Come, Lord Jesus, Come

I recently finished reading the book A Long Way Gone: Memoirs of a Boy Soldier, an account by Ishmael Beah about his horrific experiences being forced to become a boy soldier in Sierra Leone during the terrible Civil War there in the 1990s.  I was shocked to read of how he and so many other boys were hooked on drugs and forced into becoming soldiers, brainwashed and led to commit atrocious acts of violence.  After months of being a hypnotized soldier, Beah was rescued by an international organization and underwent months of treatment to help him get off the drugs and turn back into a normal human being.  He was later placed to live with an uncle (his parents and immediate family had all been killed), but then that city was attacked by rebels, his uncle died, and he was forced to flee alone into Guinea.  Eventually he was able to make it to the United States and began a new life there where he later would write his memoirs. Reading of such unspeakable suffering and violence and inhumanity, with no value placed on human life and forcing children to commit the most heinous of crimes, brings to mind the vision of Enoch: “And he beheld Satan; and he had a great chain in his hand, and it veiled the whole face of the earth with darkness; and he looked up and laughed, and his angels rejoiced” (Moses 7:26).  Surely such atrocities in our day are a part of that great chain that Satan holds over so many on the earth. 

             It is no wonder, then, that in the face of such wickedness and hatred on earth, that God weeps over the misuse of the agency He has given us.  We read in Moses’s account, “The God of heaven looked upon the residue of the people, and he wept….  The Lord said unto Enoch: Behold these thy brethren; they are the workmanship of mine own hands, and I gave unto them their knowledge, in the day I created them; and in the Garden of Eden, gave I unto man his agency; And unto thy brethren have I said, and also given commandment, that they should love one another, and that they should choose me, their Father; but behold, they are without affection, and they hate their own blood…. The whole heavens shall weep over them, even all the workmanship of mine hands; wherefore should not the heavens weep, seeing these shall suffer?” (Moses 7:32-33, 37).  This was in reference to the wickedness among the children of men shortly before the flood, but surely He weeps just as much today.  In that day He cleansed the world by water; in ours He is preparing to again cleanse it but this time with fire.  Because of the great iniquity and bloodshed and hatred among men in our day, “The wrath of God shall be poured out upon the wicked without measure—Unto the day when the Lord shall come to recompense unto every man according to his work, and measure to every man according to the measure which he has measured to his fellow man” (Doctrine and Covenants 1:9-10).  Though the suffering and cruelty sometimes appears to go unrequited in our day, the Lord who notices even the fall of the sparrow is aware of all that takes place upon the earth, and all must come before His bar of judgment at some future date and be recompensed for their actions. “For verily the voice of the Lord is unto all men, and there is none to escape; and there is no eye that shall not see, neither ear that shall not hear, neither heart that shall not be penetrated” (Doctrine and Covenants 1:2).  With the calamities we know are coming, our only safety is in Zion, in keeping the commandments of the Lord with all our hearts and following the Lord’s direction through His prophets and His Holy Spirit. He put it this way to Joseph Smith: “For they that are wise and have received the truth, and have taken the Holy Spirit for their guide, and have not been deceived—verily I say unto you, they shall not be hewn down and cast into the fire, but shall abide the day” (Doctrine and Covenants 45:57).  No matter what the world does around us, we must hold fast to the Holy Spirit to not be deceived or taken up in Satan’s great chain so that, despite all opposition, we may abide the day of His coming.  And we say and pray in earnest while we wait for that day of cleansing, “Come, Lord Jesus, come.”