It is (Not?) Well with My Soul

During another fitful early morning, wrestling with unwanted anxious thoughts, the refrain from the hymn “It Is Well with My Soul” came powerfully to my mind and heart: “It is well (it is well)/ With my soul (with my soul)/ It is well, it is well with my soul.” Deeply touched, when I awoke (after finally getting back to sleep) I immediately went to the internet to find the lyrics and ponder, “what does it mean, ‘it is well with my soul’? Is my soul, notwithstanding all of my weaknesses, really ‘well’? Do I really believe this?”

1.      When peace like a river, attendeth my way When sorrows like sea billows roll— Whatever my lot, Thou has taught me to say “It is well, it is well, with my soul.”

It is well [it is well] with my soul [with my soul]; It is well, it is well with my soul.

2.      Though Satan should buffet, though trials should come,

Let this blest assurance control:

That Christ hath regarded my helpless estate

And hath shed His own blood for my soul.

It is well [it is well] with my soul [with my soul]; It is well, it is well with my soul.

3.      My sin—oh, the bliss of this glorious thought!—

My sin, not in part but the whole,

Is nailed to the cross, and I bear it no more.

Praise the Lord, praise the Lord, O my soul.

It is well [it is well] with my soul [with my soul]; It is well, it is well with my soul.

4.      O Lord, haste the day when my faith shall be sight,

The heav’ns be rolled back like a scroll.

The trump shall resound, and the Lord shall descend;

Even so, it is well with my soul.

It is well [it is well] with my soul [with my soul]; It is well, it is well with my soul.[1]

Christians know that in Christ’s suffering and death He, as the Apostle Paul taught, “nail[ed our sins] to his cross” (Colossians 2:13-15). But, to me at least, forgiveness of “sins” is one thing, and being “perfect” (“even as your Father which is in heaven is perfect”)(Matthew 5:48) is something else. My sins of omission (if not my repeated sins of commission)—what I am not yet perfectly or consistently (such as apt to persuade, long-suffering, gentle, meek, full of love unfeigned, kind, possessed of pure knowledge (see D&C 121:40-42), to mention just a few ways I fall short)—constantly loom large in my mind. I get that through Christ’s atonement I can be justified, but becoming sanctified thereby is a little harder for me to actually see happening in my life.[2]

Of course, this line of thinking turns the hymn on its head. “It is Well with My Soul” is not about my soul or your soul at all, but about God’s soul. Sure Satan will buffet us[3] and trials (often self-inflicted) will come. God designed life that way. As he explained to Adam and Eve: “cursed is the ground for thy sake” (Genesis 3:17-18). All that weed-pulling and sweat-inducing labor (physical, mental and emotional) to build and maintain a home and to provide for and raise a family “gives us experience” (D&C 122:7; see also D&C 105:10) and, ultimately (and often immediately), is for “our good.” But God also provided a Savior, clothing His eternal intelligence in a spirit body, the eldest of all His spirit children, whom He foreknew and tutored to become the preeminent Jehovah, who under the Father’s direction “created all things, both in heaven and in earth” (Mosiah 4:8; John 1:3), standing second to God the Eternal Father in the First Presidency of Heaven. Condescending to leave His exalted state to be born in the humblest of circumstances, Jehovah continued “do[ing] always those things that please[d]” his Father (John 8:29), in the end “mak[ing] his [very] soul an offering for sin,” “justify[ing] many”[4] by “bear[ing] their iniquities” (Isaiah 53:10-11; Mosiah 14:10-11) AND “tak[ing] upon him their [physical and emotional] sicknesses and their infirmities” (Alma 7:11-12) or weaknesses, compulsions and addictions. As the songwriters so eloquently teach, “Let this blest assurance control:/That Christ hath regarded my helpless estate/ And hath shed His own blood for my soul,” not only to cleanse that soul but to perfect it. As Christ said, “I am able to make you holy” (D&C 60:7).

This is what the temple endowment and serving regularly in the temple are all about. Temple ordinances and temple buildings are among the most treasured of the second most important gifts or treasures our Father gives us (after the gift of His Beloved Son), being key elements of the gifts of the gospel of Jesus Christ and the Church of Jesus Christ, with its priesthood authority, ordinances, covenants and community. As Elder Renlund taught in his October 2024 General Conference message,[5] both of these gifts are essential to provide access to the power of Christ’s atonement, which enables the process of sanctification that is at the heart of God’s plan. As we receive temple ordinances and spend “increased time” in temples, where Christ puts His name and where He dwells through the power of His Spirit, we participate in a “virtuous cycle of growing our faith in the Lord Jesus Christ, thus increasing our ability to apply the gospel in our lives, growing from one principle or Christlike attribute to the next." Temples sanctify us like "nothing else can.”[6]

While I confess that it is difficult to see this process unfold in my own life, I have seen it demonstrated visibly in others, including my maternal grandfather, Lewis Alvin West. Grandpa's faithful great-grandparents gave the ultimate sacrifice of their lives in Winter Quarters during their journey to the Great Salt Lake Valley. My Grandfather, however, was not blessed to grow up in an active LDS family. He introduced my Grandmother, a devout Catholic, to the gospel by examining her beliefs, as found in the Bible, and comparing them, principle by principle, with the truths restored by the Prophet Joseph Smith. The process, Grandpa wrote, “resulted not only in her conversion but in mine also!” Sometime after my Grandmother’s baptism and their temple sealing, Grandpa confronted one of the more pernicious “worldly habits,” smoking, which he had picked up during his years of inactivity. Until that moment, unfortunately, he had “never realized [that such habit] could so fasten itself upon one to make that individual an absolute slave, taking away from him the power to stop.”

