All Your Losses

Greek Depiction of the Resurrection; I use it because I love the depiction of Christ's power

It would be great if I had something wonderful to post here about this week, but it was mostly mundane stuff and grading finals.  I'm just getting things packed up and I'm getting ready to pick my Dad up a week from Monday and then set out for home.  So that's more or less my life for the moment.

For many years, I've had a favorite quotation from Joseph Smith that has given me hope and filled me with joyful anticipation for coming days.  On April 16, 1843, Joseph Smith said, "All your losses will be made up to you in the resurrection provided you continue faithful, by the vision of the Almighty I have seen it" (Joseph Smith, April 16, 1843, Words of Joseph Smith, 196).  This beautiful quotation inspires me every single time I read it and consider its implications.  Lately though I've been considering this quotation in ways that had not been apparent to me earlier.

As with most things, it helps to put quotations into context.  When something is said often reveals the reasons why it was said and adds layers to our understanding that the words themselves do not convey. To say that Joseph Smith had been tried by death, would be a large understatement.  In his own immediate family, Joseph had endured the following deaths:

1. Ephraim Smith (brother), March 13, 1810
2. Alvin Smith (brother), November 19, 1823
3. Alvin Smith (son), June 15, 1828
4. Thaddeus Smith (son), April 30, 1831
5. Louisa Smith (daughter), April 30, 1831
6. Joseph Murdock Smith (son), March 29, 1832
7. Calvin W. Stoddard (brother-in-law), November 19, 1836
8. Jerusha Barden Smith (sister-in-law), October 13, 1837
9. Joseph Smith Sr. (father), September 14, 1840
10. Mary Bailey Smith (sister-in-law), January 1841
11. Don Carlos Smith (brother), August 7, 1841
12. Don Carlos Smith (son), August 15, 1842

Add in the deaths of grandparents, close friends, and other members of the Church, and we begin to glimpse just how much the topic of death was on the mind of Joseph Smith and why he was so interested in the promises of the Resurrection.

Joseph Smith spoke the above quotation on the occasion of the funeral of Lorenzo D. Barnes, an early member who had joined the Church in 1833.  He had been a faithful member of the Church, marching with Zion's Camp in 1834 and serving several missions.  On January 3, 1836, the Prophet blessed Barnes, saying, "Thou art a chosen vessel unto the Lord to bare the fullness of the Gospel unto the people and Nations afar off.  Be faithful and thou shalt be endowed with power from on high for the Spirit of the Highest shall rest upon Thee and thou shalt go forth from land to land from nation to nation and from Kingdom to Kingdom" (Lorenzo Dow Barnes, diary, January 3, 1836).  In 1841, while in the process of carrying out this commission to preach the gospel, Lorenzo Barnes was called to preach the gospel in England.  He faithfully went to England, spending a short time in Manchester, following which mission leaders sent him to Bradford, England.  On December 20, 1842, this faithful missionary passed away due to unknown causes.  And then in April, the Saints in Nauvoo held a funeral for him.  It was at this funeral, that Joseph Smith declared with power: "All your losses will be made up to you in the resurrection provided you continue faithful, by the vision of the Almighty I have seen it" (Joseph Smith, April 16, 1843, Words of Joseph Smith, 196).

Any death is painful.  But Lorenzo Barnes had died away from home while in the service of the Lord.  How must this loss have affected his family (little is known of Barnes's family circumstances) and friends?  Surely the pain of his loss was compounded by the fact that he had been thousands of miles away from home at the time of his death.  But it is in the case of just such deep and poignant losses that the atonement of Jesus Christ finds its greatest meaning.  It is in the promise of a day of absolute and eternal renewal and redemption that we find the hope and strength that are necessary to move forward after our losses.  And what strength we can take from the declaration that Joseph made with the power of a Seer, saying, "By the vision of the Almighty I have seen it."

Lately I have been coming to realize, however, that while the ultimate redemption of our losses will not come until the resurrection day, the reality is that God is constantly making our losses up to us all along the way.  For the here and now, He grants us compensating blessings as we struggle with our losses, not the least of which blessings, is the constant comfort of His love and the power of the Holy Ghost.  Where some blessings seem to be withheld for the present, He mercifully grants us strength and opportunities in life's other venues.  He does not ask us to valiantly hold on through unending misery until the resurrection.  No, He gives us countless opportunities for joy and ceaseless reminders of His great goodness to us, no matter which blessings we may momentarily be lacking.  In this I think he is like my Papa Haycock, who could never quite wait until Christmas to bestow gifts upon his grandchildren and then still had gifts for us at Christmas.  God is anxious to bless His children whenever and however we are willing to receive His blessings.

I thank God for the fact that "All [our] losses will be made up to [us] in the resurrection provided [we] continue faithful" (Joseph Smith, April 16, 1843, Words of Joseph Smith, 196).  I thank God that He testified of the truth of this principle by providing the Seer of the Latter days with a vision of its truth.  And I thank God that He does not wait until the end to make good on His promise to make our losses up to us if we are faithful.

Brett