No poor among you

Caring for others, particularly the poor, is a central tenet in nearly every religion. In the Christian tradition it is particularly important. Various translations of Deuteronomy 15:4 state, “there [should/need/will] be no poor among you,” and then reference the blessings God’s people will receive in the land of their inheritance, implying, in my opinion, that economic prosperity is a blessing granted from God with the expectation that His followers use it alleviate suffering and poverty. In the New Testament, Jesus several times extols the virtues of the poor and admonishes the rich for withholding from others. My own faith adds emphasis and clarity in other scripture. Alma 34:38 states, “if ye turn away the needy, and the naked, and visit not the sick and afflicted, and impart of your substance, if ye have, to those who stand in need—I say unto you, if ye do not any of these things, behold, your prayer is vain, and availeth you nothing, and ye are as hypocrites who do deny the faith.” In addition, Moses 7:18 describes the ideal city of Enoch in part by their collective effort to eliminate poverty, “And the Lord called his people Zion, because they were of one heart and one mind, and dwelt in righteousness; and there was no poor among them.” It seems extremely clear that faith requires us strive to improve the condition of others, and that we have a special obligation to assist the poor – especially when we are blessed with economic prosperity.

I’ve just written an article on universal basic income about how we could rather simply and completely eradicate poverty in the United States as we define it. You can read the details in that article, but the basic idea is that we could institute a new 10% income tax on everyone, then distribute the revenue of that tax to every household up to the federal poverty line, guaranteeing a universal basic income for everyone in the country, and fulfill the edict to have no poor among us. This idea is not mine nor is it new. Most social welfare programs are a lesser version of this vision, but build on the idea that we have a societal responsibility to lift up the poor, that we are or ought to be our brother’s keeper. While there are some potential drawbacks to this particular plan or any generous welfare policy, our country has been sufficiently blessed that it is easily within our means to ensure there are actually no poor among us.

So why don’t we collectively choose this path? I understand and appreciate the several reasons why people with a genuine desire to reduce poverty and improve the welfare of others might be opposed to extensive government involvement in that goal, especially a redistributive policy like this, and will discuss those reasons shortly. However, my goal in this article is to persuade those with whom I share a desire to reduce or eradicate poverty – whether that desire is motivated by religious, secular, moral, philosophical, or any other sentiments – that the government can and should play a larger and effective role in this worthwhile effort.

One of many arguments I hear against government welfare, especially from those with religious beliefs similar to my own, is that it eliminates personal choice and accountability. It forces people to help the poor, rather than allowing them to choose for themselves. Many people feel a responsibility and willingness to provide for the poor at an individual level, but believe it is inappropriate to ask or force others to do so through a government policy, even if that policy is democratically enacted through our collective choice. I deeply respect this sentiment, and spend a lot of time thinking about it. A few thoughts, however, make me believe that social welfare is a morally desirable policy, even when the state demands that the rich provide for the poor.

John Rawls’ theory of justice is important to this discussion. This is an extremely influential ideology for determining how a just society should be organized. Rawls introduces the concept of a veil of ignorance, and essentially asks us to determine the rules of a morally just society by imagining we had no a priori knowledge of our place in that society. Let me try to give a very clear and oversimplified example.

Imagine a scenario where you have a 50% chance of striking it rich next year, making $10 million dollars through some combination of your efforts, circumstances, luck, and Providence. You also have an equal chance of losing everything, leaving you with no ability to provide for yourself and your family, but have no idea which outcome will happen. Now let’s say I offer you one of two options. Option A is a perfectly free society where you will be entitled to keep 100% of your profits, but have no guarantee of help if you lose everything. Option B is a welfare society where you will be asked to pay 10% of your profits if you strike it rich, meaning you will keep $9 million, but you will be provided a basic income to meet your minimum needs if things go poorly. Would you think that Option B is some sort of morally unacceptable infringement on your liberty, or simply a reasonable insurance policy that most people would willingly accept? Obviously people might vary in their preferences depending on their risk tolerance among other things (see Prospect Theory), but what if a group of people, all facing this same scenario had to decide the rules together before the year began? If the majority, not knowing whether they were going to be rich or poor, voted for the welfare system acknowledging that it required everyone's mandated participation to work, would we consider it an affront to individual agency or simply a reasonable collective decision to mitigate economic risk? Hopefully the parallel to social welfare is obvious here, but there’s a more important point I want to make.

