Rough Stone Rolling

We don’t hear Matthew Cowley stories much anymore. Brother Cowley, as some of you may remember, was an early 20th century apostle who noteworthily raised souls from the dead– or more accurately, was instrument in the Lord’s hand raising them from the dead. Brother Cowley was also a brilliant writer and speaker, and if you have the time to peruse any of his talks, absolutely do it. Here’s an excerpt from a talk dated 1957 that he gave regarding miracles:

I was called to a home in a little village in New Zealand one day. There the Relief Society sisters were preparing the body of one of our Saints. They had placed his body in front of the Big House as they call it, the house where the people came to wail and weep and mourn over the dead, when in rushed the dead man’s brother.

He said, “Administer to him”

And the young natives said, “Why, you shouldn’t do that; he’s dead.”

“You do it!”

This same old man that I had with me when his niece was so ill was there. The younger native got down on his knees, and he anointed the dead man. Then this great old sage got down and blessed him and commanded him to rise. You should have seen the Relief Society sisters scatter. And he sat up, and he said, “Send for the elders; I don’t feel very well.” Now, of course, all of that was just psychological effect on that dead man. Wonderful, isn’t it–this psychological effect business? Well, we told him he had just been administered to, and he said: “Oh, that was it.” He said, “I was dead. I could feel life coming back into me just like a blanket unrolling.” Now, he outlived the brother that came in and told us to administer to him.

One of the pinnacle moments in the New Testament for me is when Jesus raised Lazarus from the dead. It was certainly one of His more dramatic miracles, and I appreciate the cinematic opportunity of the scene, which is not completely without humor:

Jesus said, “Take ye away the stone!”

Martha, the sister of him that was dead, saith unto him, “Lord, by this time he stinketh– for he hath been dead four days!”

Then they took away the stone from the place where the dead was laid.

Jesus cried with a loud voice, “Lazarus come forth!”

And he that was dead came forth, bound hand and foot with graveclothes, and his face was bound about with a napkin.”

That would have been something to see: “Hey, Shlomo! Check it out, man!”

Everything is all so close together, the good and evil around us. It pulls our attention every day from the miracles that happen within our peripherals. I never participated in raising someone from the dead (I did kill a sister with a blessing once), but I came close this past winter. An older brother went to the hospital with an ailment and after he got there, as is often the case, one disoirder after another took turns threatening his life. At one point, the 80-something man was emaciated, drugged and weak to immobility. We visited him, prayed with him, gave him blessings. He wasn’t ready to go– he knew his sick wife wouldn’t be able to handle things without him, and his affairs weren’t in the order he wanted them to be. Then something clicked. His body rallied back its strength and conquered every malady one at a time. Not only did he recover, he came out of retirement soon thereafter and is now a partner in an accounting technology firm. I’ve said it before: I can’t make this stuff up.

In an article simply entitled Miracles, Dallin Oaks wrote that miracles are not available for the asking. I’d like to amend that just a tad by saying I believe they are not always for the asking– that is, miracles are provided when help is requested in faith, however, such as is the case with the gravely ill, the miracle asked for might be contrary to the Lord’s plan. So then, one miracle might be replaced with another (such as healing hearts and strengthening faith). Speaking of miracles that do come for the asking, when I experience something as trivial (though they don’t feel trivial at the time) as losing my wallet or a needful document, and when I feel I’ve exhausted my options, I’ll turn to the Lord and I can’t recall once when He hadn’t brought me to them in a timely manner. Or if my wife and I pray for a beneficial outcome to a particular situation, and it happens, whether or not it was a miracle is beyond debate. The thought alone that all things are possible to him that believeth is a declaration that miracles buoy us throughout our lives whether we always acknowledge them or not. Despite some of the bonehead choices I’ve made in my life, because of my faith in God, I’ve been over-compensated in blessings. Could it be the over-compensation of blessings we receive are bestowed as a means to feed our humility, and therefore strengthen our faith? I know my feelings of unworthiness humble the heck out of me.

Here’s another great Matthew Cowley excerpt:

A few weeks ago I was called to the County Hospital in Salt lake City by a mother. I didn’t know her. She said her boy was dying from polio and asked if I would come down and give that boy a blessing. So I picked up a young bishop [Glen Rudd] whom I generally take with me, for I think his faith is greater than mine, and I always like him along. We went down there, and here was this young lad in an iron lung, unconscious, his face rather a blackish color, with a tube in his throat, and they said he had a tube lower down in his abdomen. he had been flown in from an outlying community. The mother said to me, “This is an unusual boy. Not because he’s my child, but he is an unusual boy.” I think he was eight or nine years of age. After they put the usual coverings on us, we went in, and we blessed that boy. It was one of those occasions when I knew as I laid my hands upon that lad that he was unusual boy, and he had faith. Having faith in his faith, I blessed him to get well and promised him he would. I never heard any more about him until last Sunday. I was on my way to Murray to conference; I dropped in the County Hospital, and I asked if I might see the lad. The nurse said, “Certainly. Walk right down the hall.” as I walked down the hall, out came the boy running to meet me. He ran up and asked, “Are you Brother Cowley?”

And I said, “Yes.”

He said, “I want to thank you for that prayer.” He added, “I was unconscious then wasn’t I?”

I replied, “You certainly were.”

He said, “That’s the reason I don’t recognize you.” Then he asked, “Come in my room; I want to talk to you.” He was an unusual boy. Well, we went in the room. He still had a tube in his throat. I said, “How long are you going to have that tube there?”

He said, “Oh, two weeks, two more weeks, and then I’m all well. How about another blessing?”

So I said, “Certainly.” I blessed him again. I was in a hurry. I wanted to get out to my conference. But he stopped me and asked, “Hey, how about my partner in the next bed?” There was a young fellow about sixteen or seventeen.

I said, “What do you mean?”

He said, “Don’t go without blessing him. He’s my partner.”

I said, “Sure.” Then I asked the boy, “Would you like a blessing?”

He said, “Yes, sir. I’m a teacher in the Aaronic Priesthood in my ward.” I blessed him, and then my little friend went and brought another fellow in. Here was another partner. And I blessed him.

Now, except ye believe as a child, you can’t receive these blessings. We have to have the faith of a child in order to believe in these things, especially when you reach college age, and your minds are so full of skepticism and doubt. I guess there are some things you should doubt. But you can become as little children in these things. Miracles are commonplace, brothers and sisters.

The greatest miracles, of course, come about when we reach out to others, especially when they don’t ask for it. It’s such an uncomfortable endeavor for our natural selves to perform, and when we try we sometimes “pull our punches,” delivering almost-apologetic gestures instead of the full-hearted acts we were inspired to do. We second-guess ourselves, asking, “Is it better to extend myself, or to respect their privacy and spare them any undue embarrassment?” The answer of course is always the former, and is only a mistake if we lose heart in the middle of the effort.

The other thing to consider is recognizing the miracles for what they are. We’re bombarded daily with a white noise of positive and negative stimuli, and it requires the faithful and thoughtful heart to perceive the blessings from heaven. As Claire said when confronted with remarkable events in her family’s life, in the movie Grand Canyon: “What if these are miracles, Mack? Maybe we don’t have any experience with miracles, so we’re slow to recognize them.” I’m not a fan of the hymn Count Your Blessings, but it’s message is true– if only it didn’t have that corny delivery and cadence.

The Reverend Robert Schuller, Sr. used to say, “Expect a miracle.”

It’s too bad he wasn’t expecting the Church.