It was high council Sunday today. Our speakers were Brother and Sister Taylor from Barstow. In her talk Sister Taylor altered a quote from Sister Elaine Cannon who was a former YW General President (the quote was used by Sister Wixom in her address in last October's conference). She read the quote in this way: "There are two important days in a [person’s] life: The day [they are] born and the day [they find] out why." This quote has stuck with me for the rest of the day.
As I share it now, I'm reminded of the line from the Church film "Man's Search for Happiness" that states: "Your birth is a matter of record. You take it for granted." We all know when we are born because that day is celebrated every year (okay, unless you're a Jehovah's Witness), but there are so many people out in the world who don't know why they are here. They think they flared into existence at some time along the gestational path and are now here to live out their lives and die when the time comes. As far as they can tell, there seems to be no rhyme or reason for their existence and they have no belief that they came to this earth "trailing clouds of glory" (“Ode: Intimations of Immortality from Recollections of Early Childhood,” The Complete Poetical Works of William Wordsworth [1924], 359).
I find the whole idea to be depressing. I burst onto the mortal scene, try to make through my growing up years, gain relationships (or not), get married (or just move in with as many partners as I see fit), try to make a decent living, save up for retirement, do some traveling and then pop back into whatever netherworld I came from when life is over and spend the eternities as a spirit, a consciousness, or nothing with no real connections to anyone. Yikes. Why would I sign up for something like that? In this scenario, I can see why people would do all they could to obtain the most money, power, possessions, fame, notoriety, or whatever they could before succumbing to an inevitable death. If there is no life after this one, then perhaps I would think that the best thing to do would be to make as big a splash as I could while alive in order to not become just another name on a gravestone.
As members of the Church, we should know the "why" of our existence. We are not here by chance. As President Thomas S. Monson testified, "a wise Creator fashioned an earth and placed us here, with a veil of forgetfulness of our previous existence so that we might experience a time of testing, an opportunity to prove ourselves in order to qualify for all that God has prepared for us to receive.
"Clearly, one primary purpose of our existence upon the earth is to obtain a body of flesh and bones. We have also been given the gift of agency. In a thousand ways we are privileged to choose for ourselves. Here we learn from the hard taskmaster of experience. We discern between good and evil. We differentiate as to the bitter and the sweet. We discover that there are consequences attached to our actions" (Ensign, May 2012, 91-92).
Because of the veil of forgetfulness, some people do not believe this answer or refuse to consider it as an answer, but that doesn't preclude us from testifying of its truthfulness. That is also part of the test as I see it. For those of us who have come to recognize the answer, we cannot allow the finger pointing of those in the great and spacious building to deter us from that knowledge. How much worse would it be for us to allow ourselves to be bullied away from the truth rather than dare to stand alone, if need be, in defense of that truth?
"Clearly, one primary purpose of our existence upon the earth is to obtain a body of flesh and bones. We have also been given the gift of agency. In a thousand ways we are privileged to choose for ourselves. Here we learn from the hard taskmaster of experience. We discern between good and evil. We differentiate as to the bitter and the sweet. We discover that there are consequences attached to our actions" (Ensign, May 2012, 91-92).
Because of the veil of forgetfulness, some people do not believe this answer or refuse to consider it as an answer, but that doesn't preclude us from testifying of its truthfulness. That is also part of the test as I see it. For those of us who have come to recognize the answer, we cannot allow the finger pointing of those in the great and spacious building to deter us from that knowledge. How much worse would it be for us to allow ourselves to be bullied away from the truth rather than dare to stand alone, if need be, in defense of that truth?
Brother Taylor talked about eternal perspective. During his talk he referenced a talk given by President Kimball entitled, "Tragedy or Destiny". I remember having a pamphlet of this talk back in my missionary days. Brother Taylor quoted several things from this talk, and I found it in the Priesthood and RS manual of 2006. As I was looking at it to see if I could pull anything from it that was quoted by Brother Taylor, I instead came across a quote that Bro. Taylor didn't use, but that I found to be very profound.
The quote is from Orson F. Whitney who served as an apostle from 1906 to 1931: “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 it 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 and which will make us more like our Father and Mother in heaven" (Teachings of President of the Church: Spencer W. Kimball, [2006], 16).
Interesting thought. Sometimes, I believe, we (I) get so caught up in the "here and now" we forget that God's timetable is eternity. Coming back to the "why are we here" question, He and Mother in Heaven are trying to teach us about ourselves, and they are trying to teach us that lesson by allowing us to experience it for ourselves. If They take the pain and the sorrow and the suffering away, how will we be able to understand the pleasure and the joy and the blessings and have gratitude for them? It would be too easy for them to be "helicopter parents" and just hand us all the answers or immediately give us what we want when we want it or to take away the consequences of our choices—good or bad. But what would we learn? If anything, we'd become like spoiled teenagers who expect life to be handed to them and who feel they can do anything they want because of the lack of consequences.
In a sense, that was Lucifer's proposal: to either hand us all the answers or toss the rule book aside or both. But in the end, what would we learn? Nothing. No progression; no growth; no chance to truly find out the "why" of our existence. Honestly, despite the pain and problems we face, I'd rather have this life than the one Satan proposed. I suppose that's why I fought against his alterations. In fact, that's why all of us who are here as mortals fought against his alterations. If we remember that we fought tooth and nail to have this life as it is presented to us, then we may have a greater appreciation for it and for what Father and Mother are trying to teach us as we muddle along. When we truly do understand the "why" of this life, it makes so much more sense and has such a beautiful symmetry to it. I hope I can always remember the "why" and help others to understand it as well.
The quote is from Orson F. Whitney who served as an apostle from 1906 to 1931: “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 it 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 and which will make us more like our Father and Mother in heaven" (Teachings of President of the Church: Spencer W. Kimball, [2006], 16).
Interesting thought. Sometimes, I believe, we (I) get so caught up in the "here and now" we forget that God's timetable is eternity. Coming back to the "why are we here" question, He and Mother in Heaven are trying to teach us about ourselves, and they are trying to teach us that lesson by allowing us to experience it for ourselves. If They take the pain and the sorrow and the suffering away, how will we be able to understand the pleasure and the joy and the blessings and have gratitude for them? It would be too easy for them to be "helicopter parents" and just hand us all the answers or immediately give us what we want when we want it or to take away the consequences of our choices—good or bad. But what would we learn? If anything, we'd become like spoiled teenagers who expect life to be handed to them and who feel they can do anything they want because of the lack of consequences.
In a sense, that was Lucifer's proposal: to either hand us all the answers or toss the rule book aside or both. But in the end, what would we learn? Nothing. No progression; no growth; no chance to truly find out the "why" of our existence. Honestly, despite the pain and problems we face, I'd rather have this life than the one Satan proposed. I suppose that's why I fought against his alterations. In fact, that's why all of us who are here as mortals fought against his alterations. If we remember that we fought tooth and nail to have this life as it is presented to us, then we may have a greater appreciation for it and for what Father and Mother are trying to teach us as we muddle along. When we truly do understand the "why" of this life, it makes so much more sense and has such a beautiful symmetry to it. I hope I can always remember the "why" and help others to understand it as well.
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