The key point of the veil of ignorance is that we must decide the rules without prior knowledge of the probability of our outcomes. You can imagine that those who had some reason to believe they would strike it rich might be more inclined to resist the welfare system. Unfortunately this veil of ignorance is impossible to achieve. Those who have already been successful know they are less likely to meet disaster in the future, and more able to mitigate that risk without help. Such people also know that their children are less likely to face unrecoverable loss since they can provide them with the tools to avoid it. In addition, those who have been successful tend to underestimate the effect of luck and Providence in their success and overestimate their own efforts, and might thus be biased against the welfare society. You can also imagine that implicit knowledge about the probability of our or our children’s success based on skin color, nationality, ethnicity, gender, etc. would also affect our idea of the most just society. Perhaps we need to work harder to truly put ourselves behind this veil of ignorance – acknowledging our biases – before we form our opinions.

With all this in mind, I think that a welfare policy that asks us to make this social contract is just, reasonable, and morally sound. We must think about it in terms of future payouts, not past income or current wealth. Instituting a universal basic income is asking people to forfeit a portion of future potential high income to reduce societal risk, not confiscating current wealth. We are not redistributing accrued wealth from the rich to the poor, but saying that we all should willingly contract to provide for the social welfare if we happen to be rich in the future. However, those who are currently wealthy (or privileged by color, nationality, gender, education, or other circumstances of birth) know they are more likely to be among the wealthy of the future because we do not live behind the veil of ignorance. From this perspective, a welfare policy is not forcing the rich to give to the poor, but choosing – democratically – a social insurance policy that recognizes our inherent equality and the biases that favor the already successful.

But why, you might ask, must this be a government policy? Can’t churches, communities, or other private actors put such policies in place? Though they can't mandate universal participation, private actors can and do institute admirable welfare systems, yet there are still poor among us. So long as we, at any level, are not of, “one heart and one mind,” we will fall short of our goal to have no poor among us. The burden of the poor will be placed on the generous few who are unable to meet the total need despite their best efforts. While we continue to give privately and work at the community level, we ought to advocate for a societal effort that matches our values as we do in every other area of public policy. If we argue that the sanctity of life and value of the family should be supported by public policy, shouldn’t we advocate just as strongly for a public effort to alleviate poverty when we have failed to eradicate it without a public mandate? For those who worry that we are handing our personal responsibility to the government, I can assure you there will always be ways to individually care for those around us even with a guaranteed universal income. There will be those beyond the reach of such a policy, those facing disasters or personal struggles, and myriad other ways to exercise charity to a fuller extent even if the US official poverty rate was zero. 

For those who think this looks like some failed form of communism, please recognize that no one is advocating for the state to control private assets, allocate resources, or distribute wealth equally – policies which have led to economic failures. There were still be a distribution from the fantastically rich to those hovering at the poverty line, there will still be privately property, incentive to innovate, and opportunity to make unending profit. I am just advocating that since we live in such an economically blessed society, perhaps we can take Jesus’s instructions seriously and put a floor on how poor we allow those among us to be. Perhaps we can agree that a small portion of income from the fantastically rich of the future ought to be used to make sure we meet the basic needs of all those among us.

Moving on to the more practical rather than moral or philosophical arguments against social welfare, many contend that the risk of failure is necessary for progress, that the availability of unearned income will reduce our incentive to work, or more generally that a generous social insurance system will reduce our total output and ability to provide for the poor in the future. I address some of these issues in my companion article, but the conclusion is that we just don’t know how such a policy would affect behavior and macroeconomic outcomes. There are theories and evidence to support the opposing ideas that guaranteed income will improve or deteriorate outcomes, and we just don’t know what will happen. My practical answer to this is that we should test and try to more fully understand the total costs and benefits. However, since this is a faith-based blog let me give you my heart-felt, but maybe not politically appropriate answer. What should we do when our moral responsibility, sense of charity, and the Savior Himself tells us to have no poor among us? What should we do when we know we could achieve this goal, but are hesitant or afraid because we don’t know the consequences of that choice? Perhaps faith is the answer. Jesus didn’t say there should be no poor among us unless we were worried some will get lazy, or to give to the poor unless we are worried some will make bad decisions, or to impart of our substance unless we were concerned about our gdp growth, so perhaps we ought to just do what He says, or at least vote for doing so in a democratic society, rather than finding reasons not to. Perhaps those of us who base our world view on our faith can choose to believe that lifting up others will make the world a better place, even if our Econ 101 teacher, political pundit of choice, or some other philosophy of men told us the scriptural mandate was a bad idea. So why don’t we choose to have no poor among us? 

