Thoughts on Trust

I've been working a lot lately on learning to trust completely in the Lord, which is not an easy thing to do at first. Seemingly giving up on your hopes and desires to follow what the Savior wants is difficult. Psalms 62 tells us:

  7 In God is my salvation and my glory: 

the rock of my strength, and my refuge, is in God.

8 Trust in him at all times; ye people,

 pour out your heart before him: God is a refuge for us. 

  I recently received a lesson from Him in trust. I was talking to a friend about something that's been troubling me. I told this person I've been praying about it near daily, and my response is continually "Be patient. Trust in me always, and my plan shall be revealed to you." My friend said that they constantly get the same answer about things they want. Being that we are both planners, letting that control go to trust in him is difficult, especially concerning things we want so dearly.

   After our talk, I sat in my car and prayed, but it was more like a conversation with my father in Heaven. For 20 minutes I communed with him, pouring out the desires of my heart, pleading for patience, pleading for help, pleading for guidance. And then I received the impression of what I would do if a child of mine was being impatient...

  I would make them wait longer. I can recall times in my life that my parents' would make me wait for things I wanted desperately. They were teaching me patience and obedience. It occurred to me that I was being like an impatient child, begging for something I wanted when I had already been given an answer; and like an impatient child, I was refusing to accept the answer, and was continuing to plead in vain.

  My Father was giving me a lesson in patience and trust. I wasn't trusting in him, leaving my wants and needs at his feet as I should have been. And so I begged forgiveness for being so short sighted, and forgetting that He already knows all my needs and desires, and will always give me what I need when I need it. I need only trust in him. I've since been leaving it in the Lord's hands. I know that He will grant me my needs in His own time, and when I need them most. I slip, I get discouraged, I get sorrowful, but I only need remember to trust in him, and say a little prayer, and I am comforted.

  I wonder how many of us of faith forget this lesson. How many of us beg for things we want, and not for what he wants of and for us? As people who are born again of Christ, we recognize that all things are possible through Him, and He has a plan for each of us that is greater than anything we could desire of ourselves. We need only to trust in Him in all things, and be patient, and obedient, and those things He desires for us, those things we need will be granted to us.

If only we are willing to trust in Him always.

"Faith is the Great Cop-out..."

Over the past few weeks, as I've been going to church, studying scripture, praying, recording thoughts and feelings and impressions I receive from Him in my journal, and visiting the Temple grounds; I've repeatedly had a Richard Dawkins quote come into my head. I'm sure many of you are familiar with it, it reads:

Faith is the great cop-out, 

the great excuse to evade the need to think and evaluate evidence. 

Faith is belief in spite of, even perhaps because of, the lack of evidence.

 I remember thinking, in my inactive days of... a month ago, how much I agreed with this sentiment. I remember feeling this truth, and found myself astonished that anyone could be so foolish as to think there was a Divine Being. The literal thought of God created a rage in me.

 I now know better.

Since exercising my faith, and trusting in Him to reveal Himself to me, and His subsequent revelation, I have a vastly different interpretation.

Faith is not an excuse. 

Faith is not easy.

Faith is hard. 

  Finding it is the hardest, most painful thing I have ever done. I remember spending hours as a child on my knees begging for His help. I didn't believe He would, I just had nowhere else to turn. After I (thought I had) received no help, I became angry. I raged at God. I swore at Him, I cursed Him, I reviled Him for not taking the prayers of a young man and granting them without delay. I thought only an unjust God could see and hear and feel the innate suffering, the soul-crushing agony I was going through and turn away.

My problem is that I had no faith. Faith is often defined as believing in something that you cannot see, or prove. Something that isn't tangible. But this is a vast oversimplification of Faith by those who don't understand it. Faith is so much more than belief. It is knowing without a shred of doubt in your soul that something is real, and it does exist, even if you don't know how or why. I have Faith that the Sun is a real, tangible object. I also have Faith that Christ lived, and performed miracles, and continues to do both of those things.

But wait, you might say, I can see the Sun, I can feel it's heat on my back, I know when it is gone from my sight; I don't know that of Christ.

But I do.

I see Him everyday, through miracles both large and small he performs for me, and others. I can feel the warmth of His presence when he is near me, and likewise feel the loss when He departs. I know he is real just as I know the Sun is a ball of burning gas 93 million miles away (a figure I didn't even have to look up, you should be impressed to know), or that Barack Obama is the President of the United States.

Faith is not a cop-out, it is not ignoring evidence. It is finding the abundance of evidence, recognizing it, and accepting it; and then continuing to do so throughout your life! Faith requires work, belief in science requires no such thing. I know gravity exists; I experience it on a daily basis, and I move on. That knowledge has no effect on my life. No person, or entity is striving to take away my belief in the power of gravity.

The same cannot be said of my Faith.

I know my Redeemer lives, but every second of every day, there is a very real personage trying to take that belief from me. I have struggled with a great addiction for many years, and at the moment of my conversion, any desire to partake in my Great Temptation was taken from me. Not once have I strayed from the path in the weeks following, and that is the greatest evidence to me that the Savior is working miracles in my life. but every so often, a voice whispers, "That was not His presence, that was your mind. It was a placebo." And I have to remember the burden that was lifted from me, and I have to pray for support, and I have to have faith in Him that I will be delivered, and I will be.

I go through this cycle many times a day, many times an hour. And it is hard, and it requires work, and exertion, and faith, but I can beat it. Satan does not whisper into my ear misgivings about the truth of gravity. 

And that is the difference. 

People who do not have Faith cannot know how endlessly easy it is to not have faith. I know I didn't. It would be so much easier for me to go back to my former ways. To curse, to partake in vulgar music, to give in to my Great Temptation, and to put aside the Joy I receive from Him to settle for contentment. To be complacent. To be lazy in my faith, much like being lazy in anything else.

