I prepared the following talk to give in a sacrament meeting for our church in September 2021.
Since my son Scott is leaving for two years on a mission in October, I really wanted to plan a trip with him and make some memories that would last. We decided to go backpacking to a red-rock canyon called Death Hollow. Yup, that's right, Death Hollow. Sounds really fun right? I'd seen videos online of the hike, and there are some neat narrow sections and fun swimming holes. Plus, my brother had been through the canyon in June with his ward's young men, so he was familiar with it.
As we got close to our trip, we watched the weather forecast carefully. There was a big storm predicted for the day before our trip, a Wednesday, but mostly clear on the evening we were hiking in, and clear the following two days we were planning on being in the canyon. The Wednesday storm was the one a couple of weeks ago where the town of Hanksville flooded. Our hike went along the Escalante river for a couple of miles, which flows out of the town of Escalante. That town got almost 2 inches of rain in the storm, which is just a huge amount of water over a large area that funnels into that narrow canyon. We assumed there would have been some big flash flooding on Wednesday, but hoped it would be cleared out by the time we got there Thursday evening.
Late Thursday afternoon as we approached the trailhead, it began to rain, hard. The dirt road to the trailhead became deeply rutted and our hike began by crossing a swiftly flowing stream in a normally dry ravine, which we ended up crossing a few more times along the trail.
Our route descended about 700 feet from the canyon rim to the river below. It was near dark when we reached the river. Though the rain had stopped, it looked like it was flowing pretty high and we briefly debated whether to ford the stream to our intended campsite or try to find a site where we were. I went to the edge of the water and reached out, putting my hiking pole into the water to test the depth. I was surprised that it sank down 4 feet or so, just within arm reach of the bank. With that, we decided to find camp without crossing the stream. We found a great spot up a hill from the river just as it was getting dark. We fell asleep with the roar of the river below us.
The next morning from my tent I thought that the river seemed a lot quieter, and went down to the bank to see what the water level looked like. I was completely shocked to see that the bank I had stood on the night before was now about 12 feet above above the water, which was flowing at the bottom of a steep gully that was had been completely filled when we first saw it. I had no idea how dangerous that river was the day before, as the water was brown and opaque.
This sides of this deep gully were completely covered with tall plants that were bent sideways by the strong current. In addition, along much of the width of the canyon above the gully we could see large sage brush and other plants that normally were far from flowing water, which had been pushed down sideways by a strong current. It was obvious that the flash flooding the day before was huge. As we hiked we saw several previously good campsites that had obviously been underwater the day before.
As we hiked it became obvious that the flooding had changed a lot of things about the river, such as the quicksand. We would be walking along a wet, sandy spot and suddenly we'd just step into jello and sink to our knees. We soon learned what it looked like and could mostly avoid it when we were out of the river. But we discovered that there were also long stretches of deep quicksand in the river, under the water. The first time we found some like this, the group had passed through it, and I was in the rear. My water shoes were not on tight enough and when I stepped into it I felt the mud sucking the shoes off my feet. With visions of hiking the rest of the day without shoes, I froze. As I stood still, I could feel myself sinking, inch by inch. I called out to the group for help, and they came back so I could hand them my nice camera, phone, and other things I didn't want to get wet. Then I could have my hands free to grab my shoes and pull them out of the mud. I lost my shoes a few times that day, but we mostly learned to deal with it.
The quicksand was tricky enough that we would try to leave the river whenever we found some. This usually involved climbing up the steep bank and then bushwhacking our way through thick growth, or following faint trails whenever we could find one. This is how we discovered another of Death Hollow’s delights, the poison ivy. I was with some of the kids on a path that led into a thick growth of chest-high plants that suddenly looked suspicious, with groups of three leaves and white berries. I told them to stop immediately, that we were probably in a big field of poison ivy. So we all backtracked back into the river to go enjoy the quicksand instead.
I've never wandered into poison ivy before and I learned something about it that day: you usually don't feel anything for a day or two after touching it. So you can spend all day playing in poison ivy and never realize you've done something foolish until much later. So that was super fun.
Sometimes the streambed was solid rock, and this was the best. This walking was easy and gave us relief from the stretches of quicksand, and the pain of bushwhacking or poison ivy.
All the obstacles made hiking slower than we expected, and we never made it to the fun swimming holes. As we got near them, a thunderstorm rolled in overhead, and being down in the bottom of the canyon, we couldn't see how far the dark clouds stretched. We were pretty spooked by all the flash flood evidence we had been hiking through all day, and we knew we had some long stretches of hiking in the river on our way back to camp, so we turned around. The storm blew over pretty quickly, thankfully.
However, not all changes in the canyon from the floods were bad. For example, there were two beaver dams in the canyon with deep ponds that we were planning to have to wade through, which were completely washed away. And there was a brand-new, beautiful, 50-foot waterfall pouring down onto us from a side canyon, where we took pictures and swam.
