Our Savior

The end of the semester is fast approaching and since I am teaching the Life and Teachings of Jesus Christ that means we are discussing the Atonement . As I prepare I am totally overwhelmed. I’ve always been in awe of the great love and sacrifice that is the Atonement, but since my brain surgery my feelings for the miracle and the wonder of the Atonement have increased so much that I have no words to express them. I will walk into class today feeling very, very inadequate and wishing I could convey to these young people all that I feel. I just pray that they are in tune with the Spirit so the Spirit can do what I cannot.

The last day of my radiation they gave me the mask that was used to bolt me to the table during the radiation. Molded to my head, it holds an impression of me in it. When I came home that day the radiation had completely exhausted me. I could barely walk into the house. Somehow I made it to the bed and collapsed with the mask in my hand. For the next few hours I lay there unable to hardly move. All I could do was think and with the mask so close I began to ponder it. I thought about how I was the only person in the world who fit that mask and how like it, the trial I was going through with Grizelda was also tailored just for me. I was learning and growing and being tested, in other words being made stronger. I thought about how I was the only person who had ever worn that mask, but at that thought a strong feeling washed over me that I was wrong. Someone had worn that mask long before I did—Jesus Christ had suffered every bit of the pain, anguish, sorrow, and hurt. He had suffered this exhaustion. He had suffered my pain before I had, and so he knew all about it. I was not alone in this ordeal. As a matter of fact my ordeal was much easier than it would have been because He loves me so much He suffered all pain so He could then have the power to ease my suffering.

The Atonement was not only about sin, it was about all pain. And because Jesus Christ has taken on all of our disappointments, worries, pain, sorrow, cares, sin, and injustices, He knows how to succor us. All we have to do is trust in Him.