LIFE

 

Yesterday as I reflected about life and all it entails, I felt like we have been sent down to hell. I reflected on terrible evils that we live amongst and all the suffering and agony some people go through. Terrible things presented themselves to my mind such as sexual abuse of little children and I was reduced to tears. I couldn’t stop crying.

I thought of the Atonement and I sought to understand why it only covers sins after they have been committed, why it could not have prevented some evils such as abuse of innocent little children so they did not have to suffer. Into my mind came a dimension of the Atonement I did not understand fully before: this life is not a life of prevention.

To my remembrance came a dream I had some years ago. In that dream I saw a newborn baby lying on a table. The baby was a girl and she was only a baby in physical appearance. She was in reality an adult who was speaking to two women that were there reluctant to cut the cord because of the pain it would cause. She was saying: “it’s ok, it will only hurt for a little while and then all will be well”. I knew this baby was me and I knew she was very cognizant of earth life and its purpose.

I knew yesterday as I reflected on that dream that we, who chose this second estate, also chose all the suffering that came with it because we knew it would be temporary and that after all the suffering, the Saviour’s Atonement would make us whole again……that He shall one day ‘wipe away all tears from our eyes and there shall be no more sorrow, nor crying, nor pain’ (Revelation 21:4).

I am amazed at the Saviour’s capacity to take upon himself all the human suffering. I am bewildered by His descent into the bottomless pit of human agony. So excruciating was the suffering He bore that it resonated into another continent causing the physical destruction and upheaval in ancient America.

The prophet Zenos prophesied of this destruction saying that ‘many of the kings of the isles of the sea were wrought upon by the Spirit of God, to exclaim: The God of nature suffers’ (1 Nephi 19:11,12). As I cried for the little children yesterday, I cried for Him too….

Oh the sweet, sweet agony

That tossed You onto the sea of

Merciless pain and suffering!

The nature shook

But silently wept eternity

Cradling in its arms Your glorious destiny.

 

I dreamed that You were waiting

At sweet Garden’s gate;

Your sacrifice complete,

Your promises kept,

I could scarce contain my joy

As in Your arms I wept.

 

You rose to heights unknown

To someone lowly like me.

You are now so high

And I am so low,

Climbing the ladder of my tears

Into Your arms that I will forever know.

- CATHRYNE ALLEN

(Art: Gethsemane by Danny Hahlbohm)