Mormon Musings

The great challenge is to refuse to let the bad things that happen to us do bad things to us.  That is the crucial difference between adversity and tragedy. Elder Neal A. Maxwell

“[Someday]  from  the  vantage  point  of  the  future,  we  shall  be  satisfied  with  many  of  the happenings  of  this  life  that  are  so  difficult  for  us  to  comprehend,”  …  “We  knew  before  we were  born  that  we  were  coming  to  the  earth  for  bodies  and  experience  and  that  …  after  a period  of  life  we  would  die.  We  accepted  all  these  eventualities  with  a  glad  heart,  eager  to accept  both  the  favorable  and  unfavorable.  We  eagerly  accepted  the  chance  to  come earthward  even  though  it  might  be  for  only  a  day...

Can you discern and understand the dealings of the Lord with this people from the beginning? If we can understand this, it is indeed a matter of great rejoicing to us. All intelligent beings who are crowned with crowns of glory, immortality, and eternal lives must pass through every ordeal appointed for intelligent beings to pass through, to gain their glory and exaltation. Every calamity that can come upon mortal beings will be suffered to come upon the few, to prepare them to enjoy the presence of the Lord. If we obtain the glory that Abraham obtained, we must do so by the same means that he did. If we are ever prepared to enjoy the society of Enoch, Noah, Melchizedek, Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, or of their faithful children, and of the faithful Prophets and Apostles, we must pass through the same experience, and gain the knowledge, intelligence, and endowments that will prepare us to enter into the celestial kingdom of our Father and God. How many of the Latter-day Saints will e...

The chastisements we have had from time to time have been for our good, and are essential to learn wisdom, and carry us through a school of experience we never could have passed through without. President Wilford Woodruff,  Journal of Discourses 2:198

This is a VERY timely talk by President Kimball, given recent events: http://sviewp.com/GD-OT/OT%2032-%20Kimball-%20Tradgedy%20or%20Destiny.pdf

“God knows even now what the future holds for each of us. In one of His revelations these startling words appear, as with so many revelations that are too big, I suppose, for us to manage fully: 'In the presence of God, . . . all things . . . are manifest, past, present, and future, and are continually before the Lord' (D&C 130:7).  The future 'you' is before him now.  He knows what it is He wishes to bring to pass in your life.  He knows the kind of remodeling in your life and in mine that He wishes to achieve.  Now, this will require us to believe in that divine design and at times to accept the truth which came to Joseph Smith wherein he was reminded that his suffering would be 'but a small moment' (D&C 121:7).  I’d like to talk to you about some of those small moments that will come your way in life and that come to each of us... we so blithely say in the Church that life is a school, a testing ground.  It is true, even though it is trite. ...

"Pondering a passage of scripture can be a key to unlock revelation and the guidance and inspiration of the Holy Ghost. Scriptures can calm an agitated soul, giving peace, hope, and a restoration of confidence in one's ability to overcome the challenges of life....Scriptures can communicate different meanings at different times in our life, according to our needs."  -Elder Richard G. Scott (Ensign, Nov. 2011, 6)

“The tree that never had to fight For sun and sky and air and light, But stood out in the open plain And always got its share of rain, Never became a forest king But lived and died a scrubby thing. The man who never had to toil to live, Who never had to win his share Of sun and sky and light and air, Never became a manly man But lived and died as he began. “Good timber does not grow at ease, The stronger wind, the stronger trees. The further sky, the greater length, The more the storm, the more the strength. By sun and cold, in rain and snow, in trees and men good timbers grow. Where thickest lies the forest growth We find the patriarchs of both. And they hold council with the stars Whose broken branches show the scars Of many winds and much of strife. This is the common law of life.” —Author unknown

http://jdquotes.wordpress.com/2012/07/26/purified-by-fire-john-taylor/

We're not doubting that God will do the best for us, we're wondering how painful the best will turn out to be. C.S. Lewis

