Last night in the general women's meeting Sis Linda K Burton talked about certain woman in the scriptures and how we can become certain women. She shared the story of one woman of the Restoration whose husband was paralyzed in a battle and then her son was called to join the Mormon Battalion...and she struggled to let him go. She battled it out in prayer with the Lord and asked why so much was asked of her. The Lord's answer to her struck me to my core he said "Do you not want the highest glory? ... How do you think to gain it save by making the greatest sacrifices?" She had already received assurance from the Spirit as she found herself without food and heard a voice say "hold on the Lord will provide".
I would guess that many of us have faced similar moments in our lives, perhaps not a starving family or sending a child off to war after sacrificing a father, ours may come in a wayward child who has wandered from the church, ours might come in saying goodbye to a pregnancy we were just beginning to cherish, ours might come in not knowing where the money will come to pay our bills, ours might come in watching a spouse struggle with their faith or ours might come in watching someone we love continue to battle when their desire for life has waned or ours might come in the quiet watches of the night when our hearts are breaking and we have no idea how to carry on.
I used to think that suffering only came to some, but the longer I live life the more I realize that suffering comes to all mankind, we may face it differently, we will each face suffering unique to our circumstance and heart, yet we all feel pain, we will all face times when we feel forsaken, these just come with life.
How do you think you gain the highest glory? It comes from the greatest sacrifices. Those sacrifices won't look like anyone else's. As the sisters learned last night we are called to put off the world, we are called to embrace holiness, to invite the Spirit as a constant companion so that we can then be introduced into the presence of the Lord. As Joseph Smith said, "A religion that does not require the sacrifice of all things never has power sufficient to produce the faith necessary [to lead] unto life and salvation." (Lectures on Faith, p. 58.) Perhaps our sacrifice means praying to love a neighbor or co-worker, maybe our sacrifice will be giving up a tv show that distracts us from our purpose, perhaps our sacrifice is paying a more generous fast offering, maybe our sacrifice is putting our tablet or phone down and focusing on the world around us, maybe our sacrifice is letting fear go and trusting faith or maybe our sacrifice is giving up our need for control and leaning not unto our own understanding.
I testify and know that what ever sacrifice we offer the Lord will be returned to us in blessings and sanctification tenfold. Heavenly Father understands our mortality, He understands our fears in the night, our walks in the darkness having no idea what will come. Through the last five years in my life I used to beg for the calm, I used to wish for the times when things would calm down and I could just enjoy life for a time. But now, at least for tonight, I don't mind the pain in the night, the uncertainty, the tears and the fears, because those are the moments I know God is there, those are the moments when I know I am in the presence of angels, those are the moments I know I am being sanctified, my spirit is being stretched and the weaknesses in my nature are being knocked off or purified. I tried praying for a mountain to climb once, I ended up with a debilitating illness and leaving the country I was growing to love. I don't know if I'm that brave, but I do know I don't want to dread those growing moments Heavenly Father has in store either, because I'm finding it is in the pain that I lean on Him, it is in the fear I cry into the night for His nearness, it is in the uncertainty I request His angels. I hope one day I will rely on Him in the sunshine as well as the night, but for now as I become something greater than I am now I trust Him to make me what He knows I need to be.
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