I have spent the last week reading through the first four books of the New Testament, trying to comprehend the life of Jesus Christ. I say trying because who he was and what he said and did transcends everything else I have ever studied and read. Throughout his life, he went about doing good. And he went about doing good all the time, even at the most inconvenient times. That is the thing that stuck out most to me this time as I read about his mortal life. Everywhere he went, people followed him, sought him out. No matter where he was, someone, usually crowds of someones were trying to find him, because they were sick and hoping for a miracle or because they wanted to hear him say something wrong so that they could condemn him as a fake or simply because they were curious. And no matter what he was doing, he let them come. He let them come, and he healed them. Again and again and again and again. It happens over and over and over again throughout the gospels and really everywhere else in scripture. He spent his entire life lifting and healing and helping--doing physically and spiritually for others what they could not do for themselves. All this, before he entered the garden or was nailed to a cross or left the tomb, which were the experiences that gave him the power to understand and help everyone who has ever lived or will yet live rise above and heal from their sins, sorrows, mistakes, ignorance, and pain. He was this way before He even experienced mortality. The Old Testament and Book of Mormon testify and show a Christ who exhibited these characteristics before he was born as a baby on this earth. (See Moses 1,
Moses 7:43-69,
Moroni 9:25-26,
Alma 8:14-15,
2 Nephi 10:23-25,
2 Nephi 4,
Alma 36,
"Sunday Will Come") He is eternally good. He is the Only Begotten of Heavenly Father, of a God that is equated with love.
How can a God of love allow such monstrosities, such devastation, such misery to happen to His own children? Reason will not allow it. I agree. Unless He can make everything right in the end. And I believe He can. For me, the best example of this is given, the one that helps me see more clearly is actually just a few
short verses in the Gospel of Luke. The soldiers come to take Jesus to be tried and in desperation, Peter takes a sword and cuts off the ear of one of the servants of the high priest. How does Jesus respond? He reaches out and heals the man's ear.
Why do these verses matter? They matter to me because they show on a small scale what the power of Jesus Christ can do on a large scale. I assume Peter was scared and he didn't know what to do and he certainly didn't want them to take Jesus away. So he commits violence against someone who may have been innocent--who may have only been acting on someone else's orders. The thing that is amazing to me about this story is the effect of healing that ear. The man whose ear had just been severed must have been in intense physical pain--and he probably wasn't feeling much love toward Peter. But suddenly, Jesus Christ touches him, and his ear is healed. He is physically whole again. It is quite literally as if the ear had never been chopped off. Can you imagine? And then any anger towards Peter is now transformed into awe at the miracle--awe at the man who just did what no one else could have done.
I believe that the Savior of the world has that power and that He can heal us physically, emotionally, mentally, and spiritually--and He heals in a way that makes people new and whole, that takes away anger and bitterness and turns it into reverence and love. I have felt that happen at times in my own life when I have turned to Him; and it changes me. It doesn't make sense. And yet, it really does.
Love is the essence of the gospel.
