Two topics rise to the top this week. Let’s look at a principle of moral testing (opposition in all things) and the Lord’s ability to manipulate all things for our good.
The Devil gets his due
As I sat pondering the swing in Kirtland from the mighty spiritual experience of the temple dedication to the apostasy that took place about a year later, it dawned on me that this shouldn’t have been a surprise. The Saints then didn’t know this pattern, but we do. The Lord keeps all things in balance. Have you ever noticed that someone about to be baptized is on a euphoric high from all the spiritual experiences they have newly experienced, but then after the baptism their friends turn against them, their old minister drops off anti literature, and suddenly their new found faith is directly challenged? Satan is always given his chance to sway those who have experienced the things of holiness. Sometimes his trials come first and the blessings second, and sometimes the blessings come first, but they always come in pairs.
The story of Job in the Old Testament is a good example of this principle. Job was so righteous that he was richly blessed by the Lord. Satan wanted to prove that Job was no better than any other man, because he had never suffered from the absence of blessings. God granted Satan the ability to do whatever he wanted to Job, as long as he didn’t take his life. That is quite a boon for Satan. He immediately set about stripping Job of everything God had blessed him with then tormented Job with boils from head to toe.
The lesson in the story of Job is that when Job continued to prove faithful to God, the Lord blessed him even more than Job had been blessed for his righteousness to begin with. This is our first big example of this principle of spiritual balance we find in the scriptures. When we have a new calling that will elevate our spirituality, either before or after our acceptance of the call we can expect temptations or trials to appear seemingly out of nowhere. And all these temptations are geared to try us to the core of our being, like it is personal or something. Well, it is. The Lord always gives Satan the opportunity to test our faith and testimony. It is never a one way street. The spiritual pattern in life seems to be that both sides of this spiritual battle get a chance to win our participation. We stand in the middle of this moral tug of war and choose which side we will allow to continue to influence our behavior.
We may call each side of this war either a temptation or an enticement, but both offer rewards. On the one side the rewards are the temporary absence of suffering, even though that absence may be brief, and followed by a much longer duration of suffering. The other side offers a safe passage through our trials and suffering with the promise of eternal happiness afterward. Satan’s promise of relief from suffering usually entails giving up our principles and morals for immediate relief and acceptance by others, but that is followed by years of silent regret and living a life that is shallow and spiritually empty.
No one warned the Saints of the Restoration that this is an eternal principle of testing. They were blindsided by the events that took place after the outpouring of the Spirit at the temple dedication. They innocently acted like that was just the beginning of a constant stream of happy events. Within months a spirit of apostasy crept into the hearts of even the apostles, and anger, hatred, jealousy, and a complaining spirit took control. Only those who were able to see these temptations for what they were survived the ordeal. They stayed true to their testimony and their faith in the Lord’s prophet. Spiritually speaking these were the ones who became the most stalwart saints in the church, and some of them became the new leaders of the church. This is just one of the ways the weeding process takes place in our lives.
“Order all things for [my] good”
When you read the title of this part of the week’s lessons did it sound familiar? It should have. From Doctrine and Covenants 98-101 (week 37) we see the section titled “My trials can work together for my good.” From Doctrine and Covenants 89-92 (week 34) we see the section titled “All things shall work together for [my] good.” So this is the third time this topic has come up. When the Lord tells us something one time it is important. When He tells us something time and again then we need to take it even more seriously.
The title of this section tells us that God “orders” things. To order is not just to give a command that something happen, but it also means to organize how something works. Think of someone who sets up one of those Domino courses that go all over the room and up and down ramps and around corners. They set everything up – they ordered the Dominos in order to achieve a particular outcome. That is a simple example. Remember that God commands all things, which includes the movement of the planets, the blossoming of the flowers, the rising of the sun, etc. There isn’t anything that happens that He doesn’t take credit for it happening. This includes the rising of political powers, as well as their destruction. Humanity isn’t just running rampant down here on earth. God is still in charge. He has seen the end from the beginning, and He organizes or orders all things for the ultimate welfare of His children.
We just need to remember that we are here to be tested, which includes many trials and tribulations. These tests are designed to prove our obedience and to teach us patience, courage, and all the most difficult of virtues. When we place our faith in the word of God, and we spend ample time on our knees in prayer, we can expect God to fulfill His promise to us that He will see to it that all things in our life ultimately make us better, stronger people. The rewards of the world must come before we die, because the world loses all of its ability to win us over when we leave mortality. But God’s promises not only make our lives better here in mortality, but the greatest of blessings come after this life. This is where our faith comes in.
So far in these sections the Lord has promised time and again that if we are obedient He has the ability to make things work out for our good (He orders the events of our life). The goal of every member of the church is to learn to look at life from a higher and holier perspective. If we are looking at mortality from the view of all other mortals then we will always be short sighted. When we learn to look at how mortality fits into our eternal progression then we can see that what we endure today is truly a temporary and short lived trial that is designed to enlarge and refine our soul in one way or another. Life becomes so much easier to endure and enjoy when our perspective broadens into the eternities beyond our earthly life. Each person must figure out how to broaden this perspective on their own. We can encourage one another, but ultimately it is a personal journey of discovery.
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