He does care...

I remember listening to this talk for the first time, years ago, while i was hiking down squaw peak (the actual peak above the provo temple, NOT the make out place...) alone, in the dark and i teared up as i listened because i felt like this. i felt like i was constantly swimming toward a life preserver and it was always taken away. it was really hard not to give up

I felt tonight that i should share this with someone else who might be feeling this way, in hopes that like me, they would feel god's love for them as they listen. to know that He does know.. and He does care.

Acres of Diamonds, Vaughn J. Featherstone

(this text begins about half way through the talk..)

"I guess I could share with you a personal story. I would like to change it just enough so that it won’t possibly be recognized, but the facts are true. A bishop from a ward in a distant city came to see me one day and said, “We’ve got a woman in our ward who would like to be excommunicated.”

I said, “All right. What’s the problem? Have you talked to her?”

“Yes, we’ve tried to talk her out of it many times.”

“Has the stake president talked to her?”

“Yes.”

“What do you recommend?”

He said, “Well, I hate to tell you this, but we told her that, if she would come to see you and talk to you, and if she still wanted to be excommunicated after she had the interview with you, we’d let her be excommunicated.”

I answered, “Thanks.” Then I got humble inside and said, “Of course I’ll see her.” We made an appointment, and I want to tell you that I came to that interview with a great deal of prayer and a very humble heart. 

The woman came in, and I asked, “You are so-and-so?”

And she said, “Yes.”

I said, “I have been expecting you.”

She responded, “The only reason I am here is that my bishop said if I would come and talk to you I could be excommunicated after the interview. That’s the only reason I am here.”

I said, “Would you just take a few minutes and explain the story to me?”

Then she told me some of her experiences. “When I was eighteen my mother died, and I had four younger brothers and sisters. I knew I couldn’t start dating and getting serious about a fellow, and so I didn’t even look. Anything that started developing I just cut off. I took care of the family at home, and when the older of my young brothers was ready to go on a mission, I supported him. Then my second brother came along, and I supported him on his mission. They came back and eventually found companions and got married. My two sisters got married, and then all the family was raised. I was about thirty and I thought, ‘Now I can get married.’ A short time later I found the fellow, and we fell in love and got married.

“You know,” she continued, “I believed that prayer was a one-way street. You just reported in, but you didn’t dare ask for anything. All those years that I took care of and supported my brothers and sisters, I had a health problem. I had a good job, but I had this serious health problem. After I was married, my husband was called to be a seventy. We went to one of the seven presidents of the First Council of the Seventy, and he gave my husband a blessing as he ordained him. Then he said, ‘I’d like to give you a blessing also.’ I didn’t ask for the blessing; he just volunteered it. Then he laid his hands on my head, and he told me something that I didn’t know until that day. He opened up a whole new dimension of life because he said, ‘Do you know that when you pray you can ask God for things, and he will answer those prayers?’ I hadn’t known that before. When he finished, I couldn’t believe it. I went home, and for the first time in my life I got down on my knees and started asking God for something.

“Then I decided that before I did that I had better be worthy. I was working at a place making more money than my husband, and I started looking at myself and thinking my skirts were a little shorter than they ought to be. So I voluntarily lengthened my skirts. Then I thought that maybe I shouldn’t be working. I didn’t think the Lord would be pleased with my working, and we really didn’t need both incomes, so I stopped working. We lived off my husband’s income, and I managed his affairs for him at home. We paid our tithing all those years. At one time the bishop felt impressed to give me a blessing, and he promised me that I would have a man child, that he would be a priesthood holder, and that he would do a great service for the Church. I didn’t ask for the blessing; he volunteered it and gave it to me. So I expected that his promises would take place. We’ve been married five years, but we have no children.

“Later on a member of the stake presidency gave me a blessing and promised me that my health would be increased, but my health isn’t any better. Do you know what it’s like to have someone throw a lifebuoy out to you if you’re drowning in the middle of the ocean? You swim and swim and finally get there, but when you reach out to take hold of it he pulls it away from you again. You swim and you swim farther, and you finally get there, but he always pulls it away. I don’t believe in a God like that. I believe my bishop, and he’s a great man, and I believe in the stake presidency and the president of the First Council of the Seventy. I know they are honest and upright men, but I don’t believe in a God who would not keep his promises. I want to be excommunicated from the Church.”

When I heard this sweet soul tell me that story, I want to tell you I sat there and wept with her. I’ve never been through that. I’ve never had the Lord throw out a lifebuoy to me, let me swim toward it, and just as I got there pull it away from me. I haven’t been through that kind of a test. As I heard this story, I thought in my heart, “Dear God, please, everything is riding on this interview. Help me to say the right thing today.” After she had finished, I said, “You know, I really don’t think you want to be excommunicated. You just want God to know that you’re really serious. You want to let him know that you just can’t take any more, that you’ve had your limit of pressure.”

She replied, “Yes, that’s part of it.”

Then I said, “But you know, you need to develop a Job-like attitude. Job was a great soul, and he said, ‘Though he [God] slay me, yet will I trust in him’ (Job 13:15). If we have that kind of attitude it doesn’t matter what we go through, our reward is certain in the next life. You’ve put a time limit on the Lord. You’ve been married five years. What if in five years and six months you get pregnant, and then you have this child? What if a short time later your health comes? These things haven’t happened, so you expect them now. What if it isn’t for five years and nine months? It might be seven years, or fifteen years, or maybe not in this life. But I promise you, as surely as God is in heaven, that those promises made by righteous priesthood bearers will take place in your life. Now you don’t want to be excommunicated, do you?” I was teary-eyed.

She answered, “No, I really don’t.” The tears came a little faster then, and I wanted to say, “Would you like me to give you a blessing?” but I dared not do it.

She asked, “Bishop Featherstone, before I leave, would you please give me a blessing?” And so I gave her a blessing, and she left. I closed the door, went over and sat at the desk, and cried. Everything had hinged on that one interview, and God had been there. Why, at that very instant God had been answering her prayer, but she didn’t even know it. He would continue to do so all through her life. You see, the God I worship has a thousand times more compassion than I have. If in my limited way I could see all that she had gone through and feel all that she had suffered enough, God would know much more than I ever could what suffering she should go through, the depth of it, and then at the right time he would not withhold those blessings from her. I hope you feel about that story the way I am trying to convey it to you. I think sometimes you feel as if God had thrown out the lifebuoy and then pulled it away from you. That isn’t so. You must simply trust in him as Job did. “Though he slay me, yet will I trust in him.”