A series of troughs and peaks, and a lesson my dad taught me a long time ago

I particularly like to read philosophy, specifically philosophy when related to religion. Now this may seem slightly random (what things that I do aren't?(: ) and this passion has grown with my involvement in the discussion classes at the high school under Mr. Merritt, but my first experience with it, although I didn't know it at the time, was when my dad would bring me home teaching with him when I was very young, maybe around the ages of 8 to 10. The principal type of theological philosophy he liked to read and use in his lessons was that of C. S. Lewis, one of the most inspired and insightful men I have ever heard of, and I don't think I truly understood the meaning of his lessons a lot at the time or thought a lot about them, but they definitely struck me enough that I thought of one a little while ago, and I have to share it.

In a five book series published in 1947, C. S. Lewis wrote a book entitled "The Screwtape Letters", in which an experienced, old devil is writing letters to his nephew, Wormwood, about a particular "patient" or person, giving him advice on how to properly bring this person away from God. In particular, I was reminded a couple of days ago of a chapter in the book where Screwtape is directing Wormwood on when to strike at the patient, and when to try and make him doubt his beliefs and disobey God. Screwtape pens:

"As spirits, [humans] belong to the eternal world, but as animals they inhabit time. This means that while their spirit can be directed to an eternal object, their bodies, passions and imaginations are in continual change, for to be in time means to change. This nearest approach to constancy, therefore is undulation--the repeated return to a level from which they repeatedly fall back, a series of troughs and peaks. If you had watched your patient carefully, you would have seen this undulation in every department of his life--his interest in his work, his affection for his friends, his physical appetites, all go up and down. As long as he lives on earth periods of emotional and bodily richness and liveliness will alternate with periods of numbness and poverty" (38).

I especially remembered this chapter at a young age by the keyword "troughs and peaks" because my dad would use them frequently during the lesson to explain the principle he was teaching; that is that man naturally has, is and will always go through times of relative happiness and prosperity, and then sometimes will be left for a while by God to be tempted and tested. The reason for this however, is not simply because God creates the trials, but rather he lets them happen. God did not create the storms that destroyed Job's home, and he didn't create the robbers who stole all the cattle, and he certainly did not create the boils that covered Job's body. Rather he simply stood back and allowed Job to be tried.

Now I haven't suffered that much throughout my life, nor do I think I will in the future, but I have certainly felt the troughs and the peaks of recent happenings in my personal life. I don't really know if there was a peak before, but right after regional choir about three weeks ago, I was definitely going through a deep trough. I was really starting to fall behind in classwork, my practicing was suffering, people who I thought were my best friends turned out to be just some more fake high school snobs, and I was stressed out beyond imagination. I was really antisocial at school, not smily and kind of didn't care. Let me tell you, life was pretty awful.

Right after our trip to the Carribean though, the trough ended kind of abruptly. I started weeding out the fake friends, left them in the dust and really solidified my relationships with my true friends. I started going out on frequent dates and going to work more often. My grades went up and I felt really happy at school. And then the peak has continued into this weekend, with the BEST PMEA Band festival I have ever been to, the best band conductor I've ever had, a 56 measure solo, a solo bow, a front page story and picture in the newspaper and tons of positive comments about my playing from students and faculty from other schools! Not to mention the ten dollar tip I got today at work!

It is interesting to see how the circumstances of each time were relatively the same, with me missing just as much school and hanging out with the same people and having the same experiences, and yet as a whole, each was distinctly a trough or a peak in my life. It is even more interesting to note that the peak came after the trough, further emphasizing the statement in the Book of Mormon, "ye receive no witness until after the trial of your faith". (Ether 12:7)

Further along in the chapter, Screwtape goes on to explain this principle in a much better way than I could ever express it:

"Now it may surprise you to learn that in His efforts to get permanent possession of a soul, He relies on the troughs even more than on the peaks; some of His special favourites have gone through longer and deeper troughs than anyone else. The reason is this. To us a human is primarily food; our aim is the absorption of its will into ours, the increase of our own area of selfhood at its expense. He wants to fill the universe with a lot of loathsome little replicas of himself. We want to suck in, He wants to give out. We are empty and would be filled; He is full and flows over"(39).

The Lord does not allow troughs to happen because he wants to test us and see us suffer; he wants to see us overcome those trials and emerge with a stronger sense of obedience and His will. He allows bad things to happen, so that when we come out of that trough triumphant, he can reward us endlessly with a renewed sense of hope, love and happiness.