Do you believe I could create a wind strong enough to lift you back up to the path?

Transcription

1 I want to start off with a quick story to lead into my assigned topic, and it s only a story. A man was hiking along a mountain path, enjoying the peace and quiet while taking in the beautiful scenery. As he walked, a sudden gust of wind made him lose his balance and stumble off the path and over the side of the cliff. Fortunately a solitary tree growing out of the cliffside stopped him after only feet. He clung to the branch, seeing no way to climb back up to the safety of the path and not wanting to make the rest of the trip down to the bottom. As he gripped the branch, he heard a soft voice speaking, which he at first dismissed as the sound of the wind. But it came again, Do you believe in God? Not sure if he was hearing things, he timidly answered, Yes. Do you believe I created all you see around you? Again, he answered, Yes. Do you believe I created the tree which saved you from falling? Yes, I do. was his reply. Do you believe I could create a wind strong enough to lift you back up to the path? Yes, I believe anything is possible for God. The voice simply replied, Then let go. I have been asked to speak on lessons from the Old Testament prophets which we can apply in our lives today. As I considered various examples, the theme of "trust in God" kept coming up so I figured I'd work with it. I have selected a few examples from the Old Testament prophets to show how they can teach us to trust in God in our day. There are many examples of those who didn t follow God s directions and paid severe consequences. Lot s wife was told not to turn back towards Sodom & Gomorrah. The Israelites were commanded not to take any spoils from battle and then lost to the army of Ai because a man named Achan disobeyed and kept clothes and gold for himself. Samuel warned the people of the dangers of having a king, but the people refused to listen. As a result, the kingdom was split and the Northern tribes never had a righteous king. Elisha s servant ended up with leprosy because he went back to take a reward from Naaman after he was told not to. I d rather deal with positives, so I ll focus on experiences of those who trusted God, obeyed the prophets and were blessed. First, the Prophet Jahaziel The prophet who? Don t worry if you don t recognize the name, he didn t get a lot of screen time. After the death of king David, Israel divided into the North and South kingdoms. After several unrighteous kings, Jehoshaphat was humble and obedient to the Lord. The Ammonites came to attack Jerusalem and Jahaziel told the king: 1

2 Be not afraid nor dismayed by reason of this great [army]; for the battle is not yours, but God s. Ye shall not need to fight in this battle: set yourselves, stand ye still, and see the salvation of the Lord with you. (2 Chronicles 20:15, 17) He was told to go down and meet the army, and where to find them. How did the king receive the news? He and the inhabitants of Jerusalem fell before the Lord, worshipping [God] (2 Chron 20:18). The next morning Jehoshaphat lead the people into the wilderness and told them, Believe in the Lord your God, so shall ye be established; believe his prophets, so shall ye prosper (2 Chron 20:20). Imagine going out onto the battle field against an army which outnumbers you significantly. Even with weapons, your chances don t look good. Which is good, because you didn t bring any weapons. Your entire battle plan is to just show up and see what happens. Trusting in the prophet, king Jehoshaphat consulted with his people then appointed singers who went out and began singing praises to the Lord. As they sang, the armies of the Ammonites and Moabites began fighting each other until they were completely wiped out. You have to wonder just how bad was their singing probably comparable to priesthood opening exercises. What can we apply from this story to our lives today? Well, if you re ever surrounded by hostile armies, just get the high priests to go out and sing to them. Because the people of Israel trusted Jahaziel so completely, and by extension the Lord, they received divine guidance and protection in their time of need. The fact that Jehoshaphat was still consulting with the people on the battle grounds suggests to me that he didn t doubt if the Lord would keep his promise, he just didn t know how it would be fulfilled. Is it easier to face a vast army in the days of Israel, or to keep the Lord s standards in our day? Jehoshaphat s council is as applicable in our day as it was in his, Believe in the Lord your God, so shall ye be established; believe his prophets, so shall ye prosper (2 Chron 20:20). The Prophet Elijah. Elijah set a great example of trusting the Lord. After calling a famine in the land through the sealing power of the priesthood, Elijah was told to hide near a brook where ravens would bring him food morning and evening (1 Kings 17:4). I haven't studied the carrying capacity of standard ravens, but I'm pretty sure they weren't bringing him cheeseburgers and milkshakes. Think of the faith it would take to trust God enough to depend on ravens, not only to bring you food, but to bring you something edible and enough to survive. When the brook dried up, the Lord told Elijah to travel to Zarapheth where a widow would feed him. He met the widow, who was gathering a couple of sticks for a fire, and asked her for water and bread. She replied she only had a "handful of meal... and a little oil for me and my son, that we may eat it, and die" (1 Kings 17:12). 2

