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When I realized I would be giving my Relief Society lesson on Adversity on Valentine’s Day I wondered how I could mesh those two very different subjects in a meaningful way. As I often do, I asked my morning walking partner, Lynn Callister, for counsel and she did not disappoint. Her idea was obvious and powerful: The only way we get through our adversities is to yield our hearts to the Lord and plead for the blessings of the atonement. My daughter, Lynne Christofferson, had given a similar lesson recently and shared her yielding-heart graphic (above) which tied the two themes together nicely.

Experiences with Adversity

Right on cue, as I was preparing my lesson, I began experiencing some adversities that would give me fresh, first-hand experiences to which I could apply what I was learning: I spent an agonizing afternoon in the ER with my son who was in serious pain from a kidney stone attack, another son who was out of the country was having a serious health struggle, which reminded me of a year ago when a third son was attending a seminar on the east coast for his employment and was stricken seriously ill and in the ER there with a severe mono-related illness that would take him seven months to recover from when he returned to Utah. In each case, I was deeply concerned about my sons, but could do nothing tangible on my own to help them, though my prayers were constant. That is when a parent truly suffers too.

When there is no way we can help, that is when we turn to the only true Source of help that is available to us, and we plead as never before for the Lord to intervene, reminding Him that they are His sons too and they are in His hands. While my sons were the ones physically suffering, in each case I was feeling great emotional pain in a way that almost overwhelmed me and I pled for the peace Elder Bednar describes here:

Most of us know He paid for our sins, I am not so sure, however, that we know and understand that Christ’s atonement is for the here and now as well, to help us as we struggle through this life. His atonement helps us with emotional anguish, physical sickness, every affliction known to man. . .The burdens do not necessarily change, but our ability to endure them does.” (BYU Devotional 2001, “The Atonement and the Journey of Mortality”)

The Power of the Atonement

President Howard W. Hunter asks, “Why face burdens alone. . . why face them with temporal support that will quickly falter?. . . It is the power and peace of standing side by side with a God that will provide the support, balance and strength to meet our challenges and endure our tasks here in the hardpan of mortality. . . . Christ said, in effect: As long as we all must bear some burden and shoulder some yoke, why not let it be mine? My promise to you is that my yoke is easy and my burden is light.” (Teachings of the Presidents of the Church, 2015, “Adversity—Part of God’s Plan for Our Eternal Progress,” p. 67)

In life, we have times of great testing and growth. Though we feel deep anguish, these are the times when we necessarily draw closer to God. “The suffering of the Savior in Gethsemane was without question the greatest that has ever come to mankind, yet out of it came the greatest good.” (Ibid) We must recognize and claim this supernal gift in our extremities.

A Personal Experience

In the late ‘70’s when I had just begun composing in earnest I was unable to play the piano with my left hand. Each time I tried, the middle three fingers would curl under and my wrist would pull down in an unnatural position causing considerable pain and making it impossible for me to play naturally. Many tears were shed as I went from doctor to doctor (40 to be exact) without receiving any diagnosis or cure. Five years or so after the onset, a blind osteopath, Dr. Iliff Jeffrey, who was trying to fix my arm/hand, instead taught me something of greater value. One day he admitted he could not fix the problem but maybe he could help me accept it more gracefully if I would allow him to teach me.

He spoke from his heart and his personal experience, telling me that because of this problem, my prayers would be more sincere and I would draw closer to the Savior who understands every sorrow we experience. He assured me there would be a healing time, whether in this life or the next, and that I should look forward to it, as he looked forward to seeing again. He promised me that if I would bear this trial with grace and patience there would come a time when I would not trade having the use of my hand back for all I had learned from being without it. He was, in essence, asking me to yield my heart to God and receive the blessings of the atonement so that I could find peace in my circumstance.

I didn’t play the piano much after that, and when I did, his words came back to me and I did indeed feel peace. I have even felt, at times, as Paul to “glory in my infirmity,” because “when I am weak I am strong.” I wrote a song to honor this good doctor. The first verse is about him and the other verses are for those bearing other kinds of burdens with grace.

