As we reflect on the events of 9-11, and consider all the current difficulties facing people the world over, we wanted to address this question today — one we have heard often.

This question (or a variation of it, such as “If there is a God, why does He let bad things happen?”) is one that I think most of us struggle with at some level, at some point in our lives. It’s normal to want to have a life relatively free of pain; we are actually wired to want to avoid pain (think “fight-or-flight”). Much in our world (sometimes for good and sometimes for ill) is designed to help alleviate pain, or to at least distract us from it.

It’s hard sometimes not to envy others’ lives that seem to be easier, more “blessed.” Or on the flip side, to be so consumed by the inequalities of life so as to lose hope and feel buried in despair. Or to feel so helpless because we can only do so much to help alleviate the suffering in the world.

Sometimes, to those who believe (or who want to believe) in God, the struggle with pain and the desire for relief from suffering can equate to a trial of faith.

“If God is really there, why doesn’t He intervene?”

“Why haven’t my (their) prayers been answered?”

“How long do I (they) have to wait on the Lord?”

“Does God really care about me (them)?”

“Why does God let innocent people suffer and die?”

The list of questions that sometimes come could go on and on.

There has been much written on this subject, by people of many faiths and persuasions. For each person, finding peace in the midst of trial will probably be a little different.

Following are two clusters of truth that help me not only accept my own challenges, but also process the broader questions about the issue of human suffering. This is not meant to be an exhaustive summary of Mormon doctrine or of my personal perspective. I share only a few things that help me address this question. I welcome your thoughts as well (comments are moderated, so don’t worry if they don’t show up immediately).

1. Mortality was not meant to be easy. The opposition and pain is part of a loving plan — a plan designed to allow us to learn by experience now and to eventually enjoy great eternal blessings.

I recall a time when my oldest was quite young, maybe about four or five. He had watched me, his mother, struggle with chronic health issues (which I have had for several years). He asked a pointed and poignant question: “Mom, why do people sometimes get sick?”

Obviously, it was a loaded question. And obviously, I felt an urgent desire to give him a clear answer that might help his young mind to understand truth.

God did not fail me in that moment. I had a very distinct idea come to mind.

I grabbed a couple of hand weights, and started pumping them. I may have even had him try.

You know where I went with that, of course.

We still will often talk in our family about how we can look at our trials as spiritual weights. Think about the metaphor; we have to literally break down muscle tissue in order to have our muscles strengthened. Our spirits will be tested in similar ways through the pain and struggles of mortality. But like a caring, wise trainer, God will often give us opportunities to stretch, to push through pain, to keep going —  beyond where we think our limits might be sometimes — because He knows what benefits lie in spiritual resistance.

There are many scriptures that capture my thoughts on this. One is Romans 8:18: “For I reckon that the sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared with the glory which shall be revealed in us.”

Faith to me includes holding onto the fact that even though the pain is real — and I believe God knows and empathizes with that — God knows and understands so much more than we do about the purpose of opposition now, and what awaits us after this life. Because of the atonement of Jesus Christ, there is redemption from death through the resurrection (which will come to us all), and the possibility for glory beyond our comprehension.

Another critical part of this plan of mortality includes what we call agency in Mormon doctrine — the opportunity God gives us to make choices based on knowledge that we have, to learn by experience, to have the opportunity to grow and gain wisdom through trial and error. That fact alone makes mortality very, very messy. We are all imperfect beings. We all make mistakes, and we make them often. Sometimes mistakes are serious, even sinful, and can cause great disruption, pain, and suffering for others — even for those who are innocent. As hard as it is to comprehend, even all this messiness has a place in God’s plan.

Here is my second cluster of thoughts, which build on what I have discussed above.

2. Pain can help us find out more about ourselves, gain compassion for others, and discover more about God and His plan — and about the atonement of Jesus Christ.

Regardless of whether one believes in God, adversity does give one an opportunity to dig deep for the wherewithal to rise to the challenge. Again, books have been written about the triumph of the human soul in the face of severe trial. We can discover that we are stronger than we think we are when we are put to tests of character, patience, endurance, forgiveness, courage and many other virtues. We can learn things that perhaps may not be easily learned any other way but through the “school of hard knocks.”

