This past week I with co-workers gathered around the television to watch some of the first pictures that came in from Madrid, Spain showing the disturbing images of what could hardly be recognized as an airplane. Individuals including children and vacationing families were taken in one swift moment from this life to the next.As we watched no one spoke a word for minutes as we listened to reporters and witnesses tell the story as they had seen it. A co-worker finally broke the silence chiming in with the cynical statement: “well,” he said, “I guess God must have been playing an away game again.”
It is easy in a world full of tragedy to think this way. In the past two years our family has been close to two young couples with small and in both cases infant children in which the husband was diagnosed with a life threatening brain tumor. We have rejoiced in the recovery of one of these young men and of course been heartbroken with the loss of the other as we have watched a young mother of 3 endure the sadness of losing her eternal companion for this life.
Caught up in the pain of such moments we sometimes ask: How could a good and loving God in heaven allow such things to happen? Or – How could God abandon me in such a way? Or – Where is God when it hurts? In the depths of the deplorable conditions of Liberty Jail Joseph Smith cried out, “Oh God, where art thou?” – a petition I am sure, at one time or another, we have all made.
It is this subject in particular that I want to talk to you about today: Where God is in the midst of our trials as well as what role he plays in the challenges and set backs of life. In speaking to BYU students over 50 years ago, then Elder Spencer W. Kimball asked some tough questions about human suffering and tragedy, and at the same time provided a provocative and elevated perspective on God:
"Was it the Lord who directed the plane into the mountain to snuff out the lives of its occupants," Elder Kimball asked, "or were there mechanical faults or human errors? Did our Father in heaven take the life of the young mother or prompt the child to toddle into the canal …? Did the Lord cause the man to suffer a heart attack? Was the death of the missionary untimely? Answer if you can," said Elder Kimball, "I cannot, for though I know God has a major role in our lives, I do not know how much he causes to happen and how much he merely permits… could the Lord have prevented these tragedies?" Elder Kimball continues, "The answer is, yes. The Lord is omnipotent, with all power to control our lives, save us pain, prevent all accidents, fly all planes, feed us, protect us, save us from labor, effort, sickness, even from death, if he will. But he will not…the basic gospel law is free agency and eternal development. To force us to be careful or (to be) righteous would be to nullify that fundamental law and make growth impossible."
It seems Elder Kimball is letting us know that there is a fundamental difference between a loving God which ALLOWS tragedies and mishaps to take place versus the almighty CAUSING them to take place.
It is especially difficult for persons who view God solely as a dispenser of good gifts and happy times to fathom in what way - if any - he is related to earthly trauma. Having been brought up with the constant teaching that "God is love," or "God is good" we inevitably equate such goodness with kindness. I love the works and words of C.S. Lewis but the following is perhaps one of my most favorite things he said: "By the goodness of God, we mean nowadays almost exclusively His lovingness; and in this we may be right. And by Love, in this context, most of us mean kindness – the desire to see others than the self happy; not happy in this way or in that, but just happy. What would really satisfy us would be a God who said of anything we happened to like doing, ‘What does it matter so long as they are contented?’ We want, in fact, not so much a Father in Heaven as a grandfather in heaven – a senile benevolence who, as they say, ‘liked to see (the) young people enjoying themselves,’ and whose plan for the universe was simply that it might be truly said at the end of each day, 'a good time was had by all.'
Brothers and Sisters we of course know and understand the true character and nature of God to be somewhat different. Rather, we understand that God’s goodness is absolute purity – like that of a blast furnace. God always does the right thing. God always does what is best. God always does things without error or without prejudice. Such a God might not always be likable or even comfortable. But such a God may always be worthy of worship.
As a young Boy Scout I learned a valuable lesson from my Metalworking merit badge counselor. He opened the scriptures to one of the last pages of the Old Testament and read to us from the book of Malachi:
Malachi 3
2) ...for he (referring to our Father in Heaven) is like a refiner’s fire...
