S. Michael Wilcox - The Way Back to Heaven: The Parable of the Crystal Stairs

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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Wilcox, S. Michael, author.

The way back to heaven : the parable of the crystal stairs / S. Michael Wilcox.

pages cm

Includes bibliographical references and index.

ISBN 978-1-60907-905-5 (hardbound : alk. paper)

1. SalvationMormon Church. 2. The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day SaintsDoctrines. 3. Mormon ChurchDoctrines. I. Title.

BX8643.S25W55 2015

234dc232014045036

Printed in the United States of America

Publishers Printing, Salt Lake City, UT

10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

To the woman who waits at the top of the stairs

Also by S. Michael Wilcox

Books

• Dont Leap with the Sheep: And Other Scriptural Strategies for Avoiding Satans Snares
• Face to Face: Seeking a Personal Relationship with God
• Finding Hope: Where to Look for Gods Help
• Fire in the Bones: William Tyndale, Martyr, Father of the English Bible
• House of Glory: Finding Personal Meaning in the Temple
• Land of Promise: Images of Book of Mormon Lands
• Sunset: On the Passing of Those We Love
• The Ten-Day Daughter
• 10 Great Souls I Want to Meet in Heaven
• Walking on Water and Other Classic Messages
• What the Scriptures Teach Us about Adversity
• What the Scriptures Teach Us about Prosperity
• What the Scriptures Teach Us about Raising a Child
• When Your Prayers Seem Unanswered
• Who Shall Be Able to Stand? Finding Personal Meaning in the Book of Revelation

Talks on CD

• The Fourth Watch: Receiving Divine Help When Your Prayers Seem Unanswered
• House of Glory: Finding Personal Meaning in the Temple
• How Will I Know? Making the Marriage Decision
• The Jesus We Need to Know
• King Noah Blindness and the Vision of Seers
• The Michael Wilcox Collection
• Of Lions, Dragons, and Turkish Delight: C. S. Lewis for Latter-day Saints
• Seeing as God Sees: Discovering the Wonder of Ourselves and Others
• Walking on Water: When the Lord Asks the Impossible
• When All Eternity Shook

Whoso cometh in at the gate

And climbeth up by me

Shall never fall

Moses 7:53

And he dreamed, and behold

A ladder set up on the earth,

And the top of it reached to heaven

Genesis 28:12

Introduction

The Power of Parable

I have multiplied visions,

And used similitudes.

Hosea 12:10

Sometime in my early lifein the dawning of my awareness that God had truths to share with me, and goodness to instill within me, and beauty to show me if I would listen, and be open, and observeI received, in a few brief moments of internal seeing, a key to life. It came in a series of images somewhat like a parableThe Parable of the Crystal Stairsand I have learned from it ever since. God is a gracious and a giving God. As my life progressed, I came to view with greater clarity and appreciation the interior landscape that played out in the creative drama of my mind, and was able to more thoughtfully apply its realities to the lives and experiences around me.

Perceptions given or enhanced by the Spirit are living things and grow continually throughout our lives. Their ability to guide and grant truth never diminishes. This is especially true of the scriptures and of the temple, and particularly true of the figurative, the symbol, the story, the similitude, the parable. That is the way of God. That is part of what it means to be infinite. God always runs ahead of our needs and, in his anticipatory seeing, prepares the way. Our job is to pay attention, to remember, and then to draw strength, insight, and intelligence from lifes encounters, Gods gifts, and past endowments of mercy. We then come to understanding, recognition, and, above all, wakefulness. In that wakefulness we learn to be compassionate, to be kind, to show mercy, to love, and to be non-judgingto want as our deepest desire to think and feel and see just as Christ and the Father do.

The Parable of the Crystal Stairs has one dominant, clarifying visionthere is only one way to get to heaven. This sounds obvious, but it is remarkable how many people have uncertainty about it, either in an unexamined, overconfident feeling that their way is the way, to the exclusion of all others, or in believing it doesnt much matter, as all roads lead to Rome, or they are simply apathetic or agnostic. To find that singular way back to heaven is humanitys highest searching. I am a Latter-day Saint speaking to Latter-day Saints, and though we may feel quite comfortable on our pathand with our planif were not careful well miss the whole point and get lost in the details of living a Mormon life. I fear too many of us live in a lingering sense of inadequacy and misty guilt, weights from which we would be liberated. Jesus came to show us not only how to climb but also how to remove the burdens we will allow Him to remove so that the stairs rising before us may not seem so insurmountable.

Ultimately I have come to believe that the climbthe ascent up the crystal stairshas more to do with being and becoming than believing and doing. For me, that is the essential, never-to-be-forgotten truth. They are deeply interwoven but do not balance equally across the beam when weighed. Being and becoming almost always lead to correct and proper believing and doing, but the reversal of those positions does not necessarily hold true. We will explore this. People are usually somewhat surprised to learn that faith, in its earliest definition, seemed not so much centered on our assenting to a set of statements about Gods nature and our relation to Him as much as it was focused on creating our characterthe way we see and treat others, our pattern of thinking, and the quality of our soul. The stairs are there to help us on our upward journey; we all have different steps on which to work. All are beautiful when mastered. Those that are easy for you may be a lifelong struggle for me. In a sense, the placement and sequence of the stairs are individualized for us in our Fathers grand mercy and wisdom. We also all carry with us various bundles and packages which we must part with if our climb is to be successful. Those can be painful and soul-stretching moments. I have stared into the contents of my own burdens with both a desire for release and a tenacious grip that whispers, In time, yes, but not now. Yet the stairs forever beckon and we would be home.