“The Son of Man Hath Descended below Them All”
Doctrine and Covenants 122:8
8 The Son of Man hath descended below them all. Art thou greater than he?
Elder Jeffrey R. Holland said:
“No, Joseph was not greater than the Savior, and neither are we. And when we promise to follow the Savior, to walk in His footsteps, and be His disciples, we are promising to go where that divine path leads us. And the path of salvation has always led one way or another through Gethsemane. So if the Savior faced such injustices and discouragements, such persecutions, unrighteousness, and suffering, we cannot expect that we are not going to face some of that if we still intend to call ourselves His true disciples and faithful followers.
“In fact, it ought to be a matter of great doctrinal consolation to us that Jesus, in the course of the Atonement, experienced all of the heartache and sorrow, all of the disappointments and injustices that the entire family of man had experienced and would experience from Adam and Eve to the end of the world in order that we would not have to face them so severely or so deeply. However heavy our load might be, it would be a lot heavier if the Savior had not gone that way before us and carried that burden with us and for us.
“Very early in the Prophet Joseph’s ministry, the Savior taught him this doctrine. After speaking of sufferings so exquisite to feel and so hard to bear, Jesus said, ‘I, God, have suffered these things for all, that they [and that means you and I and everyone] might not suffer if they would repent’ (D&C 19:16). In our moments of pain and trial, I guess we would shudder to think it could be worse, but without the Atonement it not only could be worse, it would be worse. Only through our faith and repentance and obedience to the gospel that provided the sacred Atonement is it kept from being worse.
“Furthermore, we note that not only has the Savior suffered, in His case entirely innocently, but so have most of the prophets and other great men and women recorded in the scriptures. The point is this: if you are having a bad day, you’ve got a lot of company—very, very good company. The best company that has ever lived.”
(“Lessons from Liberty Jail,” Ensign, Sept. 2009, 31.)
