One of my favorite gospel topics is that of hope. As part of
the plan of salvation and our time here on earth we all have trials we must
face. I have seen the difference in the lives of people weighed down by their
trails or by fear and sadness from viewing the world around them, those who
face life without hope, versus those that despite all that life throws at them
their faces are bright with smiles and their hearts are full of peace. I want
to assure you that you can have that same peace in your hearts despite the
hardships you may face or the evils you may see in the world around you.
We read in the scriptures where our source of hope comes
from. In Ether we read: “Whoso
believeth in God might with surety hope for a better world, yea, even a place
at the right hand of God, which hope cometh of faith, maketh an anchor to the
souls of men, which would make them sure and steadfast, always abounding in
good works, being led to glorify God” (Ether 12:4).
We read in Moroni: “What is
it that ye shall hope for? Behold I say unto you that ye shall have hope
through the atonement of Christ and the power of his resurrection, to be raised
unto life eternal, and this because of your faith in him according to the
promise” (Moroni 7:41).
We learn from these two verses
that hope must be founded upon faith and trust in our Heavenly Father and in
His son, even our savior, Jesus Christ. As we work to increase our faith and
strengthen our relationship with our Father and our Savior we come to realize
that we do have something to hope for. Because Heavenly Father has a plan and
the Savior accepted His role in that plan both death and Hell have been
overcome. Each one of us will be resurrected with perfect bodies, never to die
again. Eternal life is made available to us through the atonement. We must do
our part, striving to live in accordance with the gospel, but also remembering
that the price has been paid for our mistakes. If we will utilize the
atonement, we will be strengthened and cleansed from sin. Because our Savior
suffered for us we may gain eternal life. We may life with our Father in Heaven
and with our loved ones. The path has been laid before us. We’re even given
maps so to speak through the scriptures, personal revelation, and the words of
living prophets.
The path isn’t an easy one.
In the scriptures the Lord’s path is described as straight and narrow while
Satan’s is described as wide and broad. Satan tries to make his path seem
easier and more desirable. But truthfully, his is the path without hope. Hope,
as we’ve read, comes through our Savior and our trust in Him—trust that He will
keep His promises, that He will not lead us astray, and that He will strengthen
us.
So how do we strengthen our
hope even when faced with trial? To strengthen our hope we must first
strengthen our faith, and in order to do that we must learn of Him. The best
way to do that is to read the scriptures and to apply His teachings. This
sometimes means that we will be asked to do things that we’re not sure why we
were asked to do them in the first place. But we can take courage knowing that
He knows better than we do and that He will never ask us to do something that
isn’t for our benefit. As we live the principles of the gospel even when we
don’t understand them, we will gain testimony of those things, and we will be
blessed for our faith.
Let me share a couple
examples where I saw great and inspiring faith on my mission. Romania has seen
its fair share of trial. 25 years ago they had a revolution against their
communist government. They’ve made a lot of progress since then, but it seems
that the effects of that era still touch them in some way. They consider
themselves a poor people. Work is hard to come by, and most opportunities don’t
pay enough to live on, so it is common for both parents to work long hours,
many times daily. In other cases, a spouse may leave to another country where
they can earn more money and send it back home to their family.
In one of the areas I served in, the relief society
president shared an experience which demonstrates her great faith and courage.
Although her husband and children were all baptized together, she is the only
one who remains active. She worked very hard to help earn money to provide for
her family. This sister was scrimping and saving every penny so that she would
be able to return to the temple. When she had finally managed to save enough
money, one of her daughters approached her parents asking for help to pay
tuition in order to continue her schooling. The family knew that their mother
had some extra money set aside. This sister had to make what she called the
hardest decision of her life. She loves her family, and of course she would do
anything to help them, but if she gave up that money, that meant giving up this
opportunity to go to the temple, which is a hard thing to accomplish in and of
itself. The members of Romania have to travel to either Germany or Ukraine to
attend the temple, an expensive journey. In the end, this sister decided to use
the money for her temple trip. Her family didn’t understand and were angry with
her because of her decision. I can only imagine what she must have felt. Still,
she went to the temple. When she arrived and stepped into that sacred building,
all doubt was gone. She was filled with the spirit and knew that she had made
the right decision.
