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Welcome to this very special episode. Why? Why me? Why allow such an illness? How does such an illness even become justified? Why must we be punished to be blessed? Why can’t we just be blessed? All of this work to teach simple lessons that a God could most certainly instill within us without the necessary experiential suffering? Is suffering really necessary? Or is it just something we tell ourselves to make it feel as though our pain has some value?
I have grappled with these questions and so many more over the last year. I have never asked why more times in my life than I did last year. I have never suffered so deeply, penetratingly, openly and with such raw emotion as I did. No year compares on any plane. And spiritually I was doing well. I was progressing and doing what I should, when I should and for the right reasons. Why take me from a place of inclination and discovery to an abyss where it really doesn’t matter which way I go. Why take me from a place of light and put me into a darkness I never knew existed? What righteous purpose could anyone even God find in taking a striving soul and driving them ever deeper into the muddy bottoms of the river only to have them feel entirely alone. What divine purpose can be found in removing capacity, physically, emotionally, spiritually and then as they attempt even to climb from the muddy bottoms they slide backwards seemingly ever further from the shoreline. Each attempt leaving them weaker and weaker. Why must we be broken to be healed? Why must we be broken so that we will find the healer? What is it about me and everyone else in the world that we have no capacity to see the wound much less find the healer until we no longer possess the freedoms we once did? We seek the healer not to find true healing but to get back to what we were doing? Never mind that what we were doing was the problem. We seek the healer with earnest faith and devotion until the blessing arrives and with a quick thanks and a hug we are off again on our personal journey. And with relative quickness we find that we are wounded again and must seek the healer. But we seek the healer with complaints about the distance we need to travel, the time it takes to heal, the healer’s schedule, and all of the traffic around the healer’s home. We want the healing so that we can get back to what we were doing. We don’t understand how the wound keeps appearing when we are doing what we are supposed to be doing. We are following the healer’s instructions are we not? I take the meds and I keep the bandages clean and I am doing what I need to do to heal. Why can’t this wound just be finally healed?
And then we begin to question the methods of the healer. Why isn’t my wound healing? Why does my wound keep appearing? Maybe it is the healer’s fault not my own problem. Maybe the wound does not exist. Maybe the whole thing is an elaborate psychological ruse to make me feel good about myself using simple psychology. And yet the entire time we question the healer’s methods the wound remains open and festers and that causes us pain. So now weighed down by the pain we begin to blame the healer for the pain, for the festering and for his inability to heal. Perhaps we shall find our own healing among the methods of science. And we find that science is good but terribly incomplete and healing never fully feels like healing. And so still in the muddle bottoms we stubble, we cry out why are we here. This wasn’t in the plan. We had a deal. I keep the commandments, you bless me and we work together through my plan of salvation. Could I not have learned about muddy bottoms of rivers from the bank or even the hills. Why the bottoms with the foul odors and pond scum? What could possibly be here that could teach me anything? And the silence from the bank from everywhere is eerie. No answer whatsoever. So what I am to do, just wait here until someone comes by to rescue me? Still silence. Why have you placed me here? What good am I in the middle of a muddy river unable to do anything? And then the silence is broken only by thunder. A storm is approaching. The water is going to rise. So what am I going to do now? Still silence from the bank, although you know someone is watching and listening. Can you not see that I know you are there, why don’t you answer me? Why here? What do you want from me? You can hear the river starting to run faster. Suddenly it is obvious that without any aid you and the river are going to be part of one another. Just when the current is about to take you from the one small branch you found to hang on to, a voice rings out. Do You Trust Me. Almost in disbelief I ask, what do you mean? Of course, I trust you. The voice rings out again. Do you trust me? I again say, yes I do, can we get to the rescue and the healing. Finally, the voice says do you really trust me? That question wrenches the stomach because you know, you can feel that where you are now is not about to get better but a whole great deal worse. Of course, you trust the rescue and healing but do you trust when that doesn’t come right away. And as you expected he cuts the branch and down the river you go. Why must I go further? Wasn’t being thrown in a muddy pit sufficient to teach the principle? Why now am I bouncing down a river with the words do you trust me ringing in my ears.
I guess we will see this thing out says the heart taking a little courage because we really don’t have a choice. And instead of spending a few days in the river, you spend months barely able to hold yourself up against the current. And now you don’t understand anything. You are miles from where you expected to be and likely unable to get back there. This was not in the plan and not even in any of the backup plans. This was not your plan for this life. Why am I here? What good could come of being so isolated and lost? Suddenly after several months of
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hearing that voice as if you trust me, you hear the voice again. Lean not unto thine own understanding states the voice. So what does that mean you cry out. Nothing in return. And so it is you this river, steep banks of mud and this individual who does not seem to want to save you or do anything more but prolong your misery.
