Toward the end of my brief mission for the LDS church, I decided that the Lord was using various trials to teach me that “you can’t do this alone.” I had come to be a very solitary person, trying to handle my problems without any assistance or support. I joked that the Lord was “beating me into submission” and humbling me into realizing the lesson, that everyone needs the Atonement. We cannot overcome sin alone, but all Christ asks is for us to turn our hearts away from worldly temptations and keep His commandments. And in return he lifts us up higher than we ever thought possible. If any of this sunk in, it was quickly unlearned after I returned home.

Fast forward four years to last Saturday. As I was getting into bed I read a post from one of my North Star brothers and commented with comfort that “you are never alone.” This led me to post my testimony on my ward’s Facebook group the next morning. The last lesson in church on Sunday was about angels, and during it the theme sunk in. Christ never gives up on us. No matter how often we fall, how hard we resist Him out of fear and pain, how lost and hopeless we feel. He knows our sorrows, and He knows how to comfort us.

As I was leaving church I was thinking about the theme of the day and remembered that lesson from my mission. And I realized that both lessons are the same: Come Unto Me. Christ wants to help us, to lift us out of the muck and show us the way. But for Him to help us, we have to reach for it. Change is painful, but it’s a sign of growth. Our purpose on earth is to learn, to grow, and to choose for ourselves to listen to Him.

So what changed? Why did I hear the lesson so differently only a few years apart?

The Spirit speaks to our hearts, according to our capacity and worthiness. On my mission, I was still young and stubborn. I hadn’t realized just how much I needed Christ. So the lesson was “you need me,” almost a rebuke, spoken to a child who is not listening to his father’s warnings and is getting dangerously close to the busy highway.

And over the next few years I tried to play “extreme dodgeball” with those cars on the highway. I got hit, many times, but the thrill was too much for me to resist. The joy eventually faded, but I was stuck in the middle of the street, lost and surrounded by danger. I was finally ready to hear the distant call to return.

And that’s the best part of the Gospel. We can return. It is dangerous, and we will almost certainly get knocked down along the way, but if we keep listening to that constant call to “Come,” eventually we will reach the safety of His arms.