Another sister also saved every penny with the hopes of
returning to the temple. This woman was always overflowing with hope and
optimism. She recognized how blessed she had been, and she told me more than
once that she would never go back to her old life from before she was baptized.
It wasn’t worth it. Despite financial hardships, this sister never had a problem
with paying her tithing. I was touched as she explained to me that every time
she pays her tithing she imagines that it’s her small little brick that she
adds in the building up of the kingdom of God.
Because these two sisters remained faithful despite their
trials, they were able to continue to enjoy the blessings promised to the
faithful. They rejoiced in the fact that they were still able to attend church
meetings, and they were able to continue on with strength and hope because they
recognized the blessings of the gospel and that Heavenly Father was aware of
them and their trials.
Another way that we
strengthen our faith and therefore our hope is by daily personal prayer. The
more we speak to our Father in Heaven the more we will be open to the spirit.
We will be more open to His love and direction. He will help us to see that He
does have a plan for us. He will help to strengthen our hope and our faith if
we ask Him.
Another way to live a life more full of hope is to develop
an attitude of gratitude. There is something in every day that we can be
grateful for. Every night on my mission, I would ask my companions to tell me
three things they were thankful for that day. They would tell me three things
and then I would tell them three things. By doing this it made it so much
easier to have a spirit of optimism. It helped direct our focus on the good
things and all the little blessings we’d seen in the day. It was something
which helped me to recognize the Lord’s hand in my life. Every night in my
journal I would conclude by writing what I was thankful for and how I had seen
the hand of the Lord in my life that day. That constant reminder helped me maintain
hope from day to day and to fight off discouragement because I knew that I
wasn’t alone.
I remember one woman in my fourth transfer who was
recommended to us by a member. We arranged to meet with her, and after talking
with her for a while, I’m sorry to say that I didn’t see any potential with
her. She had some great trails in her life in that moment, and she couldn’t
seem to focus on anything else. She seemed to scoff at the things we were
saying and the encouragement we offered. At one point my companion tried to
help her realize that there was still good in her life, that she still had
things to be grateful for. My companion pointed out that this woman had a
daughter. Certainly that was a great blessing. The woman responded by saying,
“And what if I didn’t have her?” I was surprised and thought this woman would
never be able to see anything but the bad unless she herself chose to find the
good. I was more surprised still when she agreed to meet with us again. My
companion urged her to think of what she was grateful for daily. An arrangement
was made where my companion would call her up and ask her what those things
were. At first, this woman had a very hard time with it. Over time, it became
easier. There was even a time when my companion forgot to give her a call. When
we called the next day, this woman said, “You forgot to call me. This is what
I’m thankful for.” Although her hardships remained, she began to see a bit of
light in her life, and I even saw her take some steps to get her out of the troubles
she was in.
In contrast, I saw another woman in a different area who was
so focused on all the hardships she’d faced during the revolution and the
events that followed that she couldn’t progress at that time. Having hope
allows us to progress because we know what we’re working towards and we know
that we can make it there.
As we strive to live in accordance with the gospel we
radiate the hope and love that can only come through the gospel. One woman I taught
who was a faithful Christian of another denomination, once told me and my
companion that she could tell that we were followers of Christ because our
faces shone. This same woman offered us a room in her home so that we could
save money on rent. I would say that her light also shone.
There was a period of my mission when I was in the country
of Moldova, which is a small country sandwiched in between Romania and Ukraine.
Both Romanian and Russian are widely used there. Because of that fact, church
was sometimes in Russian, sometimes in Romanian, and sometimes half and half.
Some of the members knew both languages or even some English. However, there
were some that only spoke Russian. I wished that I could communicate with them,
but the only Russian I had figured out was pretty much “spaciba” “pa jausta”
and “das vadanya,” meaning please, thank you, and goodbye (you should know that those aren't spelled correctly, but are just in a format where I could remember how to say them). But a wonderful
thing happened. We began to communicate very simply through smiles and hand
gestures. I was amazed at these women who would come up to me on any given
Sunday, smile, and give my hand a squeeze. I could feel their love so strongly,
and I was just so amazed at that love. When I left that area, one of these
women struggled to put together a few Romanian words just so she could say
goodbye to me. I will never forget these small but very significant acts of
love.
