The Greatest Gift

          God is a great giver of gifts.  They are timely, powerful, and personal.  They teach us, help us feel loved, and change our lives forever.  But not all gifts are created equal.  There is one gift that prophets have long said is greater than any other that we receive in mortality.  It is the gift of the Holy Ghost.  President Wilford Woodruff said the following, "Now, if you have the Holy Ghost with you—and every one ought to have—I can say unto you that there is no greater gift, there is no greater blessing, there is no greater testimony given to any man on earth. You may have the administration of angels; you may see many miracles; you may see many wonders in the earth; but I claim that the gift of the Holy Ghost is the greatest gift that can be bestowed upon man."

          The first time I heard of this concept, I didn't quite accept it at face value.  I immediately began thinking of other great blessings that seemed even more powerful.  But when I chose to accept this idea to its full extent in faith, faith that Wilford Woodruff was a prophet, and that he spoke for God, great power came into my life.

          In a talk about the Holy Ghost, Elder Bednar counseled missionaries not to worry so much if a specific prompting is from the Holy Ghost or not.  "Be a good boy, or a good girl," and you will be guided by the Spirit, whether you recognize it or not.  Such confidence could only emerge from faith in God, not in ourselves.  It sometimes matters a great deal if we are doing God's will as dictated by the Holy Ghost, following our own judgment, or being deceived by a less-altruistic source.  The faith that we have is that God is powerful enough to help us do His will even though we are not 100% sure what it is, that He is powerful enough to help us even though we do not consciously discern that help.  It is faith that as we follow Him, we will arrive at the correct destination, not matter how convoluted, surprising, or confusing the journey may be.

          We can have the same faith in God as we follow the prophets.  There are those who do not believe that we can trust every word that comes from a prophet because he is mortal and makes mistakes.  But people who believe that are not actually lacking faith in prophets; they are lacking faith in God.  When has God ever set up anything for the benefit of His children that we can sometimes trust and sometimes not?  Are there times when paying tithing does not open the windows of heaven?  No.  One ironic thing about people who believe the scriptures, but not all of the words of living prophets, is that the scriptures were written by prophets identical to the ones speaking in General Conference.  Ancient prophets had just as equal a propensity to err as modern ones.  Moroni even said, "Condemn me not because of mine imperfection, neither my father, because of his imperfection, neither them who have written before him; but rather give thanks unto God that he hath made manifest unto you our imperfections, that ye may learn to be more wise than we have been" (Mormon 9:31).  It's ludicrous to think that prophets have been perfectly guided by God for thousands of years and then, in modern times, suddenly began to spout out intermittent bursts of false doctrine. 

          As with the Holy Ghost, our trust is not that prophets are perfect, now or in the scriptures.  They are not.  But God the one being in the universe who can create something perfect from something imperfect.  Isn't that one of the most fundamental truths of the Plan of Salvation?  Isn't that exactly what he is doing with each one of us?  To say that we cannot trust that a prophet will never lead us astray is to lack faith in the omnipotence of God.  In saying that, we are also saying that God cannot use imperfect beings to guide us perfectly while at the same time honoring their agency.

          It all comes down to faith.

          Christ said, "If any man will do his will, he shall know of the doctrine, whether it be of God, or whether I speak of myself" (John 7:17).  As I have followed the prophets' council and have chosen to believe their words above my own understanding of the Gospel, I have been blessed.  My explanation of things is not airtight, but the testimony of action is.  I promise that if you follow the words of the prophet as if from the mouth of God Himself, you will know that the doctrine I have talked about today is true.  In fact, it is the only way you can know.  For this is life eternal, that they might know Thee, the only true God, through Jesus Christ, and those He hath sent.

"Ice Water" by Pink Sherbet Photography, no changes made, https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0/legalcode

"Icelandic landscape #20," by Alexander Shchukin, no changes made. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/2.0/legalcode

Light and Law

          Last week I talked about seeing spiritually.  Today I will discuss what exactly it is that we see.  That is, the nature light itself.  Firstly, spiritual light is the same as spiritual law.  "The light which is in all things, which giveth life to all things, which is the law by which all things are governed..." (D&C 88:13, emphasis added).  The light that illuminates our spiritual eyes enables us to judge between right and wrong (see Moroni 7:16-18).  We see that there are certain things in our lives that are not in harmony with God.

