On a New Track: Experiencing Fresh Waves of Insight and Rediscovery
After that critical narrative becomes unsettled in some way, how do people begin moving in a new direction of growing faith?
When someone has experienced a profound moment of discovery – whether associated with a new insight, a miracle, or a profound sense of being loved – it’s perhaps only natural that we think everything else is going to be different afterwards.
That’s how our favorite narratives in sacred history go. And in one sense, it’s true in many of these accounts too. On one level, the “narrative-disrupting moments” identified in the previous section herald the beginning of something new for all these people – with everything that follows seeming to be on a different trajectory. That being said, it would also be an overstatement to characterize all that follows as somehow wholly and completely new.
That impression, and perhaps even expectation, for Latter-day Saints no doubt comes from the story of Alma, who awoke from a three day angel-induced comatose state to indeed declare “[I] have been redeemed of the Lord; behold I am born of the Spirit.”
As the scriptural record underscores, Alma began “from this time forward to teach the people,” joining his fellow renegades-turned-witnesses in reaching out, witnessing and entreating the people to consider the very message they had once rejected, and now found again.
Our natural inclination is to assume that everything after that singular and quintessential narrative-disrupting moment was different: a life full of faith, clarity, and mostly-joy.
But a closer reading of the account suggests it wasn’t quite so simple – not for any of them. While acknowledging the mighty change they had experienced, the account then notes, “nevertheless they suffered much anguish of soul because of their iniquities, suffering much and fearing that they should be cast off forever.”
After the Great Awakening, there was more to still be learned. More to yet discover. More pain to be felt. And innumerable fresh insights to come – line upon line.
This is true of these modern stories as well. Early moments of transformation are just that – early moments – a rebirth into something new. And like a new baby or hatchling, there’s a whole lot more to what transpires next.
This section is about all the Next Stuff that follows a shift in momentum. If the previous section was focused on the cracking-open, bursting-out, paradigm-shifting moments that redirected what was previously heading in another direction, this section is about the more iterative, and routine, prosaic endurance that is certainly no less sacred than the larger, often more dramatic shifts. In other words, the last section is about what unsettles the logjam to get things moving, with this one about what life is like as the logs start to flow again downstream.
Much like stroke victims who have to learn to use limbs again, the process of reconversion and returning required experimentation, openness, and the willingness to keep trying again to find out what would work in this renewed spiritual life that they needed to create for themselves.
Sometimes, this involves a recognition of something subtle – perhaps a sensation that could have been missed before.
MAJOR QUESTIONS AND DECISIONS STILL TO MAKE
While some speak of a continuing learning back in the Church, others describe a continuing search that hadn’t yet led them to the Church. Kristi Novac said, “My discomfort persisted as our family tried other churches. None of them brought me the certainty of truth, peace, and love that the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints did. The Spirit had not left me. My quest for faith in Jesus Christ always led back to one place.” (13)
Misty Sutton describes her own early crossroads: “At one point, I had a decision to make. I knew what I was doing was wrong and I couldn’t continue on the path that I was on. At least, not in the direction I was going. But I had to make some choice about which way I would head next. Thankfully by the grace of the Almighty, I still had enough of the Spirit left with me to want to make the right choice. So, I prayed. I attended Stake Conference. I listened. I got my answer. I acted on it. And that’s where the real work began.” (31)
Others acknowledge opportunities and openings for change that came, but were not always recognized or taken. Even after having a vivid impression hit him of an active, happy Latter-day Saint family, for instance, Kevin admitted, “I promptly forgot about it for a while. But, had this repeat exposure to it of this constant reminder over about a year or so of time” – adding, “it was really nice, but it wasn’t what I wanted at that point.” (38)
EMBRACING TRUTH, WHEREVER IT COMES FROM
As Don Bradley came to believe in God again, he wasn’t ready to embrace the Church – starting first with general theism, then to the Baha’i faith – before eventually having experiences that led him to embrace the restored gospel (5) Raquel Cook similarly described how receiving truth somewhere else helped draw her closer to the original truth: “ I don’t know if there was a decisive shift, other than to say I went from reckless traveling and reckless random experiences, to stumbling upon a group of people doing Tai Chi in a park and all of a sudden making the traveling purposeful. It became purposeful in a spiritual sense. And the more I learned about other religions the more I learned about mine.”
