Peace Like a River

They say that peace is like a river, but rivers make me think of chaos: rushing and furious, loud and overwhelming, speeding uncontrollably downstream. I’ve heard rivers compared to peace, but to me, they’re anything but.

Life is like a river, though, in that sometimes the current of time feels overwhelming, and it’s all I can do to keep my head afloat. And sometimes, as worries and fears speed uncontrollably through my mind, I start to flail, terrified that I am drowning, convinced that I don’t have what it takes to stay afloat.

But then this image washes over me: Christ’s disciples on a ship as waves twice, three times their height come crashing over the sides, working desperately to keep the ship upright and themselves from being swept overboard, wondering how their beloved Master could possibly be asleep, completely oblivious to this tempest that threatens His life. Terrified, they wake Him, only to hear His surprised response: “Why are ye fearful, oh ye of little faith?” And when He turns to face the sea, He commands, and all is still.

As I face my own storms, with Christ’s disciples I also wonder: What manner of man is this? How can He remain so calm when the world around Him is anything but? And how can He expect me to do the same?

But the Savior is not as other men. He is the Son of God, and as I study His words I realize why the same fear that paralyzed His disciples’ hearts did not penetrate into His own:

Because He knew who He was and what He was capable of.

Because not only did He create the earth, He came to save it as well.

Because not only did He overcome His own death and hell, but He overcame everyone else’s as well.

Because even as I feel like I am fighting for my very life, the Savior has already ensured that I will rise again.  

Then how can I not feel peace?

Additional Resources:

John 16:33

https://www.lds.org/topics/peace?lang=eng#_

Career Woman

Most of us know what “The Family: A Proclamation to the World” teaches us about parents’ roles: “Mothers are primarily responsible for the nurture of their children,” while fathers are the ones who “are responsible to provide the necessities of life and protection for their families.”

I believe what “The Family: A Proclamation to the World” teaches. I believe that it is the word of God, spoken through the mouths of His modern-day Prophet and Apostles. I want to follow what it says because I believe that doing so is what will bring me the greatest joy.

I have also recently started looking for a career.

Not a job, some temporary form of employment to tide me over until I can finally get married and start a family of my own. A career. A solid, reliable, long-term career. Something that will hone my skills and talents while providing for my physical needs. Something worthy of my intelligence and my potential to make a difference in the world.

But, you ask, isn’t that antithetical to what “The Family” teaches?

No. I don’t believe it is. In fact, I would say that the two are synonymous. Whether I continue on the career path even after getting married or give up my job to spend more time with my children, here is what getting established with a career now will add to my future marriage and family:

• Security: The burden of providing financially for the family will not rest solely on one person. If there ever comes a time when my husband for whatever reason, be it medical or economic in nature, can no longer provide for the family via his own efforts, he can rest assured that there is someone else in the household qualified and willing to pick up that burden for him.
• Example: My daughters will realize that they have the freedom and ability to choose what they do with their lives, and my sons will have a respect for women, including Mormon women, whose life’s journey takes them on a more unconventional route.
• Love: My children and husband will recognize that I choose to put them first because I love them, not because some old guy told me it was important.
• Unity: My future husband won’t feel that he has to sacrifice providing for his family over spending time with them, but will know that he has the freedom to work with me as he tries to find his own balance between the two.
• Self-worth: I will recognize that my growth and development matter independent of what they will add to my children’s upbringing. This will help me lead my children from a place of confidence; rather than basing my worth off of how well my children perform in front of others, I will base my worth off of something more substantial: my personal ability to achieve my goals, independent of the decisions those I’m responsible for make.

So while the most important thing in my future will be my husband and children, in the meantime I will take advantage of this opportunity to establish a career. Not because I care more about worldly things than I do about following the prophet, but because I care about having strong relationships with my future family. And that will begin with having a strong relationship with myself – because, really, how can I nurture my future children if I have never learned how to nurture myself?

The Eternal Truth of Families

"We . . . solemnly proclaim that marriage between a man and a woman is ordained of God and that the family is central to the Creator’s plan for the eternal destiny of His children."

-"The Family: A Proclamation to the World" 

In this one simple sentence, the First Presidency of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints makes clear God’s view on marriage and family. Life is sacred, and the most sacred part of life is the relationships we establish with one another. The most important of these relationships are created and developed in the home. The home creates the ideal environment for growth and joy: it provides constancy in a world that is ever-changing; love in a world that can seem indifferent; a moral anchor in a world of ever-shifting morality; a place to be yourself in a world that judges each individual based off of arbitrary and superficial standards.

