Page 39 - Berg_Mortuary_Bishops_Guide

BERG MORTUARY 39
sorrow and that He can point forward with joy and satisfaction to those blessings that are to
come through obedience to the Gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ, for we do understand and we
do have conviction that it is the will of our Father in heaven that we shall live on and that we

have not finished our existence when these bodies of mortality are laid away in the grave.
It is a very great blessing that in the providences at the Lord and in the revelations that have
been given by our Father in heaven, we have the assurance that the spirit and the body, in due
time, will be reunited, notwithstanding the unbelief that there is in the world today—and there
certainly is great skepticism and unbelief in relation to this matter. But notwithstanding this, we
have assurance through the revelations that have been given by the Lord our God, that that is the
purpose of God, that the body and the spirit shall be eternally united and that there will come
a time, through the blessing and mercy of God, when we will no more have sorrow but when

we shall have conquered all of these things that are of a trying and distressing character and shall
stand up in the presence of the living God, filled with joy and peace and satisfaction.

THE LORD STRENGTHENS US AS WE ACKNOWLED GE HIS HAND
AND ACCEPT HIS WILL,

There are very many things in this world that are inexplicable. It is a difficult thing for me to
understand why in the providences of the Lord,… the only two boys I had should both be
called away and that my name should end with me so far as this world is concerned. On the
other hand, the Gospel is at such an uplifting character that, notwithstanding the loss of these
two sons, I have never had the least complaint in my heart nor felt to find fault. There is some-

thing about the Gospel that causes men and women to acknowledge God in life and death, in
joy and sorrow, in prosperity and in adversity. The Lord has said that he is pleased with those
only who acknowledge his hand in all things [see D5.C 59:2l].
I can testify of my absolute knowledge that nothing short of the Spirit of the Lord ever could
have brought the peace and comfort to me which I experienced at the time of [my son] Heber’s
death. I am naturally affectionate in my disposition. I loved my last and only living son with
all my heart. I had [built] great hopes on what I expected him to accomplish. I expected to see

him a missionary proclaiming the gospel of Jesus Christ, and I hoped that he might live to be a
power for good upon the earth; and yet, notwithstanding all these aspirations that I had for my
boy, I was able, because of the blessings of the Lord, to see him die without shedding a tear. No
power on earth could have given to me this peace. It was of God. And I can never speak of it or
write of it without feelings of gratitude filling my heart, far beyond any power with which I am
endowed to express my feelings.

May we always remember, because it is both true and comforting, that the death of a faith-