Never in all my life did I have such an experience as I had when at this particular period, with the responsibility of a good woman, now my wife, with every hope of a family of children, I decided it was necessary to begin to magnify [the] priesthood conferred upon me and the covenants taken in the temple.[7] It seemed such a simple matter to say to one’s self that I would not indulge today but no sooner had I taken that resolution than my troubles commenced. I cannot explain and no one without the experience would appreciate the terrible craving which manifested itself in my body, never leaving for an instant until it was satisfied. It was quite real with me and I do confess that I weakened in my efforts.

I have always had great faith in prayer.  . . . [After extensive fasting and prayers answered, he wrote,] it was and still is a most glorious experience. To feel trapped—imprisoned—the rather frightening feeling of losing control over yourself to some strange and unseen power—and then suddenly to be released in the dawn of a new day to know the joy of freedom—above all the strength in overcoming—a complete sense of release from an evil power—dramatic—yes, so it was to me and shall always remain so.

All of my memories of Grandpa growing up were of the saintly, white-haired patriarch who gave me my patriarchal blessing at age 12. Learning of the miraculous healing from his addiction by the power of Christ’s atonement years later only increased my appreciation for him and for a Savior who, as He said, is fully capable of making us holy. When self-doubts and distresses come, may we focus on the Lord, even “Praise the Lord, praise the Lord, O my soul,” trusting in His teaching that, as we stay in our covenant relationship with Him, “It is well, it is well (and always will be), with my soul.”

[1] Hymns—For Home and Church, #1003, “It Is Well with My Soul,” Text: Horatio G. Spafford, 1876; Music: Philip P. Bliss, 1876; arr. 2024, https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/study/music/hymns-for-home-and-church/it-is-well-with-my-soul?lang=eng. [2] To be “justified” is “to be pardoned from punishment for sin and declared guiltless. A person is justified by the Savior’s grace through faith in Him. This faith is shown by repentance and obedience to the laws and ordinances of the gospel. Jesus Christ’s Atonement enables mankind to repent and be justified or pardoned from punishment they otherwise would receive” Guide to the Scriptures, https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/study/scriptures/gs/justification-justify?lang=eng. “Sanctification,” on the other hand, involves a “process of becoming free from sin, pure, clean, and holy through the Atonement of Jesus Christ (Moses 6:59–60).” Guide to the Scriptures.” In other words, sanctification is more about what we are or have become, through Christ’s power, than about what we have done or repented of. Stephen L. Fluckiger, Drawing Upon the Spiritual Treasures of the Temple, 115-16 nn. 12&13. [3] “The Lord gave us a mortal, fallen body and world in which we are subject to Satan’s influence through the flesh (unlike translated beings [see 3 Nephi 28:39] and little children [see Doctrine and Covenants 29:47]) so that we can ‘work out [our own] salvation’ (Philippians 2:12; Alma 34:37) and ‘prove’ ourselves (Abraham 3:25), learning from our own experience the difference between righteousness and wickedness.” Fluckiger, Drawing, 7 n4. Brigham Young taught that “in the first place the spirit is pure, and under the special control and influence of the Lord, but the body is of the earth, and is subject to the power of the Devil, and is under the mighty influence of that fallen nature that is of the earth. If the spirit yields to the body, the Devil then has power to overcome the body and spirit of that man, and he loses both” (in Discourses of Brigham Young, 69–70). Eternal Marriage Student Manual, “Temptations of Satan and the Natural Man,” https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/study/manual/eternal-marriage-student-manual/temptations-of-satan-and-the-natural-man?lang=eng. [4] Note Christ justifies, or forgives, “many” but not all sinners. As President Oaks has taught, “the unrepentant transgressor must suffer for his own sins.” (“Sin and Suffering,” Ensign, July 1992, 71–72, citing D&C 19:16-17) It encourages me that the number of God’s children who have already qualified for such forgiveness (and the celestial kingdom that all such individuals inherit—inheritors of the other kingdoms having to suffer for their own sins) are not few. Alma in about 82 B.C. explained that “there were many, exceedingly great many [from earlier dispensations], who were made pure and entered into the rest of the Lord their God” (Alma 13:12), meaning, of course, the celestial kingdom. [5] Fluckiger, Drawing, 48, quoting Nelson, “Focus on the Temple,” 121. [6] Dale G. Renlund, “This Is My Gospel”—“This Is My Church,” https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/study/general-conference/2024/10/15renlund?lang=eng. [7] My grandparents, who lived in Portland, Oregon their entire adult lives, were sealed in the Cardston, Alberta Temple on July 20, 1927 by President Edward J. Wood, one week after my Grandmother’s baptism on July 13, 1927. Image by  Greg Rakozy, Unsplash.