Afflictions

• President Henry D. Moyle “We believe [that] seldom [do circumstances arise in which] men of rigorous faith, genuine courage, and unfaltering determination, with the love of independence burning in their hearts, and pride in their own accomplishments, cannot surmount the obstacles that lie in their paths.”
• “Time and experience will provide the answers.” (Gordon B. Hinckley, Ensign, May 1990, 97)
• “Anyone who imagines that bliss is normal is going to waste a lot of time running around shouting that he’s been robbed. Most putts don’t drop. Most beef is tough. Most children grow up to be just people. Most successful marriages require a high degree of mutual toleration. Most jobs are more often dull… Life is like an old-time rail journey – delays, sidetracks, smoke, dust, cinders, and jolts, interspersed only occasionally by beautiful vistas and thrilling bursts of speed. The trick is to thank the Lord for letting you have the ride.” (Gordon B. Hinckley, Teachings of Gordon B. Hinckley [1997], 254)
• “It’s not so much what happens to us but how we deal with what happens to us.” (James E. Faust, Ensign, Nov. 2004, 20)
• “You will have all kinds of trials to pass through. And it is quite as necessary that you be tried as it was for Abraham and other men of God. And God will feel after you, and He will take hold of you and wrench your very heart strings and if you cannot stand it, you will not be fit for an inheritance in the Celestial Kingdom of God.” (John Taylor, Journal of Discourses, 24:197)
• “No pain that we suffer, no trial that we experience is wasted. It ministers to our education, to the development of such qualities as patience, faith, fortitude, and humility. All that we suffer and all that we endure, especially when we endure it patiently, builds up our characters, purifies our hearts, expands our souls, and makes us more tender and charitable, more worthy to be called the children of God…and it is through sorrow and suffering, toil and tribulation, that we gain the education that we come here to acquire and which will make us more like our Father and Mother in heaven.” (Orson F. Whitney, Whitney, Ensign, Nov. 1987, 60; Faith Precedes the Miracle, 98)
• “Often those who struggle with adversity ask the question ‘why did this happen to me?’ They spend sleepless nights wondering why they feel so lonely, sick, discouraged, oppressed, or brokenhearted. The question ‘why me?’ can be a difficult one to answer and often leads to frustration and despair. There is a better question to ask ourselves. That question is ‘what could I learn from this experience?’ The way we answer that question may determine the quality of our lives not only on this earth but also in the eternities to come. Though our trials are diverse, there is one thing the Lord expects of us no matter our difficulties and sorrows: He expects us to press on.” (Joseph B. Wirthlin, Ensign, Nov. 2004, 101)
• Such an act of love between a man and a woman is-or certainly was ordained to be a symbol of total union: the union of their hearts, their hopes, their lives, their love, their family, their future, their everything. It is a symbol that we try to suggest in the temple with a word like a seal. The Prophet Joseph Smith once said we perhaps could render such a sacred bond as welding- that those united in matrimony and eternal families are welded together, inseparable if you will, to withstand the temptations of the adversary and the afflictions of mortality,” Of Souls, Symbols, and Sacraments, Jeffrey R. Holland
• “On one occasion, after a congressional delegation had encouraged him (Abraham Lincoln) to make certain that America ended slavery so that God could continue to bless America, Lincoln replied: “My faith is greater than yours…I also believe He will compel us to do right in order that he may do these things, no so much because we desire them as that they accord with His plans of dealing with this nation, in the midst of which he means to establish justice…I have felt His hand upon me in great trials and submitted to His guidance, and I trust that as he shall further open the way I will be ready to walk therein, relying on His help and trusting in His goodness and wisdom.”” Seven Miracles That Saved America, Page 180
• “No matter how serious the trial, how deep the distress, how great the affliction, God will never desert us. He never has, and He never will. He cannot do it. It is against His character to do so. He is an unchangeable being…He will stand by us. We may pass through deep waters, but we shall not be consumed nor overwhelmed. We shall emerge from these trials and difficulties the better and the purer for them if we only trust in our God and keep His commandments.” (George Q. Cannon, If Thou Endure It Well, 121)
• “The Lord has made no secret of the fact that He intends to try the faith and the patience of His Saints. (.) We, mortals, are so quick to forget the Lord: ‘And thus we see that except the Lord doth chasten his people with many afflictions…they will not remember him (). However, the Lord knows our bearing capacity, both as to coping and to comprehending, and He will not give us more to bear than we can manage at the moment, though to us it may seem otherwise. (;.) Just as no temptations will come to us from which we cannot escape or which we cannot bear, we will not be given more trials than we can sustain. (.)…President Brigham Young said of a geographical destination, ‘This is the place.’ Of God’s plan of salvation, with its developmental destination, it can be said, ‘This is the process’! President Young, who knew something about trial and tribulation but also of man’s high destiny, said that the Lord lets us pass through these experiences that we might become true friends of God. By developing our individual capacities, wisely exercising our agency, and trusting God—including when we feel forsaken and alone—then we can, said President Young, learn to be ‘righteous in the dark.’ (Secretary’s Journal, 28 Jan. 1857.) The gospel glow we see radiating from some—amid dark difficulties—comes from illuminated individuals who are ‘of good cheer’! To be cheerful when others are in despair, to keep the faith when others falter, to be true even when we feel forsaken—all of these are deeply desired outcomes during the deliberate, divine tutorials which God gives to us—because He loves us. (Msh. 3:19.) These learning experiences must not be misread as divine indifference. Instead, such tutorials are a part of the divine unfolding.” (Neal A. Maxwell, Ensign, Nov. 1982, 67)
• Mosiah 9: 3… And yet, I being over-zealous to inherit the land of our fathers, collected as many as were desirous to go up to possess the land, and started again on our journey into the wilderness to go up to the land; but we were smitten with famine and sore afflictions; for we were slow to remember the Lord our God.
