Sometimes the Seagulls Don’t Come
By Susan Law Corpany

When the pioneers were about to lose their crops to a plague of locusts, seagulls came and devoured the locusts, saving the crops.  Sometimes, though, our crops are not saved.  We pray, we fast, we exercise faith, and we may not get the desired outcome.  What do you do when the seagulls don’t come?

This morning I read a news story about a man who won $225,000 in a lottery on his last day at work before the plant where he had been employed closed its doors.  I’m sure that we would all like such immediate relief from our trials (perhaps coming as an unexpected inheritance from a long-lost relative unearthed by years of faithful genealogical research as opposed to lotto winnings).

I imagine the man said something like this to his friends and family, “Somebody up there likes me!” 

As members of the Church, we are always mindful of our responsibility to build one another’s faith and to give credit to the Lord for the blessings we receive.  There are dramatic instances of promptings heeded, blessings of healing, prayers of faith answered and missionaries led to a certain door behind which is their golden contact.  Because of our gratitude when things happen in a positive or dramatic way, those are often the stories that are shared, many times from the pulpit on fast Sunday. 

Shortly after meeting the widower who would later become my husband, we attended a fast and testimony meeting at the ward of the friends we were visiting.  I was seated in the middle of the row by two little girls anxious to get acquainted with me.  Thom sat on the end of the same row next to his best friend.  The first person who shared told of a family member’s cure from cancer, referenced the faith that had been exercised and the fasting and prayers that had resulted in this great miracle.  As often happens in testimony meetings, one testimony prompts another person with a similar experience to share their story.  My heart ached for the man at the end of the row who had recently lost his wife to cancer.  We heard three people in a row share stories of loved ones miraculously cured from cancer. 

I sent my thoughts heavenward.  Please, won’t someone get up and talk about tithing, the Book of Mormon, a great genealogical find—anything but cancer. 

I was greatly relieved when a lady got up and began to tell a “feel-good story” from earlier that week.  While driving, cars in front of her had stopped abruptly.  She wondered why and then she saw a mother duck crossing the road, with a following of little ducklings waddling behind her.  All the cars in both directions waited while the mother and her babies crossed the road.  I was feeling all warm and fuzzy.  She continued.  “Then a car that couldn’t see why everyone was stopped came through in the far lane and hit the mother duck.”  She graphically described the flying feathers, and out of the corner of my eye I saw a grieving man at the end of the row get up and leave the meeting, unable to listen to the ensuing description of the little ducklings confused and scattered on the road, unsure where to go with no mother to follow.

Please someone get up and talk about cancer again.

As we prepare to share stories (which hopefully lead to testimony of a gospel  principle), we should be mindful of the fact that in the congregation might be someone who has faithfully paid tithing and yet suffered severe financial hardship.  As we rejoice about the return of a child to activity in church, there sits a couple still worried about a son or daughter gone astray.   As we talk of astonished doctors and miraculous healings, we should also remember that perhaps we speak to someone who likewise exercised faith and did not receive the hoped-for outcome.  As we sit in these meetings it is easy to begin to feel that the seagulls come for everyone else but not for us.

The furloughed workers at the closing plant who did not receive a windfall don’t make the news.  Likewise, you will not likely hear someone at the pulpit sharing the story of a wayward child and how they have prayed for him for years and just want to update everyone that he recently committed grand theft auto and is going to be spending some time at the county jail.   

Today our wise bishop said a few words after the Primary children presented their program.  Referring to God’s promises being sure, he referred to the story of faith found in the book of Daniel.  When King Nebuchadnezzar was getting ready to throw Shadrach, Meshach and Abed-nego into the fiery furnace because of their refusal to worship his gods, they answered him with the following:

If it be so, our God whom we serve is able to deliver us from the burning fiery furnace, and he will deliver us out of thine hand, O king.  But if not, be it known unto thee, O king, that we will not serve thy gods, nor worship the golden image which thou hast set up.

Daniel 3:17-18

They knew the Lord could deliver them, but they went into the furnace willing to consider that He might not, and their faith did not waiver.  Neither should we allow our faith to waiver during the times that we do not get the outcome hoped for and prayed for.  Abinadi was no less righteous than those three men and yet God did not intervene when he was burned at the stake.  The bishop then related some personal experiences of times he had done the right things and had still struggled.  It is something we all need to be reminded of, and I was grateful for his message.

We endeavor to teach our Primary children that God keeps his promises, and in so doing, we have to make sure they understand that we aren’t the ones who decide how things turn out.  Even when we fast and pray for a desired outcome, it simply isn’t up to us.  Some of God’s promises to us will be fulfilled in this life.  Many will be fulfilled in the next life.  If righteousness always brought immediate results, we would be righteous for all the wrong reasons.  Sometimes God surprises us with something wonderful we hadn’t even thought to ask for.  Other times he may try us in ways we could not imagine.

One Sunday in an attempt to reach my group of young women, I presented a container of shampoo.  I read from the label about the smooth satin finish that would reflect light and how by using this shampoo my hair would be turn from “lackluster brittle brown to glossy supple brunette with multi-dimensional shine,” that my hair would be “restored, revitalized and lustrous.”  I then asked them if my hair looked any different to them than it had looked the week before.  I told them how much more I had paid for this shampoo than I usually did because of all the things it said it would do.  Then I asked them why we are so quick to believe what is written on the back of a bottle of shampoo and yet question the things that God has promised us.  

 Whether the seagulls come to save our crops or whether we clear the land and plant again, at the end of the day, remember that it isn’t the shampoo that is going to come through with the promised blessings.