The Works of God Made Manifest

In 2012, Elder Ronald A. Rasband spoke about the birth of his grandchild. He related, “For the past 20 months, our family has been blessed with the privilege of having a very special baby. Little Paxton, our grandson, was born with a very rare chromosomal deletion, a genetic disorder that distinguishes him, literally, as one in hundreds of millions. For our daughter and her husband, an uncharted, life-changing journey began when Paxton was born. This experience has become a crucible for learning special lessons tied to the eternities.” He continued, “Shortly after precious Paxton was born, we knew Heavenly Father would bless us and teach us special lessons. As his father and I put our fingers on his tiny head in the first of many priesthood blessings, the words came into my mind from the ninth chapter of John: ‘That the works of God should be made manifest in him.’” Jesus spoke those words about “a man which was blind from his birth.” He taught that neither the man or his parents had sinned to cause the blindness, but that it came for a different purpose. For him the Savior worked an incredible miracle: “And said unto him, Go, wash in the pool of Siloam, (which is by interpretation, Sent.) He went his way therefore, and washed, and came seeing” (see John 9:1-7). And so, we might take from this scripture that one of the reasons some may have challenges, physical or otherwise, in this life is so that the Lord can work miracles and, when the time is right, to heal them.   

Elder Rasband, though, suggested that we might understand the Savior’s statement in a broader way. He continued, “God’s works are definitely being made manifest through Paxton. We are learning patience, faith, and gratitude through the balm of service, endless hours of intense emotions, tears of empathy, and the prayers and expressions of love for dear ones in need, especially Paxton and his parents.” These miracles were not the outside ones performed in a visible way, but the inside miracles to change hearts and develop Christlike attributes. In the most recent general conference, Elder Rasband again spoke about Paxton: “Some years ago at a general conference, I spoke of our grandson Paxton, who was born with a very rare chromosomal deletion. His parents would have carried him to the Savior when He called for all ‘afflicted in any manner’ to come that He might heal them. Paxton lived three treasured years. He could not speak, crawl, walk, or run after his brothers. But little Paxton’s hands reached out to ours and to our Savior with love and affection.” He again quoted these same words of the Savior as he spoke of Paxton: “I remember the first time Paxton’s father and I gave him a priesthood blessing that, as it says in the scriptures, ‘the works of God should be made manifest in him.’ They were. He brought immense joy to our family. Families with such a precious member know what a privilege it is to be blessed with one with special needs. Associating with Paxton, our whole family gained an increased, deep, and abiding trust in the Lord. Then God reached out and took him home.” Again, the “works of God” he mentioned were not the full physical healing that happened in the account of John, but the less tangible works of joy and increased trust in the Lord.

                Perhaps this is how we might consider all of the trials that the Lord has given us. Though trials certainly can come from sin, in many cases neither we nor our parents nor anyone else has sinned to cause the challenges. But perhaps we have them so that the works of God may be manifested. And what are those works? It may be that it is the work of helping us to develop the “divine nature” as Peter described: “Giving all diligence, add to your faith virtue; and to virtue knowledge; And to knowledge temperance; and to temperance patience; and to patience godliness; And to godliness brotherly kindness; and to brotherly kindness charity. For if these things be in you, and abound, they make you that ye shall neither be barren nor unfruitful in the knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ” (2 Peter 1:5-8). Peter also wrote that “the trial of your faith, being much more precious than of gold that perisheth, though it be tried with fire, might be found unto praise and honour and glory at the appearing of Jesus Christ” (1 Peter 1:7). That trial of our faith can indeed be precious if it helps us to develop the attributes of the divine nature, just as the challenge of taking care of little Paxton helped the Rasbands develop patience, faith, gratitude, empathy, and love. We can trust, as the Lord said to the Prophet Joseph in Liberty Jail, that through the works of God “all these things” that we go through “shall give [us] experience, and shall be for [our] good.”