When Adam and Eve transgressed and were asked to leave the Garden of Eden, I wonder if either of them had any idea what the Father was saying to them. “Unto the woman he said, I will greatly multiply thy sorrow and thy conception; in sorrow thou shalt bring forth children; and thy desire shall be to thy husband, and he shall rule over thee.” I imagine Eve was totally innocent of the changes that would take place in her body and the pain of delivering her first child, especially without a midwife or any assistance at all. It had to have been a very “hard thing” for her to do. “And unto Adam He said, Because thou hast hearkened unto the voice of thy wife, and hast eaten of the tree, of which I commanded thee, saying, Thou shalt not eat of it: cursed is the ground for thy sake; in sorrow shalt thou eat of it all the days of thy life; Thorns also and thistles shall it bring forth to thee; and thou shalt eat the herb of the field; In the sweat of thy face shalt thou eat bread, till thou return unto the ground; for out of it wast thou taken: for dust thou art,and unto dust shalt thou return.” (Genesis 2:16,17 and 18). Adam, too, probably had no idea the amount of hard work involved in preparing the soil, planting the seeds, watering and cultivating (weeding) and then the work of harvesting his crop in order to provide food for his family. These were all “hard things.” Everything we do for the very first time in our lives is usually harder than it is after we have prepared or trained our body to do it. There are many hard things that we have to encounter while we sojourn here. I read with interest the story of a returned missionary about how he was taught by his mission president how to do hard things: “My mission president once said: ‘I’m going to teach you to do hard things. Someday your wife will be sick, your child will be screaming, and you won’t want to get up and go to work. But you will, and that’s hard. I’m going to teach you to do hard things.’ There were plenty of hard days and times when things weren’t working out, but learning how to overcome and keep pressing forward was so important. The other day I experienced the scene described in the quote. I laid in bed and I thought of all of the hard moments and the lessons learned serving a mission and promptly got up and went to work because I can do hard things.”
Hard things may be described as anything that we are compelled to do that we do not know how to do, that we do not like to do, that we have to do, such as Adam. He had to fight weeds, thorns and thistles in order for him and his family to eat. His choice was rather simple: work or starve. When we have those choices, hard work is always first choice. He had no tools in the beginning, but I believe the Lord did probably give him some instructions before he was left alone. Possibly he was even taught to make a few tools, the most important kind. The kind that would help him till the earth. I like the following anonymous story about the two woodcutters: There was once two woodcutters who argued as to which of them will cut more wood from morning til four o’clock in the afternoon when they would stop for the day. In the morning, the two men took up their position. At first, they worked at one speed. After an hour, one of them could not be heard; he had stopped cutting trees. Realizing that this was his chance, the first woodcutter started to cut trees with double efforts. After ten minutes had passed, he heard the second woodcutter start working again. They were working almost synchronously, when the first woodcutter could hear that his opponent had stopped again. The first woodcutter kept on working, feeling the smell of victory. This lasted all day long. Each hour the second woodcutter stopped for ten minutes and the other one continued to work. When time expired, the first woodcutter who worked without stopping was absolutely sure that he won cutting the most wood. He was very surprised to find out that he was mistaken. How did that happen? He asked the other woodcutter who had won. Each hour I heard that you had stopped the work for ten minutes. How could you cut more trees than I? It’s impossible! The second one said, “It was very simple; in fact, each hour I stopped the work for ten minutes to sharpen my axe while you continued to work with your dull axe. So while you were cutting with a dull axe I was cutting with a sharp one. Hard things are done more easily when tools and minds are made sharper. Hard things are made easier with the right tools and when those tools have been maintained to work optimally while being used. Hard things are harder when little thought has been given to preparation.