3 Elijah replied, "Fear not", and instructed her to first make a little cake for him, then she could make something for herself. Before she could give an answer, he promised her the barrel of meal and her cruse of oil would not be empty until the Lord sent rain again. How much faith would it take to feed a stranger the last of your meager food storage? And not the navy beans either, we're talking about the stuff you actually want to eat. How hard would it be to trust a stranger's promise that you wouldn't run out of meal or oil for as long as there was a drought? And incidentally, the famine lasted 3.5 years (Luke 4:25-26). The widow obeyed the words of the prophet and received the promised miracle, which sustained her and her son through the famine. Okay, so aside from a plug for food storage, how does that help us today? Will there ever come a time when the prophet will ask that we give what seems beyond our own capacity? If we have faith and put our trust in God we ll find that, like the widow s meal and oil, our ability to bear our burdens is increased to match the demand. The Prophet Elisha. The next example is of Elisha, the prophetic successor to Elijah. Israel was at war with Syria, and through inspiration Elisha warned Jehoram, king of Israel where the Syrian army was hidden. So, he and the Israelites stopped traveling in that area, which irritated the king of Syria, who began to question his men thinking one of them must have warned the Israelites. His servants answered, O king: Elisha, the prophet that is in Israel, telleth the king of Israel the words that thou speakest in thy bedchamber. (2 Kings 6:12) The king of Syria decided to solve his problem by capturing Elisha. He sent horses, chariots, and a great host who during the night surrounded the city where Elisha lived. The next morning, Elisha s servant got up and saw the city was surrounded and asked Elisha, Alas, how shall we do? (2 Kings 6:15) Elisha told him, Fear not: for they that be with us are more than they that be with them. The scriptures don t say how his servant reacted. I hope he had more faith than me, because that would be a tough situation. My first reaction would be, Math was not your best subject in school, was it? The prophet prayed and asked God to open the eyes of his servant, and the young man saw the mountain was full of horses and chariots of fire round about Elisha (2 Kings 6:17). In our lives, we need to have the faith and trust that the prophet can see things which we don t. That s one of the reasons prophets are also referred to as seers. The prophet tells us where the enemy is hidden and warns us to take a safer route. Just because we may not see what he can, doesn t make the dangers or the promised blessings any less real. If the king of Israel had disregarded Elisha s warning, he would ve been taken captive by the Syrians. Similarly, if we disregard the prophet s warnings and council in our day, we stand in danger of being taken captive, according to the captivity and power of the devil, for he seeketh that all men might be miserable like unto himself (2 Nephi 2:27). 3

4 The Prophet Isaiah. It was around the year 700 BC when Sennacherib, king of Assyria, was conquering his way through the land on his way to Jerusalem. He sent men ahead of his army to demoralize the people in the city. They stood and taunted the Israelites, saying the gods of other nations weren t able to help their people against us, why do you think your god will be able to deliver you? To drive the point home a little further, they named the gods of five other nations the Assyrians had conquered. It got to the point where some of the priests and advisors went out and said, If you speak Assyrian, we can still understand you. No need to speak Hebrew on our account. Hezekiah, the righteous king of Judah, was concerned and sent men to Isaiah for council. Isaiah sent a message back to Hezekiah saying, 4 Thus saith the Lord, Be not afraid of the words which thou hast heard Behold, I will send a blast upon him, and he shall... return to his own land; and will fall by the sword in his own land (2 Kings 19:6-7). Hezekiah received the message and prayed to the Lord for confirmation. Isaiah sent another message to Hezekiah to let him know the Lord had indeed heard his prayer. Therefore thus saith the LORD concerning the king of Assyria, He shall not come into this city, nor shoot an arrow there, nor come before it with shield, nor cast a bank against it. By the way that he came, by the same shall he return, and shall not come into this city, saith the LORD. For I will defend this city (2 Kings 19:32-34) Think of how much trust in God you d need to just sit back and wait while a large army encircled the city. What would it take to drive off the enemy before they could even shoot off an arrow? To put this in a little bit of context, Sennacherib had already taken over 200,000 captives from the Northern kingdoms of Israel. His reputation preceded him to the point where he was able to take several cities in the areas of Lebanon and Galilee merely by showing up. Hezekiah trusted God and the prophet Isaiah, and that night, the angel of the Lord went out, and smote in the camp of the Assyrians 185,000 men (2 Kings 19:35). Sennacherib returned to Ninevah and was murdered by two of his sons a few years later, as Isaiah had prophesied. What made Jerusalem, capital of the Southern kingdom of Judah, different from Samaria, capital of the Northern kingdom of Israel, which had fallen to the Assyrian army a few years earlier? Both kings were warned by the prophet Isaiah. But Ahaz, king of Israel, continued in his wickedness and disobedience while Hezekiah s trust in God and obedience to the prophet resulted in the city of Jerusalem being divinely protected. In our day, we may not see our cities surrounded by armies, but our homes and families are surrounded by forces bent on our spiritual destruction. Even the very definition of family is under attack. There is no safety for us outside the prophet s council any more than there was in the days of Isaiah.

5 Common Elements These stories all have elements in common which can help us in our lives today. First, ye receive no witness until after the trial of your faith (Ether 12:6). While the Lord promised Jehoshaphat and Hezekiah that Jerusalem would be protected, there was no indication beforehand that things would work out. The widow s meal and oil weren t replenished before she made food for the prophet. The blessings didn t come until they had shown their complete commitment to God by stepping out onto the battlefield, or using the last bits of food to feed the prophet. The Lord didn t reveal how the promises would be fulfilled. Jahaziel didn t tell Jehoshaphat the Ammonite armies would start fighting each other if the Israelites would just start singing, only that they wouldn t have to fight. Isaiah didn t tell Hezekiah an angel of the Lord would defeat the Assyrian soldiers during the night, only that the enemy would return to Assyria before they could fire a shot. The Lord doesn t tell us how things will work out before we pay our tithing, only that the windows of heaven will be opened to pour out blessings on our behalf (Malachi 3:10, 3 Nephi 24:10). The need for exact obedience. What would ve happened to Jehoshaphat and his people had they decided to go back home half-way to the battlefield? Or if the widow had chosen to feed herself and her son before providing for Elijah? They each received the promised blessings because they had done everything the Lord had asked of them. If we could ask them, I m sure Jehoshaphat, the widow, Elisha s servant, and king Hezekiah would all answer with Alma, whosoever shall put their trust in God shall be supported in their trials, and their troubles, and their afflictions, and shall be lifted up at the last day (Alma 36:3). 5