Truth and Reason

The hymn Oh My Father includes a few lines about Truth and Reason, essentially arguing that if something is unreasonable, it can't be true, because the truth will always be reasonable. I have a few major problems with this line of thinking, and most of them stem from the fact that human beings aren't always great at reasoning.

In olden times, it seemed perfectly reasonable to think that the Earth was flat. I mean, just look at it. Look at the horizon, and you'll see what appears to be a perfectly flat line. Judging by that evidence, it would be reasonable to conclude that the Earth actually is flat, but we later learned, with the help of further knowledge, that the Earth is actually round, but so huge it appears flat from our limited perspective.

It's that limited perspective that bothers me. We can't base our acceptance or rejection of spiritual claims on what seems reasonable to us because our limited perspectives sometimes lead us to the wrong conclusions. Something may make sense to us but still be false, and something may not make sense to us but still be true. Thankfully, our perspective and reasoning are usually accurate enough for everyday use, but for spiritual matters, it's best not to take that kind of chance.

When it comes to spiritual truths, our flawed logic and human reasoning will only get us so far. So, rather than "proving" spiritual truths with mortal reason, I plan to rely on revelation, and on the subjects where revelation is scant, I'll try to have the courage to say "I don't know" instead of trying to guess what I think is most likely to be true just because it seems to "stand to reason."

The Last Three Lessons of Valonor Kharagon

Valonor Kharagon, my Noble Dragonborn Paladin D&D character, is dead. He died in my most recent game of D&D last Wednesday night. There are several factors that contributed to Kharagon's death; several decisions and die rolls that the DM and I made, and two die rolls I didn't make, all conspired to seal Kharagon's fate. For the purpose of this blog post, I'd like to focus on three factors that led to Kharagon's death and on the spiritual lessons we can learn from this minor, fictional tragedy.

First, Kharagon wasn't wearing his armor. As a Paladin, Kharagon was proficient with Heavy Armor. But to gain the benefit of armor, you have to wear it, and to wear it, you have to put it on. Putting on armor takes time, so when Kharagon woke up to the sound of someone or something breaking into the tavern he and his coworkers run, he didn't think he had the time to take 10 minutes to put his armor on.

And, of course, he didn't. The moment one needs ones armor is not the moment to put it on. If you want your armor to protect you when you need it to, you need to have put it on well in advance. Thankfully, we don't have to take our armor off when we go to bed, but we do have to put it on when we wake up, and we have to regularly tend to our armor to keep it in good condition. Without that armor, the namesake of my blog, we're likely going to take some serious, perhaps fatal, damage.

This leads me to the second factor that contributed to Kharagon's death: he didn't get healing. Without his armor, he was a pretty easy mark for the intruders, and his Hit Points dropped faster than I realized. There was one point at which Kharagon had taken some heavy damage, and he had an opportunity to heal up a bit, but I had him attack instead, thinking that he'd have plenty of time to heal up after the battle. Unfortunately, Kharagon didn't last that long. If he had healed himself right then, he might not have gone down to zero Hit Points and fallen unconscious, and if any of the other characters had healed him after he had fallen unconscious, he almost certainly wouldn't have died. Now, I don't mean to blame anyone else for Kharagon's death because 1) he's a fictional character; his death is no big deal, 2) his  death was almost entirely my fault, as I'll explain in a moment, and 3) most of the other characters didn't know that he had fallen unconscious, and those who knew couldn't do anything about it. The others bare no blame in this. I just wanted to make the point that, when you need healing, get it.

All of us carry some inner wounds. Some of them are from sins committed by us or those around us. Some of them came as a result of our circumstances and/or the tragic events that fall upon us or upon those we care about. I won't pretend to be able to guess what anyone is struggling with, but I will say that inner wounds need healing just as much as outer wounds, maybe even more so. So do what you need to do to get the healing you need. Take some time for yourself, if you can. Definitely pray. Maybe meditate. Listen to some good music. Heal. And if you can't heal yourself, get someone else to heal you. Friends, family members, Bishops, counselors, angels, and God Himself are all potential healers. Seek them out. Get the healing you need. If you have taken any damage at all, do whatever you need to do to heal.

