A number of years ago I was taking a math class in preparation for teaching that subject the coming school year. We were studying vectors and I just could not grasp how they worked. I had studied and studied, worked problems over and over. I had obtained tutoring but still I did not understand. The night before the test I was becoming frustrated as I tried problem after problem to no avail. Suddenly it occurred to me that Heavenly Father and our Savior know everything. Even vectors! I realized that there could be no greater tutor than them. So I got on my knees and poured out my heart about how hard I had tried to understand. I had done all that I could think to do and I just wasn’t getting it. I told Heavenly Father that I knew He knew how vectors work and asked him to teach me. I finished my prayer and tried a few more problems, but still couldn’t do them. I decided to take a break so I went downstairs to do some laundry. I remember precisely the moment that my mind comprehended vectors…it was on the second to the last stair on my way back up! Suddenly I just knew how to do them. I ran to the table where I had been studying, anxious to try a problem. Sure enough I did it right. I worked problem after problem and they were all correct. I Thanked my Heavenly Father.
The next day when I opened the test I didn’t recognize a thing on it. I prayed again saying that I had studied and that I had the best possible tutor and would He please help my mind to recall what I knew. I started in the middle of the test with a problem I felt I could do and then proceeded to complete the test. When I was done I looked it over to see if I needed to rework any problems but they all looked right to me.
Before the professor handed back the graded tests he explained that he was going to have to greatly lower the grading scale since only 1 or 2 in the class had scored above the low 80’s and the majority in the 70’s or less. For a moment I panicked! However, when I got my test back I had received 100%.
You see, Heavenly Father does know everything…even vectors!
If he knows how to do vectors, He knows how to help us with all our needs and concerns.
Do you want to know how to cope with a devastating illness or overcome an addiction? Come unto Him
Do you want to know how to deal with struggling children or strengthen a faltering marriage? Come unto Him
Do you ache for relief from loneliness and long for peace and joy? Come unto Him
Do you want to know how to comfort a friend in need or repair a troubled relationship, to forgive someone who has betrayed or abused you? Come unto Him
Do you want to feel loved, to know that you measure up, that your offering is acceptable? Come unto Him
Do you yearn for forgiveness and mercy; for solace and healing? Come unto Him!!
Perhaps you feel over-scheduled, overwhelmed but don’t know what to change. Come unto him.
Is there someone in your life causing you grief and pain? Do you feel powerless? Come unto Him!
Whatever it is that you yearn for, come unto the fountain of all love, all knowledge, all joy, all peace, all hope. Come unto Him!
He knows what experiences of life we need. He knows what commandments and covenants will help us remember Him and bring us home. If we know that he is there, if we have developed a closeness to Him we will face all the events of our lives much better.
Right now you may be in a very comfortable, safe place but just as most devastating hurricanes, tornados, and tsunamis strike quickly, we may not see the storms of our lives coming. While they are likely to ravage us for a time they need not destroy us or take us off our course. If we are prepared to trust and access our Savior’s help we can weather them well.
You may already be in the midst of a devastating ordeal. We all have them and cannot be expected to be spared on our path of discipleship. But He can ease our burden and help us through.
What he requires is our heart and a willing mind.
Elder Neal Maxwell said of this “I testify that he is utterly incomparable in what he is, what he knows, what he has accomplished, and what he has experienced. Yet, movingly, he calls us his friends. (See John 15:15; D&C 84:77.)
“We can trust, worship, and even adore him without any reservation! He is the only perfect person to sojourn on this planet; there is, as Isaiah declared, none like him! (See Isa. 46:9.)
“In intelligence and performance, Christ far surpasses the individual and the composite capacities and achievements of all who have lived, live now, and will yet live!” (See Abr. 3:19.)
