Ye Came Unto Me

“Then shall the King say unto them on his right hand, Come, ye blessed of my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world: For I was an hungred, and ye gave me meat: I was thirsty, and ye gave me drink: I was a stranger, and ye took me in: Naked, and ye clothed me: I was sick, and ye visited me: I was in prison, and ye came unto me.” (Matthew 25:34-36). I think if we ever imagine ourselves visiting the Lord, or, in His place, one of the least of these, when He is sick, we are most likely imagining ourselves as perhaps showing up to a hospital healthy and fit as a fiddle but ready to provide comfort and service as needed. If we imagine coming unto the Lord in prison, we might imagine ourselves as free men and women taking time out of our busy days to stop by the prison during visiting hours. It can be hard to make time when we are healthy to visit the hospital, or when we are free to do so many other things to voluntarily visit a prison. But we can all agree that when we are in fact sick, we definitely make the time to visit the hospital. And when we have actually been incarcerated, we have no choice but to visit the prison. Whether we deserve to be sick or imprisoned or not, sometimes that is where we must be. We can take an honest look at our lives and try to figure out how and why we ended up in the hospital or the prison, and we can definitely choose to repent and seek to fix the things that are wrong with ourselves and the world as a whole to to ensure that we don't stay sick or imprisoned any longer than is necessary, but sometimes we are stuck being an inpatient or an inmate with no way out of it for at least a little while, and maybe a long while. This can be a bitter pill to swallow when we have done everything that we can to maintain our health or our liberty and have had it taken from us despite all of our best efforts and good intentions. In such cases, one thing we can focus on is that while we are in the hospital, as sick as we are, we are nevertheless visiting our Savior who is also there in the hospital with us and with every other patient. We might have preferred to visit the sick while we ourselves are well, but just because we are patients in the hospital suffering our own ailments does not negate the fact that we are indeed visiting the least of our brothers and sisters as they are sick. If we have gone to prison based on a wrongful conviction, or have been lawfully condemned for refusing to submit to corrupt laws and institutions, or have been captured by enemy combatants, we can descend into bitterness and malevolence and curse God for ever allowing us to fall into this pit; or, we can see in our sentence and opportunity to come unto Christ while He was in prison. Whatever trial or challenge we face, we can look at it as an opportunity to come unto our Savior. Did the Lord visit Daniel in the Lions’ den, or did Daniel visit the Lord in the Lions' den? Did Christ come unto Joseph Smith in Liberty Jail, or did Joseph Smith come unto the Lord in Liberty Jail? I hope we can all take the time to recognize that when we are in the deepest, darkest pit, part of the reason that we are down there is to come unto our Savior.