Whatever trial you may be facing-be it physical health problems, mental health problems, loneliness, family issues, finances, employment, marital problems, Christ has told us “If ye will have faith in me ye shall have power to do whatsoever thing is expedient in me.” (Moroni 7:33)
When is the last time you thought about who or what your faith is actually in? And I mean stopping, and being real honest with yourself. Who or what is your faith really in?
My fiancé and I are taking the finance self-reliance class that our church offers. Each week, we have a new foundation principle to practice. The second week’s principle surprised me, it was “exercise faith in Jesus Christ”. What does faith in Jesus Christ have to do with finances or self-reliance? As I pondered on it and prayed to understand throughout the week, I received life altering clarity not only about its relation to finances and self-reliance, but regarding who and what my faith was in.
As I pondered on it, I realized that I wasn’t placing my faith in Jesus Christ, at all! Rather, my faith was in myself and my talents and that events would take place in my life that I had been waiting on for almost a year. Elder Dallin H. Oaks said, “Faith does not exist by itself. Faith requires an object. It must be faith in something or someone. For some, faith is nothing more than faith in themselves. That is only self-confidence or self-centeredness. Others have faith in faith, which is something like relying on the power of positive thinking or betting on the proposition that we can get what we want by manipulating the powers within us.”
So did I have faith? Yes. But my faith was in an event and in myself, not in Christ. That is not “true faith” as Elder Kevin W. Pearson would call it. “True faith must be centered in Jesus Christ.”
When we have faith in objects, events, other people, or even ourselves, our faith can fail us because each of those things can fail. Objects can be destroyed, events can be prolonged or not happen at all, people might not meet our expectations or follow through, and even our own grit, persistence, and hard work, still may not produce the desired outcome. Maybe this is why the first principle of the gospel isn’t “faith”, it is “faith in the Lord Jesus Christ.” True faith, faith centered in Jesus Christ, will never fail us.
Eight years ago, my roommate’s sister, Andrea, unexpectedly died in her sleep. She was in her young 30’s, had three daughters under the age of five, a beautiful marriage, was healthy and had even just ran a half marathon two weeks before. She and her family were visiting her parents in Las Vegas when she woke up in the middle of the night vomiting profusely. They rushed her to the hospital where she was soon pronounced brain dead and died the next day. She had caught meningitis. Everything Andrea and her family had known in their lives was gone. Quite literally, everything we have or life as we know it can fail us, in just one night, or even in an instant.
“There is no other thing in which we can have absolute assurance. There is no other foundation in life that can bring the same peace, joy, and hope. In uncertain and difficult times, faith is truly a spiritual gift worthy of our utmost efforts.”
In uncertain and difficult times, faith in Jesus Christ should be our foremost effort. By increasing our faith in Jesus Christ, we increase our hope (Moroni 10:20). A lack of hope can lead one to despair (Moroni 10:22) or be discouraged, which are the “very antitheses of faith.”
Discouragement (one of Elder Pearson’s “Six Destructive D’s”) “leads to lower expectations, decreased effort, weakened desire, and greater difficulty feeling and following the spirit.” From my own experience, I’ve seen this cycle play out in my own life. Faith not centered in Christ lead to loosing hope, then becoming discouraged which lead to difficulty feeling the spirit and a downward spiral which included developing mental illness. I’m not saying that mental illness is caused or fixed only by a lack of faith or having faith, but I do believe that actively centering our faith in Christ, along with other proper treatment, can help combat it.
So how do we increase faith centered in Jesus Christ in troubled times? There are many ways, but I’d like to focus on three: seeking to receive faith through prayer, consistent obedient behavior and attitudes, and trust.
Prayer
“Faith is a gift from God, and one possessed of it can receive enormous spiritual power.” If faith is a gift, how can we receive it if we don’t ask for it? I have felt the times in my life when I’ve had the “eye of faith” (Alma 5:15) and the spiritual power that it brings. We know that to Heavenly Father, and all things are first created spiritually (Moses 3:5). Receiving the gift of faith starts with prayer. When is the last time you actually prayed for faith in Jesus Christ?
Just as important as it is to pray for the gift of faith, we must act. “Learning and applying in our lives the doctrine of Christ is a prerequisite to receiving the gift of faith in Him.”
Obedience
“Faith as a principle of power comes from a consistent pattern of obedient behavior and attitudes. Personal righteousness is a choice.” If we do fall into slumps of discouragement, we can choose to keep commandments and we can choose our attitude. Even if you don’t feel like you can choose your attitude due to depression or anxiety, try to recognize negative thought patterns, and combat them with positive words until they become positive thoughts and then a positive attitude.
Remember too that just like obedience is a choice, faith and belief are a choice. “Belief and testimony and faith are not passive principles. They do not just happen to us. Belief is something we chose-we hope for it, we work for it. We will not accidentally come to believe the Savior and His gospel any more than we will accidentally pray or pay tithing. We actively choose to believe, just like we choose to keep other commandments.”In this way, faith, agency, and obedience are all interconnected. They all fuel the other. We can choose to be obedient, which increases our faith, which increases our desire to be obedient and we continue in an upward spiral (as opposed to the downward spiral mentioned earlier).
Trust
In the New Testament we read about a father asking Christ to heal his child. Jesus answered “If thou canst believe, all things are possible to him that believeth.”
“And straightway the father of the child cried out, and said with tears, Lord, I believe; help thou mine unbelief.” (Mark 9:23-24)
Elder David A. Bednar notes the paradox of the phrase “Lord, I believe, help thou mine unbelief”. In his reflection of this passage, he writes that this statement shows that the father “may have already acknowledged Christ as the Son of God…..but needed help to believe the Master’s healing power indeed could be so individual. He may have believed in Christ generally but not believed Christ specifically and personally.”Do you trust that Christ’s power can be acutely personal for you?
In our women’s Sunday church class, called Relief Society, we discussed believing Christ a few weeks ago. A sister shared the difference between believing in Christ and believing Christ. Believing in Christ is like cheering on someone who is about to walk a wheelbarrow across a tight rope 100 feet up. Believing Christ is like putting yourself in the wheelbarrow and still believing they can do it. Believing Christ is trusting Him enough to know that He knows what is best for us.
“We cannot have true faith in the Lord without also having complete trust in the Lord’s will and in the Lord’s timing. When we have that kind of faith and trust in the Lord, we have true security in our lives.“ President Kimball said, “Security is not born of inexhaustible wealth but of unquenchable faith.”
Whatever trial you may be facing-be it physical health problems, mental health problems, loneliness, family issues, finances, employment, marital problems, Christ has told us “If ye will have faith in me ye shall have power to do whatsoever thing is expedient in me.” (Moroni 7:33)
Christ showed us his perfect character- “all the attributes of love, knowledge, justice, mercy, unchangeableness, power…..to enable us to place confidence in Him without reservation.” I invite you to let go of any reservations, stop placing your faith in an event, or even yourself, and place it in Christ. As we do so, we will feel peace, joy, and hope and the “power to do whatsoever things is expedient in me.”
Ask yourself:
Where are you placing your faith?
How can you increase your faith?
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