"The God of Hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing, that ye may abound in hope, through the power of the Holy Ghost" (Romans 15:13)

The other morning my daughter came rushing into the kitchen a bit upset, and frazzled. This is so not like my daughter; she is usually like her dad, really laid back and very easy going. She proceeded to tell me that she had left her rings on the sink at the swim meet the night before, that she was late for an early morning meeting at school, and would I please call the pool across town and ask about her rings. The conversation proceeded something like this:

 I said, "You left them in Kearns?! Which rings? There is no way they are going to be there. Especially over there."

"Please, just call them and ask if they are there or if someone found them and turned them into the lost and found. I am late, so late! It's a thin silver one, a thicker silver one with my initials, and the one grandma gave me with the garnet."

"Okay, I'll call. Look up the number while I finish cooking the eggs. You know that they are not going to be there." I responded with absolutely no belief they would be turned in, they were worth a little money, and on the West side? Ha! I had little hope in that idea...but, I really wanted to hope, for my daughters sake.

She looked up the number and I asked the girl on the other end of the phone if there had been three rings turned in after the swim meet. She said, "Let me check the lost and found." I waited patiently as I stirred the eggs, potatoes, and sausage. A minute or so later the girl says, "What do the rings look like?" I proceeded to describe them to her. She said, "Yes. We have them here. What name should I put on them and you can pick them up?"

I was SO shocked and SO happy! My hope in humanity is...well returning, slowly. When I picked up the rings the woman at the counter told me to tell my daughter to, "...leave them at home next time, especially if she comes out here! She was lucky she got them back." I know my daughter was truly blessed to have them returned to her.

Two thoughts have come to mind from this experience (there are always more, but I think sharing two is sufficient for the day). One: The woman who turned the rings in was "...true at all times in whatsoever thing [she was] entrusted" (Alma 53:20). As women and men who follow Christ, true disciples, we "stand for truth and righteousness" (Relief Society Declaration) even when no one is watching us. The woman who found my daughters rings could have easily slipped those rings into her handbag or pocket without anyone noticing. Instead, she chose "the better part" (Father in Heaven, We Do Believe Hymn #180) by being honest and turning them into the lost and found. Through her example I was able to see that there are still good people in the world today and the news/media just needs to do a better job of reporting that kind of news. Also, I need to relinquish some of my doubts about others...not everyone wants to take "advantage of one" (2 Nephi 28:8). That's something I can work at doing a better job.

And the second thought: Even though I have had plenty of experiences to jade me and make me not trust people like I used to (I am definitely more cautious), there is great hope! After I got the rings and went to my car, I couldn't stop weeping from the blessings of  "lost and found". President Howard W. Hunter said, "I promise you...in the name of the Lord, whose servant I am, that God will always protect and care for His people. We will have our difficulties the way every generation and people have had difficulties. But with the gospel of Jesus Christ you have every hope, promise, and reassurance. The Lord has power over His Saints and will always prepare places of peace, defense and safety for His people. When we have faith in God we can hope for a better world- for us personally, and for all mankind. The prophet Ether taught anciently (and he knew something about troubles): 'Wherefore, whoso believeth in God might with surety hope for a better world, yea, even a place at the right hand of God, which hope cometh of faith, maketh an anchor to the souls of men, which would make them sure and steadfast, always abounding in good works, being led to glorify God' (Ether 12:4)" (An Anchor to the Souls of Men).

We all have lost important items or perhaps even valuable relationships. We all have trials, challenges, dark days, fog, and cold, that might seem to last too long and we may get a little lost in some of the "dark and dreary waste" (1 Nephi 8:7). But, we need not despair. For most definitely, "whoso believeth in God might with surety hope for a better world" (Ether 12:4), even our small world that sometimes may seem lost. Even if we hadn't found the rings, which would have been very disappointing, I can testify that nothing is lost to God. As Paul taught the Romans: "Now the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing, that ye may abound in hope, through the power of the Holy Ghost" (Romans 15:13).

Christ is "the God of hope". He taught through the parables of the the lost sheep, the lost piece of silver, and the prodigal son that nothing is lost to the Lord (read parables here). We must, in our relationships with our loved ones, and even our enemies, put our faith and trust in Him, the Keeper of the lost and found. I realized that to the Lord, we are all "the one" when He taught: "What man of you, having an hundred sheep, if he lose one of them, doth not leave the ninety and nine in the wilderness, and go after that which is lost, until he find it" (Luke 15:4)?

The found rings~
honest people and hope.

We are all "prodigals" and the Father says of each of us, "It was meet that we should make merry, and be glad: for thy brother was dead, and is alive again; and was lost, and is found" (Luke 15:32). We are each that lost brother and He rejoices when we repent. Repentance is: "A change of mind and heart that brings a fresh attitude toward God, oneself, and life in general. Repentance implies that a person turns away from evil and turns his heart and will to God, submitting to God's commandments and desires and forsaking sin" (The Guide to the Scriptures). He rejoices when we return to Him in prayer each night or any time of our day for that matter.

