Sometime We'll Understand

This past week the college a Capella group that I am a member of has started learning a new song for which I am the lead singer.  I was absolutely thrilled because it happens to be one of my favorite songs and as I am a baritone I usually don't get such big solos.  Our rendition is slightly based off of the t.v. show "Glee"s cover of the song, so we were encouraged to watch clips of it on YouTube.

As I was going through clips of the show, I observed how two young men's blossoming romance developed.  It was not depicted as a promiscuous encounter or a daring experiment.  Their interactions and dialogue seemed so real.

I wept.

Seeing such relationships really tears my heart apart.  Those who are familiar with same-sex attraction know that it can be a cold path of pain, loneliness, and desperation. Members of the Church who experience these attractions feel these emotions, particularly because of the position in which they are placed.

On one hand, they have a real, ingrained, uncontrollable draw to members of their own sex.  They do not choose these impulses; honestly, who would?!  (Perhaps there are some in the world that are so sex-driven that they will experiment with homosexual behavior and frolic in their immoral zealotry.  However, I seriously doubt that many people would want to be so deviant from thousands of years of sexual tradition and expectations. There is possibly no group on earth that has been stigmatized and persecuted for historically as consistently and internationally as those who experience same-sex attraction.)

With this reality in mind, consider the sociocultural perspective on homosexuality in modern times (in America and Western Europe, anyway).  There has never been a time when such attractions were so widely accepted and even encouraged.  Opportunities to act on these feelings without fear of societal rejection and persecution abound.  It would be very easy for me to find a boyfriend/husband, and I couldn't be denied employment or housing because of our relationship.  Those who do express hatred and disgust or even simple disapproval towards homosexuals are labeled as Hitleresque theocrats and judgmental perpetrators of hate crimes.

On the other hand, these members of the Church have real testimonies of the truthfulness and divinity of the restored gospel of Jesus Christ.  In my case, there is no doubt in my mind that the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints is the true organization established and administered by the only begotten Son of God.  I know that the Book of Mormon is true.  The Spirit has crystallized the clarity of this realization.  I know the Gospel establishes the only way that we can be happy throughout eternity and that marriage is ordained of God when it is conducted between a man and a woman.

Members of the Church with these attractions seem to be humanized paradoxes.  The struggle of reconciling their faith with their feelings can occupy their minds every single day.  There are times (such as the night I viewed this clip) that my whole body screams for companionship (and usually not in a sexual way - I'm referring to an intimacy deeper than gratification).  I pray and beg God to help me understand why He could cause such real longings to be so infused with my being that lead me in the complete opposite direction of the path which the Plan of Salvation directs.

At the time, I tried to hide my tears from my roommates (none of whom know about my attractions).  I yearned for an escape from this dichotomy.  It was then that the voice of a friend entered my mind, a friend who earlier that week had advised me to listen to Rob Gardner's Lamb of God.  Skeptically, I exited YouTube and pulled up the suggested album.

These are the words which God allowed me to hear at this trying time:

Not now, but in coming years,

It may not be when we demand

We'll read the meaning of our tears,

And there, sometime, we'll understand

Why what we long for most of all

Eludes our open pleading hand

Why ever silence meets our call,

Somewhere, sometime, we'll understand

So trust in God through all thy days

Fear not, for He doth hold thy hand;

Though dark thy way, still sing and praise,

Sometime, sometime we'll understand.

Sometime, we'll fall on bended knee

And feel there, graven on His hand

Sometime with tear less eyes we'll see

What here, we could not understand

So trust in God through all the days;

Fear not, for He doth hold thy hand;

Though dark thy way, still sing and praise,

Sometime, sometime we'll understand

(Rob Gardner. "Sometime We'll Understand." Lamb of God)

There are so many words in this song which pertained exactly to the soul-rending emotions and desires which I was experiencing.  You may notice that I reference music often throughout this blog.  I believe that God uses music to speak to us; there are messages that can only be conveyed through this medium.  The Spirit flourishes in the ambiance of such lyrics and tonalities.

I heartily suggest that you look into Rob Gardner's music.  His works touch my soul more deeply than those of most other composers.