Tender Mercies

Last fall, turmoil was swirling around me. My father was dying, people I loved were suffering terribly, my work environment was chaotic, and I was dealing with the loss of some deeply held dreams. “Hope” became my mantra. I clung to it. I needed it. The gospel is a gospel of hope, and now, more than ever before, hope was essential. I needed it to survive.

Shortly before Christmas, a work colleague—someone I see only occasionally—left a card for me in my office. I opened the envelope and took out a small gift: a silver “hope” ornament. My colleague knew my father had cancer, but she didn’t know about the rest of what I was facing. She had no idea of the special meaning that hope had taken on for me. The ornament is still hanging in my office.

Fast forward to one night last April. My father had died the previous month, and the rest of the turmoil had only increased. More than anything else, my heart ached for my loved ones, whose pain I couldn’t assuage. The path seemed dark and unending, and I felt helpless and longed for comfort. I prayed, sobbing, “Will this ever end? Or is this how life will be until I die?” At the close of my prayer, I waited for some sort of response—an impression, a sense of peace, anything. Instead—silence. I felt very alone.

As a last feeble effort, I thought I should at least open up my scriptures. My tear-filled gaze immediately fell on Proverbs 23:17, which conveyed no special meaning to me. But then I saw the next verse:

For surely there is an end; and thine expectation shall not be cut off.

Wow. I stared at the words. And then I reached for my NIV translation. It read:

There is surely a future hope for you, and your hope will not be cut off.

Could it be--? Did God just speak to me? Really? Out of the approximately 31,000 verses in the Bible, I happened to turn to one verse—one sentence, even—that seemed to address my situation perfectly. And in more than one way. But—really? It seemed too good to be true.

I tend to be somewhat skeptical about things like this. Yes, I will plead for an answer, and then I question it when it comes. But was it really an answer? Or just an amazing (and cruel) coincidence?

Another thing that made this experience quite unusual is that it followed two other experiences, within a 10-day period, when I had turned directly to a scripture that spoke to my situation. I’ve opened up the scriptures a million times, and receiving such direct inspiration is a rare experience for me. And yet three times in such a short period! Did I need comfort so desperately that I was simply reading into those words?

About a week later, a member of our Relief Society taught a lesson on the scriptures. I was given a quote from Elder Richard G. Scott to share. I didn’t look at it until it was my turn to read it out loud. In it, Elder Richard G. Scott related an experience in which he was inspired to share three different scriptures with a young missionary. The quote ended with the words: “This treasured experience is one of many that demonstrate how the Lord respects words recorded by his servants in scripture, and how he expects us to use them often to find the kernels of truth we need to resolve difficulties in our own lives.” As I read the words, I thought, “Hey. This applies to me.”

But it didn’t end there. Several weeks ago I received a call from a member of our stake presidency. He asked me to speak in the Saturday session of our stake conference, which was held last weekend. The topic? “Using the scriptures as a guide to life, especially for comfort and inspiration.” Apparently the stake 
had to listen to me give a talk so that God could prove a point to me.

That scripture from Proverbs is now on a note hanging on my bathroom mirror. I read it and repeat it to myself every day. I believe God did speak to me through that scripture. I don’t know how the situations that trouble me will be resolved. But there is an end. And there is hope. There is always, always hope.

Quote of the Day...

"It is not as a child that I believe and confess Jesus Christ. My hosanna is born of a furnace of doubt." ~ Fyodor Dostoevsky

God-Shaped Hole

I have a confession to make: lately I have been spending way too much time on the Internet. Mind you, I don't frequent unsavory sites. But it's like I'm searching for something somehow—and all the while I know that the Web is not where I'll find it.

How many of us do that? We spend too much time shopping, watching TV, raiding the fridge—all in an effort to fill a void. Yet instead we end up accumulating debt, piling on the pounds, wasting time, losing hold of our agency—sometimes even falling into addiction. And the hole keeps getting bigger.

