In All Things
By Vickey Pahnke-Taylor
What can you know, except by its
opposite?
These words are Brigham Young’s.
So few in number, they may cause us to think many paragraphs
of thought!
Opposites. Different ends of the
spectrum that allow us to gauge our feelings and responses.
Because there is something to compare, we know more than
before we experienced the opposite.
How would we know heat unless we
felt cold? How would we know light if we had never known darkness?
How could we appreciate good health if we were never sick?
This interactive experience we
call mortality is our opportunity to more clearly understand
that “it must needs be, that there is an opposition in all things”
(2 Ne. 2:11).
Learning about opposition is one
of the very things that makes this life a probationary period.
Thank heaven for the blessing of being able to judge - for ourselves
as we learn more about opposition in all things, and thus celebrating
the good as we separate it from the evil.
The school of hard knocks has a
huge curriculum and large numbers of students. Each of us, I
would imagine, has gone through its revolving doors at some
time or another. Some of those hard knocks come because we
make it that way instead of choosing a more straight and narrow
path. Some lessons are simple ones to learn. Maybe others are
much harder because of our approach to that “class.”. And whether
or not we determine to vicariously learn to decipher between
opposing principles!
I do not need to have someone
slam me in the jaw to know it will hurt. I much prefer a nice
pat on the shoulder or on the top of my head. I do not need
to be locked in a dark room for days in order to appreciate
the sunlight on a clear day. It is not necessary for me to
walk the road of evil in order to understand that choosing righteousness
is better. But in the course of living- there have been detours
here and there; stopgaps in the course of instruction; cul-de-sacs
from which I had to back up and change direction--perhaps heading
in the opposite way.
Thankfully, we come to understand
that this life is a journey, with continuous movement through
the ups and downs as we enjoy the fascinating, fun times and
endure the dull or difficult times. It is not a camp, in which
we set up permanent stakes, accepting ˜what is” (our current
situation) as “what is going to be”. Because something is one
way today does not dictate that it must be the same way tomorrow.
Even if circumstances are unchanged, our attitude may make all
the difference in how we perceive or deal with it. That quiet
strength offered as we reflect on the need for opposition in
all things may lift the burden and add some understanding to
our mortal experience.
Mortality is temporary. The
ups and downs are transitory. By noting the negative, we may
celebrate the positive, and by becoming acquainted with an opposite
in our earth life, we may freely embrace the Lord’s principles.
Forget setting up camp and building a fire to prolong the low
points. The only fire that needs to be set is within us! If
opposition can stir within us the desire to keep moving in a
heavenly direction- all really is well!
I read a stunning lesson that President
Howard W. Hunter taught at General Conference in October 1984.
This is what he said:
Jesus was not spared grief and
pain and anguish and buffeting. No tongue can speak the unutterable
burden he carried, nor have we the wisdom to understand the
prophet Isaiah’s description of him as a “man of sorrows.”
(Isa.53:3.) His ship was tossed most of his life, and, at
least to mortal eyes, it crashed fatally on the rocky coast
of Calvary. We are asked not to look on life with mortal
eyes; with spiritual vision we know something quite different
was happening upon the cross.
Peace was
on the lips and in the heart of the Savior no matter how fiercely
the tempest was raging. May it so be with us- in our own hearts,
in our own homes, in our nations of the world, and even in the
buffetings faced from time to time by the Church. We should
not expect to get through life individually or collectively
without some opposition.
Jesus taught us, through his very
own experience, that deliverance does come; that the power of
God is stronger than any temptation tossed our way.
Elder Marvin J. Ashton’s words
may bring us some real comfort when the opposition is getting
to us: “In times of hurt and discouragement, it may be consoling
for all of us to recall that no one can do anything permanently
to us that will last for eternity. Only we ourselves can affect
our eternal progression.” (Ensign, May 1984, p.10.)
Reading those words over and over,
there may be specific instruction and understanding for each
of us as students in the school of mortal experience. Even
the Savior- or, perhaps more correctly- especially the
Savior - had to become infinitely acquainted with opposition.
He can guide and help us through our own. He can teach and
inspire. He will help us “get it” without allowing it to “get
to us.”.
Free agency, and its application
here and now, allows us to see opposites for ourselves and
to learn and grow through them. In all things!
