church.
Since my call to fill the vacancy in the Quorum of the Twelve created by the death of Elder Maxwell, my assignments and travels have enabled me to become acquainted with faithful, courageous, and valiant Latter-day Saints all over the world. I want to tell you about one young man and one young woman who have blessed my life and with whom I have learned spiritually vital lessons about not shrinking and about allowing our individual will to be “swallowed up in the will of the Father” (Mosiah 15:7).
The account is true, and the characters are real. I will not, however, use the actual names of the individuals who are involved. I refer to the young man as John and the young woman as Heather. I also use with permission selected statements from their personal journals.
Not My Will but Thine Be Done
John is a worthy priesthood holder and served faithfully as a full-time missionary. After returning home from his mission, he dated and married a righteous and wonderful young woman, Heather. John was 23 and Heather was 20 on the day they were sealed together for time and for all eternity in the house of the Lord. Please keep in mind the respective ages of John and Heather as this story unfolds.
Approximately three weeks after their temple marriage, John was diagnosed with bone cancer. As cancer nodules also were discovered in his lungs, the prognosis was not good.
John recorded in his journal: “This was the scariest day of my life. Not only because I was told I had cancer, but also because I was newly married and somehow felt that I had failed as a husband. I was the provider and protector of our new family, and now—three weeks into that role—I felt like I had failed. I know that thought is absurd, but it is one of the crazy things I told myself in a moment of crisis.”
Heather noted: “This was devastating news, and I remember how greatly it changed our perspectives. I was in a hospital waiting room writing wedding thank-you notes as we anticipated the results of [John’s] tests. But after learning about [John’s] cancer, crock-pots and cookware did not seem so important anymore. This was the worst day of my life, but I remember going to bed that night with gratitude for our temple sealing. Though the doctors had given [John] only a 30 percent chance of survival, I knew that if we remained faithful I had a 100 percent chance to be with him forever.”
Approximately one month later John began chemotherapy. He described his experience: “The treatments caused me to be sicker than I had ever been in my life. I lost my hair, dropped 41 pounds, and my body felt like it was falling apart. The chemotherapy also affected me emotionally, mentally, and spiritually. Life was a rollercoaster during the months of chemo with highs, lows, and everything in between. But through it all, [Heather] and I maintained the faith that God would heal me. We just knew it.”
Heather chronicled her thoughts and feelings: “I could not stand to let [John] spend the night alone in the hospital, so I would sleep every night on the small couch in his room. We had lots of friends and family visit during the day, but the nights were the hardest. I would stare at the ceiling and wonder what Heavenly Father had planned for us. Sometimes my mind would wander into dark places, and my fear of losing [John] would almost overtake me. But I knew these thoughts were not from Heavenly Father. My prayers for comfort became more frequent, and the Lord gave me the strength to keep going.”
Three months later John underwent a surgical procedure to remove a large tumor in his leg. John stated: “The surgery was a huge deal for us because pathology tests were to be run on the tumor to see how much of it was viable and how much of the cancer was dead. This analysis would give us the first indication of the effectiveness of the chemotherapy and of how aggressive we would need to be with future treatments.”
Two days following the operation, I visited John and Heather in the hospital. We talked about the first time I met John in the mission field, about their marriage, about the cancer, and about the eternally important lessons we learn through the trials of mortality. As we concluded our time together, John asked if I would give him a priesthood blessing. I responded that I gladly would give such a blessing, but I first needed to ask some questions.
I then posed questions I had not planned to ask and had never previously considered: “[John,] do you have the faith not to be healed? If it is the will of our Heavenly Father that you are transferred by death in your youth to the spirit world to continue your ministry, do you have the faith to submit to His will and not be healed?”
I frankly was surprised by the questions I felt prompted to ask this particular couple. Frequently in the scriptures, the Savior or His servants exercised the spiritual gift of healing (see 1 Corinthians 12:9;D&C 35:9; 46:20) and perceived that an individual had the faith to be healed (see Acts 14:9; 3 Nephi 17:8; D&C 46:19). But as John and Heather and I counseled together and wrestled with these questions, we increasingly understood that if God’s will were for this good young man to be healed, then that blessing could only be received if this valiant couple first had the faith not to be healed. In other words, John and Heather needed to overcome, through the Atonement of the Lord Jesus Christ, the “natural man” (Mosiah 3:19) tendency in all of us to demand impatiently and insist incessantly on the blessings we want and believe we deserve.
We recognized a principle that applies to every devoted disciple: strong faith in the Savior is submissively accepting of His will and timing in our lives—even if the outcome is not what we hoped for or wanted. Certainly, John and Heather would desire, yearn, and plead for healing with all of their might, mind, and strength. But more importantly, they would be “willing to submit to all things which the Lord seeth fit to inflict upon [them], even as a child doth submit to his father” (Mosiah 3:19). Indeed, they would be willing to “offer [their] whole souls as an offering unto him” (Omni 1:26) and humbly pray, “Father, if thou be willing, remove this cup from me: nevertheless not my will, but thine, be done” (Luke 22:42).
What initially seemed to John, Heather, and me to be perplexing questions became part of a pervasive pattern of gospel paradoxes. Consider the admonition of the Savior: “He that findeth his life shall lose it: and he that loseth his life for my sake shall find it” (Matthew 10:39). He also declared, “But many that are first shall be last; and the last shall be first” (Matthew 19:30). And the Lord counseled His latter-day disciples, “By thy word many high ones shall be brought low, and by thy word many low ones shall be exalted” (D&C 112:8). Thus, having the faith to not be healed seemed to fit appropriately into a powerful pattern of penetrating paradoxes that require us to ask, to seek, and to knock that we might receive knowledge and understanding (see 3 Nephi 14:7).
After taking the necessary time to ponder my inquiries and to talk with his wife, John said to me: “Elder Bednar, I do not want to die. I do not want to leave [Heather]. But if the will of the Lord is to transfer me to the spirit world, then I guess I am good with that.” My heart swelled with appreciation and admiration as I witnessed this young couple confront the most demanding of all spiritual struggles—the submissive surrender of their wills to God’s will. My faith was strengthened as I witnessed this couple allowing their strong and understandable desires for healing to be “swallowed up in the will of the Father” (Mosiah 15:7).
John described his reaction to our conversation and the blessing he received: “Elder Bednar shared with us the thought from Elder Maxwell that it is better to not shrink than to survive. Elder Bednar then asked us, ‘I know you have the faith to be healed, but do you have the faith not to be healed?’ This was a foreign concept to me. Essentially he was asking if I had the faith to accept God’s will if His will were that I not be healed? If the time were approaching for me to enter the spirit world through death, was I prepared to submit and accept?”
John continued: “Having the faith not to be healed seemed counterintuitive; but that perspective changed the way my wife and I thought and allowed us to put our trust fully in the Father’s plan for us. We learned we needed to gain the faith that the Lord is in charge whatever the outcome may be, and He will guide us from where we are to where we need to be. As we prayed, our petitions changed from ‘Please make me whole’ to ‘Please give me the faith to accept whatever outcome Thou hast planned for me.’
“I was sure that since Elder Bednar was an Apostle, he would bless the elements of my body to realign, and I would jump out of the bed and start to dance or do something dramatic like that! But as he blessed me that day, I was amazed that the words he spoke were almost identical to those of my father, my father-in-law, and my mission president. I realized that ultimately it does not matter whose hands are on my head. God’s power does not change, and His will is made known to us individually and through His authorized servants.”
Heather wrote: “This day was filled with mixed emotions for me. I was convinced that Elder Bednar would place his hands on [John’s] head and completely heal him of the cancer. I knew that through the power of the priesthood he could be healed, and I wanted so bad for that to happen. After he taught us about the faith to not be healed, I was terrified. Up to that point, I had never had to come to grips with the fact that the Lord’s plan might include losing my new husband. My faith was dependent upon the outcomes I wanted. In a manner of speaking, it was one-dimensional. Though terrifying at first, the thought of having the faith not to be healed ultimately freed me from worry. It allowed me to have complete trust that my Heavenly Father knew me better than I knew myself, and He would do what was best for me and John.”
A blessing was given, and weeks, months, and years passed by. John’s cancer miraculously went into remission. He was able to complete his university studies and obtained gainful employment. John and Heather continued to strengthen their relationship and enjoy life together.
Some time later I subsequently received a letter from John and Heather informing me that the cancer had returned. Chemotherapy was resumed and surgery scheduled. John explained: “Not only did this news come as a disappointment to [Heather] and me, but we were puzzled by it. Was there something we did not learn the first time? Did the Lord expect something more from us? Growing up as Latter-day Saints, it was common to go to church and hear the phrase, ‘every trial God gives us is for our benefit.’ Well, to be honest, I could not see how this was benefitting me!
“So I began to pray for clarity and for the Lord to help me understand why this recurrence of the cancer was happening. One day as I was reading in the New Testament I received my answer. I read the account of Christ and His Apostles on the sea when a tempest arose. Fearing the boat would capsize, the disciples went to the Savior and asked, ‘Master, carest thou not that we perish?’ This is exactly how I felt! Carest thou not that I have cancer? Carest thou not that we want to start a family? But as I read on in the story, I found my answer. The Lord looked at them and said, ‘O ye of little faith,’ and He stretched forth His hand and calmed the waters.
“In that moment I had to ask myself, ‘Do I really believe this?’ Do I really believe He calmed the waters that day? Or is it just a nice story to read about?’ The answer is: I do believe, and because I know He calmed the waters, I instantly knew He could heal me. Up until this point, I had a hard time reconciling the need for my faith in Christ with the inevitability of His will. I saw them as two separate things, and sometimes I felt that one contradicted the other. ‘Why should I have faith if His will ultimately is what will prevail,’ I asked? After this experience, I knew that having faith—at least in my circumstance—was not necessarily knowing that He would heal me, but that He could heal me. I had to believe that He could, and then whether it happened was up to Him.
“As I allowed those two ideas to coexist in my life, focused faith in Jesus Christ and complete submission to His will, I found greater comfort and peace. It has been so remarkable to see the Lord’s hand in our lives. Things have fallen into place, miracles have happened, and we continually are humbled to see God’s plan for us unfold.”
I repeat for emphasis John’s statement: “As I allowed those two ideas to coexist in my life, focused faith in Jesus Christ and complete submission to His will, I found greater comfort and peace.”
Righteousness and faith certainly are instrumental in moving mountains—if moving mountains accomplishes God’s purposes and is in accordance with His will. Righteousness and faith certainly are instrumental in healing the sick, deaf, or lame—if such healing accomplishes God’s purposes and is in accordance with His will. Thus, even with strong faith, many mountains will not be moved. And not all of the sick and infirm will be healed. If all opposition were curtailed, if all maladies were removed, then the primary purposes of the Father’s plan would be frustrated.
Many of the lessons we are to learn in mortality can only be received through the things we experience and sometimes suffer. And God expects and trusts us to face temporary mortal adversity with His help so we can learn what we need to learn and ultimately become what we are to become in eternity.
The Meaning of All Things
This story about John and Heather is both ordinary and extraordinary. This young couple is representative of millions of faithful, covenant-keeping Latter-day Saints all over the world who are pressing forward along the strait and narrow path with steadfast faith in Christ and a perfect brightness of hope. John and Heather were not serving in highly visible leadership positions in the Church, they were not related to General Authorities, and sometimes they had doubts and fears. In many of these aspects, their story is quite ordinary.
But, brothers and sisters, this young man and young woman were blessed in extraordinary ways to learn essential lessons for eternity through affliction and hardship. I have shared this episode with you because John and Heather, who are just like so many of you, came to understand that not shrinking is more important than surviving. Thus, their experience was not primarily about living and dying; rather, it was about learning, living, and becoming.
The potent spiritual combination of faith in and on the holy name of Jesus Christ, of meekly submitting to His will and timing, of pressing forward “with unwearied diligence” (Helaman 15:6), and of acknowledging His hand in all things yields the peaceable things of the kingdom of God that bring joy and eternal life (see D&C 42:61). As this couple faced seemingly overwhelming challenges, they lived a “peaceable life in all godliness and honesty” (1 Timothy 2:2). They walked peaceably (see Moroni 7:4) with and among the children of men. “And the peace of God, which passeth all understanding, [kept their] hearts and minds through Christ Jesus” (Philippians 4:7).
For many of you, their story is, has been, or could be your story. You are facing, have faced, or will yet face equivalent challenges in your lives with the same courage and spiritual perspective that John and Heather did. I do not know why some people learn the lessons of eternity through trial and suffering—while others learn similar lessons through rescue and healing. I do not know all of the reasons, all of the purposes, and I do not know everything about the Lord’s timing. With Nephi, you and I can say that we “do not know the meaning of all things” (1 Nephi 11:17).
But some things I absolutely do know. I know we are spirit sons and daughters of a loving Heavenly Father. I know the Eternal Father is the author of the plan of happiness. I know Jesus Christ is our Savior and Redeemer. I know Jesus enabled the Father’s plan through His infinite and eternal Atonement. I know that the Lord, who was “bruised, broken, [and] torn for us” (“Jesus of Nazareth, Savior and King,” Hymns, no. 181), can succor and strengthen “his people according to their infirmities” (Alma 7:12). And I know one of the greatest blessings of mortality is to not shrink and to allow our individual will to be “swallowed up in the will of the Father” (Mosiah 15:7).
Though I do not know everything about how and when and where and why these blessings occur, I do know and I witness they are real. I testify that all of these things are true—and that we know enough by the power of the Holy Ghost to bear sure witness of their divinity, reality, and efficacy. My beloved brothers and sisters, I invoke upon you this blessing: even that as you press forward in your lives with steadfast faith in Christ, you will have the capacity to not shrink. I bear this witness and I invoke this blessing in the sacred name of the Lord Jesus Christ, amen.
Thursday, November 16, 2017
An High Priest of Good Things to Come
One of the truly great talks from Elder Holland (as opposed to the ungreat ones... which don't exist):
“An High Priest of Good Things to Come”
Jeffrey R. Holland
Of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles
"Some blessings come soon, some come late, and some don’t come until heaven; but for those who embrace the gospel of Jesus Christ, they come."
On those days when we have special need of heaven’s help, we would do well to remember one of the titles given to the Savior in the epistle to the Hebrews. Speaking of Jesus’”more excellent ministry” and why He is “the mediator of a better covenant” filled with “better promises,” this author—presumably the Apostle Paul—tells us that through His mediation and Atonement, Christ became “an high priest of good things to come.”1
Every one of us has times when we need to know things will get better. Moroni spoke of it in the Book of Mormon as “hope for a better world.”2 For emotional health and spiritual stamina, everyone needs to be able to look forward to some respite, to something pleasant and renewing and hopeful, whether that blessing be near at hand or still some distance ahead. It is enough just to know we can get there, that however measured or far away, there is the promise of “good things to come.”
My declaration is that this is precisely what the gospel of Jesus Christ offers us, especially in times of need. There is help. There is happiness. There really is light at the end of the tunnel. It is the Light of the World, the Bright and Morning Star, the “light that is endless, that can never be darkened.”3 It is the very Son of God Himself. In loving praise far beyond Romeo’s reach, we say, “What light through yonder window breaks?” It is the return of hope, and Jesus is the Sun.4 To any who may be struggling to see that light and find that hope, I say: Hold on. Keep trying. God loves you. Things will improve. Christ comes to you in His “more excellent ministry” with a future of “better promises.” He is your “high priest of good things to come.”
I think of newly called missionaries leaving family and friends to face, on occasion, some rejection and some discouragement and, at least in the beginning, a moment or two of homesickness and perhaps a little fear.
I think of young mothers and fathers who are faithfully having their families while still in school—or just newly out—trying to make ends meet even as they hope for a brighter financial future someday. At the same time, I think of other parents who would give any earthly possession they own to have a wayward child return.