I discussed this question with a friend of mine today. Jenny shared this thought:

I think God already has a pretty good idea of who we are. But we don’t. Through our experiences in life we come to know ourselves better. When you read an incredible story about someone helping Jews during WWII or running into the World Trade Center to save someone on 9-11 do you ever wonder ‘Would I do that if I were there?’ Well, to me that is some of what life is about. To see what we will do when faced with hard situations.

One of our prophets, Spencer W. Kimball said something that I have leaned on more than once when considering this question:

If all the sick for whom we pray were healed, if all the righteous were protected and the wicked destroyed, the whole program of the Father would be annulled and the basic principle of the gospel, … agency, would be ended. No man would have to live by faith.

If pain and sorrow and total punishment immediately followed the doing of evil, no soul would repeat a misdeed. If joy and peace and rewards were instantaneously given the doer of good, there could be no evil—all would do good and not because of the rightness of doing good. There would be no test of strength, no development of character, no growth of powers, no…agency. … There would also be an absence of joy, success, resurrection, eternal life….

The opposition and unpredictable (messy!) nature of how life unfolds is an essential part of God’s plan for us, for our eternal growth. It’s resistance training at its finest!

Adversity also can help us have compassion for others, and can enable us to serve and help and lift another. Empathy is a powerful tool in healing hearts and lives and relationships. Love can do much to alleviate the suffering of others, and can motivate us to want to help others in need. (Sometimes God won’t intervene because He gives us the chance to step in and serve!) Forgiveness in the face of suffering inflicted by another’s poor choices also expand our capacity for love and compassion.

I am especially compelled by the notion that, if we will let them, our trials can help us find God and His strength and grace, which surpasses anything that we can find or do on our own. A scripture comes to mind from 2 Corinthians. Interestingly, Paul had prayed to have a “thorn” removed from his life. Rather than having it removed, he got this answer from the Lord:

And he said unto me, My ^agrace is sufficient for thee…

And then Paul shares the insight that changed how he sees his affliction:

…for my ^bstrength is made perfect in ^cweakness. Most gladly therefore will I rather glory in my infirmities, that the power of Christ may ^drest upon me.
Therefore I take pleasure in ^ainfirmities, in reproaches, in necessities, in ^bpersecutions, in distresses for Christ’s sake: for when I am ^cweak, then am I ^dstrong.

While it’s definitely not easy to find pleasure in pain (and I think it takes experience to let that gift of perspective distill), I have  caught glimpses of that power of Christ, brought into my life through the influence of the Holy Ghost. I have seen and felt that power in the lives of others as well. Even when people don’t realize it, I believe their ability to find light in the darkness comes through Jesus Christ as a blessing from God.

That power in my life can bridge the gap between me and heaven. It helps me understand more about the Savior’s Atonement, and about the deep and abiding love of my Heavenly Father and His Son. As I trust in that power, my faith is enhanced.  Hope increases. I feel strength beyond my own. I am able to see trials more as stepping stones, not stumbling blocks.

When Jenny and I first started talking, she summed up her thoughts simply. She essentially said, “‘Bad’ is relative; it’s in the eye of the beholder.” She talked about recently hearing stories about those who suffered severe trials — life-threatening cancer, being involved on the front lines in World War II. There was a theme in these stories, which was, “I’m a better person because of what I suffered.”

I will say again that I don’t think that God is unaware of how hard “bad” things can be. And I believe He doesn’t fault us when we honestly struggle. I think honesty about our struggles can help us face them, find the good, and find God. Too much focus on the pain, however, can bring despair and hopelessness, which at their core are not of God. We don’t have to punish ourselves when we may feel those emotions, but I believe it helps to recognize that fundamentally, God is a God of hope. The message of the Atonement of the Savior, Jesus Christ, is a message of hope. The plan that includes the pain of mortality is a plan of hope. Because we are His children, God can help us find hope in the midst of suffering, and perspective in the midst of trial.