The Test

Words & Music by Janice Kapp Perry

Soloist: Roger Hoffman (from the album The Light Within)

Tell me, friend, why are you blind
Why doesn’t He who worked the miracles
Send light into your eyes
Tell me, friend, if you understand
Why doesn’t He with power to raise the dead
Just make you whole again
It would be so easy for Him
I watch you and in sorrow question why
Then you, my friend, in perfect faith reply

Chorus
Didn’t He say He sent us to be tested
Didn’t He say the way would not be sure
But didn’t He say we could live with Him
Forevermore, well and whole
If we but patiently endure
After the trial we will be blessed
But this life is the test

Tell me, friend, I see your pain
Why, when you pray in faith for healing
Does the crippling thorn remain
Help me see, if you understand
Why doesn’t He who healed the lame man
Come with healing in His wings
It would be so easy for Him
I watch you and in sorrow question why
Then you, my friend, in perfect faith reply

Repeat Chorus

Tell me, love, why must you die
Why must your loved ones stand with empty arms
And ask the question why
Help me know, so I can go on
How, when your love and faith sustained me
Can the precious gift be gone
From the depths of sorrow I cry
Though pains of grief within my soul arise
The whisp’rings of the Spirit still my cries

Repeat Chorus

 

President Hunter listed our adversities as falling under four broad categories as follows: 1) As consequences of a person’s own pride and disobedience, 2) As a natural part of life (sickness or death), 3) As a result of others’ poor choices and hurtful words or actions, and 4) As a tutoring experience from a loving Heavenly Father.” (Ibid) I have filed my trial away under #4.

Helpful Quotes on Adversity

I am in possession of many meaningful quotes about adversity by our Church leaders. While I do not have all the references I know them to be correct, and they may be helpful in summing up this article:

Elder Dallin H. Oaks: “Adversity will be a constant or occasional companion for each of us throughout our lives. We cannot avoid it. The only question is how we will react to it.”

President Spencer W. Kimball: “No pain suffered by man or woman upon the earth will be without its compensating effects if it be suffered in resignation and if it be met with patience.”

Alma: “Whosoever shall put their trust in God shall be supported in their trials, and their troubles, and their afflictions, and shall be lifted up at the last day.” (Alma 36:3)

Elder Robert D. Hales: “In the school of mortality, the tutor is often pain and tribulation, but the lessons are meant to refine and bless us and strengthen us, not to destroy us. There is nothing that we are enduring that Jesus does not understand, and He waits for us to go to our Heavenly Father in prayer.”

Elder Bruce R. McConkie: “In the wisdom of Him who knows all things. . . , all of us are given the particular and specific tests that we need in our personal situations.”

President Spencer W. Kimball: “I’m grateful that my priesthood power is limited and used as the Lord sees fit to use it. I don’t want to heal all the sick—for sickness sometimes is a great blessing. People become angels through sickness.”

President James M. Faust: “Here then is a great truth. In the pain, the agony, and heroic endeavors of life, we pass through a refiner’s fire, and the insignificant and the unimportant in our lives can melt away like dross and make our faith bright, intact and strong.”

Elder Jeffrey R. Holland: “Every one of us has times when we need to know things will get better. . . . This is precisely what the gospel of Jesus Christ offers us, especially in times of need. There is help. There is happiness. There really is light at the end of the tunnel. It is the Light of the World, the Bright Morning Star, the light that is endless, that can never be darkened. It is the very Son of God Himself.”

Conclusion

In my older age I feel such gratitude for the lessons adversity has taught me. When I had the problem with my hand in 1979 it caused me significant anguish and seemed like the worst thing that could happen to me. Now with the perspective of 37 years, and some hard-earned wisdom it hardly even registers on my Adversity Scale. Other more difficult adversities have added to my faith and to my knowledge of all the atonement covers and I have been able to eventually find peace through relying on that knowledge no matter what comes. I wrote a hymn in 2001 to articulate what I have learned through the years, “The Lord Will Try His Faithful Saints.” It was published in our Inspirational New Hymns for Choir and Home, Volume Three, p. 7 and I will conclude with this text.

The Lord Will Try His Faithful Saints

Text by Janice Kapp Perry

The Lord will try His faithful saints
Our utmost strength He may require
For stalwart souls grow stronger still
When forged within affliction’s fire
Through darkest days we trust in God
That we say with Job of old
When God has tried my heart and soul
I will come forth as gold

The Lord will try his faithful saints
That we His blessings may obtain
Then He, in love, will consecrate
Each sore affliction to our gain
The tribulations He allows
Are but a moment, small in time
And all who bear them patiently
Receive the crown of life

The Lord will try His faithful saints
Our willing hearts to purify
In wisdom He will chasten us
To humble and to sanctify
For in the harsh refiner’s fire
The love of God will be made known
And when we have endured it well
He’ll claim us as His own

Janice Kapp Perry: Composer, author, lecturer.