After relating insights about anger, healing and the atonement, she added, “I think if I hadn’t actively practiced Daoism, I would never have fully learned that.” (17) And Tina Richerson similarly noted, “I continued to practice zazen and I continued to read Buddhist books. I continued to practice meditation and mindful living but I slowly incorporated reading the scriptures, starting with the New Testament because I felt like I needed to get to know my Savior more. I began to pray more to Heavenly Father as opposed to just mediating or chanting. It only took about five or six months before the Lord showed me that I could totally incorporate my zazen and scripture reading.” She added, “Buddhism isn’t a religion, it’s a philosophy. It’s a practice of life. I just put all of my Buddhist practice to work by going back to church.” (20)
UP AND DOWN
Even after describing a mighty change internally – “I was saved!” Christian recounted feeling “distraught” after he “smoked a cigarette or two.” He reflected now in retrospect, “I don’t think you’re meant to sort it out in one day…this is a process, not an event” – noting “Alma/Paul – they still had this journey to go on.”
Christian went on to suggest these ancient prophets didn’t have time to detail the process – suggesting that their sweet moments on record were powerful instantiations of the possibilities God had for them – as they are for all of us – rather than a conclusive “you have arrived. You can park that car.” It’s precisely when he takes this attitude, he confided, “I’ve found I can run into trouble.” (40)
Joel Tippets admitted, “I’ve had weeks when I come home feeling angry and frustrated and wondering why I feel so sure that I’m supposed to be there” before adding, “I’ve also had weeks… many more weeks… where I go to church and sing the sacrament hymn and feel overcome by love. Weeks… many of them… where I choose to participate in a simple act of service, and feel all my problems evaporate, at least for a while.”
Pam Shorr also acknowledged, “It hasn’t all been easy. There have been some hard times, but I haven’t lost the faith. I always made the commitment that if things start to slide because of my crazy schedule of working full time as an elementary school teacher, and raising three kids, I will always attend my meetings and fulfill my callings. I know it’s best to go with a good attitude and a willingness to learn, but sometimes you just have to show up even if you’re not feeling like it.” (18)
This full reconciliation of heart and mind (and life) is by no means simple – and can involve substantial barriers. Even after his miraculous blessing, Dusty Smith started attending church again and even met with the stake president. But when he learned he would need to undergo a Church hearing to be eligible for rebaptism, he walked away, feeling it was unfair to “put him on trial” when he felt he had done nothing wrong. But even then, “the pull never went away” (3)
WORKING THROUGH DISCOMFORT
While some felt more at home back in the Church, for others it wasn’t so clear. The process involved more of a back-and-forth similar to other healing and recovery processes.
BACK AND FORTH
While some felt more at home back in the Church, for others it wasn’t so clear – with a process involving more of a back-and-forth more similar to other healing and recovery processes – from addiction, to mental health. Raquel said, “It was months before I got to England, it was months before I actually set foot in a church after that and before I started working with the therapist. But it was then that I was able to say, okay, I can reconcile things. My life is not so bad after all. But then it was hard because I didn’t dive right back into activity. I’d get in, I’d be active for a little while, and then I’d realize, okay, I don’t fit. And so, I’d leave again and then I’d go back again and, okay, I don’t fit.” (17)
Another person said, “Each day that passes, I see myself confronting situations where the recent-me comes into conflict with who I want to be. Recent me has a lot of ready arguments that can make current me seem kind of stupid.”
In the process of return, difficult things come up and hit people not dissimilar to withdrawal effects in people tapering off a particular substance. And they try to lean on something higher to help them.