Finally, and ultimately, Kharagon died because he didn't seek Divine Favor. When a D&D character drops to zero Hit Points, he or she has to spend each round after that rolling Death Saving Throws until he or she stabilizes, gains Hit Points, or dies. To make a Death Saving Throw, the player rolls a 20-sided die called a d20. If the player rolls a 10 or higher, that's a "Success," and if he or she rolls a 20, the character regains 1 Hit Point and their consciousness. However, if the player rolls a 9 or lower, that's a "Failure," and if he or she rolls a 1, that counts as two Failures. If a character gets three total Successes (and they don't have to be consecutive), the character stabilizes, they stop having to roll Death Saving Throws, and they are very likely going to survive. However, if the character gets three total Failures (again, not necessarily in a row), the character dies.

Kharagon's first Death Saving Throw rolled a 6, a Failure, but I knew that if I could increase that number by 4, I could turn it into a 10, a Success. Kharagon had an ability called Divine Favor, which would allow me to roll two 4-sided dice and add their results to a failed saving throw. However, I chose not to use that ability. He can only use it once per day, and I figured that just one Failure wasn't that bad. He had plenty of time for someone else to heal him or for him to stabilize on his own. I decided to save his Divine Favor for when he really needed it. But when his next turn came, and I had to roll another Death Saving Throw for the fate of Kharagon's life, I rolled a 1. That added two Failures to the one he had already gotten, and he died. At that point, there was nothing I could do. I could have invoked his Divine Favor, but it wouldn't have worked. Adding 2d4 to the result wouldn't change the fact that I had rolled a natural 1. Later that night, at home, out of curiosity, I rolled the 2d4, wondering if the Divine Favor would have been enough to change that first 6 into a 10. Between the two 4-sided dice, I rolled a total of 4. Kharagon died almost entirely because I didn't call upon Divine Favor.

The moral is perfectly clear: Call Upon Divine Favor. Unlike Kharagon, we aren't limited to doing so only once per day, and it's possible for that Divine Favor to help a lot more than those 2d4 could. You may think that you're not worthy of Divine Favor, but that doesn't matter. Ask anyway. God helps lots of people just because He loves them, whether they're worthy or not, and if God doesn't help you, it's probably because He knows that you don't need Him to, just like what happened the last time Kharagon almost died. The last (and only) time Kharagon called on Divine Favor, he got a pair of ones, which were almost no help at all, but he got healing later, so he was fine. I had thought that that lack of help meant that the God whom Kharagon worshiped was okay with Kharagon dying, but now I think that dice are completely random and don't mean anything that Kharagon's god knew that he would be healed and that he would survive, even without divine aid. Sometimes, we too will be fine, with or without divine aid. Still, it couldn't hurt to ask, and it could cost you everything if you don't.

So those are the three lessons I have learned from Kharagon's death: Wear Your Armor, Seek Healing, and Call Upon Divine Favor. Any one of those factors could have made the difference between Kharagon's life and death, and they can still make the difference between our Eternal Life and Spiritual Death. Without his armor, healing, or calling upon Divine Favor, Kharagon passed on to his eternal reward, but if we don't use those things, we may not have an Eternal Reward waiting for us when we get there. So build up your armor, get all the healing you need, and pray for Divine Favor every chance you get. Kharagon's life depended on those three factors. Ours do too.

The Fun of Misfortune

In D&D, dice and dumb decisions often lead events to turn out badly. When they do, we can often laugh about it. I can laugh about how my Dragonborn Paladin, Valonor Kharagon, became a were-rabbit through a series of questionable choices and unlucky rolls. Now, of course I didn't want my noble, heroic character to transform into a giant bunny rabbit after nearly being killed by a swarm of magically-animated carrots, but that's what happened, and the whole situation was hilarious. And while I don't like laughing at the misfortune of others, it's okay in this case because Valonor Kharagon isn't a real person. Laughing at him and his comically unfortunate situation is similar to laughing at the characters and situations in a sitcom. Of course it's not okay to laugh at others' misfortune unless they're laughing, too. That's why the one person whose misfortune it's a;most always okay to laugh at is yourself.

