My Hands are Yours

This week I read Alan Paton’s powerful novel Cry, the Beloved Country. I’ve seen the movie numerous times when I would show it in my contemporary world literature class, but I had never read the book before.

The setting is 1946 apartheid South Africa. It is the story of two fathers: the black Anglican priest Stephen Kumalo and the white landowner James Jarvis. These two fathers struggle to understand their own sons whose lives have been tragically connected. It’s about two good, good fathers who love their sons, who suffer for the pains of fatherhood, and who find continued redemption through their sons.

I don’t want to reveal the plot, but rarely have fictional characters become so real and alive as Kumalo, Jarvis, and the other priest Theophilius Msimangu. Some critics have claimed that Cry, the Beloved County is every much a Christian allegory of suffering and redemption as Pilgrim’s Progress or as Dante’s Inferno. Just reading that book gives me renewed hope in others, in myself, and especially in the Savior and His cleansing and healing Atonement.

These families that Alan Paton creates are in sharp contrast to James Goldman’s family in The Lion in Winter. This is a play about King Henry II and his wife Queen Eleanor of Aquitaine. It’s Christmas in 1183 England. It’s the one time of the year that King Henry allows Eleanor out of her imprisoned exile to be with their three sons, John, Geoffrey, and Richard. All three sons are vying and conniving and deceiving with their parents to inherit the kingdom at the expense of their brothers. It is a play of hatred, anger, deceit, and power.

Whereas, Cry the Beloved Country is only about love, forgiveness, sacrifice, and peace through suffering. A phrase that Msimangu speaks to Kumalo as they begin their journey to seek the lost son Absalom is, “My hands are yours.” This becomes an extended metaphor that by offering our own selves to others in service and love will we find what we’re searching for, including peace.

Also, repeated numerous times in the novel are the greetings, “Go well, stay well.”

So this week, may you go well and stay well.

Made to Prosper

I’ve never done much with the Pearl of Great Price, except for the last few weeks. It started when Elder Bednar came to stake conference and in a brief passing comment said we should study carefully Moses 6-7. So I did and was amazed at its fullness. I’ve also been reading Genesis and Exodus because I want to learn more about Adam and Eve; Abraham, Sarah and Hagar; Isaac and Rebekah; Jacob, Leah, Rachel, Bilhah, and Zilpah; Joseph and Asenath; and Moses and Zipporah. So because of those readings, I’ve gone to the books of Moses and Abraham.

Of course, the Book of Mormon is my favorite, but I’m discovering the strength and power of these ancient prophets. Yesterday while I was looking for another book in the library, I stumbled on Hugh Nibley’s Enoch the Prophet. I’ve checked it out and look forward to reading.

Last night I finished reading Marilynne Robinson’s Pulitzer prize winning Gilead. I mentioned it a couple weeks ago when I was reading its sequel Home. The two novels parallel each other told from the two points of view of two aged ministers. In Gilead, the 73-year-old Reverend John Ames is writing a journal to his young 7-year-old son, so his son will remember him after what will soon be this good man’s death. It’s also the story of Reverend Ames’ forgiveness of John Ames Boughton, his best friend’s wayward son.

In one of the most touching scenes in all of the literature I’ve read, Reverend Ames sits on a bus stop bench to bless the troubled but good John Ames Boughton—his simple prayer: “The Lord make His face to shine upon thee and be gracious unto thee: The Lord lift up His countenance upon thee, and give thee peace. . . . Lord, bless John Ames Boughton, this beloved son and brother and husband and father.”

The 40+-year-old prodigal John Boughton has suffered so very much in his life, yet he always seems to fall far short. The aged Reverend Ames has learned over the years the power of the Savior’s Atonement. He explains that the Greek word sozo, which is usually translated “saved,” and also mean “healed” and “restored.” In Gilead, there is sense of being saved, and healed, and restored.

While reading about ancient Joseph this week, I was encouraged by the repeated statement: “Because the Lord was with [Joseph], and that which he did, the Lord made it to prosper” (Genesis 39:23).

