All I need is a miracle

LM (a friend of HG) recently gave a talk at her church entitled "Gaining and Strengthening Your Testimony of the Gospel of Jesus Christ". I was in the audience for the talk and later received a written copy via HG. Like most things LM does, this talk was very well done. The part I found the most interesting was LM's reminder that most testimonies are not born of miracles or visitations by angels:

In an article by Robert L. Simpson, “How to Gain and Hold onto Your Testimony,” New Era, Mar. 1972, “My teenage years were very much like those of many youth I talk to from day to day. They frequently say, ‘If the Lord would only let me know for sure, then I would certainly be willing to dedicate my entire life to the work.’ Testimonies built on miracles alone are at best shallow and can only be perpetuated by other miracles. Such is not the eternal process considered best for the acquisition of a testimony that can withstand the troubles” we will encounter in our mortal existence. Think about Laman and Lemuel who saw angels and saw the power of God manifested in their brother Nephi – they fell away.

I think it is especially hard to remember this when many of the characters we read about in the scriptures have seen angels or have heard or even seen God and or His Son Jesus Christ. All but 46 pages of the Book of Mormon were written by men that all had personal visitations by the Savior. There is the story of Josephs Smith first vision, which tells us that Joseph Smith saw God the Father and His son Jesus Christ. Many other prophets of the scriptures talked face to face with the Savior including Adam, Enoch, Noah, Abraham, Isaac, Moses, Isaiah, Ezekiel, Stephen and many more. But we need to remember that we should not expect our testimonies to be born out of such experiences, “For we do not receive a witness until after the trial of our faith.”

In a 1994 general conference address, Elder Robert D. Hales stated, “Though prayer is important in gaining a testimony, we cannot merely ask in prayer for a testimony and expect it to be given immediately to us. Generally, testimony emerges over time and through life’s experiences. We can compare testimony to the process of watching a photograph develop. Powerful impressions of the Spirit come like flashes of light on receptive photographic film. Like the chemicals needed to develop the picture, certain spiritual conditions and experiences are needed in our lives for our personal testimony to develop into a certain truth and knowledge. And like a photograph, a testimony, if not carefully preserved, will fade with time.” (How You Can Know)

I especially like this photography metaphor. The photograph of my faith is only barely visible at this point but will develop (or fade) over time. It would certainly be easier to believe in God or a particular religion if God made his intentions clear via either a direct visitation/communication and/or a miracle. But then it wouldn't be "belief" - it would just be objective knowledge which would probably be less motivational than the objective knowledge that 2+2=4. There's something to be said, I think, for having to make the leap to believe in something that we cannot objectively verify. As LM points out in the introduction to her talk:

President Harold B. Lee (1899–1973) said about testimony that, “your heart tells you things your mind doesn’t know” (Speeches of the Year, 1973, 101).