I think of single parents who face all of this but face it alone, having confronted death or divorce, alienation or abandonment, or some other misfortune they had not foreseen in happier days and certainly had not wanted.
I think of those who want to be married and aren’t, those who desire to have children and cannot, those who have acquaintances but very few friends, those who are grieving over the death of a loved one or are themselves ill with disease. I think of those who suffer from sin—their own or someone else’s—who need to know there is a way back and that happiness can be restored. I think of the disconsolate and downtrodden who feel life has passed them by, or now wish that it would pass them by. To all of these and so many more, I say: Cling to your faith. Hold on to your hope. “Pray always, and be believing.”5 Indeed, as Paul wrote of Abraham, he “against [all] hope believed in hope” and “staggered not … through unbelief.” He was “strong in faith” and was “fully persuaded that, what [God] had promised, he was able … to perform.”6
Even if you cannot always see that silver lining on your clouds, God can, for He is the very source of the light you seek. He does love you, and He knows your fears. He hears your prayers. He is your Heavenly Father, and surely He matches with His own the tears His children shed.
In spite of this counsel, I know some of you do truly feel at sea, in the most frightening sense of that term. Out in troubled waters, you may even now be crying with the poet:
It darkens. I have lost the ford.
There is a change on all things made.
The rocks have evil faces, Lord,
And I am [sore] afraid.7
No, it is not without a recognition of life’s tempests but fully and directly because of them that I testify of God’s love and the Savior’s power to calm the storm. Always remember in that biblical story that He was out there on the water also, that He faced the worst of it right along with the newest and youngest and most fearful. Only one who has fought against those ominous waves is justified in telling us—as well as the sea—to “be still.”8 Only one who has taken the full brunt of such adversity could ever be justified in telling us in such times to “be of good cheer.”9 Such counsel is not a jaunty pep talk about the power of positive thinking, though positive thinking is much needed in the world. No, Christ knows better than all others that the trials of life can be very deep and we are not shallow people if we struggle with them. But even as the Lord avoids sugary rhetoric, He rebukes faithlessness and He deplores pessimism. He expects us to believe!
No one’s eyes were more penetrating than His, and much of what He saw pierced His heart. Surely His ears heard every cry of distress, every sound of want and despair. To a degree far more than we will ever understand, He was “a man of sorrows, and acquainted with grief.”10 Indeed, to the layman in the streets of Judea, Christ’s career must have seemed a failure, a tragedy, a good man totally overwhelmed by the evils surrounding Him and the misdeeds of others. He was misunderstood or misrepresented, even hated from the beginning. No matter what He said or did, His statements were twisted, His actions suspected, His motives impugned. In the entire history of the world no one has ever loved so purely or served so selflessly—and been treated so diabolically for His effort. Yet nothing could break His faith in His Father’s plan or His Father’s promises. Even in those darkest hours at Gethsemane and Calvary, He pressed on, continuing to trust in the very God whom He momentarily feared had forsaken Him.
Because Christ’s eyes were unfailingly fixed on the future, He could endure all that was required of Him, suffer as no man can suffer except it be “unto death,”11 as King Benjamin said, look upon the wreckage of individual lives and the promises of ancient Israel lying in ruins around Him and still say then and now, “Let not your heart be troubled, neither let it be afraid.”12 How could He do this? How could He believe it? Because He knows that for the faithful, things will be made right soon enough. He is a King; He speaks for the crown; He knows what can be promised. He knows that “the Lord … will be a refuge for the oppressed, a refuge in times of trouble. … For the needy shall not alway[s] be forgotten: the expectation of the poor shall not perish for ever.”13 He knows that “the Lord is nigh unto them that are of a broken heart; and saveth such as be of a contrite spirit.” He knows that “the Lord redeemeth the soul of his servants: and none of them that trust in him shall be desolate.”14
Forgive me for a personal conclusion, which does not represent the terrible burdens so many of you carry but it is meant to be encouraging. Thirty years ago last month, a little family set out to cross the United States to attend graduate school—no money, an old car, every earthly possession they owned packed into less than half the space of the smallest U-Haul trailer available. Bidding their apprehensive parents farewell, they drove exactly 34 miles up the highway, at which point their beleaguered car erupted.
Pulling off the freeway onto a frontage road, the young father surveyed the steam, matched it with his own, then left his trusting wife and two innocent children—the youngest just three months old—to wait in the car while he walked the three miles or so to the southern Utah metropolis of Kanarraville, population then, I suppose, 65. Some water was secured at the edge of town, and a very kind citizen offered a drive back to the stranded family. The car was attended to and slowly—very slowly—driven back to St. George for inspection—U-Haul trailer and all.
After more than two hours of checking and rechecking, no immediate problem could be detected, so once again the journey was begun. In exactly the same amount of elapsed time at exactly the same location on that highway with exactly the same pyrotechnics from under the hood, the car exploded again. It could not have been 15 feet from the earlier collapse, probably not 5 feet from it! Obviously the most precise laws of automotive physics were at work.
Now feeling more foolish than angry, the chagrined young father once more left his trusting loved ones and started the long walk for help once again. This time the man providing the water said, “Either you or that fellow who looks just like you ought to get a new radiator for that car.” For the second time a kind neighbor offered a lift back to the same automobile and its anxious little occupants. He didn’t know whether to laugh or to cry at the plight of this young family.
“How far have you come?” he said. “Thirty-four miles,” I answered. “How much farther do you have to go?” “Twenty-six hundred miles,” I said. “Well, you might make that trip, and your wife and those two little kiddies might make that trip, but none of you are going to make it in that car.” He proved to be prophetic on all counts.
Just two weeks ago this weekend, I drove by that exact spot where the freeway turnoff leads to a frontage road, just three miles or so west of Kanarraville, Utah. That same beautiful and loyal wife, my dearest friend and greatest supporter for all these years, was curled up asleep in the seat beside me. The two children in the story, and the little brother who later joined them, have long since grown up and served missions, married perfectly, and are now raising children of their own. The automobile we were driving this time was modest but very pleasant and very safe. In fact, except for me and my lovely Pat situated so peacefully at my side, nothing of that moment two weeks ago was even remotely like the distressing circumstances of three decades earlier.
Yet in my mind’s eye, for just an instant, I thought perhaps I saw on that side road an old car with a devoted young wife and two little children making the best of a bad situation there. Just ahead of them I imagined that I saw a young fellow walking toward Kanarraville, with plenty of distance still ahead of him. His shoulders seemed to be slumping a little, the weight of a young father’s fear evident in his pace. In the scriptural phrase his hands did seem to “hang down.”15 In that imaginary instant, I couldn’t help calling out to him: “Don’t give up, boy. Don’t you quit. You keep walking. You keep trying. There is help and happiness ahead—a lot of it—30 years of it now, and still counting. You keep your chin up. It will be all right in the end. Trust God and believe in good things to come.”
I testify that God lives, that He is our Eternal Father, that He loves each of us with a love divine. I testify that Jesus Christ is His Only Begotten Son in the flesh and, having triumphed in this world, is an heir of eternity, a joint-heir with God, and now stands on the right hand of His Father. I testify that this is Their true Church and that They sustain us in our hour of need—and always will, even if we cannot recognize that intervention. Some blessings come soon, some come late, and some don’t come until heaven; but for those who embrace the gospel of Jesus Christ, they come. Of that I personally attest. I thank my Father in Heaven for His goodness past, present, and future, and I do so in the name of His Beloved Son and most generous high priest, even the Lord Jesus Christ, amen.
“An High Priest of Good Things to Come”
Jeffrey R. Holland
Of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles
"Some blessings come soon, some come late, and some don’t come until heaven; but for those who embrace the gospel of Jesus Christ, they come."
On those days when we have special need of heaven’s help, we would do well to remember one of the titles given to the Savior in the epistle to the Hebrews. Speaking of Jesus’”more excellent ministry” and why He is “the mediator of a better covenant” filled with “better promises,” this author—presumably the Apostle Paul—tells us that through His mediation and Atonement, Christ became “an high priest of good things to come.”1
Every one of us has times when we need to know things will get better. Moroni spoke of it in the Book of Mormon as “hope for a better world.”2 For emotional health and spiritual stamina, everyone needs to be able to look forward to some respite, to something pleasant and renewing and hopeful, whether that blessing be near at hand or still some distance ahead. It is enough just to know we can get there, that however measured or far away, there is the promise of “good things to come.”
My declaration is that this is precisely what the gospel of Jesus Christ offers us, especially in times of need. There is help. There is happiness. There really is light at the end of the tunnel. It is the Light of the World, the Bright and Morning Star, the “light that is endless, that can never be darkened.”3 It is the very Son of God Himself. In loving praise far beyond Romeo’s reach, we say, “What light through yonder window breaks?” It is the return of hope, and Jesus is the Sun.4 To any who may be struggling to see that light and find that hope, I say: Hold on. Keep trying. God loves you. Things will improve. Christ comes to you in His “more excellent ministry” with a future of “better promises.” He is your “high priest of good things to come.”
I think of newly called missionaries leaving family and friends to face, on occasion, some rejection and some discouragement and, at least in the beginning, a moment or two of homesickness and perhaps a little fear.
I think of young mothers and fathers who are faithfully having their families while still in school—or just newly out—trying to make ends meet even as they hope for a brighter financial future someday. At the same time, I think of other parents who would give any earthly possession they own to have a wayward child return.
I think of single parents who face all of this but face it alone, having confronted death or divorce, alienation or abandonment, or some other misfortune they had not foreseen in happier days and certainly had not wanted.
I think of those who want to be married and aren’t, those who desire to have children and cannot, those who have acquaintances but very few friends, those who are grieving over the death of a loved one or are themselves ill with disease. I think of those who suffer from sin—their own or someone else’s—who need to know there is a way back and that happiness can be restored. I think of the disconsolate and downtrodden who feel life has passed them by, or now wish that it would pass them by. To all of these and so many more, I say: Cling to your faith. Hold on to your hope. “Pray always, and be believing.”5 Indeed, as Paul wrote of Abraham, he “against [all] hope believed in hope” and “staggered not … through unbelief.” He was “strong in faith” and was “fully persuaded that, what [God] had promised, he was able … to perform.”6
Even if you cannot always see that silver lining on your clouds, God can, for He is the very source of the light you seek. He does love you, and He knows your fears. He hears your prayers. He is your Heavenly Father, and surely He matches with His own the tears His children shed.
In spite of this counsel, I know some of you do truly feel at sea, in the most frightening sense of that term. Out in troubled waters, you may even now be crying with the poet:
It darkens. I have lost the ford.
There is a change on all things made.
The rocks have evil faces, Lord,
And I am [sore] afraid.7
No, it is not without a recognition of life’s tempests but fully and directly because of them that I testify of God’s love and the Savior’s power to calm the storm. Always remember in that biblical story that He was out there on the water also, that He faced the worst of it right along with the newest and youngest and most fearful. Only one who has fought against those ominous waves is justified in telling us—as well as the sea—to “be still.”8 Only one who has taken the full brunt of such adversity could ever be justified in telling us in such times to “be of good cheer.”9 Such counsel is not a jaunty pep talk about the power of positive thinking, though positive thinking is much needed in the world. No, Christ knows better than all others that the trials of life can be very deep and we are not shallow people if we struggle with them. But even as the Lord avoids sugary rhetoric, He rebukes faithlessness and He deplores pessimism. He expects us to believe!
No one’s eyes were more penetrating than His, and much of what He saw pierced His heart. Surely His ears heard every cry of distress, every sound of want and despair. To a degree far more than we will ever understand, He was “a man of sorrows, and acquainted with grief.”10 Indeed, to the layman in the streets of Judea, Christ’s career must have seemed a failure, a tragedy, a good man totally overwhelmed by the evils surrounding Him and the misdeeds of others. He was misunderstood or misrepresented, even hated from the beginning. No matter what He said or did, His statements were twisted, His actions suspected, His motives impugned. In the entire history of the world no one has ever loved so purely or served so selflessly—and been treated so diabolically for His effort. Yet nothing could break His faith in His Father’s plan or His Father’s promises. Even in those darkest hours at Gethsemane and Calvary, He pressed on, continuing to trust in the very God whom He momentarily feared had forsaken Him.
Because Christ’s eyes were unfailingly fixed on the future, He could endure all that was required of Him, suffer as no man can suffer except it be “unto death,”11 as King Benjamin said, look upon the wreckage of individual lives and the promises of ancient Israel lying in ruins around Him and still say then and now, “Let not your heart be troubled, neither let it be afraid.”12 How could He do this? How could He believe it? Because He knows that for the faithful, things will be made right soon enough. He is a King; He speaks for the crown; He knows what can be promised. He knows that “the Lord … will be a refuge for the oppressed, a refuge in times of trouble. … For the needy shall not alway[s] be forgotten: the expectation of the poor shall not perish for ever.”13 He knows that “the Lord is nigh unto them that are of a broken heart; and saveth such as be of a contrite spirit.” He knows that “the Lord redeemeth the soul of his servants: and none of them that trust in him shall be desolate.”14
Forgive me for a personal conclusion, which does not represent the terrible burdens so many of you carry but it is meant to be encouraging. Thirty years ago last month, a little family set out to cross the United States to attend graduate school—no money, an old car, every earthly possession they owned packed into less than half the space of the smallest U-Haul trailer available. Bidding their apprehensive parents farewell, they drove exactly 34 miles up the highway, at which point their beleaguered car erupted.
Pulling off the freeway onto a frontage road, the young father surveyed the steam, matched it with his own, then left his trusting wife and two innocent children—the youngest just three months old—to wait in the car while he walked the three miles or so to the southern Utah metropolis of Kanarraville, population then, I suppose, 65. Some water was secured at the edge of town, and a very kind citizen offered a drive back to the stranded family. The car was attended to and slowly—very slowly—driven back to St. George for inspection—U-Haul trailer and all.
After more than two hours of checking and rechecking, no immediate problem could be detected, so once again the journey was begun. In exactly the same amount of elapsed time at exactly the same location on that highway with exactly the same pyrotechnics from under the hood, the car exploded again. It could not have been 15 feet from the earlier collapse, probably not 5 feet from it! Obviously the most precise laws of automotive physics were at work.
Now feeling more foolish than angry, the chagrined young father once more left his trusting loved ones and started the long walk for help once again. This time the man providing the water said, “Either you or that fellow who looks just like you ought to get a new radiator for that car.” For the second time a kind neighbor offered a lift back to the same automobile and its anxious little occupants. He didn’t know whether to laugh or to cry at the plight of this young family.
“How far have you come?” he said. “Thirty-four miles,” I answered. “How much farther do you have to go?” “Twenty-six hundred miles,” I said. “Well, you might make that trip, and your wife and those two little kiddies might make that trip, but none of you are going to make it in that car.” He proved to be prophetic on all counts.
Just two weeks ago this weekend, I drove by that exact spot where the freeway turnoff leads to a frontage road, just three miles or so west of Kanarraville, Utah. That same beautiful and loyal wife, my dearest friend and greatest supporter for all these years, was curled up asleep in the seat beside me. The two children in the story, and the little brother who later joined them, have long since grown up and served missions, married perfectly, and are now raising children of their own. The automobile we were driving this time was modest but very pleasant and very safe. In fact, except for me and my lovely Pat situated so peacefully at my side, nothing of that moment two weeks ago was even remotely like the distressing circumstances of three decades earlier.
Yet in my mind’s eye, for just an instant, I thought perhaps I saw on that side road an old car with a devoted young wife and two little children making the best of a bad situation there. Just ahead of them I imagined that I saw a young fellow walking toward Kanarraville, with plenty of distance still ahead of him. His shoulders seemed to be slumping a little, the weight of a young father’s fear evident in his pace. In the scriptural phrase his hands did seem to “hang down.”15 In that imaginary instant, I couldn’t help calling out to him: “Don’t give up, boy. Don’t you quit. You keep walking. You keep trying. There is help and happiness ahead—a lot of it—30 years of it now, and still counting. You keep your chin up. It will be all right in the end. Trust God and believe in good things to come.”