STARTING TO TALK AGAIN TO GOD
Some things were easier to remember from previous gospel understanding than others. Kevin said, “The one thing I walked away with– the one major thing I walked away with–from my upbringing and the gospel is, ‘Hey, I can pray!’” He continued:
My parents were great examples. They were always very engaged in the church. And for whatever reason it didn’t sink in, but I’ll tell you, if I ever tried to leave the house without praying and it was like “Get back here. We’re going to say a prayer.” If nothing else, that was the thing that stuck. It didn’t make any sense to me. I didn’t know who I was talking to. I didn’t know why I was talking. I just knew I needed something different. ? It wasn’t like there was faith there, but I felt like I had to say something. I knew that’s what my parents would tell me to do. So, that’s what I did. (38)
Letitia said, “I hadn’t prayed for twenty years so I was very nervous about having my first personal prayer and kind of building on that again.” (39) Jamie Pons recounted, “On one particular night, I found myself sitting in my room, feeling very upset. I felt like I should pray but I was hesitant to do so because I hadn’t prayed for a long time. All of a sudden my parents’ advice came into my mind. After I stopped going to church, my mother would always encourage me to pray even though I didn’t feel like doing it. At that very moment, I remembered clearly her advice and I knelt down and prayed.” (21)
Tina Richerson found new love for the quiet of the morning as her time to commune: “I discovered that I really love more than anything to wake up alone and pray first thing. I don’t want to talk to anybody. I learned that I need a lot of alone time.”
FOLLOWING A DEEPER SENSE
The invitation to join in community worship is another level of challenge, which is why we dedicated a whole section to it (see Section 5: Reconciling). As detailed there, the emotional resistance and barriers to fully reuniting are considerable – and surprising to active members who haven’t experienced them.
But as people work through them, following a deeper sense – they experience growth and an emergence of deeper commitment than ever before: Going not out of duty – but because of a deeper sense. As Kevin put it, “I started going to church, and for the first time in my life I went because I felt I should go not because I needed to go. Right? and so this is a long process.”
That doesn’t mean there wasn’t resistance. As Kevin added, “There’s this part of it for me that going to church was also this thing that I knew was right. I knew I needed to, but I also didn’t want to at the same time. There’s this cognitive dissonance thing where it’s like I know I need to, but this is hard.” (38)
Ultimately, they find a consoling relationship to this community that lifts them up – rather than scares them away. As Letitia described this eventual point: “I think I was more determined this time. I’d made this decision, I knew this is what I needed, so this is what I was going to do. So I would come to Sacrament every week, I would go to all the meetings. They had an older class for Seminary, which I would do that during the week because I kind of felt like that was my midweek burst of the gospel, and it would get me through till Sunday. Then just having lots of people that were around me to help me.” (39)
Reassurance to keep moving forward. One individual described overcoming resistance coming up: “I want to [go], but I don’t know if people like me. I don’t know if I really feel great all the time here, but it’s funny time after time after time pushing through those feelings and getting to church resulted in just– at least, at the very least– just being, ‘I’m glad I went’. And there’s obviously other blessings of going.”
After feeling peace reconsidering the Church after a cancer diagnosis, Letitia describes the continuing sweetness that accompanied forward movement and “just feeling an overwhelming feeling of happiness, knowing that it was the right thing for me to do, feeling that peace, knowing that I needed to build my testimony and being able to do that” (39)
FEEDING FATIH/ THE WORK OF LEARNING AND GROWING
Letitia continued, “that’s just one thing I know one thing I have learned from this experience is that we need our own testimony. We can’t live off someone else’s testimony. We have to feed it. We have to make it grow, and if we do that it will reward us tenfold. I mean, I’m a firm believer in what I have really learned since I came back to church – you really have to work on your testimony. You can’t let it go.”
Speaking of her own experience, she added, “Everyday I just pray, I want to do better. Today I want to try harder.” And the result? “This testimony just grew and grew and grew” – a witness that she felt “was rewarding me tenfold, having a relationship with my Heavenly Father, again, having a relationship with my Savior. but it just gave me so much back. I can’t even tell you the blessings that I’ve received from coming back.