Just as my daughter lost her rings and she wanted to find them, she needed to ask for help. We too must want to be found, ask for His help that He may find us (see 1 Nephi 8:8; Enos 1:1-5; Mark 9:14-29). We are never lost to Him, no matter what we are struggling with, our location, or perhaps even our mood. He is waiting for us to open the door and invite Him in (Rev. 3:20). "The God of Hope" will fill us with hope when the impossible seems to loom before us through the power of the Holy Ghost. He will fill us with hope when the "mist of darkness" (1 Nephi 8:23-24) makes the way difficult to see and we feel lost. He is just waiting for us to ask that we may be found.

"Be patient in afflictions, for thou shalt have many" (D&C 24:8)

I have several plants that I water and neglect, uh, I mean nourish on a regular basis. I sometimes look at them as if they were a pain, more than a pleasure because I so often forget to water them. One plant in particular though, has really grown over the past several months due to the addition of fertilizer that I have added to its regular watering. As I have added the fertilizer and watered it, it has grown so tall that it really needs a new pot. It is now strong and healthy and it gets blooms on a regular basis. It is beautiful...as long as I remember to water and nourish it. The Lord taught similar principles in the allegory of the olive tree. (It can be read here). The "master of the vineyard" cared for his vineyard by nourishing, digging, pruning, and dunging the trees. Sometimes we all need a little "dung", "nourishing", "digging", and "pruning". I liken these necessary  items to trials, burdens, suffering, and afflictions, which sometimes are heavy, stink, or hurt, but they are for our good and benefit, even though we can't see the benefits immediately. I put fertilizer on my plant and it grew and got blooms. It grew stronger and much bigger than I imagined it would. We suffer, are cut down by trials or pain, digging deep within to find solace and peace as we are "refined...in the furnace of affliction" (Isaiah 48:10).

My plant that I have added fertilizer-
note the bloom and size of the pot. 

The Lord has counselled us: "Be patient in afflictions, for thou shalt have many; but endure them, for, lo, I am with thee, even unto the end of thy days" (D&C 24:8; see also D&C 66:9; Alma 17:11). As I have endured and suffered I have wondered what is the purpose of this...why? Some days it is so difficult; and then it hit me. I was growing, and I just couldn't see it. It was like trying to watch a plant grow. The plant is growing, and if I sit and watch it, it is a terribly slow and painful process to observe. But if I water it, dung it, and let the sunlight, nutrients and plant do their individual assignments together...growth happens.

This is the same in our own lives. If we expect to see growth in a day with few struggles or challenges and no discipline, yet hope we are becoming something more or stronger than we were, then we are only exercising impatience and will experience no growth. What the Lord wants for us is more; He wants for us to grow to our full potential. In essence He is saying: "What manner of men [and women] ought ye to be? Verily I say unto you, even as I am" (3 Nephi 27:27). This is His call to us to keep trying, to keep enduring in those most challenging and difficult times when it seems like there is little or no growth, but just fertilizer, mud, and painful cutting. When in reality, He is nourishing us, and shaping us because "now are we the sons [and daughters] of God, and it doth not yet appear what we shall be: but we know that when He shall appear, we shall be like Him; for we shall see Him as He is" (1 John 3:2 italics mine).

When we remember that the Lord "searcheth all hearts, and understandeth all the imaginations of the thoughts" and if we "seek Him" (1 Chronicles 28:9) then we have eyes to "see afar off" (2 Peter 1:9) because we know His vision is greater than ours and so is His timetable (D&C 64:32). It is when we keep pulling up the roots to see how our plants are growing that we begin to lose hope, for there is no growth to be made without water, nourishing, dunging, digging, and pruning. As Elder Neal A. Maxwell said: "Patience stoutly resists pulling up the daisies to see how the roots are doing" (Patience). Therefore, we can't just sit there and wait for our plants to grow, we must keep "pressing forward" that we may partake of the fruit that is most assuredly there waiting for us (1 Nephi 8:21,24,30) and is "most sweet, above all that [we] ever before tasted" (1 Nephi 8:11).

I will be honest, I wish I could be done with some of my trials and afflictions, they aren't what I really enjoy- they are difficult and challenging (I guess that's why they are called challenges). But, through them, I do, we do, become something more: more holy, more grateful, more strengthened "to o'ercome", more filled with faith, "more Savior like Thee" (see More Holiness Give Me). When we are "patient in afflictions" we can choose to become more... more Christlike. What a blessing to be "patient in afflictions, for [we shall] have many" (D&C 24:8)  as we are digged, pruned, nourished and fertilized by One who truly loves us and knows our potential growth, "that when He shall appear we shall be like Him, for we shall see Him as He is; that we may have this hope; that we may be purified even as He is pure" (Moroni 7:48).

This is a group of plants that I have neglected to water.  It looks so sad and droopy...I just forget to water these poor things. 

This is after it has been watered. Truly there is power and strength in water...imagine the growth if I added a little fertilizer!

Click here to view the Mormon Tabernacle Choir singing a beautiful rendition of "More Holiness Give Me".