          Herein is the great moral contradiction that each man or woman must deal with thousands upon thousands of times in their lifetimes, the mismatch between what we did and what we should have done.  There are only two options that a person can take when they discern a contradiction between themselves and divine law:  They may acknowledge that they are in error, or they may deny the integrity of the light by lying to themselves about its identity, existence, or authenticity.  The first option is more humbling because it requires us to accept that we are wrong and that we must repent, but the second option shuts off the indicated person from further light and truth.

          The greater a person's ability to see, the more light they receive.  Thus any contradiction between that person's actions and divine law will be more pronounced, as will the lie they would have to tell themselves in order to avoid incriminating themselves.  Therefore, "he who sins against the greater light shall receive the greater condemnation" (D&C 82:3) because the rejection of the truth is greater.

          Jesus Christ is the light.  He said,  "I am the light which shineth in darkness, and the darkness comprehendeth it not" (Doctrine & Covenants 10:57-58).  In other words, He is the light that we receive or reject.  For this reason, spiritual light is called the Light of Christ.

          With this understanding, even decisions that seem to have no bearing on Christ personally, such as whether we accept Thomas S. Monson as a prophet, seer, and revelator, are fundamentally reducible to a choice between accepting or rejecting Christ himself.  The Light bears witness that President Monson is His authorized servant on the earth today, and if we reject that truth we reject Him because He is the light.  That is why He can say, "He that receiveth you receiveth me" (Matthew 10:40).

          Those that reject the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in favor of another church that purports to worship Him are ironically rejecting Him.  It is my opinion that many times, if not always, those who do so have first lied to themselves about a standard of righteousness that they have not kept but have excused themselves from for some reason.  If Christ is the light, and light is spiritual law, then Jesus is literally the spiritual law by which all things are governed (see 3 Nephi 15:9; D&C 88:5-13).  Consider what this means in terms of the following scripture:  "That which breaketh a law, and abideth not by law, but seeketh to become a law unto itself, and willeth to abide in sin, and altogether abideth in sin, cannot be sanctified by law" (D&C 88:35).  Those that reject the light, and abide not by spiritual law, seek to become a law unto themselves through self-deception and cannot be sanctified by Christ.  They seek to create their own standards of morality and truth instead of accepting those of the Savior.

          Deep down, all of us know what is true and what is not, but depending on the amount of light we have accepted, our spiritual eyesight might not currently be strong enough to tell the difference in some cases.  Those that sin against light and knowledge damage their own ability to perceive light.  The only remedy is repentance, or acknowledging the hidden sin and turning the heart once more to God.

          On my mission one of my favorite scriptures was 3 Nephi 7:24, "Now I would have you to remember also, that there were none who were brought unto repentance who were not baptized with water."  In other words, all those who truly repent embrace the Gospel and are baptized.  This is because all those who repent clear their vision, accept the light, are redeemed by the Lord, and can once again see what is truth and what is not.

         I know that as each of us learn to repent and fill our lives with light, we will become more like it.  We will become conduits by which the light can shine into the lives of others.  Person by person, we can begin to cast darkness out of the world around us, bathing those we love in the iridescent gleam of life and truth.

"The One Light in the Dark," by Patrick Brosset. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/2.0/legalcode 
"Night Light," by Susanne Nilsson. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.0/legalcode

The Beautiful Thing Is That It's True

          There are a lot of well-thought-out ideas in the world.  For centuries there have been men who have spent their entire lives thinking about their own existence, dissecting it various ways, and coming up with theories about what exactly it is.  They tried to tackle life at its roots, taking nothing for granted and having no assumptions.  All their powers of reason were focused like an arrow on the single objective of understanding.

          But the one assumption they never broke down, the one stipulation they never considered, was that the way to discover truth about life was not through reason at all.  We know things in our hearts, not in our minds.  The entire functionality of our lives is based on using knowledge that cannot be proven.  We know that the sun will come up, that oxygen will still be breathable, and that our watches will continue to tell time properly.  If we follow our train of logic far enough into its foundations, however, we inevitably find that our knowledge is based on assumption.

          The thing that makes the way that the universe functions superior to other ideas is not its logic, poise, or presentation.  It is the fact that it's true.  If it weren't true, it wouldn't be of more use to us than any other idea we could come up with.  Truth is like this line:

          A person might feel like they have all the logic under the heaven that tells them that the line is really a square or a squiggle or a rectangle, but all that can never destroy its truthfulness or identity.

          Throughout my life, the barrier between myself and the line has grown more translucent.  Things that were once legitimate questions have faded into obscurity.  Although I am not perfect and do not have a perfect understanding, there are things that I believe, not because they are logical or because I have been brought up that way, but because I can discern their existence.  I can see them. 

