Spiritual Hunger

And my soul hungered. . .Enos 1:4

At some point in their lives, children wonder where they came from. If they are small, we don’t overwhelm them with a detailed biological description of the reproductive process. As they proceed through school, they get this description presented quite thoroughly, sometimes in more detail than we would like. Of all the data that is disseminated in the field of secular education, one fact has been neglected for so long that it is now virtually unknown.

Adolescents in the age bracket of approximately fourteen to seventeen years experience a spiritual awakening. The actual age and degree of intensity vary with each individual. Contrary to what we might suppose, this awakening is not exclusively dependent on the circumstances of the person. There is no rule, and all exceptions, because all are born with God-given agency, or free will. Yet their individual character or lack of it, and how they use that agency, is heavily influenced by what they are taught in the home.

The first major hurdle of life’s journey is adolescence and the discovery of identity. They want to know where they fit into the vast time line of human existence. Those who are given to understand that they are created in the image of God, and that they are alive because someone loves them, tend to face later challenges more successfully than those whose identity consists of nothing more than a package of hormones.

In Alma’s parable of the seed, he explains how this spiritual hunger can be nourished.

But behold, if ye will awake and arouse your faculties, even to an experiment upon my words, and exercise a particle of faith, yea, even if ye can no more than desire to believe, let this desire work in you, even until ye believe in a manner that ye can give place for a portion of my words. Now, we will compare the word unto a seed. Now, if ye give place, that a seed may be planted in your heart, behold, if it be a true seed, or a good seed, if ye do not cast it out by your unbelief, It must needs be that this is a good seed, or that the word is good, for it beginneth to enlarge my soul; yea, it beginneth to enlighten my understanding, yea, it beginneth to be delicious to me. Now behold, would not this increase your faith? But behold, as the seed swelleth, and sprouteth, and beginneth to grow, then you must needs say that the seed is good; for behold it swelleth, and sprouteth, and beginneth to grow. And now, behold, will not this strengthen your faith? Yea, it will strengthen your faith: for ye will say I know that this is a good seed; for behold it sprouteth and beginneth to grow. O then, is not this real? I say unto you, Yes, because it is light; and whatsoever is light, is good, because it is discernible, therefore ye must know that it is good. Ye have only exercised your faith to plant the seed that ye might try the experiment to know if the seed was good. And behold, as the tree beginneth to grow, ye will say: Let us nourish it with great care, that it may get root, that it may grow up, and bring forth fruit unto us. And now behold, if ye nourish it with much care it will get root, and grow up, and bring forth fruit. But if ye neglect the tree, and take no thought for its nourishment, behold it will not get any root; and when the heat of the sun cometh and scorcheth it, because it hath no root it withers away, and ye pluck it up and cast it out. And thus, if ye will not nourish the word, looking forward with an eye of faith to the fruit thereof, ye can never pluck of the fruit of the tree of life. But if ye will nourish the word, yea, nourish the tree as it beginneth to grow, by your faith with great diligence, and with patience, looking forward to the fruit thereof, it shall take root; and behold it shall be a tree springing up unto everlasting life. Because of your faith, diligence, and heed.

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