God Is Necessary

I recently finished Stephen Hawking’s book, The Grand Design. With one of the most intelligent scientific minds of our generation, Hawking has the ability to make modern physics almost reachable to those of us who find it interesting but well beyond our intellectual abilities. In his last popular book, A Brief History of Time, he discussed the role that God may or may not have had in the creation of the universe, but in The Grand Design he makes the more definitive statement, “It is not necessary to invoke God to light the blue touch paper and set the Universe going.” In interviews about the subject, Hawking clarified his point, "One can't prove that God doesn't exist," he stated, "But science makes God unnecessary…The laws of physics can explain the universe without the need for a creator." I greatly respect Dr. Hawking and am grateful for the extraordinary work he has done, as well as the opportunity I’ve had to expand my mind reading his words. In addition, I appreciate that he speaks candidly about God and that he—like most great scientists—isn’t afraid to discuss the places where religion and science meet. However, I disagree with him in this matter. Like Hawking, I’m not going to try to prove or disprove the existence of God, but I’d like to try to demonstrate why He is necessary.

The ultimate object of science is basically to tell the future. We develop theories that can help us accurately predict future events. For example, thanks to Isaac Newton, we can be relatively confident about the future position of any object if we know the forces acting on it. Physics, as I see it and as I think Dr. Hawking is stating it, is basically an effort to predict the future behavior of objects under any condition. He discusses how classical physics (basically Newton’s three laws) helps us understand large objects, and how quantum mechanics has become the dominant theory to understand smaller particles. He goes on to discuss how different theories help us understand or predict events in different circumstances, and the ultimate goal of modern physics is to try to unify these theories so that we can understand and accurately predict events under any circumstances. He then discusses biology and proposes that even human choices and desires could possibly be accurately understood and predicted with a more precise understanding of science. I would add that social science is simply in the infancy of that process. We use tools like history, psychology, economics, and political science to try to understand and accurately predict future human decisions on a mass or individual level. Dr. Hawking, in the course of discussing the history of science, makes the point that when our limited scientific knowledge made it impossible to predict events, we resorted to invoking religion. When we didn’t understand why the sun rose each day or people went crazy, we assumed it was the work of gods. The way I read the book, I believe Dr. Hawking is saying that with a perfect understanding of science we will no longer have a need for God, since we will be able to explain all things. Hence, “science makes God unnecessary.” Before I say why I think he’s wrong, let me explain some of his arguments that I found interesting.

A scripture in the Book of Mormon that I’ve always found compelling states, “all things denote there is a God; yea, even the earth, and all things that are upon the face of it, yea, and its motion, yea, and also all the planets which move in their regular form do witness that there is a Supreme Creator.” This basically sums up my feelings when looking at the complexity of life and our universe. When I see the delicate and intricate balances from the cosmos to our ecosystem to our own bodies that allow life to exist, I think, “How could this not be designed?” Dr. Hawking makes the point that a very simple set of physical laws can lead to extreme complexity, such as human life. He does so by discussing Conway’s Game of Life. This is basically a simple simulation with a large two dimensional grid where random boxes are selected as ‘alive.’ Other boxes then come to life or die based on simple rules about how many living ‘cells’ surround them. If you’re not familiar, this video is worth a thousand words. In the simulation, the simple set of laws with a random initial condition can lead to extreme complexities that can mimic actual life. Extremely large shapes develop with distinct characteristics that interact with each other, some of which can even ‘reproduce’ by creating an identical complex shape with several million cells. Hawking makes the point that if we ‘lived’ in that game, we might try to understand our world based on the interactions of many complex shapes living and dying around us. However, if we just understood the extremely simple rules that governed that entire ‘universe’ everything would be much clearer. As compelling as this is (and it really is fascinating – just Google Conway’s Game of Life and read some of the research and watch a few videos), it ignores the fact that the game still must be created and set in motion. I believe that science can and someday will help us understand many, many things that we now must rely on faith to understand – and I personally believe that God works miracles without violating the laws of nature that we are striving to learn – but that in no way undermines my awe that the complexity of our world, even governed by simple laws, interacts to give me the personal experience of my life.

