In Times of Trouble

We all have difficult challenges in life and it’s easy to judge those we don’t understand—those that are different from us. There is an old adage that says, “Don’t judge a man until you’ve waked a mile in his shoes,” and another similar saying that states, “to know someone is to love them.” Recently an old friend said in an email, “I really believe that there are just two kinds of people: the ones you love, and the ones you don't know yet.” We need to be filled with love for all of God’s children! 



Some people are definitely more difficult to love than others.  But when we try to understand them in love, miracles can happen. I had an Elementary Education teacher in college that told us when dealing with difficult students to remember there is always something you can find to love about everybody . . . even if it's only to say, "I like the way your arms swing nicely from your shoulders!"  It was a good tip for me to remember as a parent—during those frustrating times of child rearing, and has since become a family joke when trying to deal with difficult people.

The well known poet, 

Robert Frost said, “With many things the only way out is through. Keep moving. Keep trying.”

Elder Jeffery R. Holland told the following inspirational story in a BYU Devotional on March 18, 1980. It brings home these truths about our individual worth and divine importance in God’s eyes, and how it is never to late to change! 



The brethren used to announce in LDS “General Conference” the names of those who had been called on missions to preach the gospel of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. Not only was this the way friends and neighbors learned of the calls, more often than not it was the way the missionary learned of it as well! One such prospect was Eli H. Pierce, a railroad man by trade. Eli had not been very faithful in attending Church meetings. He said he had never even read more than a few pages of scripture in his life and that he had spoken in only one public gathering (an effort which he claimed was neither a credit to himself or those who heard him). Eli bought cigars wholesale—a thousand at a time—and he regularly lost his paycheck playing pool. Well, the Lord knew what Eli Pierce was, and he knew something else . . . He knew what Eli Pierce could become.

When the call came that October day in 1875, Eli wasn’t even in the Tabernacle. He was out working on one of the railroad lines. A fellow employee, once recovered from the shock of it all, ran out to telegraph the startling news. 



Brother Pierce writes, “At the very moment this intelligence was being flashed over the wires, I was sitting lazily thrown back in an office rocking chair, my feet on the desk, reading a [disreputable] novel and simultaneously sucking on an old Dutch pipe just to vary the monotony of cigar smoking.” 

He goes on. “As soon as I had been informed of what had taken place, I threw the novel in the waste basket, the pipe in a corner . . . then started into town to buy scriptures!”



Eli Pierce fulfilled a remarkable mission. His journal could appropriately close on a completely renovated life with this one line: “Throughout our entire mission we were greatly blessed.” But Elder Holland added one more experience to make the point.



During his missionary service, Brother Pierce was called in to administer to the infant child of a branch president whom he knew and loved. Unfortunately, the wife of the branch president had become embittered and now seriously objected to any religious activity within the home, including a blessing for this dying child. With the mother refusing to leave the bedside and the child too ill to move, this humble branch president with his missionary friend retired to a small upper room in the house to pray for the baby’s life. The mother, suspecting just such an act, sent one of the older children to observe and report back.



There in that secluded chamber the two knelt and prayed fervently until, in Brother Pierce’s own words, “we felt that the child would live and knew that our prayers had been heard.” Arising from their knees, they turned slowly only to see the young girl standing in the partially open doorway gazing intently into the room. She seemed, however, quite oblivious to the movements of the two men. She stood entranced for some seconds, her eyes immovable. Then she said, “Papa, who was that . . . man in there?”



Her father said, “That is Brother Pierce. You know him.”

“No,” she said, matter-of-factly, “I mean the other man.”

“There was no other, darling, except Brother Pierce and myself. We were praying for baby.”



“Oh, there was another man,” the child insisted, “for I saw him standing [above] you and Brother Pierce and he was dressed [all] in white.”



Elder Holland said, “Now if God in his heavens will do that for a repentant old cigar-smoking, inactive, swearing pool player, don’t you think he’ll do it for you? He will if your resolve is as deep and permanent as Eli Pierce’s!”



Elder Holland closed by saying: “In the gospel of Jesus Christ you have help from both sides of the veil, and you must never forget that. When disappointment and discouragement strike—and they will—you remember and never forget that if our eyes could be opened we would see horses and chariots of fire as far as the eye can see riding at reckless speed to come to our protection. They will always be there, these armies of heaven, in defense of Abraham’s seed.” 
~ Elder Jeffery R. Holland (“In Times of Trouble,” BYU Devotional, March 18, 1980)



“I will go before your face. I will be on your right hand and on your left, and my Spirit shall be in your hearts, and mine angels 
round about you, to bear you up.” ~ D&C 84:88