Jeffrey R. Holland - To Mothers

Art direction by Richard Erickson

Cover and interior design by Sheryl Dickert Smith

Cover and interior images Shutterstock/Curly Pat/Irtsya

Book design 2016 Deseret Book Company

2016 Jeffrey R. Holland and Patricia T. Holland

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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

(CIP data on file)

ISBN 978-1-62972-211-5

Printed in the United States of America

Publishers Printing, Salt Lake City, UT

10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

Prophesying of the Saviors Atonement, Isaiah wrote, He hath borne our griefs, and carried our sorrows (Isaiah 53:4). A majestic latter-day vision emphasized that [Jesus] came into the world... to bear the sins of the world (D&C 76:41). Both ancient and modern scripture testify that He redeemed them, and bore them, and carried them all the days of old (see Isaiah 63:9; D&C 133:53). A favorite hymn pleads with us to Hear your great Delivrers voice! (Israel, Israel, God Is Calling, Hymns [1985], no. 7).

Bear, borne, carry, deliver. These are powerful, heartening messianic words. They convey help and hope for safe movement from where we are to where we need to bebut cannot get without assistance. These words also connote burden, struggle, and fatigue; words most appropriate in describing the mission of Him who, at unspeakable cost, lifts us up when we have fallen, carries us forward when strength is gone, delivers us safely home when safety seems far beyond our reach. My Father sent me, He said, that I might be lifted up upon the cross;... that as I have been lifted up... even so should men be lifted up... to... me (3 Nephi 27:14).

But can you detect in this language another arena of human endeavor in which we use words like bear and borne, carry and lift, labor and deliver? As Jesus said to John while in the very act of Atonement, so He says to us all, Behold thy mother! (John 19:27).

I echo sentiments that have been expressed before when I say that no love in mortality comes closer to approximating the pure love of Jesus Christ than the selfless love a devoted mother has for her child. When Isaiah, speaking messianically, wanted to convey Jehovahs love, he invoked the image of a mothers devotion. Can a woman forget her sucking child? he asks. How absurd, he implies, though not as absurd as thinking Christ will ever forget us (Isaiah 49:15).

This kind of resolute love suffereth long, and is kind... seeketh not her own... but... beareth all things, believeth all things, hopeth all things, endureth all things (Moroni 7:45; 1 Corinthians 13:47). Most encouraging of all, such fidelity never faileth (Moroni 7:46; 1 Corinthians 13:8). For the mountains shall depart and the hills be removed, Jehovah said, but my kindness shall not depart from thee (3 Nephi 22:10; see also Isaiah 54:10). So, too, say our mothers.

You see, it is not only that they bear us but they continue bearing with us. It is not only the prenatal carrying but the lifelong carrying that makes mothering such a staggering feat. Of course there are heartbreaking exceptions, but most mothers know intuitively, instinctively that this is a sacred trust of the highest order. The weight of that realization, especially on young maternal shoulders, can be very daunting.

A wonderful young mother recently wrote to me, How is it that a human being can love a child so deeply that you willingly give up a major portion of your freedom for it? How can mortal love be so strong that you voluntarily subject yourself to responsibility, vulnerability, anxiety, and heartache and just keep coming back for more of the same? What kind of mortal love can make you feel, once you have a child, that your life is never, ever your own again? Maternal love has to be divine. There is no other explanation for it. What mothers do is an essential element of Christs work. Knowing that should be enough to tell us the impact of such love will range between unbearable and transcendent, over and over again, until with the safety and salvation of the very last child on earth, we can [then] say with Jesus, [Father!] I have finished the work which thou gavest me to do (John 17:4).

With the elegance of that letter echoing in our minds, let me share three experiences reflecting the majestic influence of mothers:

My first account is a cautionary one, reminding us that not every maternal effort has a storybook ending, at least not immediately. That reminder stems from my conversation with a beloved friend of more than fifty years who was dying outside the faith and away from this Church he knew in his heart to be true. No matter how much I tried to comfort him, I could not seem to bring him peace. Finally he leveled with me. Jeff, he said, however painful it is going to be for me to stand before God, I cannot bear the thought of standing before my mother. The gospel and her children meant everything to her. I know I have broken her heart, and that is breaking mine.

Now, I am absolutely certain that upon his passing his mother received my friend with open, loving arms; that is what parents do. But the cautionary portion of this story is that children can break their mothers hearts. Here, too, we see another comparison with the divine. I need not remind us that Jesus died of a broken heart, one weary and worn out from bearing the sins of the world. So, in any moment of temptation, may we behold [our] mother as well as our Savior and spare them both the sorrow of our sinning.

Second, I speak of a young man who entered the mission field worthily, but by his own choice returned home early due to same-sex attraction and some trauma he experienced in that regard. He was still worthy, but his faith was at crisis level, his emotional burden grew ever heavier, and his spiritual pain was more and more profound. He was by turns hurt, confused, angry, and desolate.

His mission president, his stake president, his bishop spent countless hours searching and weeping and blessing him as they held on to him, but much of his wound was so personal that he kept at least parts of it beyond their reach. The beloved father in this story poured his entire soul into helping this child, but his very demanding employment circumstance meant that often the long, dark nights of the soul were faced by just this boy and his mother. Day and night, first for weeks, then for months that turned into years, they sought healing together. Through periods of bitterness (mostly his but sometimes hers) and unending fear (mostly hers but sometimes his), she boretheres that beautiful, burdensome word againto her son her testimony of Gods power, of His gospel, of His Church, but especially of His love for this child. In the same breath she testified of her own uncompromised, undying love for him as well. To bring together those two absolutely crucial, essential pillars of her very existencethe gospel of Jesus Christ and her familyshe poured out her soul in prayer endlessly. She fasted and wept, she wept and fasted, then she listened and listened as this son repeatedly told her of how his heart was breaking. Thus she carried himagainonly this time it was not for nine months. This time she thought that laboring through the battered landscape of his despair would take forever.