Take and Seal It

Elder Gong taught in the most recent general conference, “As the Golden Rule teaches, a sanctifying symmetry in repentance and forgiveness invites us each to offer others that which we ourselves need and desire.” I have never thought of the Golden Rule applying to how we forgive each other, but certainly forgiving others as we want to be forgiven fits well this teaching of the Savior: “Therefore all things whatsoever ye would that men should do to you, do ye even so to them: for this is the law and the prophets” (Matthew 7:12). One thing that we hope that men will do to us is to forgive us and so we ought to forgive them in that way. Elder Gong continued, “Sometimes our willingness to forgive someone else enables both them and us to believe we can repent and be forgiven. Sometimes a willingness to repent and an ability to forgive come at different times. Our Savior is our Mediator with God, but He also helps bring us to ourselves and each other as we come to Him. Especially when hurt and pain are deep, repairing our relationships and healing our hearts is hard, perhaps impossible for us on our own. But heaven can give us strength and wisdom beyond our own to know when to hold on and how to let go.” As we learn to forgive we can help others to repent and to help ourselves do the same as we put faith in the power of the atonement of Jesus Christ.

                Elder Gong suggested that in order to forgive and heal relationships we must come unto the Savior for help. Indeed, overcoming our own negative feelings can be the hardest thing to change—how does one get rid of anger or offense or hurt or pain in their hearts? Sometimes a desire to do so does little to change how we feel. He said, “We are less alone when we realize we are not alone. Our Savior always understands. With our Savior’s help, we can surrender our pride, our hurts, our sins to God. However we may feel as we begin, we become more whole as we trust Him to make our relationships whole. The Lord, who sees and understands perfectly, forgives whom He will; we (being imperfect) are to forgive all. As we come to our Savior, we focus less on ourselves. We judge less and forgive more. Trusting His merits, mercy, and grace can free us from contention, anger, abuse, abandonment, unfairness, and the physical and mental challenges that sometimes come with a physical body in a mortal world.” Certainly as we experience “sorrow that the eye can’t see” we can feel alone and misunderstood, but the Savior tells us that He understands, “Behold, I have graven thee upon the palms of my hands; thy walls are continually before me” (Isaiah 49:16). Some translations of this verse suggest that the “walls” spoken of here are Jerusalem or Zion’s walls, but I wonder if we can also apply this to our own personal walls, those things that block our progress and that we are struggling to get around or over or through. In other words, our trials are continually before Him, even those which the eye can’t see, and He knows us perfectly. He is the source of help when seek in vain for rest in our souls against the silent battles of our soul, and we can look with hope to this promise from Him in ancient days: “Then will I sprinkle clean water upon you, and ye shall be clean: from all your filthiness, and from all your idols, will I cleanse you. A new heart also will I give you, and a new spirit will I put within you: and I will take away the stony heart out of your flesh, and I will give you an heart of flesh. And I will put my spirit within you, and cause you to walk in my statutes, and ye shall keep my judgments, and do them” (Ezekiel 36:25-27). How much we need that new heart and new spirit that only He can give and for which we seek alone in vain! Our “happy and forever”—as Elder Gong’s talk is titled—can only come as we obtain that heart of flesh from the Savior to conquer all the wickedness and pain and hurt in our stony heart. As we struggle because of our own weakness we must offer our heart in these words so that the great Physician can perform the transplant that Ezekiel promised: “Here's my heart, O take and seal it, seal it for thy courts above.”