(January 19, 2014)
I am beginning to learn that patience is needed in order to understand the things of God – a hard lesson to learn so late in life, but I suppose better late than never. I am learning that sometimes we are given to recognize a problem (even a serious or significant one) that would appear to need immediate and drastic action...and then we are forced to wait upon the Lord for additional light and knowledge.
As I learn this lesson, it struck me how this pattern was followed with Joseph Smith. Had I come out of the Sacred Grove and falsely claimed revelation, I would have claimed God told me to do something. He would have told me to start a Church, or reveal His word, or anything. I believe it would be a natural human behavior, when falsely claiming a vision of this sort, to also claim more information.
But this wasn’t a false vision, invented by man. Instead this was a true Vision, following the teaching methods of Deity (that I am beginning to learn). Joseph Smith was visited by the Father and the Son, told to join none of the churches, and...nothing else that he could reveal. And he was to wait. Years. Clearly the questions that he must have had, and which seemed so important and that demanded immediate answers (what to do with no true church? how then is mankind in general (and me in particular) to be saved?) were given no immediate answers.
Sometimes big questions, big apparent contradictions, and big problems have as their Divinely-appointed solution to let a few years pass. It is hard for us to deal with that as mortals, but mortals is not what the Father is raising us to be in the long run.
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