I gave this talk in Church a few weeks ago.

There are things going wrong that we all know about.

-Fires breaking out around the world

-Massive debt and deficit

-the transgender thing

-conspiracies in high places, the Book of Mormon says

-BYU infected with social justice

-an aggressive China

-Coronavirus exposing how dysfunctional the US is

-all time low birthrates

-declining IQ

-trust levels in our society keep going down

-obesity is at an all time high, we are less healthy than we have ever been

-social media is more addictive and more soul-destroying than ever

-they seem to have gone now during Corona but death rates were going up and life expectancies were going back down

[I elaborated on some points a little but I still went through it like a list, boom, boom, boom.  I had a number of people afterwards tell me it was a really disturbing list, they knew about all or most of these things but hadn’t put them together]

There are things going wrong that you know about.  I know you well enough to know that some of you have been afflicted by these things, but some of these only you know

-divorce [we have a sad situation where a wife in our ward who is self-absorbed divorced her husband for histrionic reasons recently]

-addiction . . . to all sorts of things, in all sorts of ways

-lost friends

-struggles with sin

-feeling judged

-depression

-family tension

-dreams you’ve given up on

-dreams you never dared to have

-imperfect marriage

-no marriage

-ailments

-kids you couldn’t have

-straying children, straying siblings

-betrayals

-uncertainty

-job loss

-pointlessness

-poverty

[Again I went down the list, boom, boom, boom]

That is the dark.  I just told you the dark.

And the light shineth in the darkness, and the darkness comprehendeth it not

Let’s talk about the Jesus Christ we all know

For the grieving father, he brought the father’s daughter back.

He wept when his friend died.

He fed people who were hungry.

He calmed the waves when his apostles were scared.

We all know his personal philosophy.  “A certain man had 100 sheep.  Ninety-nine were safe.  One was lost.  He went after the lost and he rejoiced when he found it.”

[I was still going down the list but slower, a little more reverently.]

That’s not all.

When a sinner was lowered down to him, he healed the man, and told him to never sin again.

In the Sermon on the Mount he taught us how to live in shining purity.

He promised Abraham, and us, land, seed, and priesthood.

He appeared to Joseph.

He gave Joseph priesthood power, and through him all of us.  We have priesthood power here with us today.

We know his power.  He has legions of angels, he controls the sea, he flattens mountains, he can stop the sun.

He can overcome anything.  He already has.  In Gethsemane he felt every pain and every consequence and he overcame them all.

He says, “I have trodden the winepress alone, yea, even the winepress of the wrath of the Almighty God.”

We know his goodness.  He rather died and suffered all than do one wrong thing.

He knows you.  He knows your name.  Your name is written on his palms, on the hands.

He has numbered every hair of your head.

That’s the Jesus Christ we all know.

There there is the Jesus Christ that only you know.  Your own personal experiences with him.

Grace

Repentance

Love

Miracles

Hope

Glory

The scriptures say we should have faith.  Faith is just an old-fashioned word meaning trust.  You can trust in Jesus.  He cares for you.  He does his best for you.

Several decades back one of the brethren told a story.  We made it into a church video.  It was Hugh B. Brown.  He was an officer in the Canadian army and doing well.  He had goals.  He went in for some kind of review board to be promoted to General.  But they rudely told him they would not pass him, because he was LDS.  He left crushed and angry.  All the way home he was shaking his fist at heaven.  “Why?  Why?  I tried so hard to follow you and then you let them end  my dreams because I do.”  Awhile after he bought a farm.  There was a currant bush that was wildly overgrown.   It was almost a tree but it bore little fruit.  He pruned it way back.  After he was done, he saw a little tear of sap drip silently off one branch like the bush was crying.  And he told the bush, don’t cry, I didn’t want you to be a tree, I want you to be a currant bush.  In that instant the Spirit brought to his mind the wreck many years before of his career in the Canadian army.  He saw that he himself had been pruned, and was now better off than before, because he had grown the way the Lord wanted, and not the way he had planned.

He, the Lord Jesus Christ, has plans for you.  He will make you greener and healthier and more overflowing with fruit than you can imagine.  He cares for you.  He does the best for you.

A man died recently, and in an obituary I read something he wrote.  He said,

I have no grounds for optimism.

I have every reason for hope.

Trust in the Lord.

 

 

 

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