Someone I heard recently was talking about giving counsel to women whose husbands had recently been called to serve as bishops or stake presidents.
They were being very kind and sensitive, but then referenced the ‘poor wives’-I am sure with the very best of intentions!
We might use that phrase to describe any calling or experience in this life that calls for great sacrifice: ‘poor’ relief society president, ‘poor’ missionary, ‘poor’ whatever.
In the moment I heard those words, however, the Spirit whispered: “is any opportunity from the Lord intended to make us ‘poor’?”
I don’t think so.
I trust that all experiences directly given from the Lord (not necessarily those given by mortality-although He makes even all of those good in time!) are designed to make us rich!
Rich in blessings and opportunity. Rich in growth and learning. Rich in experiencing His grace.
Abundance and generosity and mercy are His character, after all.
Can we acknowledge the hard and be real about the challenges, AND recognize that if we willingly put our lives in the Lord’s hands He will teach us and bless us in ways we could not have imagined?
I know, because He has given me these opportunities, He teaches us greater reliance on Him.
He shows us how good He truly is when we put our trust in Him.
He opens our eyes to see His hand on a grander scale than before and our hearts to the wonder of His love for all of His children.
He teaches us by placing the opportunity right before us, what it means to ‘lay aside the things of this world, and seek for the things of a better.’ In the process we are changed, if we let Him, into something better, more prepared, and more desirous of that better world.
That is enrichment!
I know I have not been poorer for my time in these places.
And when my time there has finished, I have looked back and not counted the cost, because the blessings have been far greater than anything I was asked to give.
They always are in the Lord’s work.
So maybe we can change the way we embrace these invitations in our own lives and change the way we talk about and to others who will be asked to sacrifice.
We can know (and say) that though there will be difficulties and heartaches and times of stretching and discomfort, the Lord is doing wonderful things in those times.
We can be witnesses that the Lord’s promises are sure when He says, “Give, and it shall be given unto you; good measure, pressed down, and shaken together, and running over” (Luke 6:38).
And our hearts will be happy (even knowing it will certainly be costly) for the experiences that lie before us or them, and the very great work the Lord will perform as we willingly walk with Him through all of the sacrifice.
Instead of feeling ‘poor,’ we can rejoice in knowing how rich the Lord truly desires to make all of us!
