About 20 years ago I was sitting in church listening to someone give a heartfelt talk about blessings. I do not remember the details of the talk but one comment they made has come to give me pause. They said that they were thankful God had blessed them with good health. This comment is innocuous enough and certainly it is admirable to recognize that all that we have is for the grace of God. In that same congregation, however, was a family whose infant daughter was born with cancer and had to go through numerous surgeries and frequent emergent trips to the hospital. Their daughter was not blessed with health. After the service the parents said how offensive the suggestion was that someone would be blessed with good health because the obvious conclusion would be that their child was cursed with illness. My mind started to open up a bit but perhaps my life experiences to date were not sufficient for me to connect any dots.

Sometime after this event I was talking with a gentleman whose wife had been diagnosed with Parkinson’s disease and, sadly, in a pathetic attempt to show sympathy I repeated the very comments I heard over the pulpit. I told him I was grateful I have been blessed with health. I was suffering from foot-in-mouth disease.  He was not impressed although he tried to hide it but at that point, my slow moving brain finally made the connection. The blessings from God are eternal, and any temporal abundance or the lack there of are simply opportunities to help us obtain these eternal blessings.

I have met so many church goers that genuinely believe that their financial position is a direct result of their obedience to god. I say bullocks. Hogwash. Their financial position is a direct result of their business acumen, education, birthright, and dumb luck. Blessings are predicated upon laws. As it is stated in LDS scripture: “And when we obtain any blessing from God, it is by obedience to that law upon which it is predicated” (Doctrine and Covenants 130:20). I am not aware of any commandment that is even remotely linked to money, health, good looks or i.q. If there were, we would find that the most righteous would all be rich and beautiful and the most wicked would be poor and ugly.

It was this very belief that caused the Jews to stumble because of their misunderstanding that God blesses the righteous with abundance and the wicked with scarcity. When the rich man came to Jesus asking what he could do more, Jesus said to give up all his wealth and follow him. The rich man, however, found this too difficult leading Jesus to make the hyperbolic comment ‘it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter into the kingdom of God” (Matt 10:25). This statement rattled his disciples “And they were astonished out of measure, saying among themselves, Who then can be saved?” In other words, as far as Jesus’ disciples were concerned, since wealth is a direct result of obedience to God, then if this rich man cannot enter the kingdom of heaven they were all doomed.

We find the same message in John 9:2 when Jesus’ disciples are inquiring about the cause of such human frailties as blindness: “And his disciples asked him, saying, Master, who did sin, this man, or his parents, that he was born blind?” The belief was, any physical deficiencies you are suffering are the direct result of sin, either your own before you were born, or that of your parents. The savior answers with the following: “Neither hath this man sinned, nor his parents: but that the works of God should be made manifest in him.”

If money or health is not a blessing, then what is it? I would argue these are opportunities. God gives us opportunities and is up to us how we use them. Acquiring wealth is an opportunity for you to help others. Money is a stewardship and few of us manage it well. As soon as we have a little bit of money, we immediately try to increase our lifestyle.

But poverty and sickness is also an opportunity. Poverty teaches humility, it teaches frugality, it teaches us to bond together. It teaches us to live the old adage ‘fix it up, wear it out, make it due or do without’. In fact, wealth is more of a curse than poverty will ever be. Consider the attributes that the Savior would have us emulate: humility, empathy, forgiveness, charity. These are not skills that can be bought with money, only great trial and tribulations teach these hallmarks of happiness.

Wealth and health are fleeting. The greatest gift is adversity. The problem is, many Christians only count the opportunities that make their life more comfortable. They are trapped in the false paradigms of Jesus’s disciples. No matter what comes our way, we should always be asking ourselves what can we learn from this. Unfortunately, we tend to see trials as necessary schoolmasters intended to lead us to temporal abundance. Another reference from the Doctrine and Covenants I turn to in this regard is section 121:7 “My son, peace be unto thy soul; thine adversity and thine afflictions shall be but a small moment;8 And then, if thou endure it well, God shall exalt thee on high; thou shalt triumph over all thy foes.”

My foes are my own personal failings. All the skills I have acquired that make me a better person have been acquired by struggling through adversity. All the coping mechanisms I have learned  have been because of mental limitations. My physical fitness has been necessitated because of high blood pressure, soft tissue injuries on my lower back, and a hernia. My remarkably good diet is the result of having to navigate through the agonizing symptoms of IBS (Irritable Bowl Syndrome). Where many see a heap of medical problems, I see opportunities afforded me to live a more abundant live and to fill the measure of my creation.

I congratulate you if you are wealthy, healthy and wise. But I do not praise God. Circumstances often outside of your control gave you all these gifts; it is now your challenge to acquire the greater gifts of charity. Good luck, because temporal abundance is not a great schoolmaster. It least, it has not been for me.