I testify that God lives, that He is our Eternal Father, that He loves each of us with a love divine. I testify that Jesus Christ is His Only Begotten Son in the flesh and, having triumphed in this world, is an heir of eternity, a joint-heir with God, and now stands on the right hand of His Father. I testify that this is Their true Church and that They sustain us in our hour of need—and always will, even if we cannot recognize that intervention. Some blessings come soon, some come late, and some don’t come until heaven; but for those who embrace the gospel of Jesus Christ, they come. Of that I personally attest. I thank my Father in Heaven for His goodness past, present, and future, and I do so in the name of His Beloved Son and most generous high priest, even the Lord Jesus Christ, amen.
Be 100 Percent Responsible
My brother Jay shared this with me. It is a powerful talk--one that should eventually be considered an all-time great one, I think.
Be 100 Percent Responsible
LYNN G. ROBBINS
of the Presidency of the Seventy
Aug. 22, 2017 • Devotional
Brothers and sisters, I am grateful to be with you in this opening session of the 2017 BYU Campus Education Week. This year’s theme comes from Doctrine and Covenants 50:24, with special emphasis on these words: “And he that receiveth light, and continueth in God, receiveth more light.”
I am going to take a different approach to this theme than might be expected by exposing and illustrating some very cunning and effective ways that the “wicked one” prevents people from progressing and receiving more light (D&C 93:39).
Many gospel principles come in pairs, meaning one is incomplete without the other. I want to refer to three of these doctrinal pairs today:
Agency and responsibility
Mercy and justice
Faith and works
When Satan is successful in dividing doctrinal pairs, he begins to wreak havoc upon mankind. It is one of his most cunning strategies to keep people from growing in the light.
You already know that faith without works really isn’t faith (see James 2:17). My primary focus will be on the other two doctrinal pairs: first, to illustrate how avoiding responsibility affects agency; and second, how “denying justice,” as it is referred to in the Book of Mormon (see Alma 42:30), affects mercy.
The Book of Mormon teaches us that we are agents to “act . . . and not to be acted upon” (2 Nephi 2:26)—or to be “free to act for [our]selves” (2 Nephi 10:23). This freedom of choice was not a gift of partial agency but of complete and total 100 percent agency. It was absolute in the sense that the One Perfect Parent never forces His children. He shows us the way and may even command us, but, “nevertheless, thou mayest choose for thyself, for it is given unto thee” (Moses 3:17).
Assuming responsibility and being accountable for our choices are agency’s complementary principles (see D&C 101:78). Responsibility is to recognize ourselves as being the cause for the effects or results of our choices—good or bad. On the negative side, it is to always own up to the consequences of poor choices.
Except for those held innocent, such as little children and the intellectually disabled, gospel doctrine teaches us that each person is responsible for the use of their agency and “will be punished for their own sins” (Articles of Faith 1:2).1 It isn’t just a heavenly principle but a law of nature—we reap what we sow.
Logically then, complete and total agency comes with complete and total responsibility:
And now remember, remember, my brethren, that whosoever perisheth, perisheth unto himself; and whosoever doeth iniquity, doeth it unto himself; for behold, ye are free; ye are permitted to act for yourselves; for behold, God hath given unto you a knowledge and he hath made you free. [Helaman 14:30; emphasis added]
THE KORIHOR PRINCIPLE—SEPARATING AGENCY FROM RESPONSIBILITY
One of Satan’s most crafty strategies to gain control of our agency isn’t a frontal attack on our agency but a sneaky backdoor assault on responsibility. Without responsibility, every good gift from God could be misused for evil purposes. For example, freedom of speech without responsibility can be used to create and protect pornography. The rights of a woman can be twisted to justify an unnecessary abortion. When the world separates choice from accountability, it leads to anarchy and a war of wills or survival of the fittest. We could call agency without responsibility the Korihor principle, as we read in the book of Alma “that every man conquered according to his strength; and whatsoever a man did was no crime” (Alma 30:17; emphasis added). With negative consequences removed, you now have agency unbridled, as if there were no day of reckoning.
THE NEHOR PRINCIPLE—DENYING JUSTICE
If Satan is not successful in fully separating agency from responsibility, one of his backup schemes is to dull or minimize feelings of responsibility—what we could call the Nehor principle, also found in the book of Alma: “That all mankind should be saved at the last day, and that they need not fear nor tremble . . . ; for the Lord had created all men, and had also redeemed all men; and, in the end, all men should have eternal life” (Alma 1:4).
What an attractive offer for those who seek happiness in wickedness! The Nehor principle depends entirely on mercy and denies justice—a separation of the second doctrinal pair aforementioned. Denying justice is a twin of avoiding responsibility. They are essentially the same thing. A common strategy of each Book of Mormon anti-Christ was to separate agency from responsibility. “Eat, drink, and be merry; nevertheless, fear God—he will justify in committing a little sin” (2 Nephi 28:8).
Faith without works, mercy without justice, and agency without responsibility are all different verses of the same seductive and damning song. With each, the natural man rejects accountability in an attempt to sedate his conscience. It is similar to the early sixteenth-century practice of paying for indulgences, but much easier—this way it is free!2 No wonder the broad path is filled with so many. The path parades a guilt-free journey to salvation but is, in reality, a cleverly disguised detour to destruction (see 3 Nephi 14:13).
Agency without responsibility is one of the foremost anti-Christ doctrines—very cunning in its nature and very destructive in its results.
THE ANTI-RESPONSIBILITY LIST
To illustrate, I want to share a list of things that Satan tempts people to either say or do to avoid being responsible. This list isn’t all-inclusive, but I believe it covers his most common tactics.
1. Blaming others: Saul disobediently took of the spoils of war from the Amalekites; then, when confronted by Samuel, he blamed the people (see 1 Samuel 15:21).
2. Rationalizing or justifying: Saul then rationalized or justified his disobedience, stating that the saved livestock was for “sacrifice unto the Lord” (1 Samuel 15:21; see also verse 22).
3. Making excuses: Excuses come in a thousand varieties, such as this one from Laman and Lemuel: “How is it possible that the Lord will deliver Laban into our hands? Behold, he is a mighty man, and he can command fifty, yea, even he can slay fifty; then why not us?” (1 Nephi 3:31).
4. Minimalizing or trivializing sin: This is exactly what Nehor advocated (see Alma 1:3–4).
5. Hiding: This is a common avoidance technique. It is a tactic Satan used with Adam and Eve after they partook of the forbidden fruit (see Moses 4:14).
6. Covering up: Closely associated with hiding is covering up, which David attempted to do to conceal his affair with Bathsheba (see 2 Samuel 12:9, 12).
7. Fleeing from responsibility: This is something Jonah tried to do (see Jonah 1:3).
8. Abandoning responsibility: Similar to fleeing is abandoning responsibility. One example is when Corianton forsook his ministry in pursuit of the harlot Isabel (see Alma 39:3).
9. Denying or lying: “And Saul said . . . : I have performed the commandment of the Lord. And Samuel said, What meaneth then this bleating of the sheep in mine ears . . . ?” (1 Samuel 15:13–14).
10. Rebelling: Samuel then rebuked Saul “for rebellion.” “Because thou hast rejected the word of the Lord, he hath also rejected thee from being king” (1 Samuel 15:23).
11. Complaining and murmuring: One who rebels also complains and murmurs: “And all the children of Israel murmured against Moses and . . . said . . . , Would God that we had died in the land of Egypt!” (Numbers 14:2).
12. Finding fault and getting angry: These two are closely associated, as described by Nephi: “And it came to pass that Laman was angry with me, and also with my father; and also was Lemuel” (1 Nephi 3:28).
13. Making demands and entitlements: “We will not that our younger brother shall be a ruler over us. And it came to pass that Laman and Lemuel did take me and bind me with cords, and they did treat me with much harshness” (1 Nephi 18:10–11).
14. Doubting, losing hope, giving up, and quitting: “Our brother is a fool. . . . For they did not believe that I could build a ship” (1 Nephi 17:17–18).
15. Indulging in self-pity and a victim mentality: “Behold, these many years we have suffered in the wilderness, which time we might have enjoyed our possessions and the land of our inheritance; yea, and we might have been happy” (1 Nephi 17:21).
16. Being indecisive or being in a spiritual stupor: The irony with indecision is that if you don’t make a decision in time, time will make a decision for you.
17. Procrastinating: A twin of indecision is procrastination. “But behold, your days of probation are past; ye have procrastinated the day of your salvation until it is everlastingly too late” (Helaman 13:38).
18. Allowing fear to rule: This one is also related to hiding: “And I was afraid, and went and hid thy talent in the earth. . . . His lord answered and said unto him, Thou wicked and slothful servant” (Matthew 25:25–26).
19. Enabling: An example of enabling or helping others to avoid responsibility is the instance when Eli failed to discipline his sons for their grievous sins and was rebuked by the Lord: “Wherefore kick ye at my sacrifice and . . . honourest thy sons above me . . . ? (1 Samuel 2:29; see also verses 22–36).
When you consider this list with Laman and Lemuel in mind, you will see that they were guilty of nearly everything on the list. It is this list that destroyed Laman and Lemuel. It is an extremely dangerous list.
When reading 1 Nephi and 2 Nephi, we can only try to imagine how difficult it was for the members of Lehi’s family to leave their home, obtain the brass plates, camp out for eight years in the wilderness, and build a large ocean-going vessel. The responsibility that faced the family was indeed formidable. Yet, as difficult as a responsibility may be, “difficulty is the excuse history never accepts,”3 as is so graphically illustrated in the case of Laman and Lemuel.
Difficult situations are the test of one’s faith, to see if we will go forward with either a believing heart (see D&C 64:34) or a doubting heart (see D&C 58:29), if at all. A difficult situation reveals a person’s character and either strengthens it, as with Nephi, or weakens and corrupts it, as with Laman and Lemuel, who epitomize what it means to be irresponsible (see Alma 62:41).
EXCUSES DO NOT EQUAL RESULTS
It is important to recognize that excuses never equal results. In the case of Laman and Lemuel, all the excuses in the world could never obtain the brass plates. The reason Nephi obtained the plates and Laman and Lemuel didn’t is because Nephi never went to the anti-responsibility list. He was a champion, and champions do not turn to the list. As Elder David B. Haight of the Quorum of the Twelve stated, “A determined man finds a way; the other man finds an excuse.”4
If the anti-responsibility list is so dangerous, why do so many people frequently turn to it? Because the natural man is irresponsible by nature, he goes to the list as a defense mechanism to avoid shame and embarrassment, stress and anxiety, and the pain and negative consequences of mistakes and sin. Rather than repent to eliminate guilt, he sedates it with excuses. It gives him a false sense that his environment or someone else is to blame, and therefore he has no need to repent.
The anti-responsibility list could also be called the anti-faith list because it halts progress dead in its tracks. When Satan tempts a person to avoid responsibility, that person subtly surrenders their agency because the person is no longer in control or “acting.” Instead they become an object who is being acted upon, and Satan cleverly begins to control their life.
THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN MAKING AN EXCUSE AND GIVING A REASON
It is important to note that everyone occasionally fails in their attempts at success, just as Nephi did with his brothers in their first two trips to Jerusalem when they were trying to obtain the plates. But those who are valiant accept responsibility for their mistakes and sins. They repent, get back on their feet, and continue moving forward in faith. They may give an explanation or a reason for their lack of success but not an excuse.
At first glance it may appear that Adam was blaming Eve when he said, “The woman thou gavest me.” However, when Adam subsequently added “and I did eat,” we are given to understand that he accepted responsibility for his actions and was giving an explanation, not blaming Eve. Eve in turn also said, “And I did eat” (Moses 4:18–19; see also verses 17–20; 5:10–11).
THE POWER AND REWARD OF BEING RESPONSIBLE
Turning to the anti-responsibility list is an act of self-betrayal. It is to give up on oneself and sometimes on others. As I share the following stories, I hope you will observe how going to the anti-responsibility list is counterproductive, even if you are right.
Story 1: 100 Percent Responsibility in the Distribution Center
In 1983 a few partners and I started a new company that taught time-management seminars and created and sold day planners.
For corporate seminars, we sent our consultants to the client’s headquarters, where they taught at the corporate training facilities. Prior to the seminar, two employees in our distribution center would prepare and ship several boxes of training materials, such as the day planners, binders, and forms. Also included was a participant’s seminar guidebook of around a hundred pages with quotes, fill-in-the blanks, graphs, and illustrations.
The two distribution center employees would normally send the seminar shipment ten days before the seminar. At the time that the following incident occurred, we were teaching around 250 seminars each month. With so many seminar shipments, these two employees would often commit errors, such as not shipping sufficient quantities or omitting certain materials or not shipping on time. This became an irritating and often embarrassing frustration for the consultants.
When these problems occurred, the seminar division would file a complaint with me, as the distribution center was one of my responsibilities. When I spoke with these two employees about errors and system improvements, they never wanted to accept responsibility for the errors. They would blame others, saying things like, “It’s not our fault. The seminar division filled out the Seminar Supplies Request form incorrectly, and we sent the shipment exactly according to their specifications. It’s their fault. You can’t blame us!” Or they might say, “We shipped it on time, but the freight company delivered it late. You can’t blame us!” Another excuse was, “The binder subsidiary packaged the individual seminar kits with errors, and we shipped the kits as they were given to us. It’s their fault.” It seemed these two employees were never responsible for the errors, and so the errors continued.
Then something critical happened. The director of training for a large multinational corporation attended one of our seminars and was so thrilled with it that she invited us to teach a pilot seminar to its fifty or so top executives. On the day of the seminar, our consultant arrived and opened the boxes of materials and discovered that the seminar guidebooks were missing. Without the seminar guidebooks, how would the participants follow along and take notes? Their training director was panic-stricken. Our consultant did the best he could by making sure each participant was given a pad of paper on which to take notes throughout the day, and the seminar turned out reasonably well, even without the guidebooks.
Extremely embarrassed and angry, their training director called our seminar division and said, “You will never teach here again! How could you have made such an embarrassing and inexcusable error with our pilot seminar?”
An upset senior vice president of our seminar division called me and said, “This is the last straw. We are about to lose a million-dollar account because of the distribution center’s errors. We simply can’t tolerate any more errors!”
As one of the owners of the company, I couldn’t tolerate such errors either. At the same time, I did not want to see these two breadwinners fired. After pondering possible solutions, I decided to implement an incentive system to motivate these two men to be more careful. For each seminar shipped correctly, they would receive one additional dollar, or a possibility of an extra $250 each month—hopefully enough to focus their attention on quality. However, if they made one error, a one-dollar penalty wasn’t much of a loss. I therefore decided to also include two $100 bonuses for no errors. With the first error they not only lost one dollar but also the first $100 bonus. If they made a second error, they lost the second $100 bonus.
I also told these employees, “If there is an error, you will lose your bonus, regardless of where that error originates. You are 100 percent responsible for that shipment.”
“Well, that’s not fair,” they responded. “What happens if the seminar division fills out the Seminar Supplies Request form incorrectly and, not knowing, we send the shipment with ‘their’ errors?”
I said, “You will lose your bonus. You are 100 percent responsible for that shipment’s success.”
“That’s not fair! What happens if we send the shipment on time but the freight company delivers it late?”
“You will lose your bonus. You are 100 percent responsible.”
“That’s not fair! What happens if the binder division commits errors in prepackaging the individual seminar kits? You can’t blame us for their mistakes!”
“You will lose your bonus,” I once again responded. “You are 100 percent responsible for that shipment’s success. Do you understand?”
“That isn’t fair!!”