Following up on the idea that even a universe perfectly and solely governed by simple laws must be set in motion by a creator, Dr. Hawking resorts to math and physics beyond the ability of most of us to understand. After some talk of gravity interacting with quantum theory, M-theory, and negative energy, he basically says that modern scientific theory states that something coming from nothing is not only possible, but inevitable – at least that’s what I got out of it. From this came his widely controversial comment, “It is not necessary to invoke God to light the blue touch paper and set the Universe going.” I’m not going to argue with the math or physics here, I’m not even going to talk about how much we don’t know in this area and how much could be wrong. In fact, I think he may be right that the laws of our universe are such that something can come from nothing and it all could have originated from a Big Bang that was an inevitable byproduct of these laws. I am however, still going to argue with the conclusion that God is unnecessary.
I’m going to start with a claim I’ve often heard before and never liked: that we need God even if He doesn’t exist. Before I continue let me state that God does exist (please see my last post about the necessity of stating that clearly), but even if He didn’t, our search for Him would be far more important than the undertaking of science alone. This seems like the claim of an aimless philosopher unconcerned with truth and averse to true science, but let me try to explain otherwise. Even if science could one day give us all the answers, what are we to do until then? While we wait for the human mind to perfectly understand the natural laws that govern our world, we must humbly accept the extent of our current ignorance and choose how to act in that ignorance. Quantum theory, our most important modern tool for understanding the natural world, is based on the uncertainty principle which basically tells us that we can’t know everything about anything; a fascinating truth that I believe God has designed into our universe to help us understand the ultimate importance of humility. So while the limitations of science render us unable to know the future, we must act in faith without that knowledge. God is necessary because, though one day we might (but probably won’t) know all, today we don’t. We must act in faith, based on what we believe to be right since we don’t yet know all. So God is necessary because God is truth and the only source of it we currently have. We can’t trust fully in the capacity of our fallible rational minds and ignore the spiritual foundation within each of us that helps us to know right from wrong. We must seek for truth (which is God) that transcends human knowledge; otherwise our faith is only in our own ignorance. That search for truth has led me to the conclusion that God does exist. I have come to this knowledge independent of, but through a process as valid and important as scientific inquiry. The Book of Mormon simply and profoundly states that we can, “know the truth of all things” if we simply study, ponder, and ask in faith for that knowledge. I have done so and learned that God is not merely a nebulous truth, but is literally our Father and Creator.

Testimony

Like many Christian churches, mine places a great emphasis on actively sharing a personal witness of our faith. In our church we call it sharing a testimony, other Christians often call it witnessing or use other terminology, but the idea is the same and stems from 1 Peter 3:15, “be ready always to give an answer to every man that asketh you a reason of the hope that is in you.” Our church encourages members to do this both formally and informally, and we dedicate the first Sunday meeting of every month for members to stand at the pulpit and freely share testimonies. While a testimony can take many forms, it generally is an opportunity for someone to stand in front of others and testify of truth. In our particular church culture, it often takes the form of someone saying some combination of, “I know God lives, I know Jesus is the Christ, I know Joseph Smith was a true prophet, I know…..etc.” Such a testimony is often accompanied by sharing personal experiences that helped an individual gain that witness of individual truths.

For a long, long time, this was one of the most difficult aspects of my faith. In my spiritual immaturity, it felt to me like the level of my faithfulness was dependent on how much emphasis I could put on the words, “I know…” People often talked of someone having a “strong testimony” as if those who could pronounce the words, “I know” with greatest conviction were furthest down the path of righteousness. I struggled with this a great deal. Rather than having my own faith strengthened as I heard others proclaim all that they knew to be true, I often sat quietly thinking that I wasn’t so sure that I “knew.” I could confidently stand up and say, “I believe God lives,” or “I have faith in Jesus Christ,” or even, “I have a conviction to live my life according to these truths,” but somehow I felt that I must have some defect in my faith because the words, “I know” didn’t seem to fit well into my personal testimony. Doctrine & Covenants 46:13-14 states, “To some it is given by the Holy Ghost to know that Jesus Christ is the Son of God...To others it is given to believe on their words, that they also might have eternal life if they continue faithful.” I always felt like I was one of those who was given the ability to believe, but hoped that someday I’d have the gift to know. Alma 32 also teaches, “faith is not to have a perfect knowledge of things; therefore if ye have faith ye hope for things which are not seen, which are true,” and, “if a man knoweth a thing he hath no cause to believe, for he knoweth it.” It seemed to me that there was a spectrum including belief, hope, faith, and knowledge; and I hadn’t quite made it to the knowledge place yet.