In that same area, there was a woman who was physically
disabled. Because of her disability she couldn’t always make it to church. She
was also the only member in her family. We visited her once a week if we could
arrange it, and I was always so pleased to see how happy she was and how strong
her testimony was even though she couldn’t always attend church. Towards the
end of my time there, we began to get very busy. I think it’s safe to say that
it was the busiest time of my mission. We had said that we would get a hold of
this sister to meet with her that week, but it hadn’t happened and the week was
going quickly. We had one time open that we knew for sure that we could meet
with her. It was the following morning. We didn’t like to set up appointments
with so little time in advance, but I decided that we needed to at least call
her, and if she couldn’t meet she would at least know that we hadn’t forgotten
about her. I didn’t realize at that moment that the thought to make that call
was a prompting. She was able to meet and we had a nice long visit with her.
During that visit she told me how she had been hoping that we would come and
visit. She longed for that, but she didn’t want to call us because she knew we
were busy and she didn’t want to bother us. I was so incredibly grateful that I
had made that call. Not only that, I was able to see a great act of faith in
this woman.
Part of the hardship of going to church was that our building
had stairs. She could make it into the room we used for sacrament meeting, but
to attend her other meetings, she would have to go up a flight of stairs. She
told me, I think in that same visit, that she had begun doing exercises to
strengthen her arms so that she would be able to make it up the stairs using
her crutches. She hoped she would be able to make it to church the following
Sunday. I prayed for her the remainder of the week, hoping that she would be
given the strength to fulfill her righteous desire of coming to church. I was
so happy that Sunday when I saw her walk in, and she stayed for all three
meetings, slowly but surely making her way up and down the stairs.
From these women I learned that we can become more aware of
the love of our Heavenly Father as we associate with other followers of Christ,
and as we strive to serve others. I also learned that exercising the faith and
hope that we have through Christ gives us strength, allowing us to overcome our
trials, physical as well as spiritual. And one other thing is that fact that
often times Heavenly Father blesses His children and demonstrates His love for
them by using other people around them.
Christ once told His disciples, “These things I have spoken
unto you, that in me ye might have peace. In the world ye shall have
tribulation: but be of good cheer; I have overcome the world.” Christ knows
everything that we have felt and must endure. We can find peace through Him and
His atonement. One of the things that was a strength to me in times of struggle
on my mission was to imagine my savior beside me, holding my hand. Just as He
has been a strength to me, I know that He can and will be a strength for each
of us if we allow Him to help us. If we continue to build our faith and trust
in Him we will be able to maintain that sense of hope. We will be lifted out of
the darkness of our trails into the light of His love. Our lives will become a
reflection of that faith and hope, and just as I could feel the love of those
Russian women, those around you will feel of your love and will be brought
closer to the love of our Savior and our Father in Heaven.
In closing, I’d like to share my testimony with you in
Romanian. I know you won’t be able to understand what I say, but I hope that
you will be able to feel the spirit.
And I did share my testimony in Romanian! You won't be able to know what it sounds like, but just so you can see what it looks like (without the added symbols because I'm not sure how to add those at present...) I'll give you a written one. Hopefully when you go to stick it into google translate out of curiosity it won't be too far off!
Stiu ca Tatal Ceresc intr-adevar este tatal nostru si ca ne iubeste atat de mult. El are un plan perfect pentru fiecare dintre noi. Viata nu e usoara, dar nu suntem singuri. Putem avea tarie prin ispisirea lui Isus Hristos. Prin El putem fim vindecati si putem sa fim cu El, Tatal nostru, si cu iubitorii nostri pentru intotdeauna. Stiu ca aceast biserica este adevarata. Fiecare dintre noi putem sa stim asta. Trebuie doar sa-L cerem.
In numele lui Isus Hristos, amin.
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