I apologize for once quipping that the "Chicken Soup" book, Chicken Soup for the Lawyer's Soul, was pulled from the press once the publisher realized that lawyers actually don't have souls. Fortunately, quite a few lawyers do have souls. Evidence includes a short article in the July 2013 Ensign, "With God, Nothing Shall Be impossible" (link is to the PDF version; there is also an HTML version). This is the story of Sang-Ick Han, a South Korean man who emigrated to New Zealand and, in an effort to better assist other Koreans in New Zealand, decided to go to law school at age 53. Though he had excellent English and had translated General Conference sessions into Korean, he found that the language of law was completely foreign (something that many of us native English speakers can affirm). He found the academic challenge of studying law at his age in a foreign language from intense teachers with strange accents to be much more difficult than he expected, and he quickly realized that it would be impossible to succeed on his own. Only with God's help would he have any chance. He succeeded, and is now a solicitor and barrister at the High Court in New Zealand. His story is notable not just for the faith he demonstrated, but also for the cool wig that he now gets to wear.

One of his examples of how help came illustrate an important principle: do all we can, but put God first. Many people excuse themselves from service or even attending Church when they are under high pressure in their studies or their work. But making God a second priority can sometimes result in missing the little miracles that God often provides when we seek His help in faith.

One day I was struggling to complete an assignment. I did my best, but I could not figure out what the lecturer wanted us to do. When Sunday came, I put off all study to focus on my Church assignments. As a stake high councilor, I visited an assigned ward to give a sacrament meeting talk. After the meeting a brother approached me and said that he had seen me in the classroom. I didn’t know he was a law student as well. When he asked me how the assignment was going, I told him honestly that I was having difficulty. He then offered to come over to my place to help me. If I had not gone to that ward and met him, I could not have submitted the assignment on time. He was an angel whom God had sent to answer my prayer.

Faith of this kind results in miracles, though they may be small. There is no guarantee we will succeed in our ventures or that God's blessings will clearly and quickly compensate for the sacrifices we make, but I love how often the Lord gives us surprise help when we are trying our best and also striving to do what's right, even when it means sacrificing study time or work time to serve others or keep the Sabbath holy.

I experienced a small miracle of this nature in my Ph.D. program. At one time, I needed every spare moment to crunch through a lot of data and prepare a paper for an international conference in Portugal that had to be submitted soon, so the request from my ward to serve in the Temple for a morning was not on my list of welcome diversions, but there was a need for my participation and felt that I should go. While in the Temple, during a quiet moment, my mind turned to the primary equation in my paper that I had been using in analyzing my data, and suddenly I could see that there was an error in it. It was a subtle but serious error that other experts at the conference might have noticed immediately when I gave my presentation. Yikes! I rushed home after the temple service and barely had time over the next few days to revise everything and submit my corrected paper on time. Whew! The conference went well and I was spared from a gruesome disaster, thanks to an unexpected blessing that came while sacrificing my time for some Church service.

Things that might be impossible for us to do can be achieved sometimes with the help of God. I suggest we make Him part of our plans and our daily life in order to do more good and realize inspired goals. May we seek His help and guidance each day.
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