When we try to see some good in our bad times, or at least trust good is there somewhere (or will unfold sometime — now or eternally), glimmers of light can shine through even the darkest times. Any effort to try to choose that kind of light is a step forward. Sometimes that progress comes a little at a time, and sometimes in the moment, it can feel like one step forward and two steps back. But I can’t imagine that any effort at choosing to “find the silver lining” is wasted. The more we choose hope, the more I think we are empowered to choose it again, and the more we recognize and enjoy the perspective and peace amid trial that can come into our lives as we do.

Truly, as Jenny noted, anytime I read or watch a story about someone who has overcome great adversity, that theme of finding some good in the bad is always, always there. This isn’t just about a superficial optimism in my mind, but in digging deep to choose a measure of hope even when it seems nearly impossible to do, and even when things don’t work out as we want.

So, why do good things happen to bad people? I know I don’t come close to understanding it all, but I do know there is a God. He is real. He loves us. Pain is not evidence that He doesn’t care, but is part of an eternal plan for our growth, progress, learning, and development. I hold onto those realities as I face daily pain of chronic illness and other trials, and as I sometimes am weighed down by the pain others experience. In the end, I trust in the truth that Jesus Christ is our “high priest of good things to come” (Heb. 8:6; Heb. 9:11). Because of Him, I — you, we — can have hope.

For more perspective on this topic, see the video below (in English and in Spanish). This video, entitled “Finding Hope,” shares the story of a survivor of 9-11 and how, through his faith in Jesus Christ, he has found blessings in his life in spite of — and even because of — his involvement in that tragedy. (“Una Nueva Esperanza” — Un hombre describe el trayecto recorrido desde la tragedia del 11 de septiembre de 2001 hasta una nueva esperanza por medio de la fe en Jesucristo.)

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~by Chantal

“We think we have chosen our peers. In reality, a few years’ difference in the dates of our births, a few more miles between certain houses, the choice of one university instead of another, posting to different regiments, the accident of a topic being raised or not raised at a first meeting – any of these chances might have kept us apart. But, for a Christian, there are, strictly speaking, no chances. A secret Master of the Ceremonies has been at work. Christ, who said to the disciples “ye have not chosen me, but I have chosen you,” can truly say to every group of Christian friends “you have not chosen one another but I have chosen you for one another. The Friendship is not a reward for our discrimination and good taste in finding one another out. It is the instrument by which God reveals to each the beauties of all the others.” –CS Lewis, The Four Loves, p. 85

Choice friends cross our life path at unexpected times and often in ways we don’t recognize at first. Severall years ago, my dear friend-to-be, Cindy, served as the Stake Relief Society President and is a midwife by profession. We had a Stake Relief Society service project in conjunction with the Relief Society broadcast that was no different than many others I’d attended over the years. And yet, this event would end up being a significant experience in the tapestry of my life.

This particular Saturday, we had gathered donations and were assembling birthing kits to go to Mozambique, Africa. Cindy had joined a medical team to give training to traditional birth assistants in rural Mozambique. These kits included a sheet of plastic (for the mother to lie on the ground), a shoe string (to tie off the umbilical cord), a razor blade, and several disinfectant wipes. She then showed a video from her experience there. I cried for the mothers in Mozambique. How is it possible that nearly half of the almost 6 billion people of the world live today in such abject poverty?

A few months later, in my role as Primary President in my ward [local congregation], we were setting up for a Primary activity. I was expecting our 5th child and had to leave early and to go to a doctor’s appointment for a routine monthly checkup — which I felt was a waste of time.

But this checkup turned out not to be routine at all. There was no heartbeat.

Ultrasound confirmed our baby had died inside of me. After a difficult induced delivery, our baby daughter, Ann, was born four days later with a kink in the umbilical cord. We held her, dressed her and buried her in the dust of the earth.

Here I became acquainted with death, grief, and God.

I am always astounded at the depth of pain I felt for a little one I had for such a short time. This heart-searing pain came from the depth of love a mother has for her baby, given only by God. My greatest desire was to hold, love, raise and nurture this beautiful daughter.

Grief was a confusing mystery to me. The anger, the depression, the forgetfulness, the loss of time and motivation all came in waves I did not recognize or understand. Most surprising to me was also the loss of self-esteem and confidence. It doesn’t seem to be mentioned much. But all that I was, all that I knew, all that I believed was crushed into tiny pieces, mixed together and left in a pile of mess at my feet. How do I begin from there?