http://jdquotes.wordpress.com/2011/06/16/storms-of-life-give-us-the-requisite-experience/

http://www.lds.org/general-conference/2012/04/mountains-to-climb?lang=eng

Do you suppose I am sorry because of persecution? No: I never was in my life; but I have thanked God a thousand times that the Devil is not yet bound; for if he had been, the Saints would have gone to sleep; and if there could be such a thing, they would have been blotted out of existence, with all their intelligence, and the earth have received them into its bowels. Light, knowledge, truth, wickedness of every kind, the works of the Almighty, and the works of the Devil, all conspire to roll on the great work that the Lord Jesus Christ is doing upon the earth,—every person and power in their own order. Brigham Young, Journal of Discourses 6:270

All of us have problems.  We face them every day.  How grateful I am that we have difficult things to wrestle with.  They keep us young, if that is possible.  They keep us alive.  They keep us going.  They keep us humble.  They pull us down to our knees to ask the God of Heaven for help in solving them.  Be grateful for your problems, and know that somehow there will come a solution. President Gordon B. Hinckley, CES Training, February 7, 2003

How can you and I really expect to glide naively through life as if to say, "Lord, give me experience, but not grief, not sorrow, not pain, not opposition, not betrayal, and certainly not to be forsaken.  Keep from me, Lord, all those experiences which made Thee what Thou art!  Then let me come and dwell with Thee and fully share Thy joy!" Neal A Maxwell (Ensign, May 1991, p. 88)

The crucial test of life, I repeat, does not center in the choice between fame and obscurity, nor between wealth and poverty. The greatest decision of life is between good and evil. We may foolishly bring unhappiness and trouble, even suffering upon ourselves. These are not always to be regarded as penalties imposed by a displeased Creator. They are part of the lessons of life, part of the test. Some are tested by poor health, some by a body that is deformed or homely. Others are tested by handsome and healthy bodies; some by the passion of youth; others by the erosions of age.  Some suffer disappointment in marriage, family problems; others live in poverty and obscurity.  Some (perhaps this is the hardest test) find ease and luxury. All are part of the test, and there is more equality in this testing than sometimes we suspect. Boyd K. Packer, October 1980 General Conference

But here comes the command of God to this man [Abraham] who has been taught so scrupulously about the sinfulness of murder and human sacrifice, do to these very things.  Now, why did the Lord ask such things of Abraham?  Because, knowing what his future would be and that he would be the father of an innumerable posterity, [God] was determined to test [Abraham].  God did not do this for His own sake; for He knew by His foreknowledge what Abraham would do; but the purpose was to impress upon Abraham a lesson, and to enable him to attain unto knowledge he could not obtain in any other way.  That is why God tries all of us.  It is not for His own knowledge; for He knows all things beforehand.  He knows all your lives and everything you will do.  But He tries us for our own good, that we may know ourselves; for it is most important that a man should know himself.  He required Abraham to submit to his trial because He intended to give him glory, exaltat...

http://jdquotes.wordpress.com/2011/06/16/485/

God speaks in our conscience, but shouts in our pains: it is His megaphone to rouse a deaf world. C.S. Lewis

So far as I am concerned, I say, let everything come as God has ordained it. I do not desire trials; I do not desire affliction: I would pray to God to “leave me not in temptation, and deliver me from evil; for thine is the kingdom, the power, and the glory.” But if the earthquake bellows, the lightnings flash, the thunders roll, and the powers of darkness are let loose, and the spirit of evil is permitted to rage, and an evil influence is brought to bear on the Saints, and my life, with theirs, is put to the test; let it come, for we are the Saints of the most High God, and all is well, all is peace, all is right, and will be, both in time and in eternity... I used to think, if I were the Lord, I would not suffer people to be tried as they are; but I have changed my mind on that subject. Now I think I would if I were the Lord, because it purges out the meanness and corruption that stick around the Saints, like flies around molasses. John Taylor, Journal of Discourses 5:114-1...