It wasn’t until many years later that the words “I know” no longer caused me concern, partly because I realized from the scriptures quoted above that faith rather than knowledge is essential, and partly because I came to realize that I had been fretting over the wrong verb. I know…. wasn’t nearly so important as God lives, Jesus Christ is our Savior, and the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints is His restored church on the earth. I can try to add whatever verbs I want before those simple sentences (I know…, I believe…, I have faith that…), but what people really need to hear and what I really need to say is just the simple truth. No one told me they KNOW gravity exists; they just told me it did. Likewise I don’t need to try to convince anyone whether I know or believe or feel strongly about God, they just need to hear me say the true fact that He lives and observe from my actions that I live my life based on that truth.

I had this lesson profoundly reinforced just a few days ago as I talked to my 3-year-old before bed. He was having concerns about being scared at nighttime and I told him if he woke up scared he could say a prayer to help him feel better. We’ve been trying to teach him to pray, and he’s learning to do so independently but still doesn’t quite understand the concept. He said if he prayed in his room no one would hear him to help, and I replied that Heavenly Father can always hear our prayers. I realized that in all my efforts to teach him to pray I had left out that one extremely important detail. He still wasn’t quite convinced, but I saw the slight change in him as he considered that fact. It was as if he started to realize that the fact that Heavenly Father could always hear us pray really did change things. I had just shared a testimony in the most important way. I told my child that Heavenly Father hears our prayers. He didn’t care if I said, with great conviction and seriousness, “I KNOW that Heavenly Father hears our prayers.” I realized he just needed to be told information that was true, that God hears prayers. So many people, adults and children alike, just need to hear what’s true. They will assess by our actions rather than our language if we really believe it, and they will make their own determination of its truthfulness regardless of how emphatically we try to convince them. When people hear such truths proclaimed enough, they will face the choice to believe them or not. Our job is not to convince people, it’s to tell people. God hears prayers, and it doesn’t matter if I know it or believe it or hope it, it’s just true – and that is my testimony.

Faith, Works, and Feeling What We Need to Feel

I was recently asked to teach a lesson in church based on an article by Henry B. Eyring. It was about the law of tithing, but taught important principles that I think apply to following any of God’s commandments. President Eyring stated, "…paying a full tithe in this life prepares us to feel what we need to feel to receive the gift of eternal life.” I think the same could be said of many other commandments, obedience to them isn’t an end unto itself, but prepares us to feel what we need to feel to receive eternal life. I thought this was an interesting statement because we often hear discussion about what we need to be or do, but rarely do we hear about what we need to feel. President Eyring didn’t teach any groundbreaking doctrine, but clearly expressed in a few words the process of conversion. In my personal experience, I have often made commitments to obey commandments before I truly felt what I needed to feel. I paid tithing because I was asked to before I learned to want to pay it even if no one asked. I followed many other commandments for the wrong reasons until I learned to want to follow them for the right reasons.

Christians have discussed and debated for centuries about works and grace, deeds and faith. While some believe our actions are inconsequential and belief is the only qualification for eternal life, some place more emphasis on the teaching in James 2:17, that, “faith, if it hath not works, is dead.” However, I think President Eyring’s statement clarifies the interdependent relationship between being and doing, believing and acting. It is in doing what God asks that we become who we should be. It is in action that we learn to believe. It is through obedience that we begin to feel what we need to feel. Faith, hope, and love are the eternal ends – obedience to the commandments are the divinely appointed means.

While I recognize that some people may have the right feelings before they take the right actions, I am not that good of a person. Perhaps some people could have faith without action, but I think the Bible makes it clear that this is difficult at best. It seems arrogant to me to think I could have the faith necessary for eternal life without putting forth some effort. I know my effort will fall drastically short and that I am completely reliant on the grace and mercy of Christ; but I also believe that nothing short of a full commitment to follow Christ in word and deed will teach me to feel what I need to feel – faith. Perhaps I feel that way because faith has been difficult for me to develop, and while I recognize that some people come by it more easily, I find it difficult to believe that such a precious gift doesn’t require diligence to attain. While I don’t believe that any diligence or deeds, no matter how great, small, many or few, will qualify me for eternal life, I do believe that constant and diligent effort will strengthen my faith and relationship with God. It is Christ’s atonement that qualifies us to live with God, our faith that qualifies us to partake of the healing power of the Atonement, and our commitment to obedience that teaches us how to have that faith. And so it is not out of a desire to earn salvation or be more righteous that I strive to follow God’s commandments, but with the humble hope that I will feel what I need to feel to receive the gift of eternal life.