She concluded, “I knew this was what I wanted, I knew it was going to be hard work, and I knew I needed to build up my testimony, again.” (39)
Tina Phillips described a “long road of testimony building experiences”(28), and Pam remembered feeling an interest in “work[ing] my way back into the Church”(18)
After describing the moment that started her family heading back towards church, Tina Phillips writes, “From that point on it was a long road of testimony building experiences. Learning and studying and coming to an understanding of the gospel. One thing I realized was we had to put in the WORK. We had to provide ourselves with opportunities to feel the spirit. Like REALLY feel it.”
Because of earlier disruptive experiences, these individuals are on a “new track.” As they receive even more confirmation to keep going, they continue aligning their lives with what they feel. This entails humbling, praying, fasting, and also acting on small promptings. As one woman said, “As I made tiny steps of faith—and I mean tiny—the evidence of God was made known to me.” (6)
STRENGTHENED BY FEASTING
Olivia writes about moving forward even though “I still did not have a strong testimony of the gospel or our Savior,” and yet, “I was willing to support my mother and her calling in the Church.” So what changed her further?
And it was during this special period of time that I started to learn the gospel sincerely and diligently. Gradually my testimony grew stronger. I started to read the scriptures, even though my reading progress was very slow. With my parents’ encouragement to read a few verses a day, I started to understand why parents want and encourage us to read the scriptures. They want us to feel for ourselves. And, little by little, I started to build up my faith.
She continues, “Later on when I reflected on this experience, I recognized the warm feeling that I had when I was kneeling and praying alone in my room that night. The special feeling was from the Spirit. This experience became one of the most significant moments of my life. It taught me how to recognize spiritual promptings.” (21)
After getting back to Church, Pam said her parents “bought me a new set of scriptures and the book, Jesus the Christ. There was just such a wonderful spirit in my life at this time. (18) Haleigh Everts recollected “Read[ing] a lot of things that made me feel really good and feel happy (1) Christian admitted “I hadn’t read books before – I was more of a comic guy” but described how he “would just devour” gospel books (40) Letitia similarly described “read[ing] a lot of books, a lot of church books– and that really helped– reading the scriptures everyday, praying.” (39)
The impact of more spiritual intake seems significant in many accounts. In Tami’s story, we similarly witness the impact of more consciously choosing to consume goodness:
A day or two later, Tami had a distinct impression to look under her bed. Sitting there were her scriptures—the ones she couldn’t find in her attempt to burn all tangible connections to the Church. She pulled out her Book of Mormon and “literally blew off the dust.” Tami looked up and said, “Heavenly Father, I’m going to open the scriptures and it better be good.” She then opened the book in her lap and the pages fell open to Mosiah 26. “I read the story of Alma the younger, and again I looked up and said, ‘Really funny, Heavenly Father.’”
On a long road trip, she later described listening to EFY music: “I cried the entire way, tears streaming down my face with this busload of people . . . my heart changed. That was the first little change of heart that I had.” Before she arrived, she texted her brother: “Holy crap. The Church is true, isn’t it?” He texted back: “It is! What makes you say that?” Her response: “This flood. The outpouring of love . . .” (2)
DEEPENING ASSURANCE AND CONVICTION
Tina described the new internal sense she had, “I opened my mind to everything I was taught and had some pretty incredible spiritual experiences that led me to KNOW that this is the true church and it’s exactly where I needed to be.” (28)
Brenna Kelley who had sensed a lack of “the closeness” and felt a sense of her need to return with her first prayer, continued, “I knew after my first lesson with the missionaries that I needed to get re-baptized. Little by little, I knew that everything about the church was true.” (35)
Sometimes people admit having to move towards what felt good, even when their head didn’t fully understand it. As Peka Holmes describes the sequence, “I turned back to what I knew was good and it wasn’t until I started going back to church that I gained my own testimony of the gospel.” (19)