“Well, it may not seem fair, but that’s life. You will lose your bonus.”
What I did was eliminate the anti-responsibility list as an option for them. They now understood that they could no longer blame others, make excuses, or justify errors—even when they were right and it was someone else’s fault!
What happened next was fascinating to observe. When they would receive an order from the seminar division, they would call the seminar division to review the form item by item. They took responsibility for correcting any errors committed by the seminar division. They began to read the freight company’s documents to make sure the correct delivery date was entered. They began to mark the cardboard shipping boxes “one of seven,” “two of seven,” etc., with each box’s contents written on the outside of the box. They began sending shipments three or four days earlier than they had in their previous routine. A few days before the seminar they would call the client company to verify receipt of the shipment and the contents. If they had somehow omitted any materials, they had three or four extra days now to send missing items by express shipment. Errors finally stopped happening, and the employees began to earn their bonuses month after month. It was a life-changing experience for them to learn firsthand the power, control, and reward of being 100 percent responsible.
What these two employees learned is that when they blamed someone else, they were surrendering control of the shipment’s success to others—such as the seminar division or the freight company. They learned that excuses keep you from taking control of your life. They learned that it is self-defeating to blame others, make excuses, or justify mistakes—even when you are right! The moment you do any of these self-defeating things, you lose control over the positive outcomes you are seeking in life.
Story 2: “Putting My Marriage Before My Pride”
Let me quote from the experience of a young wife:
Like any couple, my husband and I have had disagreements during our marriage. But one incident stands out in my mind. I no longer recall the reason for our disagreement, but we ended up not speaking at all, and I remember feeling that it was all my husband’s fault. I felt I had done absolutely nothing for which I needed to apologize.
As the day went by, I waited for my husband to say he was sorry. Surely he could see how wrong he was. It must be obvious how much he had hurt my feelings. I felt I had to stand up for myself; it was the principle that mattered.
As the day was drawing to a close, I started to realize that I was waiting in vain, so I went to the Lord in prayer. I prayed that my husband would realize what he had done and how it was hurting our marriage. I prayed that he would be inspired to apologize so we could end our disagreement.
As I was praying, I felt a strong impression that I should go to my husband and apologize. I was a bit shocked by this impression and immediately pointed out in my prayer that I had done nothing wrong and therefore should not have to say I was sorry. A thought came strongly to my mind: “Do you want to be right, or do you want to be married?”
As I considered this question, I realized that I could hold onto my pride and not give in until he apologized, but how long would that take? Days? I was miserable while we weren’t speaking to each other. I understood that while this incident itself wouldn’t be the end of our marriage, if I were always unyielding, that might cause serious damage over the years. I decided it was more important to have a happy, loving marriage than to keep my pride intact over something that would later seem trivial.
I went to my husband and apologized for upsetting him. He also apologized, and soon we were happy and united again in love.
Since that time there have been occasions when I have needed to ask myself that question again: “Do you want to be right, or do you want to be married?” How grateful I am for the great lesson I learned the first time I faced that question. It has always helped me realign my perspective and put my husband and my marriage before my own pride.5
In the story, this sister learned that even if she may have been right and it was her husband’s fault, blaming him was counterproductive, causing her to lose control over positive outcomes. She also discovered that there is power and control in the expression “I’m sorry” when it is used with love unfeigned and empathy—not merely to excuse ourselves.
In a marriage, a 50 percent attitude on both parts may seem logical, but only a 100 percent attitude on both parts closes the door to the anti-responsibility list. A final lesson that this sister learned is that you cannot control the agency of another person—only your own.
A loving mother once gave the following wise counsel to her daughter, who was unhappy with a struggling marriage. She had the daughter draw a vertical line down the middle of a sheet of paper and write down on the left side all the things her husband did that bothered her. Then, on the right side, she had her write down her response to each offense. The mother then had her cut the paper in half, separating the two lists.
“Now throw the paper with your husband’s faults in the garbage. If you want to be happy and improve your marriage, stop focusing on your husband’s faults and focus instead on your own behavior. Examine the way you are responding to the things that bother you and see if you can respond in a different, more positive way.”
This mother understood the power and wisdom of 100 percent responsibility.
THE GREATEST EXAMPLE OF ALL
Of course the Savior was the most responsible person in the history of the world. His is the greatest example. Even in His moments of excruciating pain and anguish, He showed no self-pity, one of the dysfunctional items on the list. He was always thinking outward with His ever-selfless care and concern for others—restoring a soldier’s ear in Gethsemane and, later, on the cross, praying for those who had despitefully used Him—in fulfillment of His own commandment to do so: “Father, forgive them; for they know not what they do” (Luke 23:34).
The more we are like Jesus Christ, the less likely we are to judge unrighteously, to give up on someone, or to quit a worthy cause. Even though we may sometimes give up on ourselves, the Savior never gives up on us, because He is perfect in His long-suffering: “Notwithstanding their sins, my bowels are filled with compassion towards them” (D&C 101:9).
Jesus Christ did not come to find fault, criticize, or blame. He came to build up, edify, and save (see Luke 9:56). However, His compassion does not nullify His expectation that we be fully responsible and never try to minimize or justify sin. “For I the Lord cannot look upon sin with the least degree of allowance” (D&C 1:31; see also Alma 45:16). If the Lord cannot look upon sin with even the least degree of allowance, what law of the gospel demands complete and full responsibility for sin?
That would be the law of justice. “What, do ye suppose that mercy can rob justice? I say unto you, Nay; not one whit. If so, God would cease to be God” (Alma 42:25; see also verse 24). Not in the “least degree” and “not one whit” are other ways of saying that God holds His children 100 percent responsible for the use of their agency. The danger of the anti-responsibility list consists in the fact that it blinds its victims to the need for repentance. Laman and Lemuel, for example, didn’t see a need to repent because it was all Nephi’s fault. “If it’s not my fault, why should I repent?” The one blinded can’t even take the first step in the repentance process, which is to recognize the need for repentance.
Alma understood very well how excuses keep us from repenting, as we discover in this verse where he counseled his wayward son, Corianton:
What, do ye suppose that mercy can rob justice? I say unto you, Nay; not one whit. If so, God would cease to be God. . . .
O my son, I desire that ye should deny the justice of God no more. Do not endeavor to excuse yourself in the least point because of your sins, by denying the justice of God; but do you let the justice of God, and his mercy, and his long-suffering have full sway in your heart; and let it bring you down to the dust in humility. [Alma 42:25, 30]
As we learn from this verse, those who use excuses are “denying justice”—the Nehor principle—and believe that the law of justice doesn’t apply to them. Alma was pleading with his son not to go to the list. “Do not endeavor to excuse yourself in the least point.” He was teaching his son to be 100 percent responsible.
To deny God’s justice—or to say we are not accountable for sin—is to also deny His justification in the forgiveness of that sin: “The Lord surely should come to redeem his people, but that he should not come to redeem them in their sins, but to redeem them from their sins” (Helaman 5:10; emphasis added).
TWO WAYS TO DENY THE LORD’S JUSTICE
Satan successfully divides the complimentary principles of mercy and justice when a person succumbs to the temptation to deny the Lord’s justice. Denying the Lord’s justice comes in at least two forms. The first, which I have already mentioned, is to deny the law of justice in regard to one’s own sins, something both Korihor and Nehor advocated. A second and equally damaging denial is not trusting in the Lord’s justice or in His wisdom in dealing with the injustices others have perpetrated against us.
In the movie based on the masterfully written classic The Count of Monte Cristo by Alexandre Dumas, Edmond Dantès, the protagonist, is an honest and loving man who turns bitter and vengeful after three covetous men bear false witness against him and frame him in a treasonous plot. When a corrupt public prosecutor becomes complicit, Dantès is arrested on the very day he is to be married to his beautiful fiancée, Mercédès. At age nineteen he is given a life sentence in the infamous island prison of Chateau d’If for a crime he did not commit.
After many tortuous years in solitary confinement, he finally meets another prisoner, the elderly Abbé Faria, who in his search for freedom has miscalculated and tunneled his way to Edmond’s cell rather than to an outside wall and freedom. With a tunnel now connecting their cells and nothing but time on their hands, Faria begins to teach Dantès history, science, philosophy, and languages, turning him into a well-educated man. Faria also bequeaths to Dantès a treasure of vast wealth hidden on the uninhabited island of Monte Cristo and tells him how to find it, should he ever escape.
Knowing that vengeance could consume and destroy Dantès, Abbé Faria teaches him a final lesson before he dies. The lesson is to not deny the Lord’s justice.
Abbé Faria says, “Do not commit the crime for which you now serve the sentence. God said, ‘Vengeance is mine.’”
Dantès responds, “I don’t believe in God.”
Abbé Faria then says, “It doesn’t matter. He believes in you.”6
Dantès remains unconvinced. Upon the death of Faria, Dantès devises a clever plan by hiding himself in the death shroud of Faria and is finally able to escape his fourteen years of torment from Chateau d’If. After securing the treasure, he becomes extremely wealthy and assumes a new identity as the Count of Monte Cristo.
For the evil men who conspired against him, he devises an elaborate plan of revenge with a painful and prolonged punishment—a just recompense for the fourteen years he barely survived in the dungeon to which they had unjustly sent him.
With precision Dantès sets in motion his plan, and his enemies suffer the punishment he has carefully devised for each one of them.
When we read the book or watch the movie version of The Count of Monte Cristo, there is something in us that wants to see justice served against those cruel and conspiring men who inflicted so much pain on an innocent man. There is a sense of fairness and a desire in each of us that good must prevail over evil, that things lost must be restored, and that broken hearts must be mended. Until these things happen, there is an injustice gap that is hard for us to reconcile in our minds and even more so in our hearts—leaving us troubled and finding it difficult to move on.
People try to reconcile this injustice gap in many ways: through seeking revenge, justifying their anger and bitterness, or seeking legal redress and imposed consequences. We ultimately discover that the Lord’s way is the only way for true and complete reconciliation.
The error of Dantès was not necessarily seeking redress and justice according to the law of the land and bringing devious facts to light with appropriate penalties for the guilty but in letting his desire for justice turn to hatred, anger, self-pity, self-justification, and other disabling behaviors on the anti-responsibility list. He essentially descended to his enemies’ level of ungodliness, and he used deception, lies, and fraud to entrap them—all outside the lawful process—just as they had done to him and just as Abbé Faria had prophesied.
By relying on the law of Moses—an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth—rather than on the law of the gospel, including forgiving and praying for one’s enemies, Dantès imposed a life sentence of misery and bitterness upon himself. In denying the Lord’s justice for others, he unwittingly denied the Lord’s mercy for himself and chose to serve the sentence that Christ had already served in his behalf. It robbed him of a life of happiness that could have been his but for the want of revenge.
Having faith in Jesus Christ is to trust that because of His atoning sacrifice, He will correct all injustices, restore all things lost, and mend all things broken, including hearts. He will make all things right, not leaving any detail unattended. Therefore, “ye ought to say in your hearts—let God judge between me and thee, and reward thee according to thy deeds” (D&C 64:11).
Like Edmond Dantès, many victims have been so cruelly injured, such as in abuse cases, with no apparent justice forthcoming, that they felt like the Lord was requiring the impossible by asking them to forgive.
As hard as forgiving may be in such situations, not forgiving is even harder over the long run because it puts a person on the disabling anti-responsibility list. Not forgiving is a synonym with blaming, anger, self-justifying, and self‑pity—all things that are on the list. When Satan taps into any of these negative emotions, he begins exercising control over a person’s life.
One of the most difficult times to forgive is in the case of spouse abuse, with its accompanying anguish, pain of betrayal, and cruelty. There is an interesting and common pattern with abuse cases: the abuser nearly always blames the victim, just as Laman and Lemuel blamed Nephi for their abuse of him. The Lord warned Nephi to separate his family from his brothers and their wicked intentions so he could protect himself and his family (see 2 Nephi 5:1–7). Let’s assume that a woman who has been cruelly abused receives similar revelation, and she separates from her extremely abusive husband.
Even though the abused woman is now free from the abusive environment, she is finding it hard to forgive her husband for the sustained and escalating cruelty. It seems unfair to ask her to forgive his brutality when he seems to be unrepentant. It doesn’t seem fair for her, the innocent one, to be suffering while he, the guilty one, appears to get off scot-free. Is there peace to be found without justice?
Like Edmond Dantès, until the abused wife learns to forgive, she is also denying or not trusting in the justice of God and His ability to judge wisely.
Justice is an eternal law that requires a penalty each time a law of God is broken (Alma 42:13–24). The sinner must pay the penalty if he does not repent (Mosiah 2:38–39; D&C 19:17). If he does repent, the Savior pays the penalty through the Atonement, invoking mercy (Alma 34:16).7
If the former husband does not repent, he will pay the penalty—“how sore you know not, how exquisite you know not, yea, how hard to bear you know not” (D&C 19:15). The wife will know if he truly repents because his restitution will include humbly and sincerely asking for her forgiveness and his striving to make amends.
Even though the wife may understand the law of justice, what she is feeling is the need for justice now. Elder Neal A. Maxwell wisely taught that “faith in God includes faith in His purposes as well as in His timing. We cannot fully accept Him while rejecting His schedule.”8 Elder Maxwell also said, “The gospel guarantees ultimate, not proximate, justice.”9 “Behold, mine eyes see and know all their works, and I have in reserve a swift judgment in the season thereof, for them all” (D&C 121:24).
The law of justice and trusting in the Lord’s timing allows the wife not to worry about justice anymore and places judgment in God’s hands: “Behold what the scripture says—man shall not smite, neither shall he judge; for judgment is mine, saith the Lord, and vengeance is mine also, and I will repay” (Mormon 8:20).
Elder Jeffrey R. Holland shared this helpful insight:
Please don’t ask if it is fair. . . . When it comes to our own sins, we don’t ask for justice. What we plead for is mercy—and that is what we must be willing to give.
Can we see the tragic irony of not granting to others what we need so badly ourselves?10
Those who have experienced permanent damage, prolonged suffering, or loss from an offense face a far more difficult challenge in forgiving and turning justice over to the Lord. Hopefully they can find comfort in something the Prophet Joseph Smith taught: “What can [these misfortunes] do? Nothing. All your losses will be made up to you in the resurrection, provided you continue faithful.”11
Until the abused woman can turn justice over to the Lord, she will likely continue to experience feelings of anger—which are a form of negative devotion toward her abuser—and this traps her in a recurring nightmare. President George Albert Smith referred to this as “cherish[ing] an improper influence.”12 With her husband having hurt her so deeply, why would the wife allow him to continue victimizing her by haunting her thoughts? Hasn’t she suffered enough? Not forgiving her abuser allows him to mentally torment her over and over and over. Forgiving him doesn’t set him free; it sets her free.
Part of understanding forgiveness is to understand what it is not:
Forgiving her abusive husband does not excuse or condone his cruelty.
Forgiving does not mean forgetting his brutality; you cannot unremember or erase a memory that is so traumatic.
Forgiving does not mean that justice is being denied, because mercy cannot rob justice.
Forgiving does not erase the injury he has caused, but it can begin to heal the wounds and ease the pain.
Forgiving does not mean trusting him again and giving him yet another chance to abuse her and the children. While to forgive is a commandment, trust has to be earned and evidenced by good behavior over time, which he clearly has not demonstrated.
Forgiving does not mean forgiveness of his sins. Only the Lord can do that, based upon sincere repentance.
These are things that forgiveness does not mean. What forgiveness does mean is to forgive the husband’s foolishness—even his stupidity—in succumbing to the impulses of the natural man and at the same time still hope that he will yet yield “to the enticings of the Holy Spirit” (Mosiah 3:19). Forgiveness does not mean giving him another chance to abuse, but it does mean giving him another chance at the plan of salvation.