Case in point, I went on a set of errands this afternoon. My plan was to deliver the ring I found the other day to Regional Transit's Lost and Found, go to the school to print up some papers, then meet up with friends to play D&D. None of those things actually happened. I started off on the wrong foot immediately by walking a few blocks toward the bus stop for the bus I usually catch instead of toward the bus stop for the bus I was supposed to catch. Miraculously, or maybe because the bus was late, I caught the bus anyway, or maybe I caught the next one; I'm not sure. But when I ultimately got to the Regional Transit office, I learned that they're closed on Saturdays and that I had just missed the train headed toward my next destination, so I held on to the ring and waited for the next train. I got to the school around 4 in the afternoon, only to learn that, on Saturdays, the library with the printing stations closes at 3. Fortunately, I had access to all the information I really needed through my phone, so I would still be able to play D&D with my friends. Or rather, I would have, had any other players shown up. So, instead of returning the ring, printing some papers, and playing D&D, I rode buses and trains on a wild goose chase, accomplished nothing, chatted with one (and only one) of my friends for a few minutes instead of a few hours, and caught the next bus home. This all could have been horribly disappointing, but I'm choosing to find it funny instead.

Sometimes, things go wrong so thoroughly or so badly that you just have to laugh. This was one of those times. It's funny that I walked the wrong way at first. It's funny that most of the places I went to today were closed when I got there. It's funny that I didn't accomplish even a single thing I set out to do this afternoon. Well, actually, I did accomplish one thing I had set out to do: I had fun. That's the fun of misfortune. When things go badly, it can be funny, and when we choose to see our misfortunes that way, our bad luck can be fun.

Granted, there's a good deal of misfortune and tragedy in the world that goes beyond our ability to laugh it off. I'm not talking about great tragedies like those right now. I'm talking about minor goofs and fickle winds of fate, not evil or real, painful suffering. Some misfortune can't be fun. But when your paladin turns into a giant rabbit or you realize that absolutely nothing went as planned, it's sometimes okay, and even appropriate, to laugh.

"Can't Complain"

Yesterday, I overheard someone give a unique response to a fairly common question. The question was something along the lines of "how has your day been?" Many people get asked this question regularly, and people tend to answer the question with "Good," "Fine," "Alright," or any word like that. Sometimes, people offer a two-word answer, "Can't complain." But yesterday, I heard a response to this question that I don't think I've ever heard before: "Can't complain. Well, I could, but I don't want to."

How true and profound is that!

Firstly, anyone who says that they "can't complain" about something probably doesn't mean that literally. People can (and do) complain about just about everything. Very few things in life are perfect. In just about everything, there are imperfections about which we could complain. When we compare our lives to others' or even to an imaginary ideal life, we can almost always find something that we could complain about.

But why would we want to? Apart from offering constructive criticism, which complaints often aren't, what good could complaining do? I suppose it could be cathartic to get some complaints off your chest, and it can even help others by letting them know that other people also struggle with and dislike the same things they do. Okay, there are some, perhaps many, valid reasons why a person might want to complain, but there are also many reasons why they wouldn't.

Complaining breeds negativity. The more we complain, the more we dwell on the negative aspects of life. It can't be healthy. We don't want to bottle up our negativity, but we don't want to keep it inside us either. It's better to let the complaints go and to look for the good. Instead of looking mainly at the bad news and the parts that we can complain about, we should consider the good news and the parts for which we can thank God. I believe that people will tend to see what they look for. If that's true, I want to look for the good in the world.

So, yeah, nothing's perfect, and we can definitely complain about it if we wanted to, but who would want to complain about it when they could, instead, focus on the good? Complaining doesn't do much good, but counting our blessings can. In the future, I'm going to try to keep my complaints to a minimum. Sure, I could complain, but I don't want to.

Priceless or Worthless?

