Today’s Talk: Worthy of Our Promised Blessings
What will it matter … what we suffered here if, in the end, those trials are the very things which qualify us for eternal life?
Happy Easter, dear sisters! Worthiness is a rather weighty topic for Easter, but I think it’s important nonetheless because I know that on a bright and beautiful day such as our Savior’s resurrection, there are so many who feel they will never feel close to Him or Heavenly Father despite following them faithfully.
When I was baptized, I knew my sins were washed away and I could start anew, but I still felt unworthy of the blessings and promises I had learned about and chosen to believe in. I didn’t suffer from unconfessed sins, but from shame. The shame that comes from holding onto a hurt so deep and buried that you can’t fully articulate or understand it, but it hurts you constantly nevertheless. I suffered from shame because one night long before my baptism, someone took away my ability to choose. They made a hurtful, painful, awful choice that left me feeling broken and hopeless.
It’s a nasty trick the adversary plays – convincing people that something that happened to them holds so much power over their life. I sat in silence in church meetings, always feeling less worthy than my brothers and sisters. Paralyzed by a decision I hadn’t even made. I felt like my communication with Heavenly Father was lacking, as if he was thinking: it’s lovely she’s reaching out but it’s a bit hard to hear her over the din of her past. I made great friends and dated a wonderful boy, but I still felt I couldn’t tell a soul about an experience that wouldn’t leave me alone.
I constantly wondered if someone found out, would this carefully built fortress of faith and belief I was living in tumble down? Sister Reeves quotes a talk by President Packer, where he says,
There are so many of us who are thrashing around … not knowing quite how to escape. You escape by accepting the Atonement of Christ, and all that was heartache can turn to beauty and love and eternity.
I kept praying and reading my scriptures, but often felt even more empty when I would read a scripture or a talk that would remind me of my lingering imperfection and shame. In fact, I chose this talk because this is a talk that would have sparked those memories and feelings of shame for me previously, but not anymore.
The Savior carried me through those early years of being a member. While I felt so irreparably damaged, the Spirit filled me with the strength to keep going – especially on days it felt like no matter what I did, it would never be enough to cover up the big red mark I thought was on my file with the man upstairs. The Spirit also filled me with an understanding of the truth. The truth that sometimes, people will hurt us and break us down and sometimes, it’s not any fault of our own. While we suffer the shame and indignity of their choices, we don’t have to suffer alone and we don’t have to suffer forever.
This wasn’t a quick process for me. I felt like damaged goods for several years in the Church until one night I finally felt the power of the Atonement fully. I cried for hours after years of not being able to cry at all. Tears of joy for all the feelings I could now feel that I hadn’t for so long. Tears of heartbreak for the time I had spent feeling so unworthy of God’s love.
I was able to tell my boyfriend (now husband) of the darkest hour of my life after spending nearly five years reliving it daily and nothing I feared happened. He didn’t leave me or judge me or view me as flawed. He accepted me and loved me – just as the Savior does for each of us. Amazingly, once I told him, the feelings that had haunted me stopped. The shame the adversary had tried to use to limit my willingness to pray or feel the love of Heavenly Father went away. I wasn’t haunted by the darkness I had felt any longer.
I do not know why we have the many trials that we have, but it is my personal feeling that the reward is so great, so eternal and everlasting, so joyful and beyond our understanding that in that day of reward, we may feel to say to our merciful, loving Father, “Was that all that was required?”
I pray in the future I’ll be able to do more to help those who have felt similar shame in their life, whatever the cause. I know that the Savior has suffered the pain of all our afflictions and that through him, with lots of patience, we can feel the fullness of God’s love for us. I hope this Easter, if you are filled with feelings of shame and hurt, you will continue to give those feelings to Heavenly Father so that you may feel worthy of all the beautiful blessings He has promised for you.
The decisions other people have made for you do not define you or limit your ability to partake in the sweet blessings of the Atonement. There is perfect hope for the future. I pray that you’ll be able to eventually release the shame you’ve carried and know that you are worthy and precious to our Father in Heaven and that the Savior died and was resurrected for you.
I’m a newlywed, a convert, and a Michigan girl. My husband and I live in a little studio apartment and love to go on adventures. I have some pretty pieces of paper on my wall that say I’m not too shabby at communications and economics. I really love hockey, books, 2 Nephi 2:25, sunsets, and anything pink.
This is so needed by so many women! Thanks for sharing Emily!