Elder Kevin J. Hathaway, a General Authority Seventy, opened with a string of questions: “Have you ever felt left out, wondered if you were enough, lost someone you loved, faced illness, experienced family difficulties, or carried a burden no one else could see?” His message: Jesus Christ delivers the righteous from these and every other affliction of mortality. Because the Savior descended below all things and suffered “pains and afflictions and temptations of every kind” (Alma 7:11–12), He comprehends our suffering, is filled with mercy, and knows how to succor us. “His deliverance is certain; the question for most righteous followers is not if He will deliver but how and when He will do so.”
His family experienced both trial and deliverance as they drove in two cars to begin service as mission leaders. In a construction zone, two large tires came loose from a semi-truck and struck both cars at high speed. Airbags deployed, the cars were destroyed, and they were left stranded on the roadside wondering why this had happened when we had left everything to serve the Lord. In that moment the Spirit brought peace that everything would be all right. They were not immediately delivered, but the assurance gave them hope, and with help from many people they began their mission on time and without serious injury.
From that freeway experience he drew a scriptural pattern of divine deliverance in four parts. First, opposition brings heart-rending questions and emotions. It comes to all, even the righteous, as with Joseph Smith’s cry in Liberty Jail, “O God, where art thou?” (D&C 121:1), or the grief and fear of Helaman’s stripling warriors (Alma 56–58). Such questions and emotions are not sin or weakness. They create a sacred space where agency is activated and we choose whether to turn toward Jesus.
Second, sincere seeking invites assurances. Seeking means turning to the Father and the Son through heartfelt prayer, purposeful fasting, and scripture study. Alma’s people in bondage “began to cry mightily to God” (Mosiah 24:10). King Darius fasted through the night awaiting Daniel’s deliverance from the lions’ den (Daniel 6:18). As we humbly and patiently keep our covenants, the Savior visits us in our afflictions with assurances of peace, faith, and hope.
He told of Sister Kenzie Brinkerhoff, one of his missionaries. On her last preparation day, her father, Kelly, called early in the morning to tell her he loved her, was proud of her, and was excited to hug her soon. Driving home from work that night, he was killed in an accident. When Elder and Sister Hathaway arrived, she asked through tears, “President, how could this happen when I was one week away from hugging my dad?” Weeks later she told him: “The past few weeks have been the most awful and the most sacred time in my life. I have never clung so tightly to my covenants. I know that Jesus knows what this feels like, and He will heal me.”
Third, Christ’s grace enables us to endure and grow. Enabled enduring strengthens us to “cheerfully do all things that lie in our power” and then stand still, with the utmost assurance to see the salvation of God (D&C 123:17). “This grace does not remove the pain and difficulty of affliction; it is an enabling power that allows us, after all we can do, to receive divine strength beyond our own and lay hold on eternal promises through Jesus Christ.” As Kenzie binds herself to God through prayer, obedience, and covenant keeping, He helps her endure what she cannot bear alone, and that grace is available to all who turn to Him.
Fourth, deliverance comes in the Savior’s time and way. As we wait upon Him, needed growth and spiritual stretching come, and He consecrates our afflictions for our gain (2 Nephi 2:2). He testified: The Lord is not delayed, distracted, or derelict in his deliverance. He has not forgotten you. He does not take joy in your suffering. But lessons learned while waiting can bring converting growth that an earlier rescue might not.
What about when the hour seems too late, the loss too final, and deliverance appears impossible? Jairus surely felt that when he heard his daughter had died. But Jesus said, “Be not afraid, only believe” (Mark 5:36), and Jairus watched Him raise her, showing that no mortal timeline can place us beyond Christ’s power to deliver. Elder Hathaway quoted Elder Patrick Kearon: “Jesus specializes in the seemingly impossible. He came here to make the impossible possible, the irredeemable redeemable, to heal the unhealable, to right the unrightable, to promise the unpromisable. And He’s really good at it. In fact, He’s perfect at it.”
To all still facing pain, fear, and loneliness, he echoed the Savior: “Be not afraid, only believe.” Some miracles are immediate, some come after long waiting, and some await the life to come. He invited us to hear, believe, and act on the Great Deliverer’s words: “I will seek that which was lost, and bring again that which was driven away, and will bind up that which was broken, and will strengthen that which was sick” (Ezekiel 34:16). He testified that Jesus Christ is the Great Deliverer, now and forever.
