Lessons From Camilla Kimball

I knew I heard about this somewhere, but I have never found the official quote. But here it is.

Sister Kimball says, “I’ve always had an inquiring mind. I’m not satisfied just to accept things. I like to follow through and study things out. I learned early to put aside those gospel questions that I couldn’t answer. I had a shelf of things I didn’t understand, but as I’ve grown older and studied and prayed and thought about each problem, one by one I’ve been able to better understand them. I still have some questions on that shelf, but I’ve come to understand so many other things in my life that I’m willing to bide my time for the rest of the answers.

I have tried to use this philosophy in my own life, as I come across things that I don't understand. And it works! I wanted to tell you about one that I thought about just yesterday. It has to do with the lost 116 pages of the Book of Mormon. I had always wondered why the Lord told Joseph Smith that Martin Harris could take the pages. Even though they did not accept the first two answers, it seems incorrect that the Lord should allow them to do something that would be detrimental not only to his own well being, but to the work of The Lord.

We talk a lot about the Garden of Eden, and how the Lord would could not command Adam and Eve to eat of tree of good and evil, even thought it was necessary for us to come to the earth. It was impossible for him to direct anyone to do anything that will lead them astray or cause them pain. And yet, it seems that if he knew that allowing Joseph and Martin to take the pages would cause in their loss, that would be leading them in the wrong direction. And God cannot lie.

It was also a bit disconcerting the Lord might give me an answer that was not right for me. That he might allow me go astray if I asked him the same question enough. I didn't like the implication that the Lord might 'give in' to us instead of continuing to tell us what is best.

Yesterday, however, I found out that the answer that the Lord gave to Joseph and Martin was not just that he could take the pages. He allowed him to take the pages on the provision that he would only show them to very specific people. If Martin had done this, the pages would not have been stolen. However, the Lord knew that Martin would not be able to do this. That is why he said no in the first place, to keep him as far away from temptation as possible. However, even when he pushed the limit, the Lord did not tell him to do something that he knew would lead to the loss of the pages. He gave him strict guidelines that would keep him safe. It was only when Martin went outside of these guidelines that the pages were lost.

The Lord would never lead us astray. In fact, we will try to keep us as far from the edge as possible. However, we do have the ability to make a choice. And if we push the limits, he cannot stop us from coming close to the edge where we might slip. But he will not allow us to do anything that will cause us to fail. That was very comforting to me to understand it a little better. So since most of you already knew all of this, sorry. But it was a new discovery to me, and I wanted to record it somewhere.