Triumph in Christ

The Prophet Joseph once told his cousin George A. Smith, “Never be discouraged. If I were sunk in the lowest pit of Nova Scotia, with the Rocky Mountains piled on me, I would hang on, exercise faith, and keep up good courage, and I would come out on top.”  Surely Joseph had great cause to be discouraged throughout his life, from the deaths of multiple children to the dissenters in Kirtland to the expulsion from Missouri to his time in Liberty Jail to the conflicts in Nauvoo that led to his death.  The Lord said very early on in 1830 of Joseph, “Him have I inspired to move the cause of Zion in mighty power for good, and his diligence I know, and his prayers I have heard. Yea, his weeping for Zion I have seen” (Doctrine and Covenants 21:7-8).  That weeping of course would only escalate through the trials that followed throughout his life.  And yet he did, as he counseled his cousin, come out on top and persevere with good courage until the end.  Joseph did “endure it well” so that he did “triumph over all [his] foes” (Doctrine and Covenants 121:8).  His attitude through the trials was this: “ It all has become a second nature to me; and I feel, like Paul, to glory in tribulation; for to this day has the God of my fathers delivered me out of them all, and will deliver me from henceforth; for behold, and lo, I shall triumph over all my enemies, for the Lord God hath spoken it” (Doctrine and Covenants 127:2). 

                Other scriptures also speak of the triumph we can have in the gospel.  Paul wrote to the Corinthians, “Now thanks be unto God, which always causeth us to triumph in Christ, and maketh manifest the savour of his knowledge by us in every place” (2 Corinthians 2:14).  It is only in Christ that we can truly triumph.  Paul, like Joseph, faced countless trials and yet remained true, being able to say at the end of his life, “I have fought a good fight, I have finished my course, I have kept the faith” (2 Timothy 4:7).  Another scriptural figure who triumphed despite great difficulty and wickedness around him was Moroni.  His father had encouraged him, “And now, my beloved son, notwithstanding their hardness, let us labor diligently; … for we have a labor to perform whilst in this tabernacle of clay, that we may conquer the enemy of all righteousness, and rest our souls in the kingdom of God” (Moroni 9:6).  And conquer he did, successfully safeguarding the sacred records for decades as he wandered alone.  In the very last verse of the Book of Mormon he left his witness that he had indeed triumphed: “I soon go to rest in the paradise of God, until my spirit and body shall again reunite, and I am brought forth triumphant through the air, to meet you before the pleasing bar of the great Jehovah” (Moroni 10:34).  This is the only use of the word triumph or triumphant in the Book of Mormon, and it comes as the final message to us: we can indeed triumph over the challenges of this life if we, like Moroni, come unto Christ and are perfected in him.  His grace is indeed sufficient to pull us out from under the Rocky Mountains if we will, as Joseph said, keep up good courage and hang on.