Trusting Through Our Tears

The Lord has promised us, “I will not leave you comfortless: I will come to you” (John 14:18). He has also promised that He will never allow us to suffer more than we can bear.[1]
I find some of the most calming and reassuring words in scripture in verse 8: “And then, if thou endure it well, God shall exalt thee on high; thou shalt triumph over all thy foes.” This is a principle with a promise. If we endure it well—not just survive it, but deal with it patiently, prayerfully, and with all the faith and hope we can muster—then we will receive the ultimate blessing, the highest of God’s gifts: life eternal, exaltation[2]. More immediately though, we’ll triumph over all our foes. Our foes are not always people; more often, in fact, they’re not. I would love to triumph over certain temptations and obstacles I have. I would love to triumph over depression for good. Whatever our foes, we will triumph over them, but only if we endure it well.
Section 121 continues: “The Son of Man hath descended below them all. Art thou greater than He?” (v. 9). This is a question we must ask ourselves. Do we really expect to go through life and have it easy? Our Savior, the most perfect person to ever live, descended below all things. He suffered it all. His condescension[3] included suffering more than any one of us will ever suffer. Are we so much better than He that we expect to skip it all and receive blessings for doing nothing? He suffered for our sins so that we won’t have to suffer if we repent. He suffered our sorrows so that He can succor us. He knows in a very literal way what it is like to suffer everything we have suffered. Suffering is how we become more like Him. Suffering and enduring it well.
It’s one thing to know all of this, to believe that it’s true and that it happens in theory. It’s another to put it into practice. It is hard. There is no doubt about that. But we didn’t come to earth to have an easy time and to go through life with no difficulties or obstacles. We must trust the Lord to keep His promises, because He will. He is bound if and only if we do what He says.[4]
The more I have thought about the parallel of our relationship with our Father and our own relationships with our children, the more examples I see. To our Father, we are all toddlers, like Emma, who is often so frustrated because she doesn’t get what she wants right away. When we are making dinner or she sees food that looks good, she wants it now. If we don’t give it to her now, I believe she must think that we hate her and that we’re torturing her. She thinks that if it’s not coming immediately, the answer is no; we’re not giving it to her, ever.
That is hardly ever the case, though. If we’ve just made pasta, it’s still hot. She cannot possibly understand the concept yet, but we don’t want her to hurt herself. If she gets the noodles too soon they’ll burn her mouth. We often try to speed up the cooling process by putting a little bowl of noodles in the fridge or freezer, which makes her even more upset, because now she sees that we’re completely taking away her food and it must seem, more than ever, that we are really never going to give her what she wants.
I try so hard to tell her to be patient. I want to give her what she wants, because I want her to be happy. The answer is not no; the answer is not yet. I’m sure this sounds familiar to all of us, because it’s a concept we try very hard to understand. The Lord has three basic ways He answers our prayers: “yes,” “no,” and “not yet.” “Not yet” is a form of “yes,” but it often doesn’t feel like it. Waiting even a week for the timing to be right can seem to us an eternity, but we know that we have to trust in the Lord’s timing. Timing can change everything. Like the hot noodles, what is at one point dangerous to His children can be exactly what they need, and they’ll get it soon enough.
In any situation—a couple wanting to have a baby but not being able to; knowing you’ve met the person you’re going to marry but feeling it’s not the right time; waiting to be healed of a physical illness; or pleading for reprieve from depression—our Father in Heaven wants to give us what we want, but timing is often everything. If we will be patient and trusting, we will make it far easier on ourselves. Not only that, but by showing our Father that we trust Him, we make it easier for Him to trust us.
[1] 1 Corinthians 10:13
[2] See 2 Nephi 31:20
[3] See 1 Nephi 11:16-33
[4] D&C 82:10