https://speeches.byu.edu/talks/cheryl-brown/small-things-proceedeth-great/
I am thankful for Section 59 of the Doctrine and Covenants about the Sabbath Day, and Fasting, and Joy. I studied it because it was referenced in this article, and I LOVE it. I also LOVE the story about Parley P. Pratt......
A few years back I had a very bright former student who was struggling with her testimony. She somehow felt that she had never received an overwhelming answer to her prayers about the Church. As I talked with her, trying to help her, she said something that has struck me over and over since then with its simplicity and truth. She said something like, “Yes, there are many logical reasons to think that the Church is good, but eventually everyone who believes it is true does it on faith; he or she has to choose to believe.”
What she said is true; sooner or later everyone has to choose to believe or not. We have to choose to recognize the sweetness of the Spirit that comes when we think about the Church being true. We have to acknowledge, when we pray and ask the Lord if the Church and the Book of Mormon are true, that the thought that we already know that they are comes from the Being who knows our thoughts. We have to admit that, indeed, we do know they are true.
But the decision to believe does not have to be done without plenty of evidence either. After my former student said what she did, I examined my life to see why I believed. I found numberless occasions of real joy and happiness associated with following the teachings of the Church. I realized that, even if I had not had a great confirmation of peace from the Spirit about the truthfulness of the Church, I would still choose to believe and follow simply because it makes me happy. I also recognized that I had never met anyone who had derived real happiness and peace out of wrong choices. I had known several who had tried, many of whom had claimed to be happy. Several of them had later confessed in tears—as they dealt with the consequences of their choices—that they had lied in their claims, that they had been fooled by the father of lies himself. I know that the decision to believe in the Church and the gospel is a small thing out of which great things proceed and that the choice or choices not to believe bring sorrow.
But I think there is more than just the decision to believe in the Church and the gospel that we must make if great things are to proceed. We must also choose to trust what the Lord says and understand that it applies to us. I had an experience growing up that I have recounted in other places and that I am going to repeat here because it illustrates what I am trying to say.
About as soon as I learned to read, I remember encountering on the bedroom door of my brother, who was about ten years older than I, a sign that read, “Keep out! This means you.” I remember that I found the sign puzzling. Who could my brother possibly be trying to keep out of his bedroom? The bedroom was in the farthest corner of the basement, and none of the neighbor kids ever seemed to go down there. I could not think, as I went in and out of my brother’s bedroom whenever I pleased, who he could possibly mean. It wasn’t until many years later, when I myself was in my teens and saw the sign again, that it suddenly dawned on me for whom it was intended. The sign had done absolutely no good in my case because I did not realize that it was intended precisely for me.
Many of us are like that with the teachings of the gospel. We know the gospel is true, but we don’t think individual teachings apply directly to us or our circumstances. For example, we don’t trust that the Lord will “open [us] the windows of heaven, and pour [us] out a blessing, that there shall not be room enough to receive it,” and that he “will rebuke the devourer for [our] sakes” (Malachi 3:10–11) if we honestly pay our tithing. We think that promise is for people who are not having financial troubles as we are.
Or we don’t believe that honestly keeping the Sabbath has anything to do with things that “please the eye,” “gladden the heart,” “strengthen the body,” and “enliven the soul” (see D&C 59:18–19)—and, yet, these things are promised along with the ability to keep ourselves “unspotted from the world” (see D&C 59:9). We think that keeping the Sabbath applies only for the length of the three-hour meeting block or to people who don’t have as much to do as we do. We don’t choose to take the Lord at his word.
I love the story that Parley P. Pratt tells in his autobiography of how he took the Lord at his word. Parley went through the Bible picking out all of the blessings that the Lord had promised to those who followed him. Parley wrote the blessings, each on a piece of paper, put them in a box, and carried them with him, calling them his “treasure,” because he counted the blessings the same as already given. He was absolutely sure they would follow. Parley did this before he heard of the Restoration. Later, he trusted the blessings that the Restoration offered and chose to be baptized and to follow—a small decision that was the key to big blessings for him. The decision to believe the gospel and to trust the word of the Lord in all things is a small thing for us, but it, too, will be the key to big blessings for us.
Another small thing, another particular decision to trust the Lord, that I would like to talk about is the
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