For she loved much

In Luke, Chapter 7, a woman known as a sinner visited Jesus in a Pharisee’s home. She showered the Savior with love: washing, kissing, and anointing his feet. The Savior used the woman’s example and a parable to teach a simple and profound lesson. In his parable two individuals were both forgiven a debt by their creditor, one for a much larger sum than the other. He then asked, “which of them will love him most.” The Pharisee, who had been silently condemning Christ for allowing the woman to touch him, responded “he, to whom he forgave most.” The Savior then spoke of the woman, and said, “Her sins, which are many, are forgiven; for she loved much: but to whom little is forgiven, the same loveth little.” This lesson is reiterated later in 1 Peter 4:8, when we are taught, “charity [love] shall cover the multitude of sins.” It seems that forgiveness can come as a reward for our love, which is why we are taught, “if ye have not charity, ye are nothing,” (Moroni 7:46) and, “the greatest of these [faith, hope, charity] is charity” (1 Cor 13:13). We are nothing without charity because love is what brings us forgiveness for our many sins. As I pondered these scriptures I realized how often I act like one described by the words, “to whom little is forgiven, the same loveth little.” My daily actions are often more like the Pharisee than the woman who so deeply understood her need for the Savior. I also thought back to my recent article about grace, and realized that often we love because we are forgiven rather than being forgiven because we “loved much.” It’s these times that we are blessed, through God’s grace, with that which we have not earned and do not deserve.

A similar principle is taught in Alma 32, where Alma is teaching a group of people who have been humbled by their poverty and afflictions. He teaches:

“And now, because ye are compelled to be humble blessed are ye; for a man sometimes, if he is compelled to be humble, seeketh repentance; and now surely, whosoever repenteth shall find mercy; and he that findeth mercy and endureth to the end the same shall be saved. And now, as I said unto you, that because ye were compelled to be humble ye were blessed, do ye not suppose that they are more blessed who truly humble themselves because of the word? Yea, he that truly humbleth himself, and repenteth of his sins, and endureth to the end, the same shall be blessed—yea, much more blessed than they who are compelled to be humble because of their exceeding poverty. Therefore, blessed are they who humble themselves without being compelled to be humble; or rather, in other words, blessed is he that believeth in the word of God, and is baptized without stubbornness of heart, yea, without being brought to know the word, or even compelled to know, before they will believe.”

Just as love is a prerequisite for forgiveness, humility is a prerequisite for repentance and mercy. However, when we fail in our responsibility to “love much” or humble ourselves, we often, because of God’s grace, are taught love through forgiveness or compelled to be humble and thus receive the greater blessing. However, the passage in Alma, like the story in Luke, teaches us there is a better way. I hope I can love much and humble myself rather than waiting for God, by His grace, to bestow upon me the love and humility I should have already had.

But that ye may know that the Son of man hath power on earth to forgive sins

We had a Sunday School lesson the other day about the miracles Jesus performed during his mortal ministry. The teacher had written on the board, "Why Jesus performed miracles." As we discussed some of these events in the New Testament, the class came up with various reasons such as showing individual love and compassion, teaching gospel principles, giving witness of His divine role, etc. However, the question elicited a much different response from me. Rather than thinking of why He did perform miracles in certain circumstances, I was pondering about why He sometimes doesn't intervene with a miracle. All I could think about was times when a wanted miracle didn’t occur – when people exercised faith and God could have intervened to heal someone, save a life, or soften a heart, but didn’t. I was thinking of the few times in my life when I put all the faith I could in the promise, "ask and ye shall receive," but I didn't receive. I know this may sound like unfaithful doubt to some, but I think it's important to ask these difficult questions as a way to strengthen our faith. I don't doubt at all God's ability to intervene in our lives, His love for us, and His infinite wisdom; but the simple fact is sometimes we don't see the miracle we're looking for and those are often the most difficult times in our lives.