The French philosopher Blaise Pascal says this about the void:

"What does this craving, and this helplessness, proclaim but that there was once in man a true happiness, of which all that now remains is the empty print and trace? This he tries in vain to fill with everything around him, seeking in things that are not there the help he cannot find in those that are, though none can help, since this infinite abyss can be filled only with an infinite and immutable object, in other words by God himself."

Sometimes this "abyss" Pascal refers to is called a "God-shaped hole." Each of us comes to earth with a hole in our souls, a yearning for God that we misinterpret as mere loneliness or angst or restlessness, but only God can satisfy it.

The prophet Isaiah asks, speaking messianically: "Wherefore do ye spend money for that which is not bread? And your labour for that which satisfieth not? Hearken diligently unto me, and eat ye that which is good, and let your soul delight itself in fatness" (Isaiah 55:2). I like the New American Standard Bible version of this last phrase: "Delight yourself in abundance."

Isaiah is talking about the same condition I am describing here. The remedy, he says, is to hearken unto Christ and to "eat . . . that which is good." Isaiah isn't referring to physical food. We know that the scriptures contain many references to the Savior as "the bread of life"—born in Bethlehem, the "house of bread." We are told to "feast" on his words. In the Old Testament, the wandering Israelites were fed with manna from heaven, symbolic of the spiritual feast Christ would provide.

It is only through such feasting that we can find the satisfaction, peace, and fulfillment our souls crave. Unlike eating physical food—or surfing the Net, buying material things, or popping a pill— "feasting on the word" does not always provide immediate gratification. It's a process, and the rewards build over time. Sometimes the rewards come at unpredictable times. But they do come.

There is, in fact, a purpose for the void each of us feels at times: it motivates us to seek Christ. Regardless of the bad habits we've formed, regardless of our previous attempts to avoid Him, He stands by, ever patient, ever willing to receive us. And when we choose to consistently look to Him rather than to something else, then we can delight in abundance and be filled.

A Purpose for Solitude

I’m an editor, and my job is a rather solitary one. Fortunately I have a lot going on outside of work, but at the end of the day, I still go home to an empty house. This is challenging for me, but I am going to try to view my alone time in a different way.

I have realized that God often allows some of His children to be alone for an extended period of time, and He uses those times to teach important lessons. Yes, we are told in Genesis, “It is not good that the man [or woman] should be alone” (Genesis 2:18). But the scriptures also contain many examples of people who were divinely tutored and strengthened during extended periods of solitude.

Moroni is a notable example. After the Nephites were killed by the Lamanites following the “great and tremendous battle at Cumorah,” Moroni spent twenty years wandering “whithersoever I can for the safety of mine own life” (Moroni 1:3). Twenty years. How he must have ached for human companionship during that time. But when he writes his final words, he doesn’t dwell on his loneliness but instead bears powerful witness, again and again, of the living reality of the Savior. Despite the awful scenes of carnage he has viewed and the anguish he must feel after losing everyone he loves, he writes not of grief or hopelessness but of miracles and spiritual gifts. What miracles and gifts he must have received during those lonely years!

Moroni also gives stern and urgent warning about the dangers of unbelief. It is as if he is pleading with his future readers, “Whatever your circumstances, don’t turn away from God. If you do, you will not see what I have seen. You will not experience what I have experienced.”

For those of us who have to spend an extended time alone—due to prolonged singleness, the loss of a loved one, a move away from home, or any other cause—could it be that we, like Moroni, can receive miracles and spiritual gifts as we turn to the Lord?

Other scriptural figures had to spend much time alone and would have perished without the Lord’s sustaining hand. The prophet Elijah, for example, was commanded to flee to the brook Cherith when his life was in danger. There, he had to be completely dependent upon the Lord, who miraculously provided for him by commanding ravens to bring him “bread and flesh” (1 Kings 17:1-6).