A good friend and I were discussing this very topic earlier tonight, and she had a wonderful insight into faith:

"The truth is that everyone with faith is constantly on this teeter totter

 of finding where their beliefs are, and trying to strengthen them...

It's never complacent...

It's so much easier to stop trying...

But then you're also never balanced..."

Faith requires work. It requires evidence. And it is HARD to gain. Faith is not a cop-out, just the opposite. People stop searching for Faith, not because it's easy, but because it is so hard.

I remember being told that to receive and answer to my prayer inquiring the truth of God that I needed to pray until I could pray no more, and then to keep praying. I found that absurd, like telling someone they had to walk until they passed out from dehydration, get up, and continue walking before being granted a drink. What God could require so much of me, when I was searching for HIM!  

The truth is, a loving One. A just One. I was looking at it in the wrong way. All God requires is that we, like Abraham, be willing to sacrifice our everything to Him, and through that obedience He will grant us new life. And I promise you, he does, and he will. This is coming from a person who literally thought not a month ago that people who had a "relationship" with God were stupid, and ignorant, and who knew He didn't exist, and would never, and could never exist. Until He did. He came to me, and wrapped His arms around me, and said "I am with you. I have always been, and will always be with you. I have struggled, and mourned, and sorrowed with you, and now I rejoice that you might know Me." 

And all it took was believing He would, until I could believe no longer. And then believing a little more. It took giving everything I am, everything I have to him, and the willingness to give so much more. And to maintain it, I must be willing to do the same.

What's so hard about that?

My Conversion Story

This entry is copied from a separate personal blog I wrote earlier this year.

Some of you know that I've been struggling a lot lately with my faith. Specifically, that I had none. I didn't know what was out there, but I found the notion of the traditional God and Jesus Christ to be far-fetched.

But lately, I've been doing a lot of soul searching, prompted by the realization that so many of my friends had so much joy in their relationship with the being they believed to be God. And I wanted that joy, so I sought out that relationship.

It's not been easy; after talking with the sister missionaries, and praying, and studying the scriptures, I felt nothing. So I fell back into complacency, and ignored the promises I had made to the sisters.

Then, 3 weeks later, they showed up at my door.

Crap.

We spoke again, and I voiced my frustrations. After chatting with them, and them somehow making me promise to go to church (blech) I felt even more frustrated.

But I did as they asked, and read conference talks, and read my scriptures. I listened to Rob Gardner's music, and bought his latest CD, as his music sparked my search last time. Yet I still felt very little.

Still, I had promised the sisters I would be at church on Sunday, and I wasn't prepared to break a promise again. So I woke up Sunday morning dreading the thought of church, but I'd asked my friend to come with me, so that made me feel better.

I get to church, walk in, and the sisters are surprised as all get out that I'm there...

Rude.

So I sit down, and rather than feeling uneasy, as I expected, I felt comfortable, at peace. I felt like being there was the most natural thing in the world. And then Maddi got there (LATE) and sat with me, and of course we joked around, but in a reverent-ish way?

Anyway, the first girl to speak was super nervous, and she had horrid grammar, but it felt like her talk was exactly what I needed to hear. I had never felt that before...

Gospel Principles was all about the holy ghost, which I also needed. 2/2. After church, I felt happy, and I knew I was headed the right direction, but I was still unsure.

Then this morning, I had what is undoubtedly the biggest spiritual experience of my life.

I was listening to Rob Gardner's song "There Are Angels", which has gorgeous music. But I decided to focus on the words.

"Every Shepard know the names of all his sheep.

And not one can come to harm while in his keep

But when they wander from their keeper, who is there to hold them near

Do they know there is no reason for their fear?

For there are angels watching o'er the Shepard's sheep.

To warm them in the night, and guard their sleep.

And there are angels to hold them through the rain

To guide them safely to the fold again.

If from his nest a sparrow cannot fall

Unnoticed by the Shepard of us all

Can it be that he's forsaken you through the hardships you have known

Do you know that you will never walk alone?

For there are angels watching o'er the Shepard's sheep.

To warm them in the night, and guard their sleep.

And there are angels to hold them through the rain

To guide them safely to the fold again."

 And as I listened, I felt an overwhelming sense of joy and love, more immense than anything I've ever felt before. And I had no doubt that I experienced the presence of something, someone greater than myself.

And I wept tears of joy.

It felt like the savior put His arms around me, and let me know He's been there along as I suffered, and He suffered with me, and waited until the right time to wrap me in His embrace. I can't explain the mix of emotions I'm feeling: joy and sorrow and peace, but I'm terrified, but calm. I'm happy, but I'm afraid, because I know how easy it is to get complacent, and to fall back into my old ways, because it's easy
to ignore those small feelings, and those little promptings, and to do the things you want to do because they make you "happy".

But they don't.

And I'm not trying to be preachy, I hate being "preached" at. But I know what I'm doing now, this path I'm on is making me happy, and I wasn't before. And it may not work for you, and that's okay, because you have the right to believe in whatever you wish, and to think your own, personal thoughts, and to judge people based on their beliefs, if you think that's okay.

I just want you to be happy. To be truly happy, like I feel right now. And you may find your joy in another way, and think my route to happy is wrong.

But I'll still love you, as the Savior loves us all. (if that's what you believe)

So that's my story, for now. I pray only that I'll continue along this path, and expand this joy, and grow closer to God, and take my joy from Him, and find shelter from grief, and pain in Him. That I can serve my purpose here on earth, and join Him again when the time is right.

And I'm happy.