The Hope of a Glorious Resurrection

 Of all my posts on this blog, this one is perhaps the most important. The experience I am going to tell you about is the one in which my faith in Christ has been the most needed and was the only thing to bring peace and joy. 

Today would be my grandma's 75th birthday. It's been 11 years since she passed away. I was 13. She was my best friend, and I thought my world would end when she died.

Growing up, I had been taught about the resurrection of the dead and the sealing power that bound families on Earth and through the eternities. I had always believed that my parents and teachers weren't lying to me. I had always hoped it was true. But starting that night, I needed it to be true. I clung to my hope desperately. I needed to know that I would see my grandma again, and that she would be my grandma when I did. That she would hug me and hold me and whisper in my ear "I love you", just like she did when she was alive. That she would wrap her arms around me and never let go.

Over time, through study and prayer and deep reflection, my hope and faith have changed from a desperate cling to a confident hold. 

I have a firm belief in the Atonement of Jesus Christ and the power of resurrection. I have a firm belief in the sealing power, which binds families on earth and through all eternity. Without Christ's atoning sacrifice and priesthood power, all is lost.

 I have faith, belief, knowledge that all is not lost, that death is not final, that families can be together forever. I have no fear in death, because I know what waits on the other side. My grandma. My family. My Savior.

"And there were gathered together in one place an innumerable company of the spirits of the just, who had been faithful in the testimony of Jesus while they lived in mortality;

And who had offered sacrifice in the similitude of the great sacrifice of the Son of God, and had suffered tribulation in their Redeemer’s name.

All these had departed the mortal life, firm in the hope of a glorious resurrection, through the grace of God the Father and his Only Begotten Son, Jesus Christ."  (Doctrine and Covenants 138:12-14, emphasis added)

I will see my grandma again. And when I do, she will hug me and hold me and whisper in my ear "I love you", just like she did when we were here on Earth. And she will wrap her arms around me, and I'll hold her tight and never let go.