Today's Maxwell Quote

From All These Things Shall Give Thee Experience (1980), 36-37:

In this third category of suffering and tribulation, believers sometimes suffer "for righteousness' sake" and "because of the word." (Matthew 5:10; 1 Peter 3:14; Matthew 13:21.)

We also sometimes suffer for the "name of Christ" and "as a Christian" and, ironically, for "well doing" and "for the cross of Christ." (1 Peter 4:14, 16; 1 Peter 3:17; Galatians 6:12.)

Our very blessings contain within them some of our tribulations. President Joseph F. Smith observed that there never was a people who were guided by revelation, or united of the Lord as His people, who were not persecuted and hated by the wicked and corrupt. (Gospel Doctrine, p. 46.)

It appears to be important that all who will can come to know "the fellowship of his sufferings." (Philippians 3:10.) At times, we are taken to the very edge of our faith; we teeter at the edge of our trust. Perhaps, even as Jesus did on the cross, we in our own small way may feel forgotten and forsaken. To go to the very edge is possible, of course, only when we believe in an omniscient and omnipotent God. When we understand that all things are present before His eyes and that He knows all things past, present, and future, then we can trust ourselves to Him as we clearly could not to a less than omniscient god who is off somewhere in the firmament doing further research. (D&C 38:2; Moses 1:6.) "The Lord knoweth all things from the beginning; wherefore, he prepareth a way to accomplish all his works among the children of men; for behold, he hath all power unto the fulfilling of all his words." (1 Nephi 9:6.)