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A Canadian spring brings life and renewal. Dormant plants again bloom in splendor, blossomed trees are filled with the sweet music of the songbirds who have returned from their winter retreat, and the sun’s life-giving light shines upon the play of the newly born. Truly, it is a time of gladness and joy.
Easter comes with reminders of Christ, whose miraculous life and gifts are remembered and celebrated. We are given the promise of peace in this life, a universal resurrection, and eternal life with loved ones dear. With humble and grateful hearts, we ponder His wondrous declaration, “I am the way, the truth, and the life: no man cometh unto the Father, but by me” (John 14:6). We pause in awe of all He did in fulfillment of our Heavenly Father’s plan of happiness. But in that wonder, there is no escape from reflection upon His terrible, unfathomable suffering to become our Redeemer.
The Savior Has Perfect Love and Empathy For Us
For many years, I have pondered and sought to deepen my understanding of the source of Christ’s suffering in mortality, a suffering that is somehow necessary for Him to fulfill His Father’s will. (James E. Faust, in Conference Report, Oct. 2001, 18-20; 3 Nephi 27:13-15; Mosiah 15:7).
In pursuit of such understanding, I am drawn to contemplate the empathy which flows from His suffering, and His perfect love - the defining and all-encompassing virtue of perfection. Consider love as the deep longing for the very best for another and to do all within one’s power to make it so. Should not love be the ultimate motivation? To have empathy is to truly know another. In essence, it is to see as they see and to feel as they feel. For pure love to accomplish its desires, it must flow from true empathy.
Elder Dieter F. Uchtdorf bids us to imagine the measure of God’s love for His children: “Think of the purest, most all-consuming love you can imagine. Now multiply that love by an infinite amount – that is the measure of God’s love for you” (in Conference Report, Oct. 2009, 22). And from such perfect love comes perfect empathy. This empathy moves the God of Heaven to weep because of the suffering He beholds among His children who break His commandments, “Wherefore should not the heavens weep, seeing these shall suffer?” (Moses 7:37)
Just as God the Father loves and empathizes perfectly, so too does His Son. Doesn't all we know of Jesus Christ testify of His undying love for God and man? This love moved Him to do His Father’s will and to lay down His life for His friends. (John 14:31; John 15:13)
While in mortality, like God in Heaven, “Jesus wept” (John 11:35) with those who suffered. Christ’s suffering in Gethsemane, born out of pure love, was not the beginning nor the end of His suffering for the children of God. Then also came His suffering on the cross, flowing from the great injustice by those who “know not what they do” (Luke 23:34). In all, Christ bore a cumulative weight of suffering which satisfied eternal law, bestowed agency to repent, mercy to flow, the promise of a universal resurrection, and the enabling grace of divine succor. (Alma 34:13-16; Alma 42:13-15; Mosiah 15:8-9)
We Can, and Should, Feel Love and Empathy For Others
Some years ago, while serving as a bishop, a distraught young father came in confidence to share with me that his wife had just learned of a life-threatening cancer diagnosis. Later that evening, in the quiet of their home, after a heartfelt and sober discussion, we united our faith as he gave her a priesthood blessing.
Later, while driving home in the dark along a lonely country road, I was overwhelmed by the terrible weight of this family’s concern and uncertainty. Would this husband become a widower? Would their young children lose their mother? My vehicle crawled to a stop, and a crushing sorrow overwhelmed me. I wept. Their suffering was my suffering, born out of the love and empathy that I felt for those of my little flock.
I know I am not the only one who has suffered with those who suffer. Can we fathom the breadth and depth of Christ’s suffering flowing from His perfect love, “Which suffering caused myself, even God, the greatest of all, to tremble because of pain, and to bleed at every pore, and to suffer both body and spirit – and would that I might not drink the bitter cup, and shrink – Nevertheless, glory be to the Father, and I partook and finished my preparations unto the children of men”? (Doctrine and Covenants 19:18-19) It is this suffering that gives Him perfect empathy for us, no matter what pain or challenge we will ever face.
The Atonement Was the Ultimate in Love, Suffering, and Empathy
I read Alma’s most tender account of Christ’s sharing in our mortal suffering – our “pains and afflictions and temptations of every kind” (Alma 7:11). His suffering for us filled Him with empathy, and “mercy, according to the flesh, that he may know according to the flesh how to succor his people according to their infirmities.” (Alma 7:12) “Surely he hath borne our griefs, and carried our sorrows” (Isaiah 53:4). In our suffering, we cannot say of Him, “You do not understand my suffering.”
Christ became one with us by experiencing our suffering, a oneness born out of perfect love and empathy. And flowing from this oneness, He offers divine succor. Consider the unifying path in His invitation to “Follow me” (Matthew 4:19). In this, we are invited to embrace the suffering of others born out of our growing endowment of love and empathy. From these gifts comes an increased desire and capacity to succor one another. Christ’s Atonement- His work of succoring- finds extension through us, His followers. His incomparable Atonement was more than an event; it is an ongoing redemption of which we can be part.
“Through a divine endowment born of searing torment, and out of love for us, Jesus Christ paid the price to redeem us, to strengthen us, and to save us” (Dieter F. Uchtdorf, “My Peace I Give Unto You”, Liahona, Mar. 2023, 6).
My heart is filled with inexpressible wonder and gratitude for His perfect love and empathy, knowing He understands us completely.