It is also helpful if the wife understands “that we are punished by our sins and not for them.”13 She then recognizes that her abuser has inflicted far more eternal damage upon himself than temporal damage upon her. And even in the present, his true happiness and joy diminish in inverse proportion to his increased wickedness, because “wickedness never was happiness” (Alma 41:10). He is to be pitied for the sorrowful and precarious situation he is in.
Knowing that he is sinking in spiritual quicksand might begin to change her desire for justice—which is already occurring—to a hope that he will repent before it is too late. With this understanding she might even begin to pray for the one who has despitefully abused her.
This Christlike change in her heart helps her to forgive and brings about the healing she so desperately wants and deserves. The Savior knows exactly how to heal her because He precisely knows her pain, having lived it vicariously.
In this scenario of the abused wife, we have two parties—the abusive husband and the victim-wife, both of whom need divine help. Alma teaches us that the Savior suffered for both: for the sins of the man and for the anguish, heartache, and pain of the woman (see Alma 7:11–12; Luke 4:18).
To access the Savior’s grace and the healing power of His Atonement, the Savior requires something from both of them.
The husband’s key to access the Lord’s grace is repentance. If the husband doesn’t repent, he cannot be forgiven by the Lord (see D&C 19:15–17).
The wife’s key to access the Lord’s grace and then allow Him to heal her is forgiveness. Until the wife is able to forgive, she is choosing to suffer the anguish and pain that He has already suffered on her behalf. By not forgiving, she unwittingly denies His mercy and healing. In a sense, she fulfills this scripture:
I, God, have suffered these things . . . that they might not suffer. . . .
But if they would not repent [or forgive,] they must suffer even as I. [D&C 19:16–17]
CONCLUSION
In summary, being 100 percent responsible is accepting yourself as the person in control of your life. If others are at fault and need to change before further progress is made, then you are at their mercy and they are in control over the positive outcomes or desired results in your life. Agency and responsibility are inseparably connected. You cannot avoid responsibility without also diminishing agency. Mercy and justice are also inseparable. You cannot deny the Lord’s justice without also impeding His mercy. Oh, how Satan loves to divide complementary principles and laugh at the resulting devastation!
I invite each one of you to eliminate the anti-responsibility or anti-faith list from your life, even when you are right! It is an anti-happy and an anti-success list even when you are right. It is not a list for the valiant sons and daughters of God who are seeking to become more like Him. It is one of Satan’s foremost tools in controlling and destroying lives. The day a person eliminates the list from their life is the day they regain control over positive outcomes from that point on, and they begin moving forward in the light at an accelerated pace (see D&C 50:24).
I bear my certain witness of the name of Jesus Christ and of the power and happiness that the fulness of His gospel affords us. He is the Life and the Light of the World. These principles that I shared today are His. I so testify in the name of Jesus Christ, amen.
Lynn G. Robbins, a member of the Presidency of the Seventy of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, delivered this devotional address on August 22, 2017, during BYU Campus Education Week.
NOTES:
1. There are three exceptions to this principle:
a. Children younger than the age of accountability (see Mosiah 3:16–18; Mosiah 15:25; Moroni 8:8; D&C 29:46–47; 68:27; 137:10).
b. The intellectually disabled (see Moroni 8:10; see also “Persons Who May Not Be Accountable,” Handbook 1: Stake Presidents and Bishops [Salt Lake City: The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, 2010], 16.3.5 [p. 144]).
c. Those who have not received the law or the gospel (see 2 Nephi 9:26; Mosiah 3:11; Mosiah 15:24; Alma 42:21).
2. In the early sixteenth century, Pope Leo X and the Catholic Church sold “indulgences” that supposedly absolved one of past sins and/or released one from purgatory after death. Martin Luther saw it as a corrupt attempt to sell salvation, prompting him to write his Disputation on the Power and Efficacy of Indulgences, also known as Ninety-Five Theses, and then post it on the door of the Wittenberg Castle church in 1517. See “Martin Luther and the 95 Theses,” History Channel, history.com/topics/martin-luther-and-the-95-theses.
3. Samuel Grafton, in his syndicated column “I’d Rather Be Right” (included in Edmund Fuller, Thesaurus of Quotations [New York: Crown Publishers, 1941], 272). Edward R. Murrow referred to this quote in his last newscast (22 January 1961) in a remark about John F. Kennedy’s inaugural address (see In Search of Light: The Broadcasts of Edward R. Murrow, 1938–1961, ed. Edward Bliss Jr. [New York: Da Capo Press, 1997], 346).
4. Attributed to David B. Haight, General Authority training meeting, April 1993.
5. Irene Eubanks, “Putting My Marriage Before My Pride,” Ensign, January 2008.
6. IMDb’s page for quotes for The Count of Monte Cristo (2002), imdb.com/title/tt0245844/quotes.
7. Guide to the Scriptures, s.v. “justice,” scriptures.lds.org.
8. Neal A. Maxwell, That Ye May Believe (Salt Lake City: Bookcraft, 1992), 84.
9. Neal A. Maxwell, Wherefore, Ye Must Press Forward (Salt Lake City: Deseret Book, 1977), 116.
10. Jeffrey R. Holland, “Amazed at the Love Jesus Offers Me,” New Era, December 2008; see also original version, Holland, “I Stand All Amazed,” Ensign, August 1986.
11. Joseph Smith, HC 5:362; see also Teachings of Presidents of the Church: Joseph Smith (Salt Lake City: The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, 2007), 51.
12. George Albert Smith, CR, October 1905, 28; see also Teachings of Presidents of the Church: George Albert Smith (Salt Lake City: The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, 2011), 252.
13. Elbert Hubbard, The Note Book of Elbert Hubbard: Mottoes, Epigrams, Short Essays, Passages, Orphic Sayings and Preachments (New York: W. H. Wise, 1927), 23; emphasis added.
© by Intellectual Reserve, Inc. All rights reserved.
Be 100 Percent Responsible
LYNN G. ROBBINS
of the Presidency of the Seventy
Aug. 22, 2017 • Devotional
Brothers and sisters, I am grateful to be with you in this opening session of the 2017 BYU Campus Education Week. This year’s theme comes from Doctrine and Covenants 50:24, with special emphasis on these words: “And he that receiveth light, and continueth in God, receiveth more light.”
I am going to take a different approach to this theme than might be expected by exposing and illustrating some very cunning and effective ways that the “wicked one” prevents people from progressing and receiving more light (D&C 93:39).
Many gospel principles come in pairs, meaning one is incomplete without the other. I want to refer to three of these doctrinal pairs today:
Agency and responsibility
Mercy and justice
Faith and works
When Satan is successful in dividing doctrinal pairs, he begins to wreak havoc upon mankind. It is one of his most cunning strategies to keep people from growing in the light.
You already know that faith without works really isn’t faith (see James 2:17). My primary focus will be on the other two doctrinal pairs: first, to illustrate how avoiding responsibility affects agency; and second, how “denying justice,” as it is referred to in the Book of Mormon (see Alma 42:30), affects mercy.
The Book of Mormon teaches us that we are agents to “act . . . and not to be acted upon” (2 Nephi 2:26)—or to be “free to act for [our]selves” (2 Nephi 10:23). This freedom of choice was not a gift of partial agency but of complete and total 100 percent agency. It was absolute in the sense that the One Perfect Parent never forces His children. He shows us the way and may even command us, but, “nevertheless, thou mayest choose for thyself, for it is given unto thee” (Moses 3:17).
Assuming responsibility and being accountable for our choices are agency’s complementary principles (see D&C 101:78). Responsibility is to recognize ourselves as being the cause for the effects or results of our choices—good or bad. On the negative side, it is to always own up to the consequences of poor choices.
Except for those held innocent, such as little children and the intellectually disabled, gospel doctrine teaches us that each person is responsible for the use of their agency and “will be punished for their own sins” (Articles of Faith 1:2).1 It isn’t just a heavenly principle but a law of nature—we reap what we sow.
Logically then, complete and total agency comes with complete and total responsibility:
And now remember, remember, my brethren, that whosoever perisheth, perisheth unto himself; and whosoever doeth iniquity, doeth it unto himself; for behold, ye are free; ye are permitted to act for yourselves; for behold, God hath given unto you a knowledge and he hath made you free. [Helaman 14:30; emphasis added]
THE KORIHOR PRINCIPLE—SEPARATING AGENCY FROM RESPONSIBILITY
One of Satan’s most crafty strategies to gain control of our agency isn’t a frontal attack on our agency but a sneaky backdoor assault on responsibility. Without responsibility, every good gift from God could be misused for evil purposes. For example, freedom of speech without responsibility can be used to create and protect pornography. The rights of a woman can be twisted to justify an unnecessary abortion. When the world separates choice from accountability, it leads to anarchy and a war of wills or survival of the fittest. We could call agency without responsibility the Korihor principle, as we read in the book of Alma “that every man conquered according to his strength; and whatsoever a man did was no crime” (Alma 30:17; emphasis added). With negative consequences removed, you now have agency unbridled, as if there were no day of reckoning.
THE NEHOR PRINCIPLE—DENYING JUSTICE
If Satan is not successful in fully separating agency from responsibility, one of his backup schemes is to dull or minimize feelings of responsibility—what we could call the Nehor principle, also found in the book of Alma: “That all mankind should be saved at the last day, and that they need not fear nor tremble . . . ; for the Lord had created all men, and had also redeemed all men; and, in the end, all men should have eternal life” (Alma 1:4).
What an attractive offer for those who seek happiness in wickedness! The Nehor principle depends entirely on mercy and denies justice—a separation of the second doctrinal pair aforementioned. Denying justice is a twin of avoiding responsibility. They are essentially the same thing. A common strategy of each Book of Mormon anti-Christ was to separate agency from responsibility. “Eat, drink, and be merry; nevertheless, fear God—he will justify in committing a little sin” (2 Nephi 28:8).
Faith without works, mercy without justice, and agency without responsibility are all different verses of the same seductive and damning song. With each, the natural man rejects accountability in an attempt to sedate his conscience. It is similar to the early sixteenth-century practice of paying for indulgences, but much easier—this way it is free!2 No wonder the broad path is filled with so many. The path parades a guilt-free journey to salvation but is, in reality, a cleverly disguised detour to destruction (see 3 Nephi 14:13).
Agency without responsibility is one of the foremost anti-Christ doctrines—very cunning in its nature and very destructive in its results.
THE ANTI-RESPONSIBILITY LIST
To illustrate, I want to share a list of things that Satan tempts people to either say or do to avoid being responsible. This list isn’t all-inclusive, but I believe it covers his most common tactics.
1. Blaming others: Saul disobediently took of the spoils of war from the Amalekites; then, when confronted by Samuel, he blamed the people (see 1 Samuel 15:21).
2. Rationalizing or justifying: Saul then rationalized or justified his disobedience, stating that the saved livestock was for “sacrifice unto the Lord” (1 Samuel 15:21; see also verse 22).
3. Making excuses: Excuses come in a thousand varieties, such as this one from Laman and Lemuel: “How is it possible that the Lord will deliver Laban into our hands? Behold, he is a mighty man, and he can command fifty, yea, even he can slay fifty; then why not us?” (1 Nephi 3:31).
4. Minimalizing or trivializing sin: This is exactly what Nehor advocated (see Alma 1:3–4).
5. Hiding: This is a common avoidance technique. It is a tactic Satan used with Adam and Eve after they partook of the forbidden fruit (see Moses 4:14).
6. Covering up: Closely associated with hiding is covering up, which David attempted to do to conceal his affair with Bathsheba (see 2 Samuel 12:9, 12).
7. Fleeing from responsibility: This is something Jonah tried to do (see Jonah 1:3).
8. Abandoning responsibility: Similar to fleeing is abandoning responsibility. One example is when Corianton forsook his ministry in pursuit of the harlot Isabel (see Alma 39:3).
9. Denying or lying: “And Saul said . . . : I have performed the commandment of the Lord. And Samuel said, What meaneth then this bleating of the sheep in mine ears . . . ?” (1 Samuel 15:13–14).
10. Rebelling: Samuel then rebuked Saul “for rebellion.” “Because thou hast rejected the word of the Lord, he hath also rejected thee from being king” (1 Samuel 15:23).
11. Complaining and murmuring: One who rebels also complains and murmurs: “And all the children of Israel murmured against Moses and . . . said . . . , Would God that we had died in the land of Egypt!” (Numbers 14:2).
12. Finding fault and getting angry: These two are closely associated, as described by Nephi: “And it came to pass that Laman was angry with me, and also with my father; and also was Lemuel” (1 Nephi 3:28).
13. Making demands and entitlements: “We will not that our younger brother shall be a ruler over us. And it came to pass that Laman and Lemuel did take me and bind me with cords, and they did treat me with much harshness” (1 Nephi 18:10–11).
14. Doubting, losing hope, giving up, and quitting: “Our brother is a fool. . . . For they did not believe that I could build a ship” (1 Nephi 17:17–18).
15. Indulging in self-pity and a victim mentality: “Behold, these many years we have suffered in the wilderness, which time we might have enjoyed our possessions and the land of our inheritance; yea, and we might have been happy” (1 Nephi 17:21).
16. Being indecisive or being in a spiritual stupor: The irony with indecision is that if you don’t make a decision in time, time will make a decision for you.
17. Procrastinating: A twin of indecision is procrastination. “But behold, your days of probation are past; ye have procrastinated the day of your salvation until it is everlastingly too late” (Helaman 13:38).
18. Allowing fear to rule: This one is also related to hiding: “And I was afraid, and went and hid thy talent in the earth. . . . His lord answered and said unto him, Thou wicked and slothful servant” (Matthew 25:25–26).
19. Enabling: An example of enabling or helping others to avoid responsibility is the instance when Eli failed to discipline his sons for their grievous sins and was rebuked by the Lord: “Wherefore kick ye at my sacrifice and . . . honourest thy sons above me . . . ? (1 Samuel 2:29; see also verses 22–36).
When you consider this list with Laman and Lemuel in mind, you will see that they were guilty of nearly everything on the list. It is this list that destroyed Laman and Lemuel. It is an extremely dangerous list.
When reading 1 Nephi and 2 Nephi, we can only try to imagine how difficult it was for the members of Lehi’s family to leave their home, obtain the brass plates, camp out for eight years in the wilderness, and build a large ocean-going vessel. The responsibility that faced the family was indeed formidable. Yet, as difficult as a responsibility may be, “difficulty is the excuse history never accepts,”3 as is so graphically illustrated in the case of Laman and Lemuel.
Difficult situations are the test of one’s faith, to see if we will go forward with either a believing heart (see D&C 64:34) or a doubting heart (see D&C 58:29), if at all. A difficult situation reveals a person’s character and either strengthens it, as with Nephi, or weakens and corrupts it, as with Laman and Lemuel, who epitomize what it means to be irresponsible (see Alma 62:41).
EXCUSES DO NOT EQUAL RESULTS
It is important to recognize that excuses never equal results. In the case of Laman and Lemuel, all the excuses in the world could never obtain the brass plates. The reason Nephi obtained the plates and Laman and Lemuel didn’t is because Nephi never went to the anti-responsibility list. He was a champion, and champions do not turn to the list. As Elder David B. Haight of the Quorum of the Twelve stated, “A determined man finds a way; the other man finds an excuse.”4
If the anti-responsibility list is so dangerous, why do so many people frequently turn to it? Because the natural man is irresponsible by nature, he goes to the list as a defense mechanism to avoid shame and embarrassment, stress and anxiety, and the pain and negative consequences of mistakes and sin. Rather than repent to eliminate guilt, he sedates it with excuses. It gives him a false sense that his environment or someone else is to blame, and therefore he has no need to repent.
The anti-responsibility list could also be called the anti-faith list because it halts progress dead in its tracks. When Satan tempts a person to avoid responsibility, that person subtly surrenders their agency because the person is no longer in control or “acting.” Instead they become an object who is being acted upon, and Satan cleverly begins to control their life.
THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN MAKING AN EXCUSE AND GIVING A REASON
It is important to note that everyone occasionally fails in their attempts at success, just as Nephi did with his brothers in their first two trips to Jerusalem when they were trying to obtain the plates. But those who are valiant accept responsibility for their mistakes and sins. They repent, get back on their feet, and continue moving forward in faith. They may give an explanation or a reason for their lack of success but not an excuse.
At first glance it may appear that Adam was blaming Eve when he said, “The woman thou gavest me.” However, when Adam subsequently added “and I did eat,” we are given to understand that he accepted responsibility for his actions and was giving an explanation, not blaming Eve. Eve in turn also said, “And I did eat” (Moses 4:18–19; see also verses 17–20; 5:10–11).
THE POWER AND REWARD OF BEING RESPONSIBLE
Turning to the anti-responsibility list is an act of self-betrayal. It is to give up on oneself and sometimes on others. As I share the following stories, I hope you will observe how going to the anti-responsibility list is counterproductive, even if you are right.
Story 1: 100 Percent Responsibility in the Distribution Center
In 1983 a few partners and I started a new company that taught time-management seminars and created and sold day planners.
For corporate seminars, we sent our consultants to the client’s headquarters, where they taught at the corporate training facilities. Prior to the seminar, two employees in our distribution center would prepare and ship several boxes of training materials, such as the day planners, binders, and forms. Also included was a participant’s seminar guidebook of around a hundred pages with quotes, fill-in-the blanks, graphs, and illustrations.
The two distribution center employees would normally send the seminar shipment ten days before the seminar. At the time that the following incident occurred, we were teaching around 250 seminars each month. With so many seminar shipments, these two employees would often commit errors, such as not shipping sufficient quantities or omitting certain materials or not shipping on time. This became an irritating and often embarrassing frustration for the consultants.
When these problems occurred, the seminar division would file a complaint with me, as the distribution center was one of my responsibilities. When I spoke with these two employees about errors and system improvements, they never wanted to accept responsibility for the errors. They would blame others, saying things like, “It’s not our fault. The seminar division filled out the Seminar Supplies Request form incorrectly, and we sent the shipment exactly according to their specifications. It’s their fault. You can’t blame us!” Or they might say, “We shipped it on time, but the freight company delivered it late. You can’t blame us!” Another excuse was, “The binder subsidiary packaged the individual seminar kits with errors, and we shipped the kits as they were given to us. It’s their fault.” It seemed these two employees were never responsible for the errors, and so the errors continued.
Then something critical happened. The director of training for a large multinational corporation attended one of our seminars and was so thrilled with it that she invited us to teach a pilot seminar to its fifty or so top executives. On the day of the seminar, our consultant arrived and opened the boxes of materials and discovered that the seminar guidebooks were missing. Without the seminar guidebooks, how would the participants follow along and take notes? Their training director was panic-stricken. Our consultant did the best he could by making sure each participant was given a pad of paper on which to take notes throughout the day, and the seminar turned out reasonably well, even without the guidebooks.
Extremely embarrassed and angry, their training director called our seminar division and said, “You will never teach here again! How could you have made such an embarrassing and inexcusable error with our pilot seminar?”
An upset senior vice president of our seminar division called me and said, “This is the last straw. We are about to lose a million-dollar account because of the distribution center’s errors. We simply can’t tolerate any more errors!”
As one of the owners of the company, I couldn’t tolerate such errors either. At the same time, I did not want to see these two breadwinners fired. After pondering possible solutions, I decided to implement an incentive system to motivate these two men to be more careful. For each seminar shipped correctly, they would receive one additional dollar, or a possibility of an extra $250 each month—hopefully enough to focus their attention on quality. However, if they made one error, a one-dollar penalty wasn’t much of a loss. I therefore decided to also include two $100 bonuses for no errors. With the first error they not only lost one dollar but also the first $100 bonus. If they made a second error, they lost the second $100 bonus.
I also told these employees, “If there is an error, you will lose your bonus, regardless of where that error originates. You are 100 percent responsible for that shipment.”
“Well, that’s not fair,” they responded. “What happens if the seminar division fills out the Seminar Supplies Request form incorrectly and, not knowing, we send the shipment with ‘their’ errors?”
I said, “You will lose your bonus. You are 100 percent responsible for that shipment’s success.”
“That’s not fair! What happens if we send the shipment on time but the freight company delivers it late?”
“You will lose your bonus. You are 100 percent responsible.”
“That’s not fair! What happens if the binder division commits errors in prepackaging the individual seminar kits? You can’t blame us for their mistakes!”
“You will lose your bonus,” I once again responded. “You are 100 percent responsible for that shipment’s success. Do you understand?”
“That isn’t fair!!”
“Well, it may not seem fair, but that’s life. You will lose your bonus.”
What I did was eliminate the anti-responsibility list as an option for them. They now understood that they could no longer blame others, make excuses, or justify errors—even when they were right and it was someone else’s fault!
What happened next was fascinating to observe. When they would receive an order from the seminar division, they would call the seminar division to review the form item by item. They took responsibility for correcting any errors committed by the seminar division. They began to read the freight company’s documents to make sure the correct delivery date was entered. They began to mark the cardboard shipping boxes “one of seven,” “two of seven,” etc., with each box’s contents written on the outside of the box. They began sending shipments three or four days earlier than they had in their previous routine. A few days before the seminar they would call the client company to verify receipt of the shipment and the contents. If they had somehow omitted any materials, they had three or four extra days now to send missing items by express shipment. Errors finally stopped happening, and the employees began to earn their bonuses month after month. It was a life-changing experience for them to learn firsthand the power, control, and reward of being 100 percent responsible.
What these two employees learned is that when they blamed someone else, they were surrendering control of the shipment’s success to others—such as the seminar division or the freight company. They learned that excuses keep you from taking control of your life. They learned that it is self-defeating to blame others, make excuses, or justify mistakes—even when you are right! The moment you do any of these self-defeating things, you lose control over the positive outcomes you are seeking in life.
Story 2: “Putting My Marriage Before My Pride”
Let me quote from the experience of a young wife:
Like any couple, my husband and I have had disagreements during our marriage. But one incident stands out in my mind. I no longer recall the reason for our disagreement, but we ended up not speaking at all, and I remember feeling that it was all my husband’s fault. I felt I had done absolutely nothing for which I needed to apologize.
As the day went by, I waited for my husband to say he was sorry. Surely he could see how wrong he was. It must be obvious how much he had hurt my feelings. I felt I had to stand up for myself; it was the principle that mattered.
As the day was drawing to a close, I started to realize that I was waiting in vain, so I went to the Lord in prayer. I prayed that my husband would realize what he had done and how it was hurting our marriage. I prayed that he would be inspired to apologize so we could end our disagreement.
As I was praying, I felt a strong impression that I should go to my husband and apologize. I was a bit shocked by this impression and immediately pointed out in my prayer that I had done nothing wrong and therefore should not have to say I was sorry. A thought came strongly to my mind: “Do you want to be right, or do you want to be married?”
As I considered this question, I realized that I could hold onto my pride and not give in until he apologized, but how long would that take? Days? I was miserable while we weren’t speaking to each other. I understood that while this incident itself wouldn’t be the end of our marriage, if I were always unyielding, that might cause serious damage over the years. I decided it was more important to have a happy, loving marriage than to keep my pride intact over something that would later seem trivial.
I went to my husband and apologized for upsetting him. He also apologized, and soon we were happy and united again in love.
Since that time there have been occasions when I have needed to ask myself that question again: “Do you want to be right, or do you want to be married?” How grateful I am for the great lesson I learned the first time I faced that question. It has always helped me realign my perspective and put my husband and my marriage before my own pride.5
In the story, this sister learned that even if she may have been right and it was her husband’s fault, blaming him was counterproductive, causing her to lose control over positive outcomes. She also discovered that there is power and control in the expression “I’m sorry” when it is used with love unfeigned and empathy—not merely to excuse ourselves.
In a marriage, a 50 percent attitude on both parts may seem logical, but only a 100 percent attitude on both parts closes the door to the anti-responsibility list. A final lesson that this sister learned is that you cannot control the agency of another person—only your own.
A loving mother once gave the following wise counsel to her daughter, who was unhappy with a struggling marriage. She had the daughter draw a vertical line down the middle of a sheet of paper and write down on the left side all the things her husband did that bothered her. Then, on the right side, she had her write down her response to each offense. The mother then had her cut the paper in half, separating the two lists.
“Now throw the paper with your husband’s faults in the garbage. If you want to be happy and improve your marriage, stop focusing on your husband’s faults and focus instead on your own behavior. Examine the way you are responding to the things that bother you and see if you can respond in a different, more positive way.”
This mother understood the power and wisdom of 100 percent responsibility.
THE GREATEST EXAMPLE OF ALL
Of course the Savior was the most responsible person in the history of the world. His is the greatest example. Even in His moments of excruciating pain and anguish, He showed no self-pity, one of the dysfunctional items on the list. He was always thinking outward with His ever-selfless care and concern for others—restoring a soldier’s ear in Gethsemane and, later, on the cross, praying for those who had despitefully used Him—in fulfillment of His own commandment to do so: “Father, forgive them; for they know not what they do” (Luke 23:34).
The more we are like Jesus Christ, the less likely we are to judge unrighteously, to give up on someone, or to quit a worthy cause. Even though we may sometimes give up on ourselves, the Savior never gives up on us, because He is perfect in His long-suffering: “Notwithstanding their sins, my bowels are filled with compassion towards them” (D&C 101:9).
Jesus Christ did not come to find fault, criticize, or blame. He came to build up, edify, and save (see Luke 9:56). However, His compassion does not nullify His expectation that we be fully responsible and never try to minimize or justify sin. “For I the Lord cannot look upon sin with the least degree of allowance” (D&C 1:31; see also Alma 45:16). If the Lord cannot look upon sin with even the least degree of allowance, what law of the gospel demands complete and full responsibility for sin?
That would be the law of justice. “What, do ye suppose that mercy can rob justice? I say unto you, Nay; not one whit. If so, God would cease to be God” (Alma 42:25; see also verse 24). Not in the “least degree” and “not one whit” are other ways of saying that God holds His children 100 percent responsible for the use of their agency. The danger of the anti-responsibility list consists in the fact that it blinds its victims to the need for repentance. Laman and Lemuel, for example, didn’t see a need to repent because it was all Nephi’s fault. “If it’s not my fault, why should I repent?” The one blinded can’t even take the first step in the repentance process, which is to recognize the need for repentance.
Alma understood very well how excuses keep us from repenting, as we discover in this verse where he counseled his wayward son, Corianton:
What, do ye suppose that mercy can rob justice? I say unto you, Nay; not one whit. If so, God would cease to be God. . . .
O my son, I desire that ye should deny the justice of God no more. Do not endeavor to excuse yourself in the least point because of your sins, by denying the justice of God; but do you let the justice of God, and his mercy, and his long-suffering have full sway in your heart; and let it bring you down to the dust in humility. [Alma 42:25, 30]
As we learn from this verse, those who use excuses are “denying justice”—the Nehor principle—and believe that the law of justice doesn’t apply to them. Alma was pleading with his son not to go to the list. “Do not endeavor to excuse yourself in the least point.” He was teaching his son to be 100 percent responsible.
To deny God’s justice—or to say we are not accountable for sin—is to also deny His justification in the forgiveness of that sin: “The Lord surely should come to redeem his people, but that he should not come to redeem them in their sins, but to redeem them from their sins” (Helaman 5:10; emphasis added).
TWO WAYS TO DENY THE LORD’S JUSTICE
Satan successfully divides the complimentary principles of mercy and justice when a person succumbs to the temptation to deny the Lord’s justice. Denying the Lord’s justice comes in at least two forms. The first, which I have already mentioned, is to deny the law of justice in regard to one’s own sins, something both Korihor and Nehor advocated. A second and equally damaging denial is not trusting in the Lord’s justice or in His wisdom in dealing with the injustices others have perpetrated against us.
In the movie based on the masterfully written classic The Count of Monte Cristo by Alexandre Dumas, Edmond Dantès, the protagonist, is an honest and loving man who turns bitter and vengeful after three covetous men bear false witness against him and frame him in a treasonous plot. When a corrupt public prosecutor becomes complicit, Dantès is arrested on the very day he is to be married to his beautiful fiancée, Mercédès. At age nineteen he is given a life sentence in the infamous island prison of Chateau d’If for a crime he did not commit.
After many tortuous years in solitary confinement, he finally meets another prisoner, the elderly Abbé Faria, who in his search for freedom has miscalculated and tunneled his way to Edmond’s cell rather than to an outside wall and freedom. With a tunnel now connecting their cells and nothing but time on their hands, Faria begins to teach Dantès history, science, philosophy, and languages, turning him into a well-educated man. Faria also bequeaths to Dantès a treasure of vast wealth hidden on the uninhabited island of Monte Cristo and tells him how to find it, should he ever escape.
Knowing that vengeance could consume and destroy Dantès, Abbé Faria teaches him a final lesson before he dies. The lesson is to not deny the Lord’s justice.
Abbé Faria says, “Do not commit the crime for which you now serve the sentence. God said, ‘Vengeance is mine.’”
Dantès responds, “I don’t believe in God.”
Abbé Faria then says, “It doesn’t matter. He believes in you.”6
Dantès remains unconvinced. Upon the death of Faria, Dantès devises a clever plan by hiding himself in the death shroud of Faria and is finally able to escape his fourteen years of torment from Chateau d’If. After securing the treasure, he becomes extremely wealthy and assumes a new identity as the Count of Monte Cristo.
For the evil men who conspired against him, he devises an elaborate plan of revenge with a painful and prolonged punishment—a just recompense for the fourteen years he barely survived in the dungeon to which they had unjustly sent him.
With precision Dantès sets in motion his plan, and his enemies suffer the punishment he has carefully devised for each one of them.
When we read the book or watch the movie version of The Count of Monte Cristo, there is something in us that wants to see justice served against those cruel and conspiring men who inflicted so much pain on an innocent man. There is a sense of fairness and a desire in each of us that good must prevail over evil, that things lost must be restored, and that broken hearts must be mended. Until these things happen, there is an injustice gap that is hard for us to reconcile in our minds and even more so in our hearts—leaving us troubled and finding it difficult to move on.
People try to reconcile this injustice gap in many ways: through seeking revenge, justifying their anger and bitterness, or seeking legal redress and imposed consequences. We ultimately discover that the Lord’s way is the only way for true and complete reconciliation.
The error of Dantès was not necessarily seeking redress and justice according to the law of the land and bringing devious facts to light with appropriate penalties for the guilty but in letting his desire for justice turn to hatred, anger, self-pity, self-justification, and other disabling behaviors on the anti-responsibility list. He essentially descended to his enemies’ level of ungodliness, and he used deception, lies, and fraud to entrap them—all outside the lawful process—just as they had done to him and just as Abbé Faria had prophesied.
By relying on the law of Moses—an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth—rather than on the law of the gospel, including forgiving and praying for one’s enemies, Dantès imposed a life sentence of misery and bitterness upon himself. In denying the Lord’s justice for others, he unwittingly denied the Lord’s mercy for himself and chose to serve the sentence that Christ had already served in his behalf. It robbed him of a life of happiness that could have been his but for the want of revenge.
Having faith in Jesus Christ is to trust that because of His atoning sacrifice, He will correct all injustices, restore all things lost, and mend all things broken, including hearts. He will make all things right, not leaving any detail unattended. Therefore, “ye ought to say in your hearts—let God judge between me and thee, and reward thee according to thy deeds” (D&C 64:11).
Like Edmond Dantès, many victims have been so cruelly injured, such as in abuse cases, with no apparent justice forthcoming, that they felt like the Lord was requiring the impossible by asking them to forgive.
