The Doctrine:

Trust in God and in His willingness to provide help when needed, no matter how challenging the circumstance. (Richard G. Scott, “The Sustaining Power of Faith in Times of Uncertainty and Testing,” Liahona, May 2003, 75–78)

The  Application:

There was a time in my life when I was struggling with doing something God expected me to do in the near future. After long hours of prayer, the answer came to me in the form of a scripture: If ye are prepared, ye shall not fear. (Doctrine and Covenants 38:30). So, I went to work, got myself prepared…and was scared anyway. I went back to God and told Him. The answer came clearly into my mind. “I didn’t say you couldn’t choose to be afraid. I just said you didn’t have to be.”

I was not acting like a person who trusted God. I said I did and I went through all the proper motions, but if I’d trusted Him, I’d have remembered that He could see ahead and already knew the results of what He wanted me to do. And of course, He was right. There was nothing to be afraid of and much to look forward to. Now, when I find myself scared of something I know God has planned, I remind myself to trust God and act like it.

Children are much better at this than adults. The very first year I taught Primary, I had a rambunctious and very large class. I had no idea how to get them to behave, since I was a recent convert and couldn’t draw on my own childhood for help. One day they decided it would be fun to run around the room in circles and I didn’t know how to stop them. My mind flitted to a training meeting I had just attended, where we were told that if the Spirit was strong enough in our classes, the Savior Himself could be present. I said aloud—but not expecting to be heard—“Jesus would never come to this class.”

To my surprise, the class stopped running and turned to look at me. One preschooler said, “Jesus is coming here?”

I shook my head. “Somebody told me He can come to Primary classes, but He can’t be where people aren’t being reverent. If we were reverent, He could come.”

Silently, the children filed back to their seats. However, one little boy went to the corner of the room and was dragging a large chair to the edge of the horseshoe of little chairs. “What is that for?”

He looked at me in surprise, amazed that I didn’t know. “This is for Jesus. When he comes, He will need a chair.”

That is how you act like a person who trusts God.