The best lessons of life are the hard ones.  We’d like to avoid them entirely, but they’re one of the most basic reasons we’re here.  The Lord told Joseph Smith to “be patient in afflictions, for thou shalt have many.”  (D&C 24:8).  Paul, recognizing the value of trials said that he gloried in tribulations.  (Romans 5:3).  Lehi told his son, Jacob, that the Lord would consecrate his afflictions for his gain.  (2 Ne. 2:2).  To Lehi’s statement I add “if we resist the urge to complain.”

We really do need to lower the decibels of our complaining.  Our trials have a purpose, are for our good, and are central to God’s plan for each of us.  “…All these things shall give thee experience, and shall be for thy good.”  (D&C 122:7).

Elder John B. Dickson, of the Seventy, told of being diagnosed with bone cancer after receiving his mission call as a young man.  The cancer was expected to kill him.  A priesthood blessing, however, promised him that he would fulfill his mission, marry, and have children.  An operation was performed to remove the diseased arm, and he went on to fill his mission and live his life.  In general conference he made this very interesting statement:

“…I want you to know that having one arm for nearly thirty years has been one of the greatest blessings of my life.”  (The Ensign, November 1992, pg. 45).

In 1991, over a four-day period, I went from being robust and healthy to being incapacitated and in great pain.  I basically lost the ability to walk.  I was diagnosed with rheumatoid arthritis.  Recovery took six months.

When my leg joints suddenly swelled, and a high fever set in, Margie put me in the car to take me to the doctor.  The missionaries who were serving in our ward arrived just then.  I asked them to give me a priesthood blessing.  It was the first blessing that Elder Michael Redd had ever given.

In the blessing Elder Redd told me that I would get well, but indicated that it would take some time.  He stated that I wouldn’t understand the reason for the affliction right away, but that over time I’d come to see the purpose behind it.  I was told, too, that this would prove to be a blessing to my family.

It was a warm, fall day, but I was freezing in the doctor’s office.  I requested a blanket.  There were no blankets in the office, but the nurse remembered one in the trunk of her car.  That blanket from her warm car trunk felt really good, but wasn’t enough to stem the extreme cold I was feeling from my fever.

The doctor said to Margie, “This is a very sick boy,” and directed her to take me to the hospital.  I spent three days there hooked up to intravenous antibiotics while they tried to figure out what was wrong.

Recovery seemed to take forever.  Back at home all I could do was to lie on the couch.  I couldn’t even take advantage of my down time to read and write because I didn’t feel good enough.  I had no energy.  It was all I could do to get myself up on my feet and shuffle to the bathroom.

After several weeks I felt better, but I still couldn’t walk.  I watched the action of people’s legs as they walked across the living room, and marveled that they could do that without thinking.  I tried to duplicate their motions, but my legs were just dead sticks that refused to behave like legs should.

I thought that if I could just get out and exercise, maybe the stiffness would go away.  I hobbled out onto the porch to go for a walk.  It was necessary for me to step three inches down from the porch to the sidewalk.  That was an insurmountable obstacle.  I couldn’t do it.  Tears came to my eyes, and I turned around and went back to my couch.

Walking and hiking have always been a great source of pleasure to me.  Through junior high and high school I’d get off the bus at the end of the day, change clothes, and head for the mountain.  I knew every nook and cranny up in the woods.  If I ever had my choice of riding or walking to a destination, I chose walking every time.  My legs took me everywhere.

Lying there on my couch, I uncovered my legs and looked at them.  Both knees and the right ankle were swollen.  The legs were thin and without muscle—just skin and bone.

Tears came to my eyes again.

As recovery progressed, my 81-year old father paid me a visit.  His gait was a mere shuffle like my own.  I could then negotiate the 3-inch step down from the porch to the sidewalk, so I challenged him to a footrace out in the yard.  He beat me.  We laughed, but inwardly I cried.

Matt took over the farm.  He was in high school, but he was a whirlwind of activity.  He got things done that I wouldn’t have accomplished if I’d been up and around.  He learned a great deal.  My affliction was a blessing for him.

I couldn’t take care of my cattle, so I had to sell them.  I’d spent many years building up the finest bunch of cows in the valley.  I loved them.  It hurt to sell them.  But I sold them at a high price.  That was a blessing.  The price of cattle went down after that, and stayed low for several years.  Had I kept raising cattle, we’d have gone behind financially.

After six months of recovery I was nearly normal again.  I quit taking Indomethecin for inflammation, and was finally able to get along without it.

We lived off the sale of our assets for several years.

Nathan was graduating from college and wanted to open a cabinet shop in Haines.  We bought a building, and went into business together.  Eventually Nathan moved on to other things, but not until Treeline Woodworking had introduced him to his future wife.  That was perhaps the biggest blessing of all.

I’m still there, and Treeline Woodworking is supplying a living for us.  That is a blessing, too.  Treeline Woodworking wouldn’t exist had I not had rheumatoid arthritis.

That was a difficult time for me—one of the three hardest of my life.  My point in telling the story is that like Elder Dickson, I am now able to say that having rheumatoid arthritis was one of the best things that ever happened to me.

My theory about afflictions is that they are designed to become blessings if we handle them properly.

“He shall consecrate thine afflictions for thy gain,
If we resist the urge to complain.”
(Lehi and James)

I received a burst of inspiration once when, as a bishop, I was on my way to the meetinghouse to meet with and counsel a member who had a big problem.  I don’t remember the person or the problem, but I can show you the exact spot I was in when the revelation came.

I was puzzling and praying over what on earth I could say to this person to help him or her.  A two-part picture appeared in my mind.

The picture was of an emaciated cow standing on a barren hillside.  There had obviously been a severe drought.  There was no greenery anywhere.  The cow was thin and starving.  Times were hard; and what was worse was the terrible storm beating down on the beleaguered bovine.  The cow was hunched up with her tail to the wind as a hard rain drenched her.  She felt like the end of the world had come.

The other part of the picture showed the same cow on the same hillside grazing a lush crop of grass.  She was sleek and fat and contented, except that her tail was busy swatting flies.  The flies were a reminder that irritations will always be with us.

What the cow couldn’t see while she was hunched up against the storm was that her affliction would turn into the blessing she’d been hoping for.  As the rain poured down, all she could think of was her compounded misery.  She couldn’t envision the green grass that the rains would bring.

Life is like that.

I have wished many, many times that I was a painter so that I could hang that picture on my wall.  Its title would be:  “He will consecrate thine afflictions for thy gain.”