The Times in Which We Live

Each one of us live in our reality composed of our surrounding, our perception of those surroundings which is informed by the experiences we have had throughout our life. In the world where we live today there is heard the continual cry for tolerance by those whose agendas eschew legal and moral standards of the day. As they speak of tolerance they really are asking everyone to tolerate their aberrant behavior. The difference between tolerance and tolerate is distinctive. The definition of tolerance from the Merriam-Webster Dictionary is: sympathy or indulgence for beliefs or practices differing or conflicting with one's own. Whereas the definition of tolerate from the same source is: 1) to allow (something that is bad, unpleasant, etc.) to exist, happen or be done. 2) To allow to be or be done without prohibition, hinderance, or contradiction.

Russell M. Nelson, and apostle of the Lord Jesus Christ, has said: An erroneous assumption could be made that if a little of something is good, a lot must be better. Not so! Overdoses of needed medication can be toxic. Boundless mercy could oppose justice. So tolerance, without limit, could lead to spineless permissiveness.

Also in the words of Jesus Christ as found the book of scripture called the Doctrine and Covenants we read: For I the Lord cannot look upon sin with the least degree of allowance.

(Doctrine and Covenants 1:31)

Tolerance is a two-way street; it goes both ways for those who believe in and practice it and are sympathetic to that which may be contradictory to their personal beliefs. However tolerate is a one-way street where one cannot countenance something bad or unpleasant in their eyes or permit themselves any indulgences therein. An example may be a piece of legislation that is morally in opposition to what someone believes. They may have no ill feelings for those who support it but they would never vote for it or support anything like unto it their society.

We live in a time when these two concepts are so confused they have been wrapped into one package called tolerance but are defined tolerate. Four hundred years B. C. there was a prophet of God who lived upon this continent, his name was Moroni he was the son of the prophet Mormon who had abridged a sacred record that covered a thousand years. Moroni was given charge of the record after his father's death. In his custody he added some of his prophetic utterances which I will include below. He saw our time when our beloved Jesus Christ showed the last days to him in a vision. This is, in part, what he recorded about the time when the Book of Mormon would come forth which is in our season of history:

 Yea, it shall come in a day when there shall be heard of fires, and tempests, and vapors of smoke in foreign lands;

 And there shall also be heard of wars, rumors of wars, and earthquakes in divers places.

 Yea, it shall come in a day when there shall be great pollutions upon the face of the earth; there shall be murders, and robbing, and lying, and deceivings, and whoredoms, and all manner of abominations; when there shall be many who will say, Do this, or do that, and it mattereth not, for the Lord will uphold such at the last day. But wo unto such, for they are in the gall of bitterness and in the bonds of iniquity. . . .

 Behold, the Lord hath shown unto me great and marvelous things concerning that which must shortly come, at that day when these things shall come forth among you.

  Behold, I speak unto you as if ye were present, and yet ye are not. But behold, Jesus Christ hath shown you unto me, and I know your doing. (Book of Mormon, Mormon 8:32-36)

Maybe a few headlines from a recent newspaper may illustrate this point:

"Disgusting" case puts focus on scams targeting the elderly

Michigan gay ban struck down

4 die in New Jersey shore fire

Russia formally annexes Crimea, E.U. pulls nation closer to separate deals

And again from the Book of Mormon:

And the words which I have spoken . . . are sufficient to teach any man the right way; for the right way is to believe in Christ and deny him not; for by denying him ye also deny the prophets and the law.

And now behold, I say unto you that the right way is to believe in Christ, and deny him not; and Christ is the Holy One of Israel; wherefore ye must bow down before him, and worship him with all your might, mind, and strength, and your whole soul; and if ye do this ye shall in nowise be cast out. (2 Nephi 25:28-29)

And another prophet from the Book of Mormon said this:

And now, my beloved brethren, I would that ye should come unto Christ, who is the Holy One of Israel, and partake of his salvation, and the power of his redemption. Yea, come unto him, and offer your whole souls as an offering unto him, and continue in fasting and praying, and endure to the end; and as the Lord liveth ye will be saved.