Months pass and you are completely spent and exhausted. Clinging to a log along the side of the river. He says let go of the log. No you say. It doesn’t make any sense. You won’t save me, you barely help me, why should I listen. I am done and I want out of the river. He smiles and says let go of the log. Trust me. I have trusted you. You cry out and look where I am. He smiles again and says let go of the log. You sit there silently not sure what to do or what to answer. You spend time on that log contemplating if there is value in this life in the muddy river. You have no capacity to do anything. You are helpless and hopeless and just want to be lifted out of the water.
Finally, you slip into the water and drift away, now fully trusting the voice. Just around the bend in the river you see a sand bank and a beautiful city. This must be the destination. This must be where he wants me to be. Glad that I trusted. As you near the sandy bank and look forward to being away from this river, he appears. This is not where I want you. Now you are frustrated and somewhat angry. This city has everything I need, why would I want to get back into that river. You are just going to need to trust me he says. There the two of you sit in silence. There is no way you are getting back into that river never knowing when you might be able to get out again. For all you know that river goes on forever. I really don’t want to get back into the river. He nods understandingly. I have been in this river many times so I understand. But I ask you to trust me. You need to get back into the river. The longer you wait the more difficult it will be. He waits and so do you. The desire to go to that city has never been stronger. You don’t want any part of that lonely river again. This fight goes on for some time. At times you get up to walk to the city and get part way but your heart turns you back. You know the voice and the person who is the guide and you do trust him, you just don’t want any more of that dark muddy river. He doesn’t relent and so eventually you get back into the river with the promise that he will provide for you and rescue you when the time comes to do so.
That river is cold, muddy and high with water. And so you get back into the water and began the lonely drift. Suddenly the walls of the river become too high to climb you are truly trapped unless something changes. Now you are feeling desperate and the voice is not as close as it once was. He speaks to you from the top of the hill which makes listening far more difficult. The river is not kind and begins to run more steeply and more quickly.
You are now hitting boulders regularly and they hurt. Now you question every decision you have ever made. This is not where you want to be and you are so far off that every plan you once had is now gone. Laid waste by this ride down the muddy river. You are frustrated, cold, miserable and ready to give up. As suddenly as the walls arose they slowly dissipate. You see a light in the distance and it is warm and inviting. You realize that the trial has come to an end. And he is there on the bank with a towel and some good food. After some time and good conversation you ask why. Why the river. Why couldn’t I have gone another way? Certainly there existed other ways.
He smiles. The answer is simple. Because there is no other way. The river, the mud, the cold, the darkness all teach lessons one cannot learn any other way. This is not just some random river with random boulders and high water. This is your personal river. Every rock, every slippery bank, every gallon of water is there to teach you. You cannot enter the city unless you have journeyed through your personal trials. I was not that I could not rescue you. I could. I was that if I did you would not have come to the City of Zion but would have chosen a lesser reward. In the river, your focus is on me. Outside the river you focus on the world.
You see if I send you down the easy trails with some pack horses and plenty of supplies. You will learn nothing about yourself and the truths of the gospel. And you would simply choose another city thinking that you have found Zion. Only under the pressures of the rushing waters, deep canyons, and bruising boulders can you find those attributes you need. That is the way the mortal and spiritual body learn. There is no other way to learn those lessons. Zion is only accessible through the rough waters and deep canyons. And so you see just as the Savior, we have a path to walk. Your life is not filled with random accidents and trials that can be easily removed. To remove them would remove a weight of glory. If you are doing everything you can and the trial remains then it is valuable to your soul and required. We have bitter cup trials as necessary for our salvation as the atonement of the Savior. They must be consumed until the trial ahs provided its gift. Yes gift. Trials are gifts of salvation and hopes of eternity. If we have them then the Lord is working with us and finds us worthy and willing. But if we remove our willingness, the trial will continue only we will find ourselves sitting in Bountiful complaining that the Lord doesn’t care about us as Laman and Lemuel did.
So the answer to why is that he loves you. He loves you enough to develop you through humbling moments and whether you believe it or not you asked him to before this life. This is your time and your path to walk. The Lord will always be there to strengthen and guide but it is our cup to drink and our bitterness to shallow until the Lord says it is enough. May the Lord bless you in your trials and troubles and may you see him and hear his voice from the shoreline. Until next week do your part so that the Lord can do his.