Similarly, when Hagar was cast out of Abraham’s household, she was forced to go into the wilderness with her young son Ishmael. Soon the bread and water she carried were gone. What fear and despair she must have felt! But though she couldn’t see Him, the Lord was watchful. When she thought she couldn't go on any longer, He “opened her eyes” so that she could see how He would sustain her and her child (Genesis 21:9-21).

I am reminded of a passage in the book of Deuteronomy. The unruly Israelites spent 40 long years wandering in the wilderness before reaching the Promised Land. We know they were often discouraged; surely they must have felt lonely too as they traveled.

Not long before reaching their destination, Moses said to them: “ And thou shalt remember all the way which the Lord thy God led thee these forty years in the wilderness, to humble thee, and to prove thee, to know what was in thine heart, whether thou wouldest keep his commandments, or no.

“And he humbled thee, and suffered thee to hunger, and fed thee with manna, which thou knewest not” (Deuteronomy 8:2-3).

Perhaps we too are being proved during our solitary times. What will the Lord find in our hearts? Will we continue to keep His commandments? Will we recognize the manna He sends us? When we reach our own promised land, will we bear witness of the loneliness we felt or of the times when we were succored?

When I reach my own promised land, I hope the Lord will be pleased with the condition of my heart. I hope I will have learned that I can receive guidance and strength as I turn to Him—and that I am never truly alone.

Overheard

Twice a week I work at a residential center for people with serious mental illnesses. The other day I heard this:

Resident 1: Did you know that unicorns are mentioned in the Bible?

Resident 2: No.

Resident 1: But they aren’t around anymore because they never got on Noah’s ark.

Resident 2: Yeah?

Resident 1: They played too much. When the other animals got the call, they just kept on playing.

Resident 2: Oh.

Persisting Despite the Questions

Over the years, when I've found myself feeling confused about questions that don’t seem to have ready answers, I have pondered the experience of my dear friend Michele.

When Michele and I were both seniors in high school, her mom was diagnosed with cancer. Despite the fact that the cancer quickly spread throughout her body, she received numerous blessings from different priesthood holders in which she was promised a full restoration of health. She and her family clung to those promises in faith—until her body finally gave out and she passed away about five years after her diagnosis.

As you can imagine, not only did Michele have to deal with the wrenching loss of her mother, but she was troubled by many unanswered questions. It just didn’t make sense. And as her friend, I, too, was terribly confused. That wasn’t the kind of story I had ever heard in church or read about in the Church magazines.

Several years later, Michele got married, and soon afterward she became very sick and had to be bedridden much of the time. For ten years she tried to find solutions, but nothing worked. Finally one night, after a particularly difficult time—she’d had one crippling migraine after another—her husband gave her a priesthood blessing. I’m sure Michele had received other blessings during her illness, but in this particular blessing she was promised that she had been sick long enough, that she was supposed to learn lessons from this experience, and that she was now healed.

She went to bed shortly afterward, and the next morning, she woke up feeling fine—and the next morning, and the next.

For the first year or so after she told me about that blessing, I have to admit that I would steel myself every time I called and asked her how she was doing—waiting for her to say, “I’m sick again.” But it’s been about four years now, and she still has a clean bill of health—still has the energy to do all those things she dreamed of doing during the years she spent mostly in bed.
Michele would be the first person to say that it wasn’t “the power of positive thinking” that made her get better. It wasn't the placebo effect. By the time her husband gave her that blessing, she had learned that she didn’t always understand the way the Lord worked, and she hadn’t been counting on any particular outcome. She simply left it in the Lord’s hands.

After that agonizing experience with her mom—after dealing with all those feelings of betrayal and confusion and doubt—Michele hadn’t turned her back on the Lord. She didn’t walk away. And because of that, she was in a position to receive a great gift from Him—a gift she hadn’t demanded or even expected.

When I asked her once how she made sense of her experience, she shook her head and said, “Some things I just have to place on my spiritual back-burner. I figure the answers to my questions will come at a later time.