3) And he shall sit as a refiner and purifier of silver: and he shall purify the sons of Levi, and purge them as gold and silver, that they may offer unto the Lord an offering in righteousness.
The counselor then took a piece of unrefined silver and held it over the extreme heat of the fire. He explained that, in refining silver, one needed to hold the silver in the middle of the fire where the flames were hottest so as to burn away all the impurities. The silversmith is required to sit and watch the silver very carefully during the entire process because if it is left for a moment too long in the flames it can overheat and absorb to much oxygen which then makes the silver unworkable and therefore useless to the worker. How does the refiner know when the silver is ready and the impurities have been removed – that’s the easy part he says – I know it is ready when I can see my image reflected in it.
This story has brought a new meaning to the question posed by Alma, "…can you look up, having the image of God engraven upon your countenances?"
To quote Lewis again: "(God) has paid us the intolerable compliment of loving us, in the deepest, most tragic, most inexorable sense…We are," he continued, "not metaphorically but in very truth, a devine work of art, something that God is making, and therefore something with which He will not be satisfied until it has a certain character.”(Thus it is perfectly) “natural for us to wish that God had designed for us a less glorious and less arduous destiny; but then we are wishing not for more love - but for less"
Hebrews 12
6) For whom the Lord loveth he chasteneth, and scourgeth every son whom he receiveth.
11) Now no chastening for the present seemeth to be joyous, but grievous: nevertheless afterward it yieldeth the peaceable fruit of righteousness unto them which are exercised thereby.
The Father is the Husbandman, the Vinedresser. The Savior is the vine and we are the branches. The Vinedresser chooses the manner in which he will purge the branches. Why? Notice from John 15, “every branch that beareth fruit, he (the Father) purgeth it, that it may bring forth more fruit.”
Every one of us will come face to face during our lives with burdens and trials. We may lose a loved one, suffer financial setbacks, be heartbroken over a wandering child who has lost their way or deal with the pain of self doubt. We question ourselves. We question our faith. We question our God. These are of course natural reactions to trauma – especially when each one of us would be perfectly content to remain perfectly content. But that’s not why we’re here.
Questions such as “Why is this happening” are not the right questions to ask. The answer to why is this happening is because we are mortal. Because things like this happen in a mortal world. No one of us is required by God to enjoy suffering or to anticipate with delight the next trial. On the other hand it makes little sense for us to come to this world to be proven and then ask why we are being proven.
Elder Richard G Scott taught: “When you face adversity, you can be led to ask many questions. Some serve a useful purpose; others do not. To ask, Why does this have to happen to me? Why do I have to suffer this, now? What have I done to cause this? will lead you into blind alleys… Rather ask, What am I to do? What am I to learn from this experience? What am I to change? Whom am I to help? How can I remember my many blessings in times of trial?”
President Boyd K. Packer explained:
“There are three parts to the plan. You are in the second or the middle part, the one in which you will be tested by temptation, by trials, perhaps by tragedy… Understand that, and you will be better able to make sense of life and to resist the disease of doubt and despair and depression…If you expect to find only ease and peace and bliss during Act II, you surely will be frustrated. You will understand little of what is going on and why it is permitted to be as they are.
“Remember this!” Elder Packer said, “The line ‘And they all lived happily ever after’ is never written into the second act [of a play]. That line belongs in the third act, when the mysteries are solved and everything is put right. …”
Brother Robert Millet former Dean of Religious Education at BYU related the following experience as he and his wife Shauna dealt with the agony of a wandering child. He said he was approached one day by a fellow professor familiar with his trails and asked the question, “Bob, do you think our Heavenly Parents wander throughout the heavens in morose agony over their straying children?” Startled a bit by the question he thought for a moment and said, “no, I don’t think so. I know they feel pain, but I honestly can’t picture them living in eternal misery.” Then his friend responded: “Ask yourself why they do not do so and it will make a difference in your life forever.” Brother Millet goes on to say that he did not get much work done for the rest of the day. He went home that night and with his wife set out in a prayerful quest over the next several days to understand how our Eternal Father and Mother deal with their pain. “In time,” he explained, “it began to dawn on us that the Lord knows the end from the beginning, and that, as Joseph the Prophet declared, all things – past, present, and future – are and were with Him “one eternal ‘now.’” Perspective. PERSPECTIVE. That was the answer. God deals with pain through and by virtue of his infinite and perfect perspective. Gods own faith in the outcome of His plan of salvation is perfect. Gods own faith in the redeeming mission of His Son our Savior and in that of His Atonement is without doubt or question. Although Satan and his forces of evil will win many skirmishes the ultimate delivery and victory of the faithful is ensured. What we need for the time being to do is to seek through prayer and fasting for at least a portion of our God’s perspective.