While we're on the subjects of worth an worthlessness, I want to tell you about something I found the other day. Two days ago, I found a ring lying on the ground at a light rail station. The ring was silver in color and had clear crystals on it, but it didn't have any markings on it that gave any clue as to whom it might have belonged to. I thought that it could possibly be a real, silver and diamond ring, or it could be a worthless piece of plastic. It could have been priceless, or it could have been worthless, and I wasn't fully sure how to tell.

In life, it's important to be able to tell what has real value and what doesn't, not just because that ability could save you from being scammed out of a lot of money, but also because it can affect our eternal well-being. To many people value temporal things too much and spiritual things too little. Some people think that money and power and fame are worth spending a great deal of time acquiring, leaving little time left for spiritual things, which they judge to be far less valuable. Misvaluing things can be the cause of great disappointment and regret, both in this life and the next. This is why we must be careful to correctly determine what is truly priceless and what is truly worthless.

As for the ring, I figure that it's probably worthless. It's not heavy enough to feel like real metal, and there are some spots where the blemishes make me believe that the ring is fake. However, knowing the importance of not devaluing things that are truly priceless, I'm going to try to find out how to report the ring as being found, just in case anybody's looking for it. Maybe I'll take it to some light rail lost and found, maybe I'll take it straight to a police station, I'm not sure. But I am sure that, in case it truly has value, I should probably treat it as such.

Cost ≠ Worth

I was recently reminded that cost and worth are not always related. There are some things that are expensive, yet worthless, like overly fancy cars and some works of art. They cost a fortune, but they don't provide much value, and what value they do provide could be obtained at much lower costs. In contrast, some things are relatively inexpensive, but are worth their weight in gold, like good food, sturdy and useful tools, and comfortable clothing. The things that offer the greatest value aren't the most expensive things, but rather the least expensive of the things of great worth.

And, of course, the "things" of greatest worth don't even cost a dime. Good friends and family, a strong relationship with God, and the everyday blessings of nature, like sunrises, sunsets, fresh rain, and gentle breezes, are all free (though, arguably, a strong relationship with God does carry the cost of tithes and offerings, but the blessings of such a relationship far outweigh the costs).

Good things don't have to be expensive. Expensive things aren't always worthwhile, and there are many things that are worthwhile, regardless of their costs. A thing isn't valuable just because it's expensive, and a thing isn't worthless just because it's cheap. We must learn to evaluate the true worth of things, regardless of what they cost.

The Mystery Lesson of the Barely-Caught Bus

The other day, I met a guy who barely caught the bus that I was riding. It wasn't that he was late. He was waiting for the bus as it approached, but the bus driver misread his body language and thought that he wasn't interested in catching the bus, so the bus rolled right past him. A few blocks later, the guy, riding a skateboard, caught up to the bus and was eventually allowed on. We happened to be getting off at the same stop, so after we got off the bus, I struck up a conversation with him and ultimately invited him to join me for a free breakfast at the LDS Institute. We talked about the church and General Conference. It's hard to say whether the conversation had any real impact on him. But he invited me to a play he's in and he lent me the book that the play is based on, so I'm sure I'll see him again, if only to return the book. Maybe we'll talk more then.

I've been trying to think of what sort of lesson we can learn from this. In theory, the guy should have been able to just catch the bus like normal. After all, he was waiting for it. It should have stopped for him. His ride would then have gone uneventfully, and we never would have talked. Maybe, just maybe, that conversation we had was important enough to God that He was willing to give the guy some undeserved grief, just to make sure the conversation happened. It's possible. I may never know for sure.

But what I do know for sure is that God never takes anything away from us without (eventually) offering us something better. They guy I met on that bus lost the opportunity to have a normal bus ride. That opportunity was taken away from him. In return, God gave him an opportunity to hear about the church. That may be a great blessing, if it goes anywhere. If not, maybe there's another reason for our meeting. That's another thing I know. There are reasons behind everything God does. We might not learn all those reasons until much later, and we can't necessarily attribute all events to the hand of God anyway. Maybe the guy missing the bus was just bad or good luck. I don't know for sure whether or not to call it an act of God.

Still, something happened, and I highly doubt that we have, or ever will, hear the end of it. I'm confident that someone's life was blessed by the events of the other day, but I have yet to fully learn whose or how.