I don't remember when I first became afraid of the dark. One night, I was perfectly capable of going to sleep in a darkened room, and then the next night, quite suddenly, I was not. In that 24-hour period, I had learned one very important principle — light is good and darkness is bad.
Fortunately, I was a middle child who benefited from the knowledge of older brothers who had learned to conquer darkness. So, like many of you, I overcame the darkness of night by arming myself with objects that emitted light. A flashlight strategically placed underneath my pillow was my weapon of choice. I favored aiming a flashlight beam at whatever darkness troubled me rather than hoping a stationary night light would lessen the darkness long enough for me to fall asleep. Besides, at 7 years of age, using a flashlight to chase away darkness seemed manlier than a quick dive under the covers. And so at an early age, I learned that President David O. McKay was right when he declared, "Yes, it is a great thing to celebrate the light" (David O. McKay, Gospel Ideals, 577).
I still do not enjoy darkness, although at my current age, it is spiritual darkness that troubles me most. Fortunately, there is an easy solution to spiritual darkness that has as its starting point our capacity to increase in knowledge. The pursuit of just any knowledge, however, is not enough. All knowledge is not created equal, and too often we spend a disproportionate amount of our limited time on earth in the pursuit of knowledge that does little to deliver us "from the powers of Satan and from darkness" (Doctrine and Covenants 24:1).
President Gordon B. Hinckley stated on more than one occasion that one of his favorite scriptures concerning the importance of knowledge is the following: "And that which doth not edify is not of God, and is darkness. That which is of God is light; and he that receiveth light, and continueth in God, receiveth more light; and that light growth brighter and brighter until the perfect day" (Doctrine and Covenants 50:23-24). The Book of Mormon prophet Alma taught a similar truth when he declared that certain knowledge, namely revealed knowledge, "is light; and whatsoever is light, is good, because it is discernible, therefore ye must know that it is good" (Alma 32:35).
The strength of revealed knowledge was made clear to me when, as a young missionary, I found myself teaching a well-educated minister of another church. After the first discussion, my companion and I left hopeful that he and his congregation would accept our message and join the Church. During the second discussion, we discovered his goal was to convince us that our message was false. He asked many questions that we were unable to answer. He was frustrated, however, by our reliance on the simple doctrines of the restored gospel. Finally, in a moment of exasperation, he turned to me and said, "Do you mean to tell me that you can look me in the eyes and say with no doubt that Joseph Smith saw God the Father and Jesus Christ, that the Book of Mormon is true and that there is a living prophet on the earth today?" Those were questions I could answer because that knowledge had been revealed to me by my Father in Heaven. After I responded to each of his questions, he quietly said, "Then I guess we don't have anything more to talk about." He was right. Revealed knowledge trumps all other kinds of knowledge, even when declared by a relatively unimpressive-looking young man like I was back then.
All of the accounts of the earth's creation make reference to the critical act of separating light from darkness. The creation account in Abraham reveals that "they (the Gods) comprehended the light, for it was bright; and they divided the light, or caused it to be divided, from the darkness" (Abraham 4:4). In our personal pursuit of knowledge, we must engage in the same act of identifying and separating light from darkness, truth from error, and that which edifies from that which destroys. If not, we will end up seeking our "own counsels in the dark" and find ourselves having "gone astray" (Moses 6:28).
As we seek after revealed knowledge, knowledge that flows directly from God, the day will come when our "whole bodies shall be filled with light, and there shall be no darkness" (Doctrine and Covenants 88:67) in us. Then, and only then, will we fully benefit from the revealed knowledge we have diligently sought in this life and be blessed by God to comprehend "all things" (Doctrine and Covenants 88:67).
Allen D. Haynie, an attorney, is president of the Escondido California South Stake
