Belief Comes First

by Autumn Dickson

In the chapters this week in Mosiah, we learn about the rising generation who did not believe in the word of God. They had not been around in the time of King Benjamin, and so they didn’t have the same experiences as their parents. There is one verse in there that really has me pondering some of the ways I have framed the gospel in my mind.

Mosiah 26:3 And now because of their unbelief they could not understand the word of God; and their hearts were hardened.

They couldn’t understand the word of God because they didn’t believe, not the other way around. As I’ve tried to engage with some of my loved ones and strangers over the church, I have held onto the belief that if I could simply help them understand, they would believe. Apparently this is a fallacy. If you want to understand God and His plan and His choices amongst the children of men, belief actually comes first.

As I look back on my own life, I realize that this is exactly how things work. When I have reached any new understanding of gospel doctrine, belief preceded it.

Being aware of the fact that belief precedes understanding can help us know how to approach the gospel personally and with others.

Reasoning has a place

We live in a world of sophistry, both in temporal and spiritual matters. In temporal matters, it can make sense to engage. I actually read an entire book once about the fact that America was built on argumentation and that effective argumentation can actually bring us closer to our goals. If we can avoid turning those who disagree with us into enemies, disagreement is beautiful because it gives us opportunities to engage, listen, and evolve.

When it comes to spiritual matters, reasoning, disagreements, and discussion absolutely have their place. I work with FAIR, and a huge basis for their work is apologetics. For a long time, their entire purpose was to respectfully argue against critics and help people see a wider perspective. They’ve helped so many people better understand issues and history. We absolutely should discuss, explore, and question. The more I engage with doctrine, the more it has made sense to me and strengthened my testimony.

But in the end, belief has to come first. Understanding will come. But belief is a precursor to that understanding.

Belief first

I know that the idea of “believing first” is ridiculous to some, but let’s talk about what I actually mean when I say that belief needs to come first. I don’t mean, “Ignore the things you don’t understand and may even feel harmful. Just believe because I’m telling you that it’s good for you.” This is not what I mean by belief. In order to understand what I mean when I say “belief first,” you have to understand the transition I went through in my own faith.

When I have run into things that don’t make sense or when I run into things in the church that even seem hurtful, I have approached those uncomfortable feelings in a myriad of ways. If I’m being totally honest, when I was growing up, I simply didn’t approach them at all. I just pushed them to the back of my mind and forced myself to “have faith.” In case you were wondering, this wasn’t exactly effective. Sure, I held on for a while, but looking back, I can see that this approach couldn’t have lasted.

After my period of ignoring things I didn’t understand, I tried to hold onto testimony moments. This meant that I held onto moments where I had felt something beyond myself. These were good stepping stones that pushed me in the right direction, but they were ultimately insufficient in the long term. There were too many questions about whether I was feeling good old-fashioned nostalgia or truly feeling something that was given to me by my Heavenly Father.

And though holding onto testimony moments would have been ultimately insufficient for my personal testimony, this process allowed me to build the foundation for what has really helped me develop a resilience against Satan fighting me with things that I don’t understand or don’t have answers to.

Just over four years ago, I started the blog, and that’s when things really changed. I consistently speak with my Heavenly Father, and He responds. Now when I run into things I don’t understand, they can still bother me. However, I simultaneously can’t deny what’s right in front of me. I speak with God, and He answers back. That is as real to me as the things I don’t understand. Why place the reality of my concerns over the reality of my relationship with God? He has helped me find peace, helped me to understand, and proved His trustworthiness to me a million times over. I trust Him. I believe Him. Utilizing testimony moments to help build the foundation for this relationship was a big step, but I ultimately had to bring my relationship into the present. I had to talk to Him consistently in order to achieve this feeling of belief.

A concrete example

I have been married for seven years. Though this isn’t really that long, it has been long enough to solidify my trust in my husband. My relationship with Conner has consisted of moment after moment after moment after moment of evidence of Conner’s trustworthiness. A few years ago, Conner had some major decisions to make in regards to our family. I didn’t understand the choices he was making when the information I had was pointing us in a different direction. I kept bringing this up to him until one day he confided in me that I didn’t have all the information. There were things going on that were beyond our family that he couldn’t share with me, even though they affected my life as well as that of my family.

It didn’t even phase me. I told Conner I trusted him, and I did. He had consistently proved to me that our family was his first priority. He had proven to me that he could make wise decisions and that he would make decisions based on our happiness. I had no qualms letting him utilize the information he had to guide our path.

I didn’t understand, but I believed in Conner because of the evidence I had observed consistently in our relationship.

This is what I mean in terms of belief.

When I talk about belief coming first, I mean cultivating a relationship with God. Don’t take my word for it. Get to know Him, cast off imperfect qualities that you’ve given Him in your mind, and you’ll find that He consistently shows up in powerful ways. You’ll find that belief in Him is easy because of who He is.

When I talk about belief coming first, I’m talking about real trust based on a real relationship of invested time. I’m not talking about ignoring discomfort or having a death grip on “faith” because you’re supposed to. That’s not what belief is supposed to feel like. It’s not what it has to feel like.

Get to know Him. You will believe in Him, and eventually the truth comes.

When I hit snags 

Developing this relationship has changed how I process things when I hit snags. When something comes along that I don’t understand, when I run into information on the news or social media that I can’t disprove, when I hear accounts of history that may or may not have validity, I believe in the very real relationship I’ve developed.

Believing in that relationship looks like a lot of things. Sometimes it means that I push the snag away without a second thought because I’m having a really good day, and I’m feeling really close to Him. Other times, it means that I take that snag to the Lord and talk to Him about it. I know He won’t be angry with me for asking because I know how He responds in the relationship I have with Him. I tell Him exactly why it bothers me, why it logically doesn’t make sense to me, or why I feel hurt.

Then I usually take some concentrated, conscious time for belief. I reaffirm what I know about Him, His power, His belief in me, His love for me, and my indispensability to His happiness. I think about how wise He has proven Himself in the past. Oftentimes, I find the answer or peace I’m looking for as I reflect on my relationship with Him and as I reflect on who He is and has proven Himself to be. Other times, I find that it softens my heart to the extent that He whispers more words of wisdom or comfort. Either way, I usually find what I’m looking for when I believe in Him first. The understanding comes because I believe in Him.

When I read this verse about the rising generation not understanding because they didn’t believe, I wasn’t sure how I felt about it at first. But as I took the time to reflect on my own life, I’ve realized that is exactly true. When we believe in our Father in Heaven and develop a relationship of trust with Him, understanding will follow.

Autumn Dickson was born and raised in a small town in Texas. She served a mission in the Indianapolis Indiana mission. She studied elementary education but has found a particular passion in teaching the gospel. Her desire for her content is to inspire people to feel confident, peaceful, and joyful about their relationship with Jesus Christ and to allow that relationship to touch every aspect of their lives.

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