President Jeffrey R. Holland lifts spirits of Southern Californians devastated by wildfires
VAN NUYS, Calif. — President Jeffrey R. Holland looked across the faces Saturday of scores of Southern California Latter-day Saints who recently lost their homes and most of their possessions to recent wildfires.
He assured them that he and his fellow apostolic leaders of The Church of Jesus Christ are praying for them daily.
And then, emphatically, he assured them again.
'We pray for you every day,' he said. 'We pray for you in private. We pray for you in our own apostolic circle. And we pray for you in public meetings like this.
'We know something of the challenges that exist around the world — and there are many, many in distant places, as well as California.
'And we know something about the challenges in each of our own lives.'
Last month's devastating Los Angeles-area wildfires consumed the homes of dozens of Latter-day Saint families from the Pacific Palisades and Altadena communities. Many others remain displaced.
On Saturday, President Holland visited the capacity-filled San Fernando California Stake Center to share support and spiritual counsel — while lifting the spirits of many who remain physically overwhelmed and emotionally spent.
In a nearly hourlong message fueled by emotion, tenderness and humor, President Holland, the church's Acting President of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles, reminded his vast audience of the vitalness of prayer and service.
Find strength in one's faith, he added — and then go look out for one another.
President Holland was joined Saturday by Elder Mark A. Bragg, a General Authority Seventy and president of the church's North America West Area — along with Elder Bragg's wife, Sister Yvonne Bragg.
Prayer is needed more than ever before, said President Holland.
'An event like we've faced here brings out prayers across the land; across the globe — but it surely will bring them out as family-to-family and friend-to-friend and neighbor-to-neighbor,' he said.
'We can offer those prayers before an event happens — and we surely offer them with you after they happen.'
Sometimes during difficult times, all one can do is cry with loved ones — at least at the beginning.
'I don't know whether a meeting like this means anything to you, but it means a lot to us,' said President Holland. 'We cry with you, we pray with you. You're not isolated. You're not forgotten. The brotherhood and sisterhood of the Saints is a real thing — a true promise.
'And we do this across the church.'
President Holland shared several 'tips or words of encouragement' that can help sustain the Los Angeles-area Latter-day Saints and their neighbors at an unsettling time.
First, he said, 'God loves us.'
Next, he added, 'Don't spend needless time asking, 'Why?'.'
And why do tragic, heart wrenching things happen? 'Generally, we don't know,' answered President Holland.
Questions, he added, often arrive without answers.
Perhaps such unanswerable questions seek meaning to wildfires in Southern California. Or they could be questions about Latter-day Saint history. They could be family questions or questions about a job loss and money difficulties.
'When we have questions to which we don't know the answer, then we cling tenaciously and never yield on what we do know,' taught President Holland. 'We do know that God is our Father. God is good. God is merciful. God is kind. God is all those things with all those virtues that we're supposed to reach toward.'
Seek patience — and keep one's life 'free from the love of mammon' and be content with what one has, he added.
Life can be arduous. It's rarely an easy journey.
But 'our Father in Heaven is not going to give us less love — but more,' said President Holland.
'Walk and talk and be and assume and project the life of the Savior in our own. That's the deal. That's what we talked about back before we came here. Christ was the model. Christ was the example.
'He wouldn't ask us to do one single, solitary thing that He had not experienced.'
Christ takes his people to the 'great feast in heaven' — and pays for it all.
If people follow him, promised President Holland, God will speak to them.
'He whispers to us in our pleasure. He speaks to us through our conscience. He shouts to us in our pain.'
The Southern California fires were a megaphone to the deaf world, he added.
'God is asking us to listen. To pray more. To be in communication more. To know more. And to take the steps more and better.'
The Southern California fires are also reminders that life is replete with loss, turbulence, challenges and disappointments.
'But what we have to remember is that God loves us,' he said. 'He is good. He is merciful. There is a plan. ... We call it the plan of salvation. We call it the plan of happiness. We call it the plan of mercy. We call it the plan of justice. We call it the plan of the gospel.'
A recurring element of that plan often involved being broken, added President Holland.
'It takes broken clouds to generate rain. It takes rain over a broken earth to grow grain. It takes broken grain to make bread. It takes broken bread to feed us.
'These are the cycles of life.'
The Lord, he continued, loves broken things.
'The greatest offering we can make to him is a broken heart and a contrite spirit, and he gives us this chance,' said President Holland. 'I don't think he creates them. I don't think he forces them on us. I don't think that when we have a hard day, it's God's fault if we're trying to live the gospel.
'But he turns those to an educational experience. He turns those to accepting a broken dream, a broken heart, a broken home, a broken child — and he says: 'Put it on the altar'.'
God's people will stumble up to the altar with their broken elements. 'And if we're honest and pure and contrite and trying — we get back perfect.
'It's worth the journey. It's worth the trip. It's worth the challenge, the sorrow and the sadness, — because it all comes true in the end.'
President Holland concluded Saturday by sharing an apostolic blessing with all gathered in the crowded stake center.
'I bless you, everyone, with every righteous desire of your heart,' he said.
'It would seem that almost no age of holy scripture can be turned to in which it does not say: 'Ask and it shall be given. Seek and ye shall find. Knock and it shall be opened unto you.
'We don't have a stopwatch on when that will happen — but that is repeated time after time after time after time.'
The recent wildfires trigger deep emotions for the Braggs, who are both Los Angeles natives.
On Saturday, Sister Bragg called the disaster's aftermath a deciding moment 'where we need to remember to have care, comfort and concern for ourselves — and care, comfort and concern for our friends and loved ones around us.
'This is where we lean on the firm declaration of our faith. Where we put our complete trust in the Lord.'
Elder Bragg, meanwhile, said he is watching the Los Angeles-area members bless each other, their neighborhoods and their communities.
'I've never seen a group of individuals go through such trauma — and their first thought was to see how they could bless others,' he said. 'That is what I will remember about this time in our lives: Seeing you take care of one another so beautifully.'
Continue to offer empathy and compassion to all in need, added Elder Bragg.
'As we draw close to (Christ), we can be an instrument in His hands to go and bless others — just as Christ has done. Just as He does. Just as He will continue to do, until we are safely home.'
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