Trials and Blessings: Individual Paths

Each individual comes to this world to experience individual trials and blessings. Some will experience dramatic changes: Jackson Mills is one of them.

Uncertain Beginnings

Jackson, our first born, came to this earth in a room filled with stress, fear, and chaos. Doctors were running everywhere. Urgency was in the air. Tense voices barked observations, and instructions. When the dust settled, a quiet reverence filled the room. A miracle had happened that night, and everyone in that room knew it.

Jackson finally went home with us from the newborn ICU a couple of weeks later, accompanied by an oxygen tank and a monitor. His heart defect required a constant flow of oxygen. He lived that way for the first 15 months of his life. At 15 months he had surgery to fix his tiny heart so he could breathe on his own. His early life was to be a succession of trials and blessings as weaknesses gradually gained strength. As his parents we learned to depend on God and yield to the enticings of the Holy Spirit.

 After Jackson’s surgery, his surgeon admitted that he still didn’t understand the complex anatomy of our son’s heart, but it was working. He anticipated Jackson could participate in almost any sporting activity. But one of the side effects from the trauma surrounding the hospital visits and surgery was that Jackson’s speech regressed and was stunted.

Trials and Blessings Catching Up

As Jackson was growing up, trials and blessings continued as a pattern in his life. Though he had been tried by physical weakness as a young child, he grew strong and healthy. He participated in sports like most other kids. He has since participated in football, wrestling, soccer, cross country, and track. He even ran a marathon at the age of 16.

We had been told that Jackson’s speech challenges would probably affect him for a long time. When my wife took Jackson for a heart check-up at age 11, a doctor said that he would have limited speech—until the conversation she had with him. She found it hard to believe that he had ever had problems with his speech because he was so well spoken at the age of 11.

Dedicated Young Adult

Jackson’s life of trials and blessings, weaknesses and strengths, has led to talents and accomplishments no one could have predicted for the struggling small boy. Jackson has consistently followed the will and guidance of the Lord, which have brought him up from weak infancy to maturing dedicated servant of God.

President Russell M. Nelson asked these profound and far-reaching questions:

Are you willing to let God prevail in your life? Are you willing to let God be the most important influence in your life? Will you allow His words, His commandments, and His covenants to influence what you do each day? Will you allow His voice to take priority over any other? Are you willing to let whatever He needs you to do take precedence over every other ambition? Are you willing to have your will swallowed up in His?

Jackson has allowed his will to be swallowed up in God’s.

He served a mission in Colombia, so he speaks Spanish fluently. While on his mission, he had an impression to also learn Portuguese, so he began reading the scriptures in Portuguese and picked up that language as well.

When he returned from his mission, Jackson enrolled at BYU Hawaii, where he has worked at the Tahitian village at the Polynesian Cultural Center. So he picked up French and some Tahitian. Once weak in speaking, he now speaks five languages. There is no doubt in my mind that my son’s decision to serve the Lord as a missionary and to continue in His service today has played a major role in his ability to learn and use these languages to share the love that Jesus Christ brings.

This past weekend our family attended a concert in Miami featuring the Tabernacle Choir at Temple Square—and our boy Jackson, who is now 22 years old. He was one of several young single adults who narrated a special segment of the concert focusing on Jesus Christ and the lessons he taught His disciples at the Sea of Galilee.

As we make decisions to put God’s will above our own, He will strengthen us in ways that wouldn’t be possible if we weren’t willing to follow where He guides and directs us.

I’m so grateful for our Heavenly Father and our Savior, who love us and know us so well that they they can help us to make sense of the trials and blessings that make up the paths of our lives.

My son has and I will continue to follow Them every day.