• 1 Nephi 15:5…Even Nephi has felt overcome (overwhelmed) by his afflictions
• Alma 26: 27…Bear your afflictions with patience and then the Lord will give you success
• Alma 26: 29-30…Missionaries and members go through all manner of affliction so that they can perhaps be the means of saving some soul (which will bring them joy)
• Mosiah 24: 16-19…Suffer burdens & afflictions with faith and patience and the Lord will bless you
• Mosiah 24: 15…We must submit cheerfully and with patience to the will of the Lord during burdens
• Mosiah 24: 14…The Lord does visit people in their afflictions
• Mosiah 24: 10…When afflictions are hard people turn to God
• Alma 20:29…After being in prison naked, bound (causing worn skin), suffering hunger, thirst, and all kinds of afflictions, Ammon’s brethren were patient in all their sufferings.
• Alma 25: 6…After suffering much loss and so many afflictions people remember and believe in the Lord, and are converted
• Mosiah 21:14…Humility makes one cry to the Lord in prayer to be freed from afflictions
• Mosiah 14:7…No matter how difficult the afflictions or trials, be like Christ and don’t open your mouth
• Mosiah 9:3…If we’re slow in remembering God we’ll be smitten w/ famine and sore afflictions
• Alma 34:40-41…Be patient in afflictions
• Moroni 9:25…Be happy in Christ during afflictions
• Alma 38:4…How to handle afflictions
• 1 Nephi 18:16…Never murmur against God no matter how hard the afflictions.
• 2 Nephi 2:2…Lord gives afflictions for our gain
• 2 Nephi 2:24…All things done in wisdom
• D&C 24: 8…Patience in afflictions
• Alma 17: 9…  And it came to pass that they journeyed many days in the wilderness, and they fasted much and prayed much that the Lord would grant unto them a portion of his Spirit to go with them, and abide with them, that they might be an instrument in the hands of God to bring, if it were possible, their brethren, the Lamanites, to the knowledge of the truth, to the knowledge of the baseness of the traditions of their fathers, which were not correct.  10 And it came to pass that the Lord did visit them with his Spirit and said unto them: Be comforted. And they were comforted. 11 And the Lord said unto them also: Go forth among the Lamanites, thy brethren, and establish my word; yet ye shall be patient in long-suffering and afflictions, that ye may show forth good examples unto them in me, and I will make an instrument of thee in my hands unto the salvation of many souls. 12 And it came to pass that the hearts of the sons of Mosiah, and also those who were with them, took courage to go forth unto the Lamanites to declare unto them the word of God
• “Every trial a man goes through, if he is faithful in that trial and does honor to God and his religion he has espoused, at the end of that trial or affliction that individual is nearer to God, nearer in regard to the increase of faith, wisdom, knowledge, and power, and hence is more confident in calling upon the Lord for those things he desires. I have known individuals who have trembled at the idea of passing through certain ordeals who after they were through the temptation have said they could approach the Lord in more confidence and ask for such blessings as they desired. …”   Teachings of Presidents of the Church: Lorenzo Snow, 2011
•  Jacob 3:1…  But behold, I, Jacob, would speak unto you that are pure in heart. Look unto God with firmness of mind, and pray unto him with exceeding faith, and he will console you in your afflictions, and he will plead your cause, and send down justice upon those who seek your destruction.
• Alma 26: 27….Now when our hearts were depressed, and we were about to turn back, behold, the Lord comforted us, and said: Go amongst thy brethren, the Lamanites, and bear with patience thine afflictions, and I will give unto you success.
• “Though we will face trials, adversities, disabilities, heartaches, and all manner of afflictions, our caring, loving Savior will always be there for us.” General Conference, Ronald A. Radband, April 2012