Each of these speak to the condition of the world in which we live.

And also this comment from an editorial in the local newspaper:

For the past decade, I have seen some of our policy makers appear to lose their moral sense--our caring for each other, and the love-thy-nieghbor thing. Now, we see lawmakers more concerned about material things, instead of how we live and care for each other. They say one thing and do another, especially when it comes to health and welfare of our people. They take great pride in the growth of our economy and how they are able to subsidize building hotels and attract business to our state. They tout our healthy and growing economy, our natural resources and their beauty, but what about 

the health and well-being of our people?

Any foundation we build upon other than Jesus Christ will crumble and falter in time. The Savior could have no allowance or tolerance for sin because that is the way we can return to Him. However, the Savior does have tolerance for the sinner, it is through that tolerance that He affords us the repentance process which brings us closer to Him. The world may be a very unsettled place but we need not be unsettled in it when we exercise our Faith in He who created this world and Whose hand is recognizable in all things. Therefore, it is His words found in all holy writ that teach the right way to live as spoken by the prophet king Benjamin in the Book of Mormon when he said:

And the words which I have spoken . . . are sufficient to teach any man the right way; for the right way is to believe in Christ and deny him not; for by denying him ye also deny the prophets and the law.

And now behold, I say unto you that the right way is to believe in Christ, and deny him not; and Christ is the Holy One of Israel; wherefore ye must bow down before him, and worship him with all your might, mind, and strength, and your whole soul; and if ye do this ye shall in nowise be cast out. (2 Nephi 25:28-29)

And another prophet from the Book of Mormon said this:

And now, my beloved brethren, I would that ye should come unto Christ, who is the Holy One of Israel, and partake of his salvation, and the power of his redemption. Yea, come unto him, and offer your whole souls as an offering unto him, and continue in fasting and praying, and endure to the end; and as the Lord liveth ye will be saved. (Omni 1:26)

Thus in a world where lines between morality and immorality are fading into obscurity, there are voices crying for tolerance and are telling us we must tolerate that which is offensive to God. However we have a more clear voice inviting us to come unto Christ and to fear nothing of this world for did He not say to His apostles "In the world ye shall have tribulation: but be of good cheer; I have overcome the world." (John 16:33)

He has given us a supernal gift, "Therefore, cheer up your hearts, and remember that ye are free to act for yourselves—to choose the way of everlasting death or the way of eternal life." (2 Nephi 10:23)

We in wisdom may choose to have tolerance but that does not suggest nor imply we must tolerate that which is offensive to us or to our God. In fact we must stand against that which is offensive and morally reprehensible without condemning the individuals supporting such things but strive to be like the Savior for, "Jesus saw sin as wrong but also was able to see sin as springing from deep and unmet needs on the part of the sinner. This permitted Him to condemn the sin without condemning the individual." (Spencer W. Kimball)

In Times of Challenge

In times of challenge and testing:

In this mortal sphere we have the opportunity to have some very wonderful moments of joy and happiness, moments of success and acceptance, moments of aloneness and despair and moments of what sometimes seems like long periods of challenge and testing. All trials bring balance but not all are equally appreciated especially by yours truly. It has been my experience that true learning experiences which are critical to emotional, psychological and spiritual growth are, at the time, least enjoyable but most productive.

Sometimes the relief from such experiences may come soon and sometimes it may not come for a very long time. There are a few examples from scripture that stand out in my mind that illustrate the workings of  the Lord, there are many examples but these few seem to fit the purpose of this post.

First: In Genesis 18 we find Abraham and Sarah who “were old and well stricken in age; and it ceased to be with Sarah after the manner of women.” Sarah in her old age had wanted children for a long time and had never been blessed with any. She is now past the age where she could have children. It would be reasonable to assume she would anticipate having no children in this life. However, the messengers of the Lord have just spoken to Abraham and Sarah saying “Is anything too hard for the Lord?” Even to making a womb that had been fallow for ninety years fertile! Sarah did conceive and did give birth to a baby boy, Isaac, who would be a man of God like unto his father, Abraham.