For these reasons, God has designed a plan that centers around the family unit. Family is not a social construct; it is a heavenly one. Our Heavenly Parents have an eternal marriage, and they find their joy in helping their children grow and become more like them (see Moses 1:39). As children of our Heavenly Parents, we also will find our purpose and our joy in creating Christ-centered families.

Modern culture has stigmatized those who marry young, as well as those who voluntarily give up their career for their children. However, God’s truth has not changed along with the culture. Marriage is still ordained of God, and the family is still central to the Great Plan of Happiness. Eternal marriage and a Christ-centered family life will always be the key to eternal joy. This is an eternal truth, and as such will never change.

Hope

“Wherefore, there must be faith; and if there must be faith there must also be hope; and if there must be hope there must also be charity” (Moroni 10:20).

In the Mormon world, we tend to hear a lot of talk about developing charity and faith. Everything from Sunday School lessons to whole chapters in the Book of Mormon get devoted to these two Christlike attributes. And whenever faith and charity get grouped together, another Christlike attribute always seems to pop up as well: that of hope. But whereas multiple scriptures define faith and charity and detail exactly how we can develop them (see, for example, Alma 32 or 1 Corinthians 13), scriptures that break down hope seem much harder to find. What is hope? Why do we need it? And what does it look like in everyday life?

Hope Defined

In modern lingo, we use the word hope to denote something that we wish for but cannot control: I hope the weather’s good today, I hope that cute boy asks me on a date, I hope this traffic doesn’t make me late to work. Our limited control over these outcomes means that we have no guarantee that these wishes of ours will come true.

When I try to apply this definition to scriptural passages about hope, however, it doesn’t quite seem to fit. Paul teaches that “we are saved by hope” (Romans 8:24), but salvation seems too essential to our eternal well-being to come from something as flimsy as wishful thinking. Moroni also speaks of hope, claiming it as “an anchor to the soul” (Ether 12:4). But me hoping I’ll get an A on my paper does nothing to anchor my soul; instead, it feels as if the nervous anticipation causes my heart to get swept away with my thoughts until both feel the complete opposite of anchored. How do I reconcile this disconnect between what I mean by the word hope, and the blessings promised by these ancient prophets?

Turns out, the word hope hasn’t always had the definition it has today. Like many words in the English language, its meaning has changed throughout the centuries. At the time the scriptures were translated, its definition was a feeling of trust.

So it’s not just wishful thinking, after all. It’s something more tangible than that: trust. So now we know what hope means – but where does this feeling of trust come from? And how can we cultivate it for ourselves?

So now we know what hope means – but where does this feeling of trust come from? And how can we cultivate it for ourselves?

The answer comes from Moroni: Hope is found “through the Atonement of Christ." Our hope grows as we continuously apply the Atonement of Jesus Christ in our own lives. As we follow the words of Christ as taught by the prophets, we experience firsthand the power of Christ’s Atonement to heal and strengthen us, spirit as well as body. This increases our hope – our trust – that the Savior will continue to strengthen and heal us. And with this trust comes the reassurance that even though we may not see a way to make those good things that we wish for happen in our lives, our Heavenly Father has a plan, along with the power to make that plan happen. God controls the outcomes, and with that knowledge we have the guarantee that all we hope for will come true.

Now when we look back at those two verses, they make a lot more sense. Our salvation comes through trusting that the Savior can and will save us. This trust, in turn, gives us motivation to stay anchored in following the Savior’s teachings no matter what is going on around us, because we trust that from our efforts will come worthwhile results. Hope gives us something to rely on when all around us feels unstable. It requires that we yoke the emotion of trust with the action of obeying, the emotion motivating the action and the action generating more of the emotion in a cyclical process. In this way cultivating hope is similar to cultivating charity and faith.

One last question that has often puzzled me: How can "good things to come" affect my current emotional state? How can something in my distant future make a difference in my present bleakness?

                                             

Hope Applied

Surprisingly, to have hope does not mean that we solely focus on - and therefore live in - the future. It means that because we trust God to fulfill all His promises to us at some point in the future, we can then let go of our anxieties for what's to come, as well as our regrets over what has happened in our past, and thus become more anchored in the present moment. 

