Two Truths to Help Us Navigate Trials with Faith and Optimism

I don’t know all the burdens and trials you may face, but I know you face them! They are an essential part of this mortal experience.

Some of our trials are known to people around us. Others are known only to the Lord. I pray that He will fill your souls with peace, ministering to you as only He can, as we review two fundamental principles. The more deeply we understand and believe these two basic truths, the more successfully we can navigate life’s trials.

Principle #1: Heavenly Father’s plan for this mortal life includes trials, challenges, sickness, and opposition. They are part of the plan for our individual spiritual growth.

In the Pearl of Great Price, we learn a purpose of our earthly experience: “We will prove them herewith, to see if they will do all things whatsoever the Lord their God shall command them” (Abraham 3:25; emphasis added). The phrase “we will prove them” implies a “testing” or a “verification” of who we really are. This life, then, is a test. That is a key part of the plan.

It would not be much of a test without challenges or opposition of some kind. In our premortal life, we accepted our Father’s plan for mortal life. We realized that we would be tested. We realized that there would be “opposition in all things” (2 Nephi 2:11).

All of us are currently experiencing this opposition. We need not be surprised. Our challenges can strengthen our resolve to walk in faithfulness along the covenant path. What a wonderful plan our Father created—a mortal experience, custom-crafted for the growth and development of His children.

Principle #2: Jesus Christ, through His atoning sacrifice in our behalf, has felt and overcome every trial, every challenge, every sickness, and every heartache that we will ever encounter. He has overcome the world. He will walk with us. We are not alone.

Heavenly Father is aware of our trials and temptations, and He has not left us to face them alone. Heavenly Father sent His Son, Jesus Christ, to help us (see Alma 7:11–13). The Savior did not want us to face our trials alone. He has “trodden the wine-press alone” (Doctrine and Covenants 133:50) so that we do not have to. Whatever we face, Heavenly Father and Jesus Christ will support and sustain us as we turn to Them. We can emerge victorious over the challenges and trials and heartaches of this mortal life.

The Power of These Truths

These two truths—that trials are part of God’s plan and that God sent His Son to help us—are so basic to our beliefs that it can be easy to underestimate their power. But consider how these truths can affect the way we think and feel about adversity. Because we understand the purpose of God’s plan, we know that our adversity is not a sign that we are failing or that the plan is failing. It means we are progressing. And because we understand the scope of Jesus Christ’s Atonement, we know that we never have to face our trials alone. The Savior understands even our most intimate and personal struggles, and He knows exactly how to help us get through them.

All Things Working Together for Your Good

Perhaps I can illustrate how understanding the Father’s plan and the Savior’s divine mission empowers us to face life’s challenges.

In the summer of 2020, I started feeling pain in my left shoulder, and I could not figure out why. The pain wouldn’t go away, so finally, in late October, I visited with a doctor. He looked at an X-ray and suggested a CT scan. The next evening, the doctor called me at home—likely not a good sign—and told me that the CT scan had identified metastatic disease in my shoulder. In other words, he said I had cancer. He also said it appeared to have traveled to my shoulder from somewhere else in my body.

I got up from my chair, walked into the other room, and told Anne Marie I had cancer. That evening, our lives changed. Everything seemed to change.

I reached out to my father and asked if he would give me a blessing. He is 95 years old. We gathered as a family at my parents’ home. All our children joined us. It was a miracle that they were all in town. We were careful to wear our masks, except for in this picture.

I had hoped that, in the blessing, my father would strike the spot and command the cancer to be gone. But that is not the blessing he provided. He blessed me that the cancer would be identified, that there would be a course of treatment, that I would follow the course of treatment, and that I would be made whole.

From the moment he and my sons took their hands off my head, a feeling of peace settled on me. I knew that peaceful feeling came by the influence of the Holy Ghost.

For the next month, medically speaking, I could not see past the end of my feet. I knew I had cancer in my shoulder and in at least one other place in my body. I did not know what kind of cancer it was or how pervasive it was. I just did not know very much at all.