          I think it is interesting how Christ phrased a description of discovering truth, "For this people’s heart is waxed gross, and their ears are dull of hearing, and their eyes they have closed; lest at any time they should see with their eyes, and hear with their ears, and should understand with their heart, and should be converted, and I should heal them.  But blessed are your eyes, for they see: and your ears, for they hear" (Matt. 13:15-16).

          Jesus never once asked his disciples to logically probe the Gospel.  Rather, He asked them to open their spiritual eyes and look.  What naturally fell onto their retina was the truth.

          The idea of eternal families, of opportunities to help others with great power, of happiness and joy, and of the great change in our natures brought about by the Lord Jesus Christ are not just great ideas.  What makes them beautiful is that they are true.  And that truth is discernible.

          President Ucthdorf once said, "Today we can see...distant galaxies.  We know that they are there.  They have been there for a very long time.  But before mankind had instruments powerful enough to gather celestial light and bring these galaxies into visibility, we did not believe such a thing was possible.  The immensity of the universe didn’t suddenly change, but our ability to see and understand this truth changed dramatically. And with that greater light, mankind was introduced to glorious vistas we had never before imagined."

       I can see that Jesus Christ is the Son of God, that there really are prophets in our day and age, and that the power of the priesthood is real.  I have used that power.  It is the power that makes all that is important in life binding and legitimate.  I know that through that power, the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints is the only true and living Church by which we may be saved.  Everything that it stands for embodies truth which is eternal.

I see it with every step I take.

"The Light that Failed," by Bart https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/2.0/legalcode

Power in Simplicity

          After studying the same principles of the Gospel over and over again for years, it is sometimes easy to get distracted from what is truly important by a lack of interest in the basic,  seemingly ever-present doctrines that are the foundations of spiritual safety.  If you're like me, it's natural to try to push the borders of your understanding into the unknown rather than rehash something so familiar.  There is danger in doing that, however.  The danger is forgetfulness.

          When we recognize the need to repent we can make appropriate course corrections and move toward the Savior.  If we forget our duty, however, the commandments can slip away from us without our knowledge until by and by we find ourselves in serious trouble.  Focusing on the old can seem frustrating at times, but it is the only path to true safety.

          True perspective is finding beauty in familiar and simple things.  Isn't it better to be happy with what we have rather than to be constantly looking for something more?  Normal may sound boring, but maybe we just lack appreciation for something earth-shattering that is exceptionally readily available to us.  Normal, basic, Primary truths with change a person's life more surely than the study of behavior will change behavior.

          There are many things that I do not understand, including things that seem fundamental.  It is difficult to accept at times that, as a human, we live in a sea of imperfect knowledge.  But that is significantly easier than what we try to do, which is profess certainty about things that we don't know anything about.  That is when it is time to be quiet and to listen.

          Sometimes a person accepts something to be true, not because they really believe it, but because they want perfect certainty so bad that they put their confidence into something they don't have complete evidence for.  They act as though they have a perfect knowledge of something, even though perfect knowledge doesn't exist in this world except for a few rare cases.  Accepting that there are limitations to what we know and understand is not unbelief or faithlessness.  It is honesty.  It is remembering that there may be things that we think and feel that are off the mark.  Real faith is trusting that God will help us.  It is not convincing ourselves that we know the world nearly as well as He does.

          "And if men come unto me I will show unto them their weakness. I give unto men weakness that they may be humble; and my grace is sufficient for all men that humble themselves before me; for if they humble themselves before me, and have faith in me, then will I make weak things become strong unto them" (Ether 12:27).

          If we humble ourselves, repent, and come unto the Savior, He will show us the weakness of our understanding of things.  He gives us that limited capacity that we may be humble.  Truly His grace is sufficient for us as we humbly acknowledge what Elder Holland once called our "very mortal, very inadequate, and sometimes childish grasp of things" and have faith in God. 

          In many ways we are spiritually blind, acquiring our somewhat vague sense of direction from running into a wall here or stumbling up a step there.  But how arrogant we would have to be to loudly proclaim a detailed floor plan to those around us, loud enough to drown out the voice of the One person in our entire civilization who has eyes to see!  Well did the Savior say, "If ye were blind, ye should have no sin: but now ye say, We see; therefore your sin remaineth" (John 9:41).

          Are you man enough to accept that?

"Flower" by Sunny_mjx
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"Blindfold game 1" by Lee Carson
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