Reading Sections 6-11 of the Doctrine and Covenants and knowing a little about Church history, some interesting observations can be made. Oliver Cowdery was given some amazing promises and great spiritual experiences. The things he witnessed during a few short years were likely beyond anything anyone in the Church today would experience in their lifetimes. Oliver discovered two truths: 1. The more he experienced, the greater the growth and joy he obtained. 2. The more he grew spiritually, the greater the burden, challenge and opposition he experienced. The same is true of Hyrum Smith and many others. The difference among them is that those who endured and did not succumb to the challenges and opposition continued in growth and joy. Those who allowed the opposition and burdens to overcome them ceased receiving the blessings. In most cases, they considered the great spiritual experiences as a distant memory of something that hardly seemed real any more.
Oliver had expectations of wealth and given the prosperous times, the expectations were well founded. Land prices were accelerating at an unprecedented rate in Kirtland and all the upper part of Ohio as people moved into the fertile country to settle. There was no central banking system, so money was produced by the local bank. Our money today is the result of the type of money they had developed then. Banks would take your gold or silver coin or bullion and issue you "notes" in various denominations. Your $5 note may be worth $5 or more, or less depending upon the good credit of the bank upon which it was drawn. Today we have a central bank, so our money is subject to inflation or deflation, but will never be worth nothing. Unfortunately, in Kirkland the bank, along with thousands of others, became the victim of the bursting of the real estate bubble and resulting depression and it failed.
Oliver had many trials from mobbers and others outside the Church and even disaffected members of the Church, but this time, he felt that investing with the prophet was his pathway to wealth. His faith and that of several others was tried beyond what he felt he could bear and he left the Church. He became a bitter man and an enemy to the prophet.
Brigham Young, Wilford Woodruff and many others also lost their fortunes in the venture, but disassociated the bank from the restoration of the Gospel and continued faithful. Revelations continued, the process of restoring the Gospel, the Church and the priesthood with its saving ordinances also continued. Oliver felt that he had become an indispensable part of the process and became, at first, bitter when he saw that it all continued without him and that others had easily taken his place. Later, this realization touched his heart to the point of turning him around and he sought to be readmitted into the Church.
We sometimes make mistakes similar to Oliver. It may not be that we feel the Church cannot do without us, but we place our finite understanding before God's infinite understanding. He gives us counsel we would rather not accept. We find that the way we are living or the way someone we love is living is harmless in our own minds and that a loving God would accept that. We try to create God in our own image. We cannot (or choose not to), with our limited understanding, accept certain principles that have been revealed.
We have two choices. We can continue faithful and accept that the principles are true and eternal, or we can give God an ultimatum that if he does not change the principle, the situation, the commandment, or whatever the case may be, we will leave him and his church. Put that way, the choice is clear, but when we are emotionally invested in the outcome, our ability to see the situation logically sometimes gets cloudy.
In my experience, it never works to try to punish God or his church. As Cecil B. DeMille once observed, "We cannot break the Ten Commandments, we can only break ourselves against them." The only process that works is to continue faithful and wait for the day that it becomes clear to us. That day does come, eventually. Why?
We know without any doubt that God's understanding is infinite, thus obviously superior to our own, so we trust in his wisdom and keep his counsel. We know that God's power is infinite, but functions within universal laws which he cannot break because, if he did, the universe would be chaos. Therefore, he can accomplish with his power what our puny arm is incapable of accomplishing. Finally, we know his love is infinite and superior to our own. Because he loves us he cannot excuse our kicking against the pricks and our violations of his laws and commandments, but will give to us what we deserve. We will deserve what we truly seek. When we come to the realization that what we seek is damning us, his love, power and understanding are available to change our hearts.
Where is Christ in all this? It is by his grace (enabling power) that we can approach the Father and receive the miracle of forgiveness. I am reading a book written by Neal A. Maxwell when he served as a member of the First Quorum of Seventy - well before he became an apostle. It is one of the books that came from my father's library. It is entitled Things as They Really Are. In it he talks of the reality of the purpose of life, the reality of a living God, the reality of a living church, a living prophet, living scriptures and things as they really will be. It is typical of Elder Maxwell's writings; short, filled with brief metaphors, but direct. In the chapter on The Reality of the Living God he makes the point these sections we have been looking at in the D & C are making.
In this chapter he makes the point that it may be "nettling" to be reminded that our work is unfinished and that we yet have remaining possibilities, responsibilities and things that must be done or undone. "But, could we honestly worship the living God or care much about membership in the living Church if it all were not really so?" He goes on to describe the various levels of acceptance of God. There are those who are angry with God for not existing (he does not respond as a butler when they call), those who are angry because he does exist (that bothersome conscience thing), those who accept his existence, "but smugly do not choose to take him seriously."
Then there are "others [who] believe their morals are superior to God's. Because he does not adopt their issues or jump the hurdles they wish him to jump, they are not going to extend themselves in worship of him. The Lord describes such individuals as 'walking in darkness at noon-day.' (D&C 95:6) The living God will not be disregarded."
He then states that a "passive life force" (a God who is like a book on a shelf - there when you need him, but otherwise unnecessary) or "an indulgent grandfather God" (one who will change to match our superior morality) wouldn't worry about our life's challenges. "As long as we are being basically good boys and girls who might find some good to do in Tarshish [where Jonah tried to flee in order to change his mission to one he favored over Nineveh]. But we have a precise and loving Father in heaven who knows what we need and who loves us enough to get us to Nineveh instead of settling for the chores of Tarshish.
"We keep forgetting that a test must really be a test, and a trial a trial... It is a measure of both the love of a living God and his perfect awareness of our needs. In our hearts we often know this even if we resent it!"
What of those who never choose to change their damning course; who place their morality before God's; who leave his living church, scriptures, worship and Christ's grace? We also cannot assume we know their hearts, their conscience or their disabilities. We must only assume that a living God knows them deeply and completely. They will receive what they have chosen and that with which they will be comfortable. We weep for them, we grieve for them, but in the end, we must never cease loving them and trusting in a God whose infinite power will change them if they choose to come unto him. Life tends to last a long time; longer than time, to be exact. Much can happen that we cannot even predict. We are patient and loving with them, but we do not accept evil and call it good. We stay on a plane from which we can pull another up and not descend to a plane below where we should be.
The last verse of Section 11 states: "[A]s many as receive me, to them will I give power to become the sons of God, even to them that believe on my name." That is why we seek to know his will for us every day of our lives. That is why we conform to his will despite our desires to avoid the challenges of Nineveh and just stay comfortable in Tarshish. The result is always that we become better than we thought we could in every aspect of our lives.
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