But this I did know: my father, accompanied by my four sons, had pronounced a blessing upon me by the authority of the Melchizedek Priesthood. I had great faith in the power of that blessing. I also had faith that the blessing was in keeping with the Lord’s will.

Throughout the month of November, the medical tests continued. As we waited for the results, Anne Marie and I talked a lot about the future and our faith in our Heavenly Father’s plan. We discussed the possibility that perhaps my stay in mortality would be a bit shorter than anticipated. But regardless of which side of the veil I would be on, it did not change our love for each other or our marriage or our family. It did not change our gratitude to Heavenly Father for the gift of His Son, Jesus Christ, and for the blessing of participating in this wonderful mortal experience.

In our prayers as a couple, we prayed that my life would be spared. But if the plan was that I be called home at this time, we would accept that as well. I also prayed that I could learn what the Lord wanted me to learn from this experience. I remembered Elder Neal A. Maxwell (1926–2004) of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles saying on one occasion that the Lord gave him cancer so he could teach the people with authenticity.¹ I continue to ponder that.

As we waited for the diagnosis, I continued to feel at peace. I was very grateful for my father’s blessing. Spiritually speaking, he did strike the spot and make me whole. He healed me spiritually.

During all this, I felt the faith and prayers of friends, family, and loved ones. It is quite something to realize that your children, their spouses, and your grandchildren are praying for you with great faith. The missionaries and the Saints with whom we served in the Spain Barcelona Mission are also exercising their faith and prayers in my behalf. What greater blessings could there be? These prayers of faith and support from so many have created a giant tsunami of love that has been overwhelming to me.

At last, the diagnosis came. I have cancer in my right kidney, which has metastasized to my left shoulder. The cancer had already been in my shoulder for a year or so and therefore even longer in my kidney. For some reason, unknown to me, there is no cancer in my brain or lungs. The Lord is very kind. There is a course of treatment, I am following it, and I trust that in a year or so I will be made whole. “But if not” (Daniel 3:18), I am willing to accept the Lord’s will for me.

Now, I am not the only one with health challenges or worries or heartaches of different kinds. Like you, I have faith in the Lord Jesus Christ. Like you, I have faith in Heavenly Father’s plan. And like you, I have faith that “all things shall work together for your good, if ye walk uprightly and remember the covenant wherewith ye have covenanted one with another” (Doctrine and Covenants 90:24).

Our faith does not necessarily remove our trials. But it does give us the power and perspective to navigate those trials successfully.

The Example of the Savior: “Not My Will, But Thine”

Our Savior, who is our example in all things, has taught us how to endure adversity faithfully. Most poignant is His experience in Gethsemane:

“And he was withdrawn from them about a stone’s cast, and kneeled down, and prayed,

“Saying, Father, if thou be willing, remove this cup from me: nevertheless not my will, but thine, be done.

“And there appeared an angel unto him from heaven, strengthening him” (Luke 22:41–43; emphasis added).

The Father didn’t remove this cup of suffering, but He also didn’t forsake His Beloved Son. He sent an angel to strengthen Him, and with that strength the Savior was able to carry out the infinite Atonement.

Likewise, when we face challenges, the Father does not always remove the burden, but when we submit to His will, we can count on Him to give us strength equal to the challenge.

Peace in Christ

I testify of Jesus Christ, the true source of lasting peace (see John 16:33). Because He overcame the world, He provides the strength for us to meet every trial the world can give us. He provides eternal perspective through His restored gospel and comfort through the influence of the Holy Ghost. Indeed, the gospel of Jesus Christ is the answer to every issue we face in life.

“Peace I leave with you,” the Savior said, “my peace I give unto you: not as the world giveth, give I unto you. Let not your heart be troubled, neither let it be afraid” (John 14:27).

Note

1. Bruce C. Hafen, A Disciple’s Life: The Biography of Neal A. Maxwell (2002), 562.