Kevin described “going to church, and trying to understand what the gospels all about, trying to understand why I need to be going to church cuz it’s still terrifying, at this point I still have a ton of social anxiety” He spoke of his own deepening understanding in contrast to a shallow appreciation in the past, “Yeah, that’s exactly what it was because really the gospel… I’m a gospel idiot. I really don’t get a lot of it. I really don’t and going there was a social thing –a lot of it.” (38)
In some cases like this, people describe embracing a fresh embrace of a belief that felt new. In other cases, individuals described revisiting beliefs they formerly had, but had rejected. After his brother’s death, Don Bradley reflects: “I was drawn to the only hope I could see that Charles, not just some aspect of him, but my brother, would live on: the hope of resurrection,” Bradley said. “Re-examining the claim of Christ’s resurrection, I … became persuaded that God had raised Christ.” (5)
QUESTIONS CLEARING UP
Tami describes “In that first Relief Society meeting back” getting “an answer to a question that she’d been struggling with for a long time”:
During her months as an anti-Mormon, she’d told God that if he would just send an angel, she’d come back. “For me, that was the only way I’d believe…I wanted an angel dressed in a white robe, with a halo and big, white wings. It didn’t happen.” The answer was a quote that the Relief Society teacher put up on the board: “The Spirit of God speaking to the spirit of man has power to impart truth with greater effect and understanding than the truth can be imparted by personal contact even with heavenly beings. Through the Holy Ghost, the truth is woven into the very fiber and sinews of the body so that it cannot be forgotten.” “I almost stood up and raised my arms and said, ‘Praise Jesus. Hallelujah,” she wrote. (2)
Sometimes answers come in more subtle, even miraculous ways. After being reawakened by his own moment of healing, Dusty Smith recounts falling to his knees and saying: “Okay, God. You want me to be LDS again? Fine, but you’ve got to do your part. I don’t have a testimony, and I have these issues that I need answers to.” The story continues:
After listing all his questions and doubts, Smith watched in awe during the following days – recalling, “One by one, I would wake up in the middle of the night with an answer—every single night. One of my issues was [the lack of] archaeological evidence of the Book of Mormon. [One night] God said to me, ‘Does the fact that you can walk the streets of Jerusalem make the Bible true?’ And I said, ‘No.’ He said, ‘But what if somebody uncovered a sign tomorrow that said, ‘Welcome to Zarahemla, population 420’? What would that do to the Book of Mormon?’ And I said, ‘Then it would make it true.’ But He said, ‘Then where would be your faith?’”
Still, Smith had other questions about Joseph Smith’s life, treasure seeking, polygamy, and other difficult topics in Church history. These issues were addressed as well. “One night,” Smith recalls, “God said, ‘Okay, Mr. Attorney, if you are so smart, who would you choose to be a prophet? You, who doesn’t believe anything? A doctor who needs proof? I happened to choose a young boy who could accept the impossible, who could dream the unimaginable. That’s the kind of person who was needed to be able to accept and to believe the visions he was seeing and act on the voices he was hearing. Would you have? You have [spent] 26 years fighting it.’” (3)
“One by one, his questions fell away” his story goes, “These answers humbled Smith, opening his eyes to the fact that no matter how much he searched, researched, and debated online, these answers could come only from his Heavenly Father.”
In some cases, the questions seem to be answered directly. In other cases, they “fall away” – or lose importance as a new backdrop emerges and they are put into a new context again. Still in other cases, of course, questions endure.
THE WORK OF NOT KNOWING
Describing a consequential moment with a priesthood leader, Abby Olson said, “It would be an oversimplification to say that he changed everything, but that humble man was a mouthpiece for Heavenly Father that day. He didn’t try to answer the questions I knew there were no satisfactory answers to” (10)
The work of not knowing is, at times, as important as the work of knowing. However difficult it can be to hold space for unknowing, even that can involve a fresh perspective. As Tina Phillips put it, “I don’t have a full understanding of EVERYTHING (no one does) BUT I have enough faith to know that one day we will know the answers and the reason and purpose behind why certain things happened…that carries me.” (28)
Even some who held significant questions about church policy and culture around gender and other issues (11) are able to push back on those critiques enough to find a way home.