“I compare it to trying to teach algebra to my four-year-old,” she continued. “I could try to explain the concepts to her in the simplest terms, using the easiest words I can think of, and she still wouldn’t understand. She just doesn’t have the capacity to understand yet. And that’s like you and me and everyone else—we don’t always have the capacity to understand how the Lord works. That’s where faith comes in.”

Faith—the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen.

I remind myself that when we have faith in Christ, we let go of outcomes. We can hope for a promise to be fulfilled, but if our faith is conditional upon that outcome, we are building our house upon the sand, and sooner or later we will fall. Our ultimate faith must be placed in Christ. And someday the answers will come.

Miracle of the Hiking Boots

A few years ago, a friend and I went to Kauai, Hawaii, to backpack along the Kalalau Trail. This arduous, 11-mile trail leads through the dense Hawaiian jungle to a secluded beach paradise that was my friend’s favorite place on earth. My friend had been going through a particularly difficult and discouraging time, and so when she asked if I would accompany her on this trip, I was happy to help get her mind off things—and I was looking forward to a new adventure.

Several days before the big hike, we went on a preliminary hike along the first few miles of the trail. The rocky trail was covered with thick red mud, and for the life of me I could not seem to stay upright. My hiking boots slipped and slid all over those rocks—I still have a thin white scar on my calf from one fall. Worst of all, when we got back to the car, my feet were killing me.

Now, I had had my cheap boots for years, and they had taken me up numerous trails before, including Half Dome in Yosemite and Mount Timpanogos. I had always figured that having painful feet was just the price you paid for a rigorous hike. But this time, I knew I couldn’t take one more step in those boots. And the tread was too worn down to grip the rocks. (I know—I was a pretty naïve hiker and should’ve figured that out long before then.)

It’s usually not a good idea to hike a long distance in new boots—but I knew my only option was to find a new pair, and fast! So when we got back to the condo where we were staying, we opened up the phone book and called every shoe and sporting goods store we could find. We soon learned, however, that while it’s easy to buy flip-flops and rubber sandals in Hawaii, apparently nobody sells hiking boots there. What would I do? What if I couldn’t go on the hike?

Finally, as a last resort, we decided that the following day we would go to a little shopping area that we had visited previously. That night I prayed fervently, Heavenly Father, please help me find some boots tomorrow. Please don’t let me ruin this trip for my friend.

The next day we visited all the shops, and at each one we heard the same thing: “No hiking boots.” So we visited the very last store, and when I asked, “Do you carry hiking boots?” the clerk gave the expected answer. But then I noticed a few shoe boxes stacked behind her. Her eyes followed my glance, and she said with a shrug, “Oh—I guess we do have a few pair. I’m new here.”

Wouldn’t you know—there was one pair in my size, and although they weren’t very cute, they fit beautifully, like they were made for my feet. I am convinced they were the only pair of hiking boots in my size on the entire island of Kauai. I am also convinced that the Lord led me to those boots. They carried me along the entire 22 miles of the trip, my friend and I had a great time, and even though my knees ached for a couple months afterward, my feet never hurt at all.

Now, I know that in the eternal scheme of things, finding a pair of hiking boots may not seem that important. Sometimes I find myself wondering: Why does Heavenly Father answer some seemingly insignificant prayers and leave other, more important requests unanswered? Why would He help me find a pair of hiking boots but not help me find a spouse? Why would He help someone find a missing contact lens but not help a parent find answers for a wayward child? Why would He help someone find a lost set of car keys but not help a paraplegic find a way to walk again?

I will never have all the answers in this life, but I think one of the reasons He grants us these “tender mercies” is to remind us that He is there and that He does hear us. During those times when it seems our prayers are met with cosmic silence, we can think back to those occasions when we were divinely led—to a pair of hiking boots, a new job, a kind friend—and we can know that, just as He is aware of each tiny sparrow, He is involved in the details of our lives. And all of our righteous requests will one day be answered according to His wisdom, His will, and His timing.