Me Thinks

A lot of the time our family texts are humorous, but today a family member posed a deep question:

"I know that the power of the Atonement covers sins and afflictions of all kinds.  What I am trying to understand is why we still feel grief and pain even after we've used the atonement. When I repent of sins I usually feel completely free from the guilt and shame, but when I ask for the Atoning power to comfort me in times of grief or sadness, it doesn't just go away. The situation improves, but sometimes the grief lasts for years. If Christ suffered for those things, why do those feelings still remain? Why do the scriptures talk about being 'made whole' if some of the pain is still left behind? I don't want this question to come off as me doubting the atonement."

Responses:

My initial thought would be that pain and suffering are an essential aspect of mortality, so we can't totally be relieved of that without losing the necessary lessons and refining that come from enduring the hard parts of life.  When I've experienced grief, disappointment, or sadness the atonement has lessened my pain and despair but it hasn't fully taken it away--probably because that particular struggle is something  necessary for me to experience while on earth.  But I have felt the atonement buoy me up enough to survive the rough times.  

We come to know the Savior and His sacrifice better by getting a taste of suffering. As far as actually getting past it and being able to leave it behind--I think we still will be made whole for all of that, but maybe not in mortality.  Like a physical ailment that can last a lifetime, some things we endure and feel all through our lives and hope for completion and perfection in the future.

I worry that if all pain and grief were completely taken, my memory would fade and I would fall back into the same bad decisions.

Healing from pain is a gradual process, and I think we are continuously being made closer to whole through the atonement.

I am in a very odd position because I have several women my age who are friends of mine, who have lost their husbands.  I have been told that some of them cry every single day, even though their husbands passed well over a year ago. The pain is part of mortality.  The pain is the price that is paid because they loved so deeply.  The atonement has not taken every ounce of grief and pain away from them, but it has softened it, and each of the ladies have been blessed, as they have turned to the Savior, with spiritual power to go forward in their lives. I think that as they walk through the remainder of their days here on earth, they will always feel somewhat incomplete without their spouse by their side, but the hope in Christ that they carry in their hearts makes possible their being whole again.

"Salvation is not a cheap experience. Salvation never was easy. How could we believe it would be easy for us when it was never, every easy for Him? It is supposed to require some effort, something from the depths of our soul." (Jeffrey Holland, "Missionary Work and the Atonement," October 2001)

"Sometimes suffering comes to the righteous too. When we promise to walk in His footsteps, and be His disciples, we are promising to go where that divine path leads us.  And the path of salvation has always led one way or another through Gethsemane.  So if the Savior faced such injustices and discouragements, such persecutions, unrighteousness and suffering, we cannot expect that we are not going to face some of that if we still intend to call ourselves His true disciples and faithful followers. However heavy our load might be, it would be a lot heavier if the Savior had not gone that way before us and carried that burden with us and for us." (Jeffrey R. Holland, "Lessons from Liberty Jail," September 2009)

I see the Atonement's enabling power to include the enhanced ability to establish and maintain perspective.  And that perspective doesn't necessarily remove the sting but rather dulls it. And as our faith grows we are better able to endure, even joyfully.