The Crucible of Doubt: Reflections on the Quest for Faith

by Terryl L. Givens

Abandoning our faith because it doesn’t answer all the questions would be like closing the shutters because we can’t see the entire mountain. We know in part, Paul said, looking for the flickering flame to give us a glimpse of the way ahead in the gloom. With Nephi, we readily confess: “I know that [God] loveth his children; nevertheless, I do not know the meaning of all things.”30 We know more than we think, even if we know less than we would like.

What if we saw them as opportunities to bear with one another in all our infirmities and ineptitude? What if we saw the mediocre talk, the overbearing counselor, the lesson read straight from the manual, as a lay member’s equivalent of the widow’s mite? A humble offering, perhaps, but one to be measured in terms of the capacity of the giver rather than in the value received.

The question may remain, how does one lock onto the propositional assertions of a restored gospel that is also laden with claims about gold plates and the Book of Abraham and a male priesthood and a polygamous past and a thousand other details we may find difficult? Perhaps, with those five core ideas in mind, one might focus on the message rather than the messenger. One might consider that the contingencies of history and culture and the human element will always constitute the garment in which God’s word and will are clothed. And one might refuse to allow our desire for the perfect to be the enemy of the present good. Finally, we might ask ourselves, with the early disciples, “to whom [else] shall we go?”