One of Christ’s miracles described in Mark 2 helps answer these questions. A group of faithful men went through great effort to bring their friend who was sick with palsy to Jesus. In response to their faith, Christ said, “Son, they sins be forgiven thee.” When some of the scribes in the room questioned Christ’s authority to forgive sins, he stated, “Whether is it easier to say to the sick of the palsy, Thy sins be forgiven thee; or to say, Arise, and take up thy bed, and walk? But that ye may know that the Son of man hath power on earth to forgive sins, (he saith to the sick of the palsy,) I say unto thee, Arise, and take up thy bed, and go thy way into thine house” The man was healed and a great lesson was taught. At first, Christ basically ignored the request to physically heal the man but instead responded to their faith by forgiving sins. He later offered the physical healing as a witness that he has power to forgive. He seemed to be teaching us that the miracle of true significance was the Atonement, the power of Christ to forgive our sins and reconcile us with God, and that any other miracle is only to help us have faith in that great and eternal miracle of the Atonement. I think He was teaching that with an eternal perspective, any other miracle is relatively unimportant. While God, at times, may not intervene to stop an untimely death, heal an infirmity, or soften a hardened heart – He never withholds the miracle of forgiveness and Atonement for those who seek it in faith.

While I still don’t always understand why some requests are granted and miracles are performed while others aren’t, I can exercise faith in God’s infinite wisdom. I know that even the worst of trials we face in this life is “but a small moment” (DC 121:7) in the eternal scheme. Any miracle we do witness is only a testimony of the more important miracle of forgiveness, and any miracle we seek for but do not receive pails in comparison to the miracle of the Atonement already performed for us.

Grace

Grace, much like other common and seemingly simple scriptural words such as faith and hope, carries much more meaning that any simple definition can convey. I’ve often struggled to understand exactly what the concept of grace really means. Some of the difficulties my wife and I went through during my recent deployment to Afghanistan gave me an increased understanding on the topic.

I think my idea of grace has, for a long time, been shaped by the words in 2 Nephi 25:23, “…for we know that it is by grace that we are saved, after all we can do,” as well as a popular book from LDS author Stephen Robinson called Believing Christ. His book shared what he called the Parable of the Bicycle where a young boy does all he can to save money to buy a bicycle, but comes up drastically short of the needed sum. His father, recognizing the boy’s intent, effort, and limitations, makes up the difference. This story and the scripture in Nephi build the concept that grace is what we are given as a reward for our faithful efforts, given from a loving Heavenly Father that knows we will fall short of our end goal. I think I had the idea that while we can’t earn salvation, perhaps we can earn grace, and, “we believe that through the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ we shall be saved” (Acts 15:11). I’ve come to believe, however, that we should be very careful of thinking we can “earn” anything, even grace. Faithful effort and good works are necessary requirements for growth, but I believe they have intrinsic rewards and grace isn’t bestowed contingent upon them.

The definition of grace on LDS.org states, “Grace is the help or strength given through the Atonement of the Lord Jesus Christ.” In my trials, I’ve found grace not to be the reward for my own faith, but rather the unearned and undeserved strength I received when my own faith failed. It was what allowed me to carry on when I gave up, the help I was given when I quit asking. It was the blessings I received when I stopped doing my part, not what I received after doing my fair share. Grace, I’ve found, is the most humbling of all gifts. It’s when I realize I gave up just before the finish line and the Lord carried me across anyway. When I receive God’s grace, I realize how much I don’t deserve, how limited my faith really is. It’s when I didn’t do what the Lord asked and I still receive the blessing, not because I earned it or deserve it, but because Heavenly Father has boundless love and knows that the bestowal of the undeserved blessing is the only way for me to move forward.

In addition, I have come to believe that the limitations of our language and temporal understanding have led us to apply some sort of chronological limitation on grace. It’s what we get after all we can do…we exercise faith; then we get grace…we do our part, then the Lord makes up the difference. Perhaps we could replace these temporally limiting words of “after” and “then” with “in spite of” or “notwithstanding.” We are given grace in spite of our own failures, notwithstanding our tendency to give up and quit. It’s not that we live a complete and good, but imperfect, life and then God gives us grace to qualify us for salvation. Rather, we are constantly failing to live up to our own potential, do be as faithful and good as we could be, and God’s grace is constantly being bestowed on us anyway simply to keep us moving in the right direction.