“And when ye shall receive these things, I would exhort you that ye would ask God, the Eternal Father, in the name of Christ, if these things are not true; and if ye shall ask with a sincere heart, with real intent, having faith in Christ, he will manifest the truth of it unto you, by the power of the Holy Ghost.” (Moroni 10:4). The word manifest has a few different definitions. One of the older meanings of the word is to make something clear or evident beyond doubt. One of the newer definitions of manifest is the act of wishing something into existence by sheer willpower, as in, I am manifesting a new job offer to show up in my inbox any minute now. A lot of people think that the truth is something that can be manifested in the second sense of the word. The truth is what we want it to be, and if we want it badly enough, it will become true. This is not how truth works. Truth can only be manifest in the sense that it can only be revealed or made evident by our Heavenly Father through the power of the Holy Ghost. The verse quoted above says “HE will manifest the truth of it.” We have to be patient and rely on the Lord's timing and trust that He will manifest the truth unto us at the moment where it will have the greatest chance of sinking deeply into our minds and hearts and taking root and growing and bearing fruit in the good soil of our souls. As much as we might want to manifest the truth in our own time and according to our own understanding and desires, whatever we manage to conjure up in our stubbornness and pride and impatience, the one thing that we can be certain of is that it will not be the truth. If we seem to be lost in the mists of darkness and the fog of doubts and our Heavenly Father is not manifesting the truth to us as quickly as we like, all we can do is continue praying for the truth, striving every day to be more sincere in our hearts, more real with our intentions, and with ever stronger faith in our Savior Jesus Christ. If we keep at it, God will manifest the truth of it unto us and eventually we will know the truth of all things.