I CAN LEARN THAT WAY AGAIN
Through this all, some acknowledge shifting how they consider knowledge and learning as a whole. As Don admitted, “I overthink things. I saw that I’d often done this, to my detriment.” More specifically, he added, “I’d been trying to solve spiritual questions with the tools of history.” At one point in his journey, he encountered new skepticism for attempting to build faith on historical evidence alone, considering the possibility “that spiritual questions can’t be resolved by scholarly analysis?” (5)
This prompted placing trust again in spiritual instincts and intuitions. Whereas research had prompted him to walk away previously, now research “helped bring him back…this time with a broader view of Smith’s spiritual abilities” (5).
However sweet this all can feel, it’s not all good and easy – with very hard moments that come, including reconciling past pain. In Dusty Smith’s story, it states, “He still felt the pain that being a member of the Church had brought into his life. But he could not shake that pull from the Spirit.” (3)
RE-NARRATING THE STORY
We previously noted the way in which history gets re-narrated when people walk away. Perhaps it should be unsurprising, then, that upon returning that revised narration gets re-narrated again. Frequently, we see recognition that what they thought required them to leave wasn’t what they thought….
What some thought was betrayal and lying was not just that. For instance, Kristi Novac notes, “I became more uncertain when my husband tried showing me some of the material he found. However, I knew that the sources he was accessing were deceitful.” (13)
Many begin to realize the bigger lie was that they had been “deceived by the Church”- seeing with new eyes all that had happened. For instance, Rosanne Herseen describes seeing with new eyes the friend who had given her the consequential anti-Mormon materials in the first place in a more truthful light: “I found the ‘friend’ so keen on leading me away from the church was really not a very nice person at all.” (29)
After his own spiritual awakening, Joe Tippets described fresh curiosity arising “to see if listening to one of my old critical podcasts would shake me out of this reverie.” So, as he remembers, “I plugged in my earbuds and fired up a classic Mormon Expression episode where John Larsen and his panel clearly demonstrated how impossible it was for Nephi to build a trans-oceanic vessel. He described all the industries that would be needed. The thousands of sheep. The acres of forest. The dry dock. 100 years-worth of man hours. Etc.As I listened, my reaction was different than in the past. It didn’t evoke a sense of disgust mixed with confirmation of my decision to leave the church. The long list of ‘facts’ that appear to disprove God and religion felt like only part of the story. Part of the evidence one can use to determine truth.”
Coming to see the deception as deception correlates with its loss of power of these people. As this mindfulness of narratives – past and present – continues to expand, people seem to find more space about Church members as well: “They aren’t the terrible people I’ve made them out to be…”
It’s not just deception and lies from which people describe detoxifying.
SHEDDING ANGER
In making sense of her own return, Raquel suggested, “I think a lot of it had to do with ridding myself of anger and embracing the Atonement and recognizing that the Atonement is not just about overcoming sin. It’s about believing that the Lord’s going to take care of things. That all is fair and just and I don’t need to hang onto the anger, because the Lord’s going to take care of it.”
As Raquel traveled around the world “the anger started to dissipate and I started to do more purposeful things.” As she found opportunities to serve and grow, her “anger-venting” became “soul-searching.” (17)
In reflecting on her prior experiences, she said “When I left, I was angry and I professed to believe in God so I’d have somebody to blame for different things” – before adding, “Me being angry at something someone did to me years ago is like being angry at a brick wall. It doesn’t affect them in any way. All it does is make me unhappy. But if I can hand that anger over to someone who has already suffered for it, then I can put my energy in a better place. In a place where it’s actually going to be useful.”
She concludes, “That’s what the Atonement has become for me: a way to forgive other people and a way to deal with trials in life. Just hand it over. I don’t need to carry this burden. It’s not mine.”
Pam Shorr admitted always feeling “like I was ‘kicking against the pricks’ when I was active before. When I was reactivated, I had to work through some of my issues. I had to get rid of my hard heart. It was difficult.” (18)
DEBURDENING FROM OTHER INTERNAL BURDENS
Along with anger, people describe the sweetness of getting unblocked through repentance of other things. As one woman said, “From the moment I decided to meet with my Bishop and let go of my past – everything changed.”