My hope has developed slowly, over the course of several years, and even as I write this post I know that still I have much to learn. As I have grown ever closer to the Savior, I have gained several insights about this feeling of trust that comes from Him:

Hope means moving forward: Not letting my past define my present, but letting go of past pains and mistakes because I trust that the Atonement has the power to make me whole again. And when I combine this with my (ever-growing) faith in the Savior's love for me, I can then start to comprehend that my worth is defined by God’s love and sacrifice for me, not by anything I ever do or say. My actions affect my progression, but they can never change my worth. As I act on my hope I begin to understand this principle within both my heart and mind, thus enabling me to work towards my potential in spite of the chance of failure. God loves me even when I don’t succeed – and that gives me the hope to keep going after experiencing discouragement as I let the Savior – and those around me – help pick me up and get moving towards my dreams and goals again.

Hope means looking back purposefully: Seeing how God’s hand has guided me in the past, then using the resulting feeling of faith and love to trust that He will continue to guide my life in the future, and that, furthermore, whatever my life is like right now, the Lord has a plan and is guiding me patiently and intentionally through it. This helps me keep going when there seems to be no point, knowing that someday I will understand the hows and whys of everything I am going through right now, and that it will all seem worth it.

Hope also means being immersed in the present: Trusting in the Lord enough to let go of my wishes and fears of the unknown, trusting that He has a plan – and enough power to make that plan happen, no matter what mistakes I may not know enough to avoid. This letting go frees me from worries and gives me space to enjoy the small pieces of wonder that exist inside the shards of even otherwise broken days. Hope leaves my mind free to fully embrace each new moment as it comes.

Hope Cultivated

Most of all, hope is a journey. It’s something we learn and practice one little bit at a time. My own journey to hope has taken years, and I’m definitely not at the finish line yet. All those things I described above? A year from now, I’m sure I’d be able to expound hope with even greater depth. But here’s the thing about hope: I trust the Savior enough to know that even though I don’t know everything right now, what I do know is enough for Him to make today magnificent. And as I keep on striving to learn more so I can draw ever closer to God, my Savior will be there to hold my hand every step of the way.

My hope has come from doing the little things daily, doing them sincerely, doing them with the expectation of results. My hope for the future has come from recognizing how God has turned the me of the past into the much calmer, more confident, more loving, peaceful, grounded me of the now – and having the faith that He will continue to fulfill all the promises He has made to me, both through the words of prophets (ancient and modern alike), and more individual promises made specifically to me, through the words of my Patriarchal Blessing and personal revelation. Hope is faith in God’s charity for all mankind, but also, individually, for me. Hope is faith in God's love.

The Power to Change Lives

A lot of modern-day prophets have made intense promises about the blessings of studying from the Book of Mormon every day. President Benson talked about “a power in the book that will begin to flow into your lives the moment you begin a serious study of the book.” Boyd K. Packer stated that the Book of Mormon “has the nourishing power to heal starving spirits of the world.” Joseph Smith himself claimed that “a man would get nearer to God by abiding by its precepts, than by any other book.” Many other prophets, apostles, and inspired men and women have made similar promises.

But sometimes those promises seem so far out there. Once you’ve finished the Book of Mormon the first time, why would you want to keep reading it every day for the rest of your life? Doesn’t that seem a little, well, boring?

While it may seem redundant, those promises are true. Here’s the thing: We expect God to produce miracles using some exciting, one-time event. He’s God; He has that kind of power. But that’s not how He works. That’s not how anything in the universe works, really. Even Redwoods grow from tiny seeds, and mountains reach their impressive heights only over millions of years of constant shifting of the earth. Mere mortals also have experience with the slow steadiness of change: Skyscrapers do not go up instantly, in a blaze of smoke. Neither would we trust doctors to perform surgery after just a few weeks of study. Artists spend years practicing their art before even attempting to start a masterpiece that will itself take days and weeks and months of continuous effort to perfect. It takes consistent effort to produce significant results. Why then should it be any different with learning the mysteries of God?

And the Book of Mormon contains more than mortal power. The stories and doctrines contained therein were written not merely in the language of the Nephite prophets, but in the language of the Spirit. This Spirit that infuses the Book of Mormon is the same Spirit that God uses to communicate with us personally. As we read its pages, God speaks to us, answering our questions in the way that we best will understand, comforting us in the way that He knows we best respond to, giving us specific guidance for our specific needs for every specific day in our specific lives.

