This is something that I think we do not often talk about, but which I believe is a fundamental fact of life, a basic truth of existence, encapsulated in Lehi’s famous expression, “it must needs be, that there is an opposition in all things” (2 Nephi 2:11).
Opposition is not always dramatic, and it is not always negative.
That is, the fact that there is
opposition in our lives does not always mean that
what I am doing is right and what opposes me is wrong.
Sometimes – possibly even most times –
opposition is in our lives in order to challenge and guide us – or
in other words, to invite us –
to do what we ought to do,
which may differ from what we want to do.
In this sense, then, I should be very happy that there “must needs be... opposition,” because
without it I might utterly fail in this life,
missing the mark and
walking along improper paths.
For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways, and my thoughts than your thoughts. |
“as man is, God once was;
and as God is, man may become,”
we can begin to think that this describes an almost inevitable process, and that God is really somewhat like us. This can be dangerous thinking.
God. Is. Different.
It is true that Joseph Smith taught that as we are, God once was (though I could not begin to tell you how or when that was or what it really means – I simply trust in the assurance I believe I feel from the Holy Spirit, which tells me the doctrine points to something that is true); but the fact is, He is not like that anymore.
Further, the second part of that couplet, “as God is, man may become,” tells us that
not only is our future godly nature not guaranteed,
it also entails becoming very different than we are now.
God is something other than us.
The otherness of God, and the challenge to be different in order to be like Him and to enjoy an existence like His, was also presented to us in the life and ministry of Jesus Christ.
Jesus’ words and behaviour during His mortal ministry challenged the Jewish establishment at the time. Every individual He met found Him to be different than what they expected.
By many He was not recognized as the Messiah,
because He did not do what they had come to believe the Messiah would do.
He claimed to be the Son of God –
the idea of there being a Son of God was blasphemous to them.
He not only healed the bodies of all who came to Him for healing,
He also claimed for Himself the right to heal their souls, to forgive their sins.
This was also blasphemous.
He said that the children of Abraham could be made from the rocks if God wished;
that the covenant birthright Israel claimed for itself was
not simply a genetic feature of their lives.
He was teaching over and over again, that God is different from what we think or expect, and that becoming close to God, becoming like God, and receiving the fullness of His blessings and promises, requires us to become different too.
Even those closest to Him barely understood what He was really all about until well after His death and resurrection and ascension, after which they received the Holy Ghost and were transformed in their thinking and their feeling so that they gradually began to see and understand what He had all along been teaching them.
In order even to follow God, let alone to be like Him, they had to be willing
to become very different than they had been before;
and so do we.
Most dramatically, Jesus taught that if we love our lives, if we want to live, and particularly if we want eternal life, then that life which we cherish is exactly that thing we must give up in order to be saved. He said, “He that findeth his life, shall lose it; and he that loseth his life for my sake shall find it.”
This is a spiritual principle, but it also has material consequences. In this regard, to His disciples Jesus said,
Therefore I say unto you, Take no thought for your life, what ye shall eat; neither for the body, what ye shall put on. The life is more than meat, and the body is more than raiment. |
This specific commandment is a challenge for many of us.
that isn’t the good life
and, in fact,
you might need to give some of that up
in order to discover what a good life really is.
A timely repetition: “Your ways and not my ways,” said the Lord to Isaiah.
Some have interpreted this directive as a call to a simpler mode of living: Get rid of “things”, and put aside your desires for “abundance”. That is a commendable but clearly challenging choice.
Some people in the history of Christianity have taken it to mean they should live as poorly as they possibly can. For some, this has led to insanity and suffering, as in at least the legends of the artist, Vincent Van Gogh. In his earlier life, Van Gogh attempted to be a minister of the gospel, but was regarded as somewhat of a lunatic. He continually gave away what he had, till he had nothing and, one story says, he was found at last by his brother, Theo, lying on the floor of his dilapidated shack sharing his last meal with a rat. (More can be learned about Van Gogh's remarkable life and artwork, here.)
For others, the challenge to live poorly has led to what we call an ascetic spiritual life. Many monks in Christian history have taken vows of poverty, and even those many that do not do this still lead their lives in a way that avoids what the rest of us gluttons consider to be the “finer things in life.”
Whether their choice to live in that way is right or wrong, I cannot say, and would not try to judge. I admire the fortitude and faith they express, and it seems to me that God does bless them for their sacrifices and often uses them to produce great works of spiritual beauty.
But I can say this: that it appears to me that such extreme sacrifice as a lifestyle choice does not appear to be what Jesus was talking about (at least not exclusively), and is not what He requires of us today in order to be His saints, to follow Him and to receive eternal life.
