Hope For a Better World

This week as I was studying I decided to study ahead and read Ether chapter 12. There are a lot of great things in this chapter and as I read it I was thinking about what Professor Griffin was saying about how sometimes we have verses or sections of scripture that we are so used to hearing over and over again that they can loose a little bit of the value to us since we just skim over them so I decided to try and slow down and read this chapter. The verse that I really saw in a different light was verse 4 "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." I had always thought this verse meant that if we have faith in God we can have hope that things will get better in this life but I'd never really looked at it with an eternal perspective. Honestly while the first explanation I think still stands it is much more clearly directed at what we shall receive in the next life. I realized that if we believe in God no matter what happens we can still have hope.

I think this is really important to remember when we think of the bad things that happen in the world. This week I had a friend come to me and show me a video where someone is talking about how if God really did exist why does he let bad things happen to good people. We talked about it for a while and it was a really good talk and then when I read this verse it hit me that, honestly, good people, especially people in our church, don't do good things because they think it will protect them from bad things. We don't believe in God as merely a way to protect ourselves. We know that we will have problems but we look to God for support in those hard times and with a hope that when it's all said and done that we will be able to find rest in the presence of God.

Hopefully we can all have a little more of an eternal perspective and realize that God loves us no matter what. Even when life gets hard he never gives up on us and if we look to God in faith we will find rest for our souls and find a better world in the world to come.