A Prayer of Faith

I attended Northern Arizona University (NAU). NAU is mentioned in the endlessly popular game of Trivial Pursuit as being the only university in North America that is bordered by three graveyards. When I first arrived I noticed the graveyards and wondered to myself what, exactly, went on at that university that would require so many graveyards to be nearby. I never did find out. One day, however, one of these quiet, clean, grassy graveyards became quite literally hallowed and sacred ground in my heart.

In October Conference of 2003 Elder Holland Gave a talk entitled The Grandeur of God. In this talk Elder Holland states:

Jesus did not come to improve God’s view of man nearly so much as He came to improve man’s view of God and to plead with them to love their Heavenly Father as He has always and will always love them. The plan of God, the power of God, the holiness of God, yes, even the anger and the judgment of God they had occasion to understand. But the love of God, the profound depth of His devotion to His children, they still did not fully know—until Christ came.

Elder Holland emphatically teaches that mankind has come to misunderstand God the Father as having a different, less forgiving, temperament than that of Jesus Christ.

There is a tendency to feel distant from the Father, even estranged from Him, if they believe in Him at all. And if they do believe, many moderns say they might feel comfortable in the arms of Jesus, but they are uneasy contemplating the stern encounter of God.

He goes on to teach that all of Christ’s actions and teachings are to be taken as a model of Heavenly Fathers actions and teachings. The answer to the popular question “What would Jesus do?” is quite literally, “Exactly what God would do.”

Elder Holland goes on to bear testimony of the deep, affectionate love that Heavenly Father has for each of us.

I testify that amidst the wondrously complex tasks inherent in the universe, He seeks our individual happiness and safety above all other godly concerns… in the words of [Joseph Smith] I, too, declare: “Our heavenly Father is more liberal in His views, and boundless in His mercies and blessings, than we are ready to believe or receive. . . . God does not look on sin with [the least degree of] allowance, but . . . the nearer we get to our heavenly Father, the more we are disposed to look with compassion on perishing souls; we feel that we want to take them upon our shoulders, and cast their sins behind our backs.”

After hearing those words it became clear to me that at that time I did not understand Heavenly Father. I didn’t know Him, and I was unaware of the love He had for me. I had been projecting my own poor self-esteem onto Heavenly Father for years, imagining His opinion of me was as low as my own. I found those declarations of His love and mercy to be unbelievable, incredible, and inspiring.

Because I was crying, I was embarrassed to return to my apartment after conference and instead wandered around the university campus. I found myself on a bench in the graveyard I mentioned earlier, and there prayed for, and received a testimony of God’s love for me. That testimony, so long in the making, has been the single most positive influence on my life, above any other knowledge I have gained through either study or prayer. A knowledge of God’s love for us gives meaning to all the principles of the Gospel. It gives hope in time of struggle, and gives purpose to times of joy.

This truth is further brought home to me by something my own father shared with me shortly after being set apart as a stake patriarch. He said that whenever he gives a blessing he is powerfully aware of God’s love for that person. The feeling of love is so overwhelming that he has difficulty saying anything other than “God loves you! Oh! How He loves you!”

This entry was posted on Thursday, June 29th, 2006 at 5:44 am and is filed under True and Living. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.