And this means that, although the words contained inside the Book of Mormon may never change, their meaning in our lives does. Why? Because our lives are constantly changing. And through the Book of Mormon’s simple words and stories, the Spirit can communicate the individual application of God’s truth.

And there is so much depth to the doctrine in the Book of Mormon that it is impossible to glean it all in even a lifetime of readings. Not because the doctrine is dense, but because that’s how God’s truth works: It contains both simplicity and depth. A child can understand the basics – and yet the more we go through new experiences, the more principles taught in the Book of Mormon that we’ve never noticed before start to make sense – and even principles we thought we fully understood take on more substantial meaning in our lives. And just as we understand the love our parents have for us in deeper and deeper shades as we gain more experience of what it means to sacrifice for someone else, so too does our understanding of the Savior’s love for us grow in ever deepening shades as we experience more of the heartbreak and joy that life has to offer, and realize the immensity of His all-encompassing sacrifice for us.

Through the stories in the Book of Mormon, God reassures us of the reality of His existence and of His love for us, as evidenced by the Plan He set in motion before He even started creating the world, centered in the willing agony and death of His Son. And He’ll reassure us of the specific parts of that Plan we need to understand in order to draw steadily closer to Him day by day, week by week, month by month, year by year. Little by little, our lives will become more full of His love and peace, and less full of the artificiality and complications of the world around us.

God uses the small and simple means of the Book of Mormon to bring about His complex miracles – because really, what greater miracle can there be than the one that happens inside of us? And rather than making Him look weak, it is evidence of God’s power that He can take something so simple and, from it, create something so magnificent.

*For further study of this topic, check out Julie B Beck's talk from April 2004

Someone Else

One of the gospel’s basic tenets is that life is not a competition. We all have the same potential, and therefore we are supposed to help each other reach that potential, supposed to rejoice when someone else reaches life goals that we have not yet reached, supposed to not get annoyed when other people else achieve things that we want, supposed to not hate anyone for living the life we feel that we deserve.

I don’t know about you guys, but sometimes I do get annoyed. Sometimes I do hate people for being better than me. And I’m pretty sure I’m not the only one. Even though we know we’re not supposed to covet our neighbor’s anything, sometimes it’s still so hard to not get bitter. And I think it stems back, at least in part, to this idea that someone else’s joys and successes are somehow a reflection of our own self-worth.

For example: Someone else gets a prestigious internship, someone else gets asked on four dates a week, someone else takes 18 difficult credits and still manages to pass them all, someone else just off their mission gets engaged – and I get jealous, I get bitter, I get oh so insecure. I wonder: What’s wrong with me that I’m not like that? Am I not as good as them? Not as attractive? Intelligent? Competent? Interesting? Fun? Do I not put as much effort into being my best self? Why should fate favor them and not me? Doesn’t God want me to have joy? Then what am I doing wrong?

Does any of this sound familiar?

I know I’m not the only one out there who thinks like this. Even though we know that these sorts of things are not what the gospel teaches, even though we know exactly what cliché gospel truths this line of thinking goes against, that does not make it easy to just stop these emotions from happening. There is a difference between knowing and believing, and making that switch from intellectual to emotional can be scary. It means trusting in God’s view of us and letting go of a lifetime of accumulated assumptions about our tentative place in this world, and our instinct warns us that if we let go, we will fall.

Remember Peter, though, trying to be like Jesus and walk on water? He looked down at the waves – and started to sink. He fell. But the Savior heard his cry for help, and Peter did not drown.

Neither will the Savior let us drown. As we let go of our beliefs about our worth, He will reach out and raise our thoughts up to a place where we no longer feel as if we are drowning.  And He will replace our insecurities with the truth about His love. Because it’s not enough to know that a belief is incorrect; to get it to leave our hearts, we must replace it with the truth (see Isaiah 55:9).

So what is the truth about our worth?

Someone else’s joy has no reflection on my worth or my potential. If someone younger than me gets 

married, does that mean I’m doing something wrong in my life to not be progressing along in the Lord’s Plan of Salvation the way I want to be?

No. It means that God has a different plan for my life. Why? Because I’m a different person than those people I’m comparing myself to. Of course things are happening in my life at a different time than in other people’s lives – because God loves my individuality. He has prepared a plan for my life that caters to what I, Miriam Jones, need. Not what my friends, my family, my classmates, or anybody else in this world needs, but what I, Miriam Jones, with my unique set of strengths and challenges, need. More than anything, God wants me to grow closer to Him through becoming more like Him. And because He understands me (see Alma 7:11-13), He knows what I need and when I need it, and He is so good at providing it – because I am His daughter, and He loves me.  

