Assets and Liabilities

Walking around the park this morning I was pondering the words of the prophet Ammon in the Book of Mormon as he was rejoicing in the Lord and as he described the challenges that they faced, but also the success they had found.  As I listened to him declare his love for the Lord I asked myself, “Amber, are you an asset or a liability to the Lord?”

That was a loaded question.

As much as I wanted to say, “I’m an asset in the Lord’s battalion!,” my heart was a little more honest. I had that internal shrug and I thought to myself, how I wish I were a little more on the side of asset and and little less of a liability. How easily I succumb to the frailties of man and how often God drags me through life in a manner I’m not proud of.

Another conversation entered my mind from a class I had recently attended.  One of the class members spoke about the experience of a boss and his employee.  Imagine one of your employees made a mistake that caused your business to lose a substantial amount of money- thousands maybe hundreds of thousands of dollars.  Do you fire that employee or do you keep them on your team?  What they have done was an extremely costly mistake for your business, but could losing them cost you more?  Do you take the risk of hiring a new employee with the realization that they may in turn make the same mistake and again cost you substantial loss, OR do you capitalize on what they have learned by way of experience?  Have they now become one of your greatest assets, whose worth is incalculable to the success of your team because of their liability?

With truthful admittance I found myself feeling much like the disappointing employee... but a loving Father reminded me of how great His plan is.  We come to earth to have a hard time.  We come to earth to fail.  We come to earth to gut wrenchingly succumb to our weaknesses over and over and over again.  We come to earth to disappoint people.  We come to earth to be surrounded by darkness that feels like it won’t lift, and temptations that rock our core and we lose.  But God’s plan doesn’t stop at what is lost, He sent a Savior- who’s first miracle ever recorded was a miracle of transformation... that of turning water to wine.  Through His love and infinite atonement, our water- that which oft times feels like a medium of drowning, is changed into wine- a symbol of the miracle of His atoning sacrifice.  It is our liabilities that give us worth because of the power they hold to bear witness of Him.

Joseph Smith was in the grips of a force of darkness just before the heavens opened to him.  Just before being nearly consumed by the darkness, God the Father appeared to him.  Those wrestling moments ushered in the dispensation of the fullness of times when Joseph would become one of God’s greatest assets.  So too must must we have dark moments which in turn become incalculable assets.

So today I am thankful for a merciful plan.  And for the first miracle- 

“So Jesus came again into Cana of Galilee, where he made the water wine.”

May His miracle come again, and again and again to all of us, His hallowed liabilities.