As hard as forgiving may be in such situations, not forgiving is even harder over the long run because it puts a person on the disabling anti-responsibility list. Not forgiving is a synonym with blaming, anger, self-justifying, and self‑pity—all things that are on the list. When Satan taps into any of these negative emotions, he begins exercising control over a person’s life.
One of the most difficult times to forgive is in the case of spouse abuse, with its accompanying anguish, pain of betrayal, and cruelty. There is an interesting and common pattern with abuse cases: the abuser nearly always blames the victim, just as Laman and Lemuel blamed Nephi for their abuse of him. The Lord warned Nephi to separate his family from his brothers and their wicked intentions so he could protect himself and his family (see 2 Nephi 5:1–7). Let’s assume that a woman who has been cruelly abused receives similar revelation, and she separates from her extremely abusive husband.
Even though the abused woman is now free from the abusive environment, she is finding it hard to forgive her husband for the sustained and escalating cruelty. It seems unfair to ask her to forgive his brutality when he seems to be unrepentant. It doesn’t seem fair for her, the innocent one, to be suffering while he, the guilty one, appears to get off scot-free. Is there peace to be found without justice?
Like Edmond Dantès, until the abused wife learns to forgive, she is also denying or not trusting in the justice of God and His ability to judge wisely.
Justice is an eternal law that requires a penalty each time a law of God is broken (Alma 42:13–24). The sinner must pay the penalty if he does not repent (Mosiah 2:38–39; D&C 19:17). If he does repent, the Savior pays the penalty through the Atonement, invoking mercy (Alma 34:16).7
If the former husband does not repent, he will pay the penalty—“how sore you know not, how exquisite you know not, yea, how hard to bear you know not” (D&C 19:15). The wife will know if he truly repents because his restitution will include humbly and sincerely asking for her forgiveness and his striving to make amends.
Even though the wife may understand the law of justice, what she is feeling is the need for justice now. Elder Neal A. Maxwell wisely taught that “faith in God includes faith in His purposes as well as in His timing. We cannot fully accept Him while rejecting His schedule.”8 Elder Maxwell also said, “The gospel guarantees ultimate, not proximate, justice.”9 “Behold, mine eyes see and know all their works, and I have in reserve a swift judgment in the season thereof, for them all” (D&C 121:24).
The law of justice and trusting in the Lord’s timing allows the wife not to worry about justice anymore and places judgment in God’s hands: “Behold what the scripture says—man shall not smite, neither shall he judge; for judgment is mine, saith the Lord, and vengeance is mine also, and I will repay” (Mormon 8:20).
Elder Jeffrey R. Holland shared this helpful insight:
Please don’t ask if it is fair. . . . When it comes to our own sins, we don’t ask for justice. What we plead for is mercy—and that is what we must be willing to give.
Can we see the tragic irony of not granting to others what we need so badly ourselves?10
Those who have experienced permanent damage, prolonged suffering, or loss from an offense face a far more difficult challenge in forgiving and turning justice over to the Lord. Hopefully they can find comfort in something the Prophet Joseph Smith taught: “What can [these misfortunes] do? Nothing. All your losses will be made up to you in the resurrection, provided you continue faithful.”11
Until the abused woman can turn justice over to the Lord, she will likely continue to experience feelings of anger—which are a form of negative devotion toward her abuser—and this traps her in a recurring nightmare. President George Albert Smith referred to this as “cherish[ing] an improper influence.”12 With her husband having hurt her so deeply, why would the wife allow him to continue victimizing her by haunting her thoughts? Hasn’t she suffered enough? Not forgiving her abuser allows him to mentally torment her over and over and over. Forgiving him doesn’t set him free; it sets her free.
Part of understanding forgiveness is to understand what it is not:
Forgiving her abusive husband does not excuse or condone his cruelty.
Forgiving does not mean forgetting his brutality; you cannot unremember or erase a memory that is so traumatic.
Forgiving does not mean that justice is being denied, because mercy cannot rob justice.
Forgiving does not erase the injury he has caused, but it can begin to heal the wounds and ease the pain.
Forgiving does not mean trusting him again and giving him yet another chance to abuse her and the children. While to forgive is a commandment, trust has to be earned and evidenced by good behavior over time, which he clearly has not demonstrated.
Forgiving does not mean forgiveness of his sins. Only the Lord can do that, based upon sincere repentance.
These are things that forgiveness does not mean. What forgiveness does mean is to forgive the husband’s foolishness—even his stupidity—in succumbing to the impulses of the natural man and at the same time still hope that he will yet yield “to the enticings of the Holy Spirit” (Mosiah 3:19). Forgiveness does not mean giving him another chance to abuse, but it does mean giving him another chance at the plan of salvation.
It is also helpful if the wife understands “that we are punished by our sins and not for them.”13 She then recognizes that her abuser has inflicted far more eternal damage upon himself than temporal damage upon her. And even in the present, his true happiness and joy diminish in inverse proportion to his increased wickedness, because “wickedness never was happiness” (Alma 41:10). He is to be pitied for the sorrowful and precarious situation he is in.
Knowing that he is sinking in spiritual quicksand might begin to change her desire for justice—which is already occurring—to a hope that he will repent before it is too late. With this understanding she might even begin to pray for the one who has despitefully abused her.
This Christlike change in her heart helps her to forgive and brings about the healing she so desperately wants and deserves. The Savior knows exactly how to heal her because He precisely knows her pain, having lived it vicariously.
In this scenario of the abused wife, we have two parties—the abusive husband and the victim-wife, both of whom need divine help. Alma teaches us that the Savior suffered for both: for the sins of the man and for the anguish, heartache, and pain of the woman (see Alma 7:11–12; Luke 4:18).
To access the Savior’s grace and the healing power of His Atonement, the Savior requires something from both of them.
The husband’s key to access the Lord’s grace is repentance. If the husband doesn’t repent, he cannot be forgiven by the Lord (see D&C 19:15–17).
The wife’s key to access the Lord’s grace and then allow Him to heal her is forgiveness. Until the wife is able to forgive, she is choosing to suffer the anguish and pain that He has already suffered on her behalf. By not forgiving, she unwittingly denies His mercy and healing. In a sense, she fulfills this scripture:
I, God, have suffered these things . . . that they might not suffer. . . .
But if they would not repent [or forgive,] they must suffer even as I. [D&C 19:16–17]
CONCLUSION
In summary, being 100 percent responsible is accepting yourself as the person in control of your life. If others are at fault and need to change before further progress is made, then you are at their mercy and they are in control over the positive outcomes or desired results in your life. Agency and responsibility are inseparably connected. You cannot avoid responsibility without also diminishing agency. Mercy and justice are also inseparable. You cannot deny the Lord’s justice without also impeding His mercy. Oh, how Satan loves to divide complementary principles and laugh at the resulting devastation!
I invite each one of you to eliminate the anti-responsibility or anti-faith list from your life, even when you are right! It is an anti-happy and an anti-success list even when you are right. It is not a list for the valiant sons and daughters of God who are seeking to become more like Him. It is one of Satan’s foremost tools in controlling and destroying lives. The day a person eliminates the list from their life is the day they regain control over positive outcomes from that point on, and they begin moving forward in the light at an accelerated pace (see D&C 50:24).
I bear my certain witness of the name of Jesus Christ and of the power and happiness that the fulness of His gospel affords us. He is the Life and the Light of the World. These principles that I shared today are His. I so testify in the name of Jesus Christ, amen.
Lynn G. Robbins, a member of the Presidency of the Seventy of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, delivered this devotional address on August 22, 2017, during BYU Campus Education Week.
NOTES:
1. There are three exceptions to this principle:
a. Children younger than the age of accountability (see Mosiah 3:16–18; Mosiah 15:25; Moroni 8:8; D&C 29:46–47; 68:27; 137:10).
b. The intellectually disabled (see Moroni 8:10; see also “Persons Who May Not Be Accountable,” Handbook 1: Stake Presidents and Bishops [Salt Lake City: The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, 2010], 16.3.5 [p. 144]).
c. Those who have not received the law or the gospel (see 2 Nephi 9:26; Mosiah 3:11; Mosiah 15:24; Alma 42:21).
2. In the early sixteenth century, Pope Leo X and the Catholic Church sold “indulgences” that supposedly absolved one of past sins and/or released one from purgatory after death. Martin Luther saw it as a corrupt attempt to sell salvation, prompting him to write his Disputation on the Power and Efficacy of Indulgences, also known as Ninety-Five Theses, and then post it on the door of the Wittenberg Castle church in 1517. See “Martin Luther and the 95 Theses,” History Channel, history.com/topics/martin-luther-and-the-95-theses.
3. Samuel Grafton, in his syndicated column “I’d Rather Be Right” (included in Edmund Fuller, Thesaurus of Quotations [New York: Crown Publishers, 1941], 272). Edward R. Murrow referred to this quote in his last newscast (22 January 1961) in a remark about John F. Kennedy’s inaugural address (see In Search of Light: The Broadcasts of Edward R. Murrow, 1938–1961, ed. Edward Bliss Jr. [New York: Da Capo Press, 1997], 346).
4. Attributed to David B. Haight, General Authority training meeting, April 1993.
5. Irene Eubanks, “Putting My Marriage Before My Pride,” Ensign, January 2008.
6. IMDb’s page for quotes for The Count of Monte Cristo (2002), imdb.com/title/tt0245844/quotes.
7. Guide to the Scriptures, s.v. “justice,” scriptures.lds.org.
8. Neal A. Maxwell, That Ye May Believe (Salt Lake City: Bookcraft, 1992), 84.
9. Neal A. Maxwell, Wherefore, Ye Must Press Forward (Salt Lake City: Deseret Book, 1977), 116.
10. Jeffrey R. Holland, “Amazed at the Love Jesus Offers Me,” New Era, December 2008; see also original version, Holland, “I Stand All Amazed,” Ensign, August 1986.
11. Joseph Smith, HC 5:362; see also Teachings of Presidents of the Church: Joseph Smith (Salt Lake City: The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, 2007), 51.
12. George Albert Smith, CR, October 1905, 28; see also Teachings of Presidents of the Church: George Albert Smith (Salt Lake City: The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, 2011), 252.
13. Elbert Hubbard, The Note Book of Elbert Hubbard: Mottoes, Epigrams, Short Essays, Passages, Orphic Sayings and Preachments (New York: W. H. Wise, 1927), 23; emphasis added.
© by Intellectual Reserve, Inc. All rights reserved.
Bread or Stones: Understanding the God We Pray To
Eric Anderson turned me on to S. Michael Wilcox--Eric said he was his favorite speaker. This is a version of the first talk I found from Bro Wilcox. The one I heard had been on the BYU Speeches website, but it's no longer there. This one is close, though.
Devotional Talk Given at
Brigham Young University-Hawaii
https://devotional.byuh.edu/node/332
Brigham Young University-Hawaii
https://devotional.byuh.edu/node/332
March 31, 2009
S. Michael Wilcox
Religion Instructor & Author
CES Institute of Religion
Religion Instructor & Author
CES Institute of Religion
Well it’s wonderful to be here. I’m supposed to say Aloha, right? I’ve always wanted to do that and I got to do it, finally.
I think that the majesty of a church, the power of a church is best judged by the integrity of its youth and by the beauty of its music—and we certainly had that idea validated this morning, so I appreciate the wonderful music.
A number of years ago when my daughter was about your age, she was just out of high school, she went to one semester at BYU and then she got an opportunity to go to the Soviet Union (former Soviet Union) and teach English in Russia. Now this was before e-mail and cell phones, and communications between the United States and the Soviet Union were not going to be really good. She was eighteen; we were a little bit worried that there might be moments or times when she would need to talk with a parent, and not be able to because of communication difficulties. So I decided that I would write her a series of letters and try and figure out each situation she might find herself in that maybe she would want to talk to a mother or father over. So I wrote about a dozen letters and sealed them in envelopes, and on the outside of each envelope I put the topic of the letter: When You’re Discouraged; If You’re Tempted; When You Get Homesick. Now I tried to guess as many of those as I could, and I gave them to her at the airport.
She opened a number of them in Russia; some of them were not needed, and she opened them when she got home—to see what I had said. But I have often thought about the scriptures in a very similar manner. The scriptures are our Father in Heaven’s letters; only He knows more than I did as a father what you and I would need. There are times in our lives when we need to open the letter and communicate with our Father in Heaven, and understand what He is like and His concern for us. I would like to share this morning, with you, four letters from my Father in Heaven that have been very important to me—that I hope will be indicative of the power that the scriptures can be for us as we face different trials and challenges of our lives.
The first letter is called "The Fourth Watch." That letter comes from the sixth chapter of Mark. The Savior has fed the five thousand that day, and in the late afternoon, early evening, He is sending his apostles down into the ship. He will dismiss the multitude. He wishes to pray that evening, and then He will meet the apostles a little later on the shore and they are to pick Him up. In late afternoon, early evening, the apostles get on the ship; they push out in the Sea of Galilee. The Savior dismisses the multitude, and prays. The Savior could pray a long time; so, He prays late into the night. We read in Mark what takes place with the apostles:
And when he had sent them away, he departed into a mountain to pray. And when even was come, the ship was in the midst of the sea, and he alone on the land. And he saw them toiling in rowing; for the wind was contrary unto them: and about the fourth watch of the night he cometh unto them, walking upon the sea. (6:46-48) In John’s account of this particular story we read that the apostles had rowed the equivalent of about seventy-five football fields against the wind. There are times in our lives when we toil, rowing against the wind. We are trying to make progress and sometimes it seems that there are forces that are against us. There may be some great blessing that we deeply desire. There may be some trial that we want deeply to be over. And it doesn’t seem like we are making any headway against the wind. We wonder if the Lord is listening.
Now we need to understand something about our Father in Heaven, and that is that He is a fourth watch God.
The Hebrew night was divided into four watches. The first watch—six o’clock at night to nine [p.m.], second watch—nine to midnight, third watch—midnight to three in the morning, fourth watch—three in the morning to sunrise. Sometimes that creates a bit of a problem for us, certainly for me. I worship a fourth watch God. One who tends to feel that it is good to let His children toil in rowing against the wind to face a little opposition. My problem is that I am a first watch person. Now there is something inside of me that understands that it is good for me to toil in rowing against the wind. But certainly by the second watch He would come. And when the second watch has passed and He still has not come. Sometimes I forget that as Mark says, He is watching. He watched them toiling and rowing.
I began to make some assumptions that are often dangerous to make—maybe you make the same. We begin to assume that, number one, He is not there. That is why He’s not responding. And then we calm down and understand that He is there; He is always there. Then the second assumption is if He is there, He must not be listening. And then again, in calmer times—He always listens. Well then the third assumption is He must not care. No—He’s there, He listens, He cares. Maybe the most dangerous assumption, the fourth assumption is I must not be worthy. Now that fourth assumption we are probably correct on. But when has that ever stopped Him from responding; we are as worthy as we can be. We must assume that we have not yet reached the fourth watch; and He is a fourth watch God.
The scriptures are full of fourth watch stories: Joseph Smith in the Sacred Grove—“At the very moment I was ready to sink into despair” (JSH 1:16). Do you ever feel that way? “Just at this moment of great alarm, I saw a pillar of light” (JSH 1:16). It was when the widow of Zarephath was gathering two sticks to make a final meal for her and her son that Elijah came walking through the gate to save them from the famine (1 Kings 17). It was when the water was spent in the bottle and Hagar had placed Ishmael under a tree because she did not want to see his death, that the angel came to say, Hagar, what aileth thee? and showed her a source of water (Genesis 21:17).
We worship a fourth watch God. So when the trials aren’t over and the blessings don’t come, don’t assume that He is not there, or He is not listening, or He doesn’t care, or you’re not worthy. Always assume you have not yet reached the fourth watch.