Again, there is opposition in all things; our ways are not His ways; and what we think and expect and interpret from His words, is not always what He really wants for us. Jesus Himself said He had nowhere to lay His head at night – no home, no things of His own. And yet, at the same time, He was accused of being a bit of a partier, associating with publicans and sinners, enjoying their fine meals and company, so He clearly did not entirely put aside such things in His life or require that His followers do so.
First, He does not tell us merely not to be greedy or covetous. To Joseph Smith He said,
I give unto the church in these parts a commandment, that certain men among them shall be appointed…And they shall look to the poor and the needy, and administer to their relief that they shall not suffer. |
It is also an obligation for each of us personally.
To wit, second, in a later revelation to Joseph Smith, the Lord said this:
Wo unto you rich men, that will not give your substance to the poor, for your riches will canker your souls; and this shall be your lamentation in the day of visitation, and of judgment, and of indigation: The harvest is past, the summer is ended, and my soul is not saved. |
if any man shall take of the abundance which I have made, and not impart his portion, according to the law of the gospel, unto the poor and the needy, he shall, with the wicked, lift up his eyes in hell, being in torment. |
that caring for the poor and needy is not merely a nice idea.
It is even not merely a commandment.
We have been “commanded” to grow gardens, keep food storage and write journals; but
the failure to do these things does not result in a promise that
you will end up suffering in hell.
However, failure to care for the poor and needy has that consequence.
Of course, we understand that the Latter-day Saint doctrine of hell is not necessarily about an actual place, and particularly not a place of actual fire and brimstone where devils whip you and poke you with pitchforks.
For the vast majority of us who experience it, Hell is more a condition than a place; it is the condition of the misery we will experience (either, or both, during or after this life), knowing we have not done or been or become what we should have done or been or become in this life, and have ourselves cut ourselves off from the grace and presence of our Heavenly Father and our Lord Jesus Christ. It is the condition of spiritual death and a failure to obtain eternal life.
He who loses his life for my sake, said the Lord, shall find it, but he whose focus is on finding his own life, He said, shall lose it. (See also, here .)
Well, we don’t often hear that kind of fire and brimstone teaching in the Church. We like to present a more positive sounding message most of the time; but I would suggest that
this is the opposition that we need
against our greed,
against our covetousness,
and, most of all, against our comfort.
We all want to be comfortable. We want to come home after a day’s work, to a nice home, to a comfortable place; to kick off our shoes, to relax, to feel safe, to be fed, to be warmed and to rest.
We want to associate with our family members freely, and with good friends whom we trust and who make our lives feel full.
And it is okay that we want these things. Nothing in the scriptures I have read says that we should not want those things. What we cannot do, however, as we acquire those things, is to covet them against others and be unwilling to share.
Over and over again in The Book of Mormon we watch this cyclical trend, where the people accept the gospel of Jesus Christ, live according to its precepts, and as a result many of them become wealthier as to the things of the world, and then there arise divisions amongst them. Those whose lives remain more humble and poor become despised and looked down on. The wealthy make the mistake of seeing their wealth as correlating to their righteousness, and consider it something they merit and deserve.
They forget it is the grace of God that gives it to them,
and they forget that the purpose of such wealth is not to keep it all for oneself
but to share it with those whose circumstances are not so blessed.
Each time, when the story hits that point, we see that the people begin to fall, contentions arise, gossip, backbiting, animosity and eventually all out war claim their countries and send them all down a spiral path to unhappiness and suffering until they once again learn to humble their hearts and desires, call upon God and seek a more righteous path in life which includes caring for one another.
This cycle is part of the opposition that faces us in life: we don’t want to follow that path; we are opposed, challenged, or in softer terms, invited, to avoid that path by living instead what President Monson might describe as “a life of service,” and what I know he and other prophets have described more simply as, “following Jesus Christ”.
Do you retain in your minds and memories an awareness that when you were baptized,
you were not merely baptized to become “Mormons”?
You were not merely made members of a Church.
You were called by God in the moment of baptism ,
and in the moments of conversion that led up to it,
and through the process of repentance that accompanied it,
to become disciples of the Lord Jesus Christ,
His ambassadors on earth,
to do His works the way He would
if He walked amongst us now.
Part and parcel of that sacred calling – perhaps the most sacred calling we will ever receive in life – is
the commandment to live our lives in the service of others.
This includes not only caring for the poor in body, of which I have mostly been speaking, but caring as well for the poor in spirit and the poor in heart.
As you lose your life in this sacred service,
you shall find your life abundantly blessed, perhaps not with an abundance of wealth in this world, but
with the riches of eternity which shall never canker or rust or ever be lost.
May we all be willing to do so.