In the end, we succeeded in making some memories that should stick with us for a long time. And while I'm not anxious to repeat that exact trip, I'm really glad we had the experience together. So, since this is a sacrament meeting talk, what lessons can we learn from this?
First, some of you may be asking yourselves what kind of dad would take his son on a hike to a place called Death Hollow? I was thinking about this yesterday and had a sudden realization that our Father in Heaven has sent us down to a place called mortality. Mortality is defined as "the state of being subject to death" or "death, especially on a large scale." So essentially, we are ALL in Death Hollow.
Next, my goal in the trip was to make some long-term memories with Scott. Yes, we succeeded in doing that all right. I'll probably always remember the feeling of my shoes getting sucked off my feet in deep quicksand, and the realization that we had wandered into a huge patch of poison ivy. I've learned that my strongest memories usually come from pretty uncomfortable experiences, which challenge me or stretch me. Our Father in Heaven knows that when we are challenged, chastened, tested, and tried, we are ripe for learning much more rapidly then when things are easy. He always plays the long game with us, allowing us temporary discomfort or suffering for our long-term good. D&C 101 was given to the prophet after the saints in Zion had suffered severe persecution. The Lord says this in verses 35-36:
35 And all they who suffer persecution for my name, and endure in faith, though they are called to lay down their lives for my sake yet shall they partake of all this glory.
36 Wherefore, fear not even unto death; for in this world your joy is not full, but in me your joy is full.
The Lord is basically promising us hardship while in mortality. We should expect that any persecution or trial that is hard enough to produce real faith will be unpleasant in the short term. Joseph Smith taught that “a religion that does not require the sacrifice of all things never has the power sufficient to produce the faith necessary unto life and salvation.”
I learned that my path was so much easier when I was on the rock. Helaman tells his two sons in Helaman 5:12 "...my sons, remember, remember that it is upon the rock of our Redeemer, who is Christ, the Son of God, that ye must build your foundation ... which is a sure foundation, a foundation whereon if men build they cannot fall." Christ is the sure foundation for our footsteps through life and if we stick with him, while the road still isn't easy, it's so much better than any alternative.
I learned that some of Satan's deceptions are sometimes easy to detect like feeling yourself sinking in quicksand, and some are much harder to detect because the consequences come later, like poison ivy. How I wish I had prepared and studied what poison ivy looks like before our trip; it would have been easier to avoid. President Ezra Taft Benson declared: “The Book of Mormon exposes the enemies of Christ. … It fortifies the humble followers of Christ against the evil designs, strategies, and doctrines of the devil in our day.” How important it is to read the Book of Mormon!
In D&C 101:22, the Lord says, "Behold, it is my will, that all they who call on my name, and worship me according to mine everlasting gospel, should gather together, and stand in holy places;" I learned in the canyon that yesterday's high ground, like the flooded campsites we saw along the river, may no longer be high enough for today's conditions. Our "holy places" must be carefully prepared to meet the demands of our changing world.
James E. Faust tells the following story: Bishop Stanley Smoot was interviewed by President Spencer W. Kimball. President Kimball asked, “How often do you have family prayer?” Bishop Smoot answered, “We try to have family prayer twice a day, but we average about once.” President Kimball answered, “In the past, having family prayer once a day may have been all right. But in the future it will not be enough if we are going to save our families.”
Elder Faust then says: "I wonder if having casual and infrequent family home evening will be enough in the future to fortify our children with sufficient moral strength. In the future, infrequent family scripture study may be inadequate to arm our children with the virtue necessary to withstand the moral decay of the environment in which they will live."
We have been warned. I was blind to how precarious my position was on the bank of a raging, 15-foot-deep river because I could only see the surface. I am thankful that I stayed away from danger and left the river bank for safer, higher ground.
The last lesson I want to point out is that it's harder to see at the bottom of the canyon than from a vantage point up top. We could not tell how big the storm was because our field of vision was limited. D&C 101 talks a lot about the importance of watchmen on a tower who can see all the land. Our living prophets are watchmen to us. They can both see and correctly interpret the signs and warnings around us. They can forecast the weather and tell us exactly what we need to know, to be safe down in the canyons of mortality. Just like the weather forecast helped us avoid catastrophic flash flooding, listening to and following the living prophets may just be the difference for us between life and death.
I know that if we will prepare and proceed carefully, listening to our living prophets, and founding ourselves on the rock of Christ, we can all endure the guaranteed challenges of mortality--our Death Hollow hike--and eventually enjoy the incomprehensible blessings that await the faithful. D&C 101 talks a great deal about a future time on the earth when war, conflict, disease, and sorrow are no more. The Lord’s long game is to prepare us to be worthy of such blessings. These blessings are surely as real as the challenges we currently face. In the name of Jesus Christ, amen.