So,we all need to be saved, healed, and restored. And that is only possible through the Savior’s atonement. And we are also given the same promise as Joseph’s: with Heavenly Father’s and the Savior’s love and help, our attempts will be made to prosper.

May we prosper this week.

General Prophets

I have recently read Milton’s Paradise Lost. I have never read the entire poem, only excerpts from my undergraduate years with Professor Waterstradt. I remember sensing the poem’s significance, but I’ve been so intimidated by it for all these years that I’ve not touched it since.

However, I’m grateful for this recent reading. It is a difficult read, but it is worth the effort. I read it in preparation for a class I’m teaching this fall on Creating Peace, and I wanted to use parts of Paradise Lost and Paradise Regained. So now I’m trying to determine what passages and what approaches to make this selection meaningful and workable in class.

Initially, when I thought about it, I would consider Satan’s dialogues which are very captivating and memorable, and I have suddenly realized that Satan’s intrigue is one of his tools. Satan can easily be seen as the hero or protagonist of Paradise Lost because of the focus he demands. However, the protagonists are Adam and Eve and their creation, fall, and redemption. It’s because of their actions, because of their faith, because of their submission to God that makes them the epic heroes with qualities for us to emulate.

What I’ve learned from Paradise Lost is that every mature person has lost paradise within. Everyone confronts temptation and choice; everyone falls, or loses innocence. Many also experience some kind of regeneration, through the Savior, through love for others, through families, and through service. Paradise Lost deepens our understanding of relationships between parent and child, husband and wife, individual and God. Through this poem I realize that as a father who watches his sons struggle, grow, assume responsibility, and make their own decisions, that at times they will fall, but that through the Savior’s love and Father’s great plan, all will work out for our good.

This poem is also powerful in its depiction of war, or eternal wars. The war is Satan against God and His plan, and Satan wants us to be the casualties—he’ll use every subtle and brazen tactic to destroy us. But as Paradise Lost shows us, God provides teachers, prophets, angels, and families to strengthen and heal us. The War in Heaven still continues in full force. But it wasn’t until just this morning I realized the real and symbolic image that reminds us of this battle and of our promise to succeed and win. That image is the Angel Moroni who stands atop nearly all the temples of the world. Moroni is both a prophet and a general who leads spiritual and temporal war against Satan. At times it may appear that Satan has won, but that glorious angel blowing his trumpet above the temples powerfully announces to the world that God the Father and His Son Jesus Christ are our leaders, and if we turn to Them, we will be successful and blessed and protected in this great war that will end at the Son’s Coming to usher in peace and righteousness.

Wandering Sons

This week I read Marilynne Robinson’s Home. Home is a companion novel to her 2004 Pulitzer Prize winning novel Gilead. These novels are about two aging ministers during the 1950s in the small town of Gilead, Iowa. These two best friends are ministers in different churches. Reverend John Ames of Gilead is the minister of the Congregationalists while Reverend Robert Boughton is the Presbyterian minister. These are two men of faith, good men who are also fathers. Reverend Ames lost his wife and child early in life, and after all these years, he has married late in life and has a new, young son. Gilead is about what Ames wants his young son to learn about him in the short time they have together.

Home, on the other hand, is about the end of the widowed Reverend Boughton’s life whose caregiver is his 38 year-old daughter Glory. Boughton’s alcoholic prodigal son Jack returns home after a twenty-year absence—no word from him for twenty years. This novel is a poignant, tender, powerful novel of a father and son who desperately try to reconcile and find peace. This is a novel of healing, but it does contain so much pain. There were several times while reading that my heart ached and eyes teared for either the father or for the son.

I assume much of my connection with this novel is my own good relationship with my sons. I’ve been very blessed to be aware of my sons’ own individual struggles and their often feelings of inadequacies and self-assumed not measuring up to some self-imposed standards. They often feel they fall short. I’m also blessed as a teacher to know other fathers’ sons who feel they don’t measure up and are sometimes disappointments to themselves.