Now occasionally people have said to me, “I’m sure I’m past the fourth watch.” I was once talking with Sheri Dew and she said later, “Mike, I think I’m in the ninth watch—now what?” Well, when you feel that you have passed the fourth watch, then we need another letter. We need another letter called Tight like a Dish. Now that is an expression I think you all will understand — ‘Tight like a dish.’ It’s the description of the Jaredite barges.
Now I have a tendency, because I’m an English major, to edit almost everything I read. It’s just a habit I can’t get out of with whatever I read—textbooks, newspapers, novels, biographies—I’m always editing. I edit the scriptures as I’m reading them. There are actually times where I say, “Lord, I could fix this verse for you if you would like me to.” And one of the verses that I used to think I would edit is Ether chapter two, the seventeenth verse; the description of the Jaredite barges. Can you realize what word I might write if I were editing this? This is how it reads:
“They were built after a manner that they were exceedingly tight, even that they would hold water like unto a dish”—that’s once. “And the bottom thereof was tight like unto a dish”—twice. “And the sides thereof were tight like unto a dish”—three times. “And the ends thereof were peaked; and the top thereof was tight like unto a dish; and the length thereof was the length of a tree; and the door thereof, when it was shut, was tight like unto a dish”—five times.
I would have written redundant. We get the impression they are waterproof. It’s like taking a jar and sealing it and throwing it. These are not submarines; they float light like a fowl, we are told, on the water. But the problem is that great waves are going to be washing over them, and so they need to be waterproof.
Now being ‘Tight like a dish’ causes two problems for the Jaredites’ crossing of the sea. Number one, minor problems, it was probably Mrs. Moriancumer who pointed them out to her husband: “We can’t breathe in here, and we can’t see, so unless we are going to get the Promised Land in sixty seconds, we’ve got big problems. Did you get the instructions right?”
And so Moriancumer, the brother of Jared, goes back to the Lord, and he presents his two problems. Now you learn something about your Father in Heaven in the solution or the handling of these two problems. Of the two problems—no air and no light—the Lord solves one of them just because He is asked. He tells them to put the holes in so they can have air. And sometimes when we go to the Lord, we simply ask and we will receive. He tells us the solution. The second problem we have to seek and find; for the second problem the Lord says, “You come up with a solution.” Now He put some parameters on that. He tells them, “You can’t go by windows”—probably not invented yet, and the second, “You can’t go by fire”—oxygen is a problem anyway. All that tossing around in the sea with coals flying everywhere probably wouldn’t be good, so you come up with a solution.
Now you are the brother of Jared. I want you to listen with his mind at what the Lord says because the twenty-fourth verse is a really interesting verse of Ether chapter two:
"Behold, ye shall be as a whale in the midst of the sea; for the mountain waves shall dash upon you. Nevertheless, I will bring you up again out of the depths of the sea; for the winds have gone forth out of my mouth, and also the rains and the floods have I sent forth."
Now the reason they need ‘Tight like a dish’ ships is because there are going to be mountain waves. Now what causes mountain waves in the ocean?—wind and storm. And what did the Lord just say the source of the winds were? “The winds have gone forth out of my mouth, and the rains and floods have I sent forth”—do you have a solution to the problem?
If I were the brother of Jared, I would have said, “Lord, we don’t need these ‘Tight like a dish’ ships at all. Since waves are the problem, and waves are caused by wind, and wind comes out of your mouth—blow softly. Blow softly. Breeze us to the Promised Land. We’ll sit on deck, we’ll fish, we’ll get tanned, we’ll play shuffleboard.” How many here want the first watch cruise version of life?—that’s me; I’m a first watch person. I don’t like mountain waves.
And then the great lesson: We know God can still the storms of our lives—we know that; there are precedents. But he prefers to do something else:
"Behold, I prepare you against these things; for ye cannot cross this great deep save I prepare you against the waves of the sea, and the winds which have gone forth, and the floods which shall come. What will ye that I should prepare for you that ye may have light when ye are swallowed up in the depths of the sea?" (Ether 2:25)
What we need to understand about our Father in Heaven is that He prefers to prepare us to face the storms of life, the contrary winds, rather than to still them. So if you are past your fourth watch and He has not come, don’t assume that He is not there, that He doesn’t care, He doesn’t listen, or that you are not worthy. Assume your ship is tight like a dish. You will not sink. Somewhere in the past of your life, experiences have been placed by a wise and foresighted Father in Heaven to prepare you to face the very things that you are facing. As the lion and the bear came to David, before Goliath, to prepare him to face Goliath, so will lion-and-bear moments come in your lives before the Goliath moments come. Because if your ship was not tight like a dish and you have reached the fourth watch, He will come to you and still the storm. So if the storm is not still, we must assume our ship is tight like a dish.
Sometimes we don’t understand the Lord’s answers because the answers that we are getting may not be the ones we particularly want. And so we go to another letter I call Bread or Stones.
In Luke, the eleventh chapter, when the disciples asked Jesus to teach them about prayer, He introduced it with a parable, and then He said,
"Ask, and it shall be given you; seek, and ye shall find; knock, and it shall be opened unto you. For every one that asketh receiveth; and he that seeketh findeth; and to him that knocketh it shall be opened. If a son shall ask bread of any of you that is a father, will he give him a stone? or if he ask a fish, will he for a fish give him a serpent? Or if he shall ask an egg, will he offer him a scorpion? If ye then, being evil, (meaning being human, imperfect) know how to give good gifts unto your children: how much more shall your heavenly Father give (good things, give) the Holy Spirit to them that ask him?" (9-13)
Now the Lord’s prayer is introduced with a phrase; the Savior says your father in Heaven knows what you need before you ask Him (Matthew 6:8). We are also counseled in the scriptures to tell the Lord our desires. Now that may cause a problem. I know what I desire and God knows what I need. I am always hoping that those are the same. But what if what I need and what I desire are not the same?—and the Lord says, “Mike, you get to choose what you need and what you desire.” I’m afraid in my worse moments I may say, “Well if it’s just the same to you Father, I’d like what I desire, rather than what I need.”
C.S. Lewis calls the desired need the ‘expected good’; and, the needed good he sometimes called the ‘given good.’ All things given from God are good; and, sometimes if what I desire is different from what I need, if what I expect is different from what I’m given, I may, if I’m not careful, turn the given bread into a stone. I may turn the given fish into a serpent. I may view the given egg as a scorpion because it is not what I anticipated, what I asked for, what I hoped for—what I desired.
What we must understand about our Father in Heaven is that He only gives bread; He never gives stones. He only gives fish; He never gives serpents. He only gives eggs; He never gives scorpions.
May I illustrate: As long as I can remember I wanted to go on a mission and I knew where I wanted to go. I wanted to go to Denmark. My mother is Danish; my grandparents were born and raised in Denmark; I idolized my grandfather—I wanted to go to Denmark on a mission. Everybody in our family went to Denmark. My grandfather went to Denmark, my uncles went to Denmark, my cousins went to Denmark. If you’re in my family, you go to Denmark. So I, as my mission call approached, began to pray to the Lord that He would send me to Denmark.
The problem was back in southern California, where I grew up, they didn’t teach Danish in high school. They taught French, and I had four years of French. So as my mission call approached, I began to have a feeling of impending doom that I was going to go to France instead of to Denmark.
France would have been okay, except that I had a French teacher from Paris who was so proud of her French language; if you mispronounced something, she would throw chalk or erasers at you. She would walk up and down the aisles throwing a piece of chalk, and then she would turn on you and fire a French question at you. Just the look in her eyes would drive every French word right out of my brain, and I would try and answer, and she would get mad, and she would throw the chalk at me, and I thought, if this is what the French are like, I don’t want to go to France; two years of that would be bad. I want to go to Denmark.
But I had a feeling of impending doom that I would go to France. As my mission call approached, I finally realized that it was probably not appropriate to tell the Lord where you wanted to go on your mission, so I changed my prayers. I did not feel that it was inappropriate to eliminate one country from all the countries God could send you to. And so I began to pray, “I’ll go anywhere Lord, please don’t send me to France. They speak French in Tahiti.”
On the day my mission call came, I was at work.
I was driving home from work, and I knew my mission call was there, and I knew it said France, and I didn’t want to go home. I lingered at work; I drove slowly, hoping for red lights. And finally I was so discouraged that just before I turned the corner to my home, I pulled off to the side, turned the car off, parked it, and gave one final prayer. You’re going to think I’m making this up, but I actually prayed this; I said, “Father in Heaven, I know my mission call is at home, and I know it says France. Thou art all powerful; thou art merciful and loving. Please—thou canst do all things—please change it in the envelope.”
With a certain amount of hope, I drove home and opened my mission call. What did it say?—France. Of course it said France. Actually, I think it originally said Denmark, and the Lord said, “We need to teach this boy something, so let’s send him to France.” Now, could I have ruined my mission?—yes. I could have spent two years wanting to be in Denmark, but I learned to love the French people, love their language—beautiful language.
God listens to prayers in all languages, but He answers them in French. They are beautiful, wonderful people. I had a great mission. I found out when I got home that I had French ancestors, and, that I served in some of the cities where they had lived. God did not give me a stone. A stone, when you want bread, is something useless. God does not give useless things. He did not give me a serpent; a serpent, when you want a fish, is something harmful. He does not give harmful things; He only gives bread, and fish, and eggs.
Sometimes we don’t get answers because there is no place for God to put the answer. In the Doctrine & Covenants, the ninety-eighth section, in the first few verses, the Lord introduces another idea of another letter. I call it Holding Places of the Heart.
"I say unto you my friends, fear not, let your hearts be comforted; rejoice evermore, and in everything give thanks; Waiting patiently on the Lord, for your prayers have entered into the ears of the Lord of Sabaoth, and are recorded with this seal and testament—the Lord hath sworn and decreed they shall be granted. He giveth this promise unto you, with an immutable covenant that they shall be fulfilled; and all things wherewith you have been afflicted shall work together for your good." (1-3)
Now God tends to do everything backwards; we worship a backwards God, in a sense. I say, “Lord, help me understand and then I can believe.” But in the scriptures, the Lord says, “No, believe and then you will understand.” I say that’s backwards, and He says, “No, you have it backwards.” So here the Lord says, “Be comforted, rejoice, give thanks, then I’ll answer your prayers.” And I say, “Lord, answer my prayers, and then I’ll be comforted, rejoice, and give thanks.” That is backwards.
Now sometimes the reason the Lord doesn’t answer is because He has a wonderful answer, a comforting answer, a rejoicing answer, and He says, “Where do I put it? There is no place yet in your heart, in your mind for me to put the answer. But life will create a holding place for the answer. So be patient; in time it will come. I have recorded your prayers. I know your needs. I will answer it when the holding place has been created.”
Let me give you an example of that if I may:
My parents were divorced when I was one year old. My father, for not the best of reasons, left the family. That caused certain concerns, certain problems, certain challenges for my mother, my two sisters, and myself.
If you were age fourteen and you were me and you prayed, “Father in Heaven, help me be at peace and forgive my father for having left his family,” that’s a good prayer; that’s a good desire—I received no answer.
At eighteen, you’re praying, “Father in Heaven, help me be at peace and find solace, and comfort, and forgiveness about this particular episode.”
My father had very little to do with us as we were growing up. One day a year he would take us to Lagoon in Utah. That was my only contact with my father, growing up. I got married. I’m praying. I had two daughters, two sons. Now I’m over thirty years of age.
One day I was preparing to give a talk on parenting. Now my mother was an absolute saint. I can’t imagine a boy being given a greater mother than the mother I was given; and everybody who knows my mother would agree with that. I was thinking, as I was preparing to talk about how to raise children, that I would talk about my mother. But the Spirit seemed to say, “You need to talk, and you need to think about your father.” I wondered, “What do I say about my father? I hardly know my father. I was not raised with him; I had no contact with my father.”
Just at that moment as I’m pondering about my father, my two sons—I had two at the time, my third son wasn’t born yet—they were about six and two years of age; they came in and they stood in front of me where I was sitting in the family room; they just stood there in front of me staring at me, the older brother standing behind his younger brother. I looked at those two boys and the Spirit just washed my brain with memories of things I had done with those boys. Simple things, nothing important: Trick-or-treating, carving Halloween pumpkins, Christmas mornings, blowing out birthday candles, looking at turtles at the pond, piggyback rides, listening to their Primary talks, listening to their prayers, bedtime stories, the first puppy, catching a fish in the same fishing hole I caught my first fish in.
Nothing critical, nothing important. Just the everyday memories that I as a father had shared with those boys in six years of my being a father. As I was thinking of those things, the Lord said, “Now Mike, life has carved a holding place in your heart, and I will give you the answer”; and this is what He said: “Now that you are a father, now that you know a father’s joys and love, would you be the son who lost his father? Or the father who lost his son?”
Do you understand what the Lord was saying to me? I began to weep. I just sobbed. I grabbed those two boys and I just hugged them, sobbing—not for me—for my father. Because I knew the tragedy of his life greater than he knew it. I knew what he missed. I knew that it was a greater tragedy for him to have missed all those wonderful things with his family, than it was for me, as a son, to have missed them with a father.
My wife came in, she said, “For heaven’s sake Mike, what’s the matter?” I was sobbing, clinging to my boys. I said, “I can’t talk about it now.” I went up to the bathroom and just cried and cried, cried myself dry—for my father.
God always had an answer. But why didn’t He give it to me at age fourteen, or eighteen, or when I was married, or when I was the father of two daughters? It had to be when I was the father of boys and had shared enough life with those boys to comprehend the answer that God would give. The easiest thing in the world for me to forgive was my father for having left the family. But it took life to create the space for God to put the answer.
May I share one final, tiny, little letter with you, because we’re on the islands? We have talked about waves, and sea, and stilling storms, and rowing against the wind; I thought that would all be appropriate for here. The Doctrine & Covenants begins with an image, created first by Isaiah, of the isles of the sea (you have heard that expression all the time):
"Hearken, O ye people of my church, saith the voice of him who dwells on high, and whose eyes are upon all men; yea, verily I say: Hearken ye people from afar; and ye that are upon the islands of the sea, listen together."
The Doctrine & Covenants begins with the islands of the sea. You are living on and many of you are from a symbol of God’s love for all the world.
The very first time I came to Hawaii, I was sitting on an airplane next to a young African American basketball player from Detroit. He kept looking out the window, nervously. All through the flight, he kept looking out the window nervously, and finally he turned to me and he said, “How do they find it in all this water?” I could tell that he had images of circling around the Pacific, which is a big ocean, trying to find these tiny little islands out there. How did they find it?
I think it is interesting that one of the first missionary labors, the very first foreign speaking mission, was to an island of the sea in French Polynesia. And if God will see that the gospel is taught on Fiji, and Tahiti, and Hawaii, and Samoa, and Tonga, He will see that it will be taught in China, and India, and Egypt, and Saudi Arabia. And if there is a temple on Tahiti, and Hawaii, and Samoa, and Tonga, and New Zealand, all the islands of the sea—places that many people wouldn’t even be able to find on a map—if God is going to put a temple on all those tiny little dots of land in behalf of the people that live there, it is His assurance, His testimony to all of us that He will put a temple in Beijing, and Cairo, and New Delhi, and Jakarta, and Moscow.
You are on God’s chosen symbol that He remembers all His people, all His children, and many of you will be His message as you go back to those countries and represent His voice, His assurance that God is aware of all. May you search God’s letters when you need them; may your fourth watches come quickly; may your ship be tight like a dish. May God, as He does, always give you bread, and may you recognize that it always is bread. May life carve the holding places in your heart, and may you realize as you walk on this living symbol of God’s love for all the world that if the gospel is preached on the islands of the sea, it will be preached in all the world one day with its fullest blessings. For that day I hope and pray for in the name of Jesus Christ, amen.
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