Early in the spring of this past year I felt I was being taught a bit of this principle in the following example: I had the wonderfully gut-splitting opportunity to attend game 7 of the 2001 Baseball World Series which pitted the Arizona Diamondbacks against the New York Yankees. Many call that 7-game series one of the greatest ever played. The Diamondbacks were facing one of the great sport dynasties in history and I am sure the tension and excitement is not too far from the memories of those of you who watched the games. What I am sure is also not too far from the memories of those who remember is a certain un-named relief pitcher who the manager kept sending out to only give up leads and home runs. In the games I watched at home I must have believed that if I shouted loud enough at the screen somehow Bob Brenly would hear my protests. My son Drew at the time was just an infant and I could tell by the disapproving glances of my wife that it would probably be better that I went to game 7 instead of scare and set a bad example of temperament to my young and impressionable son. The final game of the series was just as exciting and gut-wrenching as you would hope it would be. It came down to one pitch and one spray single just out of the reach of the infield. The Diamondbacks won and we cheered and celebrated.
This past Spring in an effort - I am sure - to raise season tickets purchases - they decided to air highlights of the 2001 World Series on television as well as the entire 7th game. I realized that because I was there in person I never had the chance to see the game up close and from the cameras angle. So Drew (now 6) and I sat down on a Saturday morning to watch the game. I noticed, as did my wife, an almost immediate change in my temperament. The boos from the crowds and Yankee Stadium in the Bronx and the utter and complete blindness of Umpires which seemed to exist before did not bother me. Players struck out, home runs were hit, errors were made – it did not bother me. Why? Because, I knew the eventual outcome of the game – The Diamondbacks were to be the World Champions. My prior frustrations were replaced with grins as though to say, “ah yes, the suspense of it all made for good theater.”
I in no way wish to trivialize your trails and sufferings nor my own with cute references to games and stories. As a counselor to a bishop I am not acquainted with names and details, but I do sense the levity of the sorrows and concerns he shares with you – both known and unknown. I testify that he is God’s chosen servant to guide this ward at this time.
I know the day is coming when all the wrongs, the awful wrongs of this life, will be righted, when the God of justice will attend to all evil. Those things that are beyond our power to control will be corrected either here or hereafter. Many of us may come to enjoy the lifting, liberating power of the Atonement in this life, and all our losses will be made up before we pass from this sphere of existence. Perhaps some of us will wrestle all our days with our traumas and our trails. But He who orchestrates the events of our lives will surely fix the time or our release.
The Book of Revelations in the New Testament is all about the assured victory of God and his people over the forces of evil. It contains in my view one of the more beautiful scriptures of hope as we face our trials:
13 And one of the elders answered, saying unto me, What are these which are arrayed in white robes? and whence came they?
14 And I said unto him, Sir, thou knowest. And he said to me, These are they which came out of great tribulation, and have washed their robes, and made them white in the blood of the Lamb.
15 Therefore are they before the throne of God, and serve him day and night in his temple: and he that sitteth on the throne shall dwell among them.
16 They shall hunger no more, neither thirst any more; neither shall the sun light on them, nor any heat.
17 For the Lamb which is in the midst of the throne shall feed them, and shall lead them unto living fountains of waters: and God shall wipe away all tears from their eyes.
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