Not in a moment, though. She admits it was “not easy” since she “had to face some consequences because God will not be mocked” and she needed to “prove myself.” As she describes it:
I needed to put all the crap behind me – I felt so sick…I let myself get used and abused by a lot of men. I did disgusting things I’m not proud of. I don’t know who that was. I can’t put into towards how lonely, sad, depressed, miserable I was…I want it all gone, I want to move forward. I want to make changes. I don’t want this – I hate the way that I feel. (110)
Kevin spoke of “seeing the bishop to just get my life back in order, starting the repentance process.” He describes the sense of being unblocked by what happened next:
Eventually, the repentance process ended, and it worked. I got the spirit back, and I started being guided by it and started to understand what that was about, and starting to feel that and having the fact that God speaks to His children become a reality for me. Which, up until then, understanding that the spirit was actually talking to me and guiding me, was just this kind of like okay “how does this work? I don’t get it? Why am I here? What is everyone talking about –the spirit thing? Where’s this ‘the rubber meets the road part of this gospel’ kind of thing? (38)
After an acute feeling of God’s love, Christine Woerner began attending church and “living the life of someone who lived by Gospel principles.” But she didn’t partake of the sacrament because of previously being disfellowshipped. As she worked with the bishop to clear her record, she also met and began dating a man who wanted to marry her in the temple. As she put it, “Given my past mistakes, I couldn’t believe he valued my soul that much.” They were sealed and are the best of friends now (14)
Letitia described habits in her life “pointing in another direction – and away from what you’re moving towards – I guess it was like giving up on old habits that you’ve done for twenty years and sometimes you would think ‘oh my gosh, I don’t think I’m ever going to get over this. Am I ever going to be able to immerse myself in all this’? (39)
These fears are ultimately eclipsed by the possibility that repentance can bring for many of these people. Elaine said, “I found my way to a church and asked the Bishop if I could see him. I cried and cried as I talked about the last 26 years of my life. I thought I would have to go before a council of some kind. He just hugged me and said ‘Welcome home.’” (12)
REPENTANCE AS DELIVERANCE – NOT JUST MORE WORK
However rich the result may be, none of this suggests the pathway of personal change with God’s help is easy. Repentance is usually challenging for most people – a difficulty that can push people back in the other direction. We see the temptation towards that regression in these narratives. As Misty acknowledged, “The repentance process was grueling. From having to come clean with my husband to meeting with the Bishop to skipping the Sacrament. Every moment was heart wrenching. Every week a reminder. Every day I would wake up and, for a split second, forget and then suddenly be washed over and drowned by the weight of it. Some days I didn’t want to get out of bed. Most days I didn’t want to wake up at all. But I tried.”
Kevin described how it wasn’t always so easy to feel connected and comfortable during his own repentance process: “There were times where I had to tell myself, ‘it’s going to be so much better if you just go to church,’ and I got into the habit. There was a good year –year and a half of going through that repentance process where I didn’t want to go. Everything just felt hard and but I learned how to to push through that and I felt like the Lord supported me at the end pushing through it always. It was always a relief to have gone to church.” (38)
Misty continued to relate her experience working through the hard stuff, “I knew that this–all of this–from the loss of the Sacrament to the rift I’d caused in my family, was my doing and I was bound and determined to fix it. I threw myself into my responsibilities. I recommitted myself to my family. I took on the role of homeschool mom again. I did anything and everything I could to keep my mind off of the guilt, off of the pain of knowing what I’d done and how badly I’d hurt everyone, from building bookshelves to color-coding crayons. And I did it with such a fervency that I was sure I would earn my forgiveness. I was SURE I could make it right again.”
“But it didn’t work. I didn’t feel better. The pain didn’t go away. For anyone. It just got worse.”
At that point, Misty took a step very similar – if not exactly the same – as “Step 1” in the famous 12 steps, prompted by a conversation with a friend: “It wasn’t until I was inadvertently forced by a dear friend to take a long, hard look at what it was that I was still so desperately seeking–that I was inexplicably reaching out to find. It wasn’t until I had no choice but to analyze his perceptions that I ultimately had to face my own.”
