“After Many Sorrows, Blessings Come”

Due to a childhood disease, Jiang Liang-ying 江良瑛 spent the first several years of her life in a hospital run by Christians. Although she frequently heard missionaries and pastors say, “Jesus Christ has saved you, you are a child of God, and you must trust and rely on God,” as a young girl she did not understand it.

When she was a university student, she was diagnosed with scoliosis and had to discontinue her studies. The doctor said that because her spine was curving, it would put pressure on her internal organs, and she would not live to be more than 30 years old. She felt sorry that her high medical fees, equivalent to the cost of purchasing a house, put strain on her parents, who already had their own health issues: her mother had cataracts and could not see well, and her father had a liver disease that required him to be hospitalized.

At night, Jiang often experienced tremendous pain that caused her to sweat all over her body and prevented her from sleeping. Amidst this suffering, Jiang began to ask herself, “What is the purpose of existence?” One night as she pondered this question, she recalled what she had heard as a child about being God’s child and trusting in God. For the first time in her life, she prayed to be able to find God and that God would help lift her troubles. A few days later, her mother ran into missionaries of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, and they began to teach Jiang.

Jiang was baptized in 1977. Within two months of her baptism, she had become a diligent student of the gospel, reading the entire Book of Mormon. She also felt that the pain from her scoliosis had gone. In 1981 Jiang received a health care grant from the city of Tainan to undergo a high-risk and delicate operation, which successfully extended her life. Jiang gave thanks, for “blessings have come down from Heavenly Father’s direction.”

Jiang Liang-ying 江良瑛 working in the Taiwan Taipei Mission office, circa 1985.

In 1985 Jiang accepted a call to serve a mission. During the day, she worked in the mission office and family history center in Taipei, and in the evening she engaged in proselytizing activities, riding a motor scooter. After her mission, another operation on her foot in 1989 allowed her to walk without bindings, which she had worn every day for 30 years. “I am very grateful for God’s grace and blessings,” Jiang reflected. “As the scriptures teach us, life on earth has suffering and trials, testing our faith and spirituality, but we should not try to avoid them. The scriptures say that after many sorrows, blessings come.”