I just got done reading a thoughtful blog on the topic - I like to read up on this topic that seems to bring out so much human angst and emotion. In my marriage to my sweetheart, we have shared many a heart-felt hour poring over the topic. We both are at peace with the doctrine - 18 years later. BTW - I have no intention of attempting it in this life - way too much difficulty in providing for my small family and meeting all the needs of them and my dear wife. The challenges of another set of logistics would be daunting - the daily crush of meeting just the basic physical needs of one family unit is just too much. However, I know it is completely possible to make it happen - especially in a place where temporal matters do not exist.
Clearly, Abraham and most all of the greats of time participated in it and Jesus himself apparently did having at least two, if not three wives that we are aware of. Jesus put his stamp on it when he declared that he does the works that Abraham did (what else could that mean?) and that Abraham himself was enthroned in heaven as a God. If Abraham were a vile person, that statement simply would NOT have been made. So, what does all this mean?
It comes down to personal testimony and a deep and abiding understanding/testimony of the law of consecration and stewardship (simply being asked to take care of something to the full measure of its necessity, and then doing it). When my wife was struggling with the effects of mental illness tied to the lack of B-12 in her diet and post-partum issues (an earlier post), I was beside myself and wanted to walk away. It was in my extremity that I had a heavenly intervention and fully learned the concept of consecration and stewardship. It was at that point that I feel I won the (true) love of my wife and the approbation of God. I had prayed mightily and asked to be released from that trial - and indeed received permission to walk away, if that were my choice as there is true agency in everything - but I also would have sacrificed ALL blessings tied to enduring to the end and never learned the pivotal lesson of life and Christ-like living.
So what does this have to do with polygamy? My mother passed away six months after my wife and I lost our 9 month old son. Before she died, I remember her many times telling my father that he was under no circumstances to marry another woman if she were to go first. Precisely because she would potentially have another to deal with on the other side - and did not want things to be messy. One thing my mother was - was the stereotypical jealous woman. If another woman so much as gave my father a sideways glance, my mother was all over it. I was intrigued by that human characteristic in my mother as I watched it growing up. So, the night my kid passed away, I was blessed with a particularly poignant dream in which I was shown what would befall my wife and I for the next three years as we passed through the healing process of losing our little treasure from heaven. The second part of that dream involved knowing that "everything would be alright" given with a distinct sign. We puzzled over that until my father gave me a call out of the blue a month after my mother died on Christmas day. He related that my boy and my mother had visited him in the night in an open (waking) vision and had set the record straight and given him other counsel. My boy was just there as a bonus or priesthood representative (he had been called over to the other side by my G-g-gfather because "he needed more help attending to family business"). Well, Dallin (my boy) was helping out with that kind of thing obviously in a big way. The one portion of the message my mother gave to my father was that she was wrong in her desire that he not marry another and that he should proceed as soon as possible and be fulfilled and happy in the remaining years of his life. My boy in his spirit form and according to my father, was slightly taller and broader shouldered than I was when I was in my prime at around 25 years of age. He described my mother as in her prime - about how she looked like when she and my father were married in their mid-twenties. So, for all the people who struggle with that doctrine of God - and I am not aware of too many women that don't - here is my little piece of the puzzle. I know my dad is not making it up (speaking strictly from a logical standpoint) so that he could run off and immediately get re-married without waiting the requisite 2-3 year period, as some of my female siblings have accused.... I know that, simply because he did not know the details of the second portion of my dream I had the night my kid died and could not have known exactly how those details dovetailed into the impeccable timing of his phone call to me. A complete improbability. It simply happened, as stated.
So many people will kick against the pricks - many will leave the Church and allow themselves all kinds of excuses based on that doctrine that seems to be even more divisive than even the hellish practice of abortion. After what my wife and I have passed thru, it is safe to say that we understand the concept of stewardship as God intended it. When our child was called over to the other side to accomplish God's purposes, our time of nurturing was over and we had to comply with a heavy heart but with an attitude of "Not my will, but thine be done". Not quite an Abrahamic test by any means; as our son was not handed over, nor did we have to build an altar and gather the sticks for the ultimate test in obedience, but when it was all said and done, we did have to endure with faith and without angry recrimination at God for having allowed us to pass through such a trial as that one.
Reading some of the early writings of how the wives of polygamous marriages gained a "testimony" of the principle, I am astounded at their faith. God did not leave them alone to mourn - but gave most all of them fantastic experiences in order to endure their ordeal in faith and long-suffering; just as my wife and I were given our faith-building experience in the face of tragedy.
Here is the quote from the blog topic on plural marriage that got me going down this bunny trail:
My wife’s ancestor, Sarah Levitt, was present during the early Nauvoo period. She asked her husband if she would have to share him. He encouraged her to pray about it. She had a dream. In the dream she was told that she wouldn’t have to share her husband (he died later). She wrote that she had a vision of the heavenly order and the beauty of it. She also wrote that the practice would be the means of “saving thousands and damning thousands. It was too sacred for fools to handle.”
Truly, the most powerful doctrines of the restored gospel are too powerful for fools to handle - precisely why they are so divisive and are used to separate the wise and foolish virgins in preparation for the glory that may come in the following life, if obedience is the outcome and not the rebellion of the "wise and learned" who think to counsel God and his servants.
