The Distant Scene

I had a conversation with a good friend yesterday about how we would each like to be able to have a whole life plan of what we can do and become laid out in front of us. For example, we would love to understand exactly how our careers are going to develop over the coming years and decades and see clearly where we are headed and what we can accomplish. And while we can and should try to make plans and work towards certain goals, if we are looking for the Lord to tell us how it will all unfold with the major difficulties and milestones ahead laid out before us, I think we will most often be disappointed. The Lord may not feel the need to show us a great sweeping vision for our lives now. Instead, I believe in general our attitude should be that of the humble words of a beloved hymn as my friend reminded me: “Lead thou me on! Keep thou my feet; I do not ask to see the distant scene—one step enough for me.” Certainly the Lord may choose to show us some “distant scene” where we are headed, but if He chooses in His wisdom not to we must still keep moving one step at a time.

                This discussion reminded me of a story of President Packer that I have often thought about and quoted here before. He recounted, “Shortly after I was called as a General Authority, I went to Elder Harold B. Lee for counsel. He listened very carefully to my problem and suggested that I see President David O. McKay. President McKay counseled me as to the direction I should go. I was very willing to be obedient but saw no way possible for me to do as he counseled me to do. I returned to Elder Lee and told him that I saw no way to move in the direction I was counseled to go. He said, ‘The trouble with you is you want to see the end from the beginning.’ I replied that I would like to see at least a step or two ahead. Then came the lesson of a lifetime: ‘You must learn to walk to the edge of the light, and then a few steps into the darkness; then the light will appear and show the way before you.’ Then he quoted these 18 words from the Book of Mormon: ‘Dispute not because ye see not, for ye receive no witness until after the trial of your faith.’” If that is how the Lord worked with President Packer as a general authority, surely we might expect the same for ourselves: we will not “see the end from the beginning” most of the time and the Lord may not reveal to us what we hope to understand about the future of a particular family member or our professional life or an illness we battle with or some other struggle that we want to see the resolution of. In short, as Habakkuk put it and Paul often quoted, “The just shall live by his faith” (Habakkuk 2:4).

                I think we see this principle that the Lord will not always show us the distance scene particularly in the life of Moroni. After the death of his father, he wandered with the plates and wrote what he could. Several times, as I wrote about recently, he “finished” writing because he thought he might be done. But then when he wasn’t killed and found the means to write more, he did. He even abridged the record of the Jaredites in the which he wrote the sweeping revelation given to the brother of Jared which included a description of this vision: “He showed unto the brother of Jared all the inhabitants of the earth which had been, and also all that would be; and he withheld them not from his sight, even unto the ends of the earth” (Ether 3:25). From that Moroni must have understood incredible things about the future and the final days. He also went so much as to say to us, “Behold, I speak unto you as if ye were present, and yet ye are not. But behold, Jesus Christ hath shown you unto me, and I know your doing” (Mormon 8:35). And yet, after prophetically understanding what would come upon the world in the last days, writing his own prophecies and the brother of Jared’s, he still did not understand fully the Lord’s plan for his own mortal life. He wrote this after completing the book of Ether: “Now I, Moroni, after having made an end of abridging the account of the people of Jared, I had supposed not to have written more, but I have not as yet perished…. Wherefore, I write a few more things, contrary to that which I had supposed; for I had supposed not to have written any more” (Moroni 1:1,4). Clearly the Lord did not fully reveal to Moroni how the end of his life and mission would play out. Surely the Lord can and may reveal to us things about our future, but if He doesn’t, we should not be discouraged but stick to John Henry Newman’s words and move one step at a time into our future: “Lead thou me on! Keep thou my feet; I do not ask to see the distant scene—one step enough for me.”