I won’t go into much detail on the year following except to say that after much fasting, prayer and a priesthood blessing we decided to have one more little baby. Not to replace our little girl, for no one will replace, but we felt to move on. In full confidence and faith we were delighted to learn another little daughter would join our family. Having paid my dues to death and with such astronomical medical odds of such a problem, I moved on in courage, not fear, and hope.

But again at a regular appointment in nearly identical fashion and timing, there was no heartbeat. It had never even remotely crossed my mind that this could happen again. The surprise and shock was more than I could wrap my mind around. There are no words to express the stunned crushing blow that moment held. I literally thought my own heart would stop and I would die of pain on the spot as I collapsed to the floor. It is far more horrific when you know what is ahead and I was hysterical. I learned that death twice is exponentially more painful and difficult.

I fought depression with anger. I was mad. Mad at the world, mad at people, mad that I would have four out of six children to raise here on earth. Logically, I understood everything about the plan of salvation but my heart would not match my logic. The river of emotions came despite my knowledge and faith. It was several years but felt like a lifetime. I felt 90 years old. Then I was numb. I felt nothing. I wondered if as a mother I could ever find joy after such grief or if I would have to die first. I prayed many times my other children would forget and not be too damaged from the difficulty of those years.

Here is where my friendship with Cindy changed my life….

(Please follow this link for Part 2.)

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Below, we give some highlights from his talk that stood out to us.

Elder Bednar discussed the importance of truth, “things as they really are.” He focused particularly on the truths about the importance of our bodies in the plan of our Father in Heaven, quoting from The Family: A Proclamation to the World, teaching us that as spirit children of God, we:

accepted His plan by which His children could obtain a physical body and gain earthly experience to progress toward perfection and ultimately realize his or her divine destiny as an heir of eternal life.

Our bodies give us experience that is essential for our eternal growth. The adversary has no body, and as such, cannot have the opportunities and growth (and even challenges) available to us because we do. He does all he can to distort God’s plan, and to make us miserable like he is.

The devil seeks to influence us, Elder Bednar taught, to misuse our bodies, and to minimize the importance of our physical bodies in God’s plan. He warned against defiling of the body, and improper focus on body image. He invited us to learn “by study and also by faith” the ways we can discern what is and isn’t correct in relation to the proper use of the gift of a physical body.

Elder Bednar warned against extreme forms of extreme “entertainment” (sought for thrill or ego or social acceptance) that could put our physical safety at risk. He also warned against “digital distractions, diversions, and detours that have no lasting value.” Video and online games and social networking sites were two specific digital distractions he mentioned that can distort reality, rob us of the joy of eternally-important relationships, and even become addictions.

Elder Bednar made it clear that digital tools can be of great benefit when used for good purposes, but he reminded us that they can also be seemingly-harmless distractions that can numb our minds and spirits and gradually, subtly pull us away from truth and truly fulfilling relationships and activities. He pleads with us to not become so “engrossed in pixels, texting, ear buds, Twittering, online social networking, and potentially addictive uses of media and internet that you fail to recognize the importance of the physical body, and miss the richness of person-to-person communication.” What starts as “entertainment” can become enslavement if we are not vigilant.

He quoted from a sobering Wall Street Journal article, relating a tragic story about a man who spent so much time on Second Life (a virtual reality site), “married” to someone else, that he ignored his new wife of only seven months. Elder Bednar also quotes statistics from the article, illustrating that many who participate in online gaming tout their virtual relationships and experiences as being as good as, or even better than, “real-life” relationships and experiences.

He reminds us that electronic tools can also, of course, be used for outright evil and blatant disobedience of God’s commandments. But we found the more subtle ways media can distract from the richness of life and distort the truths of God to be the potent core of his talk. He quotes Paul, who reminds us that we “should know how to possess [our] vessels [bodies] in sanctification and honour.

We highly recommend his talk to anyone who uses the computer, who has children who do, who is wondering about the appropriate use of new media, and/or who desires to ponder more about the importance of the physical body in the plan of our Heavenly Father.

See other reviews here.

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