And, lately, as I’ve worked to understand how God views me I have discovered a depth inside of me that, in certain recent attempts to fit in, I had started to neglect.

I’ve rediscovered my love for sincerity, for emotional writing, for long bike rides and wading in rivers, for upbeat music and dance parties, for deep discussions about the nature of humanity and life and politics and how it all ties into what the Savior teaches, for my family’s smart-alecky sense of humor and how it’s so much like mine.

I have discovered how alive I feel when I focus on using my talents, my strengths, my personality to brighten my life and that of those around me.

And I’ve discovered that as I do this, I feel so connected to everyone around me. Everyone is connected, but sometimes we focus so much on beating other people in this game called life that we forget to let our hearts feel this connection. But it’s as I focus on connecting with God and with others that I also feel connected to my own soul. I see my worth as others help me see it, as I discover it by doing those things that I love, as God helps what I know align more closely with what I believe, and as I help others see their own worth. Keeping connected with God, myself, and others – all three in an increasingly perfect balance – helps me feel connected to the depths that exist inside of me, help me feel alive and so sure of who I have the potential to become.

And as I feel the depth of my worth and my potential, I can start to see the same things inside of everyone else. I see unexpected strengths in people I had written off. I see unexpected trials in people I had labelled as always happy and easy-going. I see charity inside of people I’d never bothered to talk to. Suddenly it’s easier to interact with people and let the depths inside of them draw out the depths inside of me. Suddenly I feel so much love, both for myself and for all those I interact with. Suddenly, I start to understand how God feels about His precious sparrows.

Ward Family

As an introvert, socializing in a large group setting is not my forte. In fact, places where there are large groups of people all gathered together can really stress me out. So, for example, church. Especially when it seems, as it so often does in Mormon singles’ wards’ culture, that the main expectation of church is socializing. To be honest, sometimes this drives me crazy.

But lately I’ve been realizing on a more personal level one of the blessings that comes from actually getting to know the people at church. Church leaders often refer to a “ward family,” and I’m starting to understand what that means with my heart.

This past semester has been one of draining struggles. Before my mission, I would have been so hesitant to ask for support from those around me. I would have kept my struggles to myself until I absolutely could not take it anymore. But something about spending 24/7 with someone and not being able to hide my hard days from them, whether I wanted to or not, taught me a much-needed lesson: it’s okay to let others into the hard parts of my life. Not only is it okay, it’s also helpful. And what’s more: there are always Christlike people around me who want to help.

And so, these past few months, I have once again seen that Christlike desire to help in those people who are around me. And I have found the majority of those people in my ward: neighbors, roommates, the bishop, home teachers, visiting teachers, friends. I have felt my Savior’s love through the willingness that these people in my ward have shown in spending time with me and serving me. I feel so much love from those around me, and it fills me with the strength to get through yet another day. It gives me hope that I can figure out solutions and that things will get better. The effort they put into serving me helps me understand my worth.

And it’s not just one person, but a whole multitude of them, and each one brings with them a different strength. Including those people whom I barely know who keep bringing me cookies. I don’t even know how they knew I was struggling, but somehow they did, and without even really knowing me they are showing me that they care.

It makes me think of a game from a ward activity a couple months ago: each person in a group of five or so had to hold onto a strand of duct tape connected to a pen and draw a picture. Now, picture this in your mind: If only one person holds onto a strand of the duct tape, they can hold the pen upright, no way could they actually draw something with it. Another person holding a strand on the other side would balance it out better. Add two more people to the other corners, and the pen’s now fairly stable. The more people there are supporting the pen, the easier it is for the pen to draw.

Lately I have been that pen. Some days I just feel like lying flat on the ground. So I read my scriptures and I pray, and I find myself standing upright, tied straight to heaven. But even with heaven pulling me upright sometimes it’s still hard to move myself enough to make a mark.

But then my ward family gets involved, and now I have even more people holding onto the strands of duct tape, reinforcing what scripture study and prayer are telling me, that I can do this and everything will work together for my good. All these people supporting me, reinforcing me, helping me not just to stand up straight but to move forward – and suddenly, when I didn’t feel that I could even stand up on my own, I find that somehow I have the strength to make a piece of art.