The Parable of the Prodigal Son has always been meaningful to me. I’m always so touched by the warm, welcoming, tight hug the father gives his son as he sees the return. I imagine the father running to his uncertain son to hold him, to heal him, to love him.

This week I’ve also read Milton’s Paradise Lost, and saw again the prodigal son in the Father’s relationship with Adam who is good, who does want to be obedient, yet he fails to measure up and falls. And of course, there is the extreme prodigal son of Lucifer who willfully, angrily, demonically leaves his Father’s home. Lucifer will never return to his Father. But some of the most powerful passages of Paradise Lost is when the Father, His Son Jesus Christ, or angels explain to Adam how he can return to Father through the Atonement of Christ. Father pleads for Adam’s return.

Even the great Nephi in his lament cries, “O wretched man that I am! Yea, my heart sorroweth because of my flesh; my soul grieveth because of mine iniquities” (2 Nephi 4:17). However, Nephi soon turns to Heaven for help: “Nevertheless, I know in whom I have trusted. My God hath been my support; he hath led me through mine afflictions in the wilderness” (2 Nephi 4:17, 20).

Soif there is ever a time when we feel we don’t measure up or that we feel we’re a wandering son, know that there are those who know we do measure up, who are grateful for our goodness and our strength, and who are confident we’re heading in the right direction to return Home.

Revelation and Sarah

This week has been testimony strengthening. It hasn’t been anything spectacular but just simple, quiet, and reaffirming.

Our stake was reorganized this week, and Elder David A. Bednar accompanied a member of the Quorum of Seventy. Since the Bednars were in our ward and in our stake, it was a very comfortable, almost intimate experience for me. There’s something about being in his and Sister Bednar’s presence when they bear their testimonies and share their experiences.

And on Sunday, he answered the question, “How do you know if you’re receiving revelation or if you’re just responding to your personal feelings?” His response was, “It doesn’t matter. Just be a good boy or a good girl, keep the commandments and your covenants, do your best, and in time you will receive a witness that you’re doing what your Heavenly Father wants you to do.” He said that he has learned as an apostle that the process for him to receive revelation is the same as it was for him before and as it is for everyone else. The witness or revelation doesn’t come until after we’ve acted on our faith in the Lord. He shared a few experiences, including this last conference talk he gave about safety through the temple. He had another talk prepared and submitted, until two days before the translation deadline. He woke up feeling uncomfortable with that talk for this time. He knew he had to prepare another talk, but all he could think about was a scripture that came to his mind during the Rexburg temple dedication: “that thy servants may go forth from this house armed with thy power, and that thy name may be upon them” (D&C 109:22).

He didn’t know why that scripture or what his talk was going to be—he just acted on the prompting and began to study and prepare, and he submitted his talk. He simply acted on a feeling; he didn’t hear a voice telling him to change his talk, he didn’t get direction on the topic, he didn’t have the talk dictated to him, he didn’t wake up to find the talk written out for him, and even when he prepared the talk, he didn’t know why he was to change his original topic. It wasn’t until after he followed Elder Oaks’ talk of service, covenants, and temples and until after Elder Gary Stevenson followed him with his talk on “Sacred Homes, Sacred Temples” that Elder Bednar knew why he had received that feeling that he should change his talk—his talk was to fit between these other two.

This week I read Orson Scott Card’s Sarah, the story of Abraham’s wife Sarah. She is such a perfect example of an individual who kept her covenants and her faith with a life-time of praying for a child. Of course she felt discouraged, hurt, and at times abandoned. She didn’t understand why her prayers weren’t answered the way she wanted them answered. Yet she remained faithful and true. However, Heavenly Father had another plan, and she was very much an important part of that plan, and He heard her prayers and answered them with Isaac in His own due time.

And also this week, I finished George Q. Cannon’s The Life of Joseph Smith the Prophet. We're so blessed to live in a time of prophets, seers, and revelators. I know our prayers and heard and answered, that our Heavenly Father is aware of us—both our goodness and our struggles. Stay close to Him, and we will feel His presence when we need it most. He loves us.