Freedom

On this fourth of July, I find my thoughts turned to the freedom and liberty that we have as a people. I am thankful and humbled to live in this time on earth where I do not have to pay such a high price for the freedom that I so effortlessly enjoy. I couldn't imagine what it must have been like for the Pilgrims and all of the others who left their homes and the land they knew, to search for a better life where they could freely worship without the hand of injustice upon them. I couldn't imagine what it would have been like to send my husband out to fight only to hope and pray that he would come home trimuphantly, even against all odds.

I couldn't imagine what it must have been like to have finally found a place where I could worship without ridicule and then to find out how untrue that would be as my family and fellow saints would be kicked out of our homes over and over again. As mobs would pursue us, destroy our temple, kill our prophet, and leave us with nothing except faith and hope that freedom would come in the Lord's time. I couldn't imagine having to walk 1, 280 miles across mountains, freezing rivers, and snow-covered prairies in order to search for the freedom that was so forcefully taken. And even today, I couldn't imagine how difficult and painful it must be to send a husband out to fight a war that doesn't have an end in sight. It is in moments such as these, that I realize that freedom is a gift, a gift from a loving Heavenly Father. It is a gift that comes with pain, sorrow, joy, suffering, peace, and triumph.

Today as I was reading my scriptures, I came to the part in Mormon where Mormoni finds himself alone. The Nephites have been defeated and all chances of his freedom seem to be lost, but then he writes the words of his father and in this verse I learned what freedom really is..."Know ye that ye must come to the knowledge of your fathers, and repent of all your sins and iniquities, and believe in Jesus Christ, that he is the Son of God, and that he was slain by the Jews, and by the power of the Father he hath risen again, whereby he hath gained the victory..." Freedom is knowing that the ultimate price has been paid. That in and through our Lord and Savior we will come to know that freedom from sin is the ultimate form of freedom. A freedom that will always and forever be a victory. A victory that allows each of us to someday return home triumphantly.