Many centuries later just prior to the birth of the Savior another devout and righteous woman was well stricken in years and childless as was Sarah. This woman, know as Elisabeth, was told she too would give birth to a baby boy and as reassurance the angel speaking her said, "For with God nothing shall be impossible." So it was then and so it is in our day, as well.

Sometimes we have to wait upon the Lord when His timing is different from our own, but the blessings that eventually come, in time are then, to us, far greater and much more appreciated than if they had come early on in our trail.

Second: In Judges 7 Gideon was called of the Lord to defeat the great Midianite and Amalekite armies that were like “grasshoppers for the multitude”. However the Lord told Gideon his army of 22,000 was too great because if they were victorious they would think they were saved by there own hand and not by God’s hand. So the Lord reduced the army to 300. Following the Lord’s directions an army of 300 scattered the armies that was so great they looked like a field of grasshoppers. In time Gideon and his army destroyed those enemies who sought to destroy them.

When we face what seems to be insurmountable trials or challenges if we will turn to the Lord with all our heart, mind and soul and with faith in the Lord Jesus Christ fully depending upon Him and doing what He asks of us then in His way and in His time we will be victorious.

The third example comes from the Book of Mormon Another Testament of Jesus Christ. The first chapter of the first book called the First Book of Nephi we find a statement that helps us understand in part the great blessings that come to all who have faith in Him. The verse, in part, reads as follows:

But behold, I, Nephi, will show unto you that the tender mercies of the Lord are over all those whom he hath chosen, because of their faith, to make them mighty even unto the power of deliverance. (1 Nephi 1:20)

Nephi and his family were required to do many difficult things one of them was to leave their home and all of their treasured belonging in 600 B.C. prior to the Babylonian captivity of the residents of Jerusalem which occurred in 587 B.C. They traveled for 8 years in the Arabian wilderness enduring many privations, hunger, thirst and the danger of robbers. Albeit hard for us to imagine in our present day just how much they suffered, in retrospect Nephi gives this testimonial;

And it came to pass that we did again take our journey in the wilderness; and we did travel nearly eastward from that time forth. And we did travel and wade through much affliction in the wilderness; and our women did bear children in the wilderness.

 And so great were the blessings of the Lord upon us, that while we did live upon raw meat in the wilderness, our women did give plenty of suck for their children, and were strong, yea, even like unto the men; and they began to bear their journeyings without murmurings.

 And thus we see that the commandments of God must be fulfilled. And if it so be that the children of men keep the commandments of God he doth nourish them, and strengthen them, and provide means whereby they can accomplish the thing which he has commanded them; wherefore, he did provide means for us while we did sojourn in the wilderness. (1 Nephi 17:1-3, underline added)

And so it is in this life we may be called upon to do very hard things, we may be required to travel in our own figurative wilderness for a period of time. But if so, we may be assured no matter how difficult that journey is if we do keep the commandments of God we will be sustained and we will be able to say “so great were the blessings of the Lord upon us. . .” seeing more clearly in hindsight what may not have been fully visible during the journey.

It is my belief and my testimony that God the Father is in fact our Eternal Father, we are His spirit children and He never leaves us alone even when we choose to leave Him. His love for us is incomprehensible, it never wanes, we are His children and He wants us to return to His presence thus He never ceases to grant us blessings without taking away our ability to choose for ourselves if we want to accept those blessings under all conditions.  And further it is my Testimony that Jesus Christ is our Savior who was the only born son of God in the flesh in this mortal sphere and that He has borne the burden of our sufferings as it says in the Book of Mormon:

 And he shall go forth, suffering pains and afflictions and temptations of every kind; and this that the word might be fulfilled which saith he will take upon him the pains and the sicknesses of his people.

 And he will take upon him death, that he may loose the bands of death which bind his people; and he will take upon him their infirmities, that his bowels may be filled with mercy, according to the flesh, that he may know according to the flesh how to succor his people according to their infirmities. (Alma 7:10-12)

May His peace rest upon you and in your heart that your burdens may be made light and that your eyes may see His eternal grace when you are feeling the heavy trials that may come upon you during this mortal journey in which we are all engaged.