This post is part of the General Conference Odyssey. This week covers the Saturday Morning Session of the October 1998 Conference.
When I was talking to Abe on the phone the other day, he told me that he and the other missionaries in his district were discussing conspiracy theories and which ones they thought were true. Ha! It made me laugh, but since then I've also been thinking about how many people (in Abe's generation, especially!) seem to be suspicious of everyone and everything.
Don't get me wrong—in a lot of ways, I understand and sympathize with that attitude! I've grown more and more distrustful of many institutions, including the government, this past decade or so. And while the phrase "conspiracy theorist" is meant to conjure up visions of some crazy crackpot, of course we know through ancient and modern prophets that secret combinations will be commonplace in the last days! So it's not that I blame a lot of these young adults for being skeptical and even cynical. But I also think it's too bad that so many of them don't seem to be able to trust anything, or believe that truth can be found at all. A life without any sort of anchoring truth is subject to so many winds and storms!
I thought about that when I read Sister Virginia Jensen's talk about prophets. She says,
There aren’t many guarantees in this life. There isn’t a car made with a warranty that covers everything. No bank on earth can absolutely guarantee that your money is completely safe. Even the Good Housekeeping seal of approval has a disclaimer written right on it! Nothing man-made or man-controlled can ever be truly guaranteed! But here’s the miracle. The Lord has given some marvelous guarantees without any disclaimers. And this is one of them: He will choose the prophet, and He will never let that man lead us astray. Imagine for a moment the impact of that promise. There is at least one place we can turn for pure, unpolluted guidance.
I love the simplicity of that. There aren't disclaimers or footnotes to God's promises about His prophets. They just won't lead us astray! We can count on it! And as much as we could legitimately try to MAKE it complicated if we wanted to…"He wasn't speaking as a prophet! He didn't say it in conference! He's a man and he's fallible! We have to think for ourselves! Etc. etc. etc."…
…for me, it is so comforting NOT to complicate it. Everything else might be confusing and up in the air. All other certainty might feel out of reach and unknowable. But to have this one institution, our latter-day prophets, to count on absolutely—that seems to me one of the most calming and steadying blessings we could possibly have.
Other posts in this series
A Season of Opportunity—by Rozy
I just love “for me, it is so comforting NOT to complicate it.” I’ve just noticed that so much through reading Saints—how many just took such issue all the time with things like … “this is a crummy place to settle”, “a prophet shouldn’t get involved in how we should handle finances and business “, etc. etc. I don’t think you have to be naive or overly innocent to just decide to follow the prophets. The Lord has, since the restoration, worked and moved his work forward despite their mortal weaknesses, expression of opinions, etc. And it is comforting to just trust that process and stick with the prophet. It makes me think of this counsel: “stand by my servant Joseph, faithfully, in whatsoever difficult circumstances he may be”. I want to choose to just support my prophet and throw my strength in with him whether he is receiving “this saith the Lord” revelation or doing his best to lead a worldwide church when the heavens are silent and he has to make his best guess.
ReplyDeleteAlso … I love that picture at the top of the post!
Yeah, that's a good point, and I feel that way too--even if the prophet IS just doing his best and making his best guess. I STILL would rather trust him than "the arm of the flesh"!
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