She continued, “And as I did so, two words continued to ring out from the very Stake Conference talk that President Keogh had gotten up to give nearly 18 months before. The very talk that had answered my prayer and inspired me to make the right choice in the first place. “Let go of what you think you want,” he’d said.
Let. Go. Two simple little words that, for me, held so much meaning. It was time to finally let go. To admit that I had been right so many months ago. That I wasn’t good enough, and I never would be. That no matter how ‘together’ I thought I was, I couldn’t really do this.
And that was ok. “You can’t do this, Misty. You aren’t good enough. And you never will be…At least, NOT ON YOUR OWN.”
I once read that the reason that Satan is so good at deception is because he uses the truth to deceive. The truth, sprinkled with one simple, little lie. For me, that lie was that I had to do it on my own. That if I couldn’t stand on my own, that if I couldn’t get through mortality by my own devices, then I was a failure. That I was good enough…that I was special enough…that I was elite enough…and that I was different enough that I could “lean on my own understanding.” That I–in my fallible, flawed, prideful, mortal thinking–knew better than He did. That I was in control.
And to get there, I first have to let go. I have to let go of what I think I want. I have to let go of my vision of the way things are supposed to be. I have to let go of my expectations and inhibitions. I have to let go of my understandings and interpretations. I have to let go of my imaginary control. I have to let go of how I think things should play out and trust that the person who is in charge knows what He’s doing.
And this is when the bigger, more beautiful realization emerged: “I do need Him! I do need the Gospel. And I ABSOLUTELY need the Spirit. I CAN do this. But not the mortal me. Not the one that thinks she’s so awesome and knows everything. The divine me. The eternal me that’s trapped inside this imperfect body and waiting desperately to be spiritually fortified. The me that I was always meant to be.” (31)
This deeper placing of faith and love on God – in an expression of “He can do it…and I want him” reflects the 2nd and 3rd steps in the 12 steps.
MORE LIGHT & JOY THAN EXPECTED
Simultaneous with seeing the darkness and weight for what it is, people speak of seeing the light and good with fresh eyes – including a discovery that this path of return and recommitment is more enjoyable than the alternatives. As Janice Esplin Oviatt writes, “Each one of my callings has helped me grow and learn so much. I also learned life is more enjoyable sober and following God’s path. There is so much more, so many faith building stories, so many trials that taught me what I needed. So many wonderful friends that are examples for me to follow. I know Heavenly Father and Jesus love me, Janice…With that knowledge I can do whatever They need me to do. I know following His plan is the only way to have true joy.” (9)
Don Bradley reflected, “I experienced something my own investigators had described, that during the discussions and after, there was a light with me.” (5)
These discoveries and joys came not as simply a scholarly or conceptual process of learning – but also from a behavioral, existential process of continuing change.
Peka says, “I am so grateful for that experience because I don’t take the gospel for granted anymore. I absolutely love it. I engulf myself in it” – adding, “I had gone without taking the sacrament for such a long time that once I was able to take it again I didn’t ever want to go without it.” (19)
Commenting on one woman’s return story, another person said her experience was similar, adding, “It’s funny how much you forget about the church when you stop going. It’s also strange how much stronger your faith and understanding can become when you’ve seen life without God and decide you really do want Him back.”
As people taste again what they had missed, they decide it’s good.
DISCUSSION
So, what’s the difference between narrative-disrupting insights described previously – and these kinds of moments described above? Many of these experiences above reflect a more gradual increase in light over time, rather than the dramatic, paradigm-shifting moments…and yet, sometimes major shifts are prompted by otherwise small, subtle, simple discoveries.
So, it’s not the depth of impact that differentiates these or the relative intensity (or subtly) of the interaction. Rather, we would suggest it’s simply where in the progression of someone’s account these moments fall: Whereas the previous section attempted to focus exclusively on the earliest or first moment where the tide began to turn, here we’ve started to consider how the tide begins to rise.
Regardless of the impact, then, we’ve tried to consider: was it an initial burst – OR a continuation of earlier changes?
It’s worth pointing out that, in a real sense, these should be understood as a continuation of one and the same: a spectrum of God reaching to teach and redeem His people.
