FAMILY EVENING ON MONDAY NOVEMBER 9

FAMILY EVENING ON MONDAY NOVEMBER 9

Ether:1to 5 »

Without the help of 2 great LDS teachers, David Butler and Emily Belle Freeman, I couldn’t share what I have learnt about the experiences related through the chapters mentioned above and I’m deeply grateful to them, and to the Lord who have sent them as angels.

Ether is the prophet who put the whole record together ...The book, as we have it here is super condensed, as it was abridged by Moroni: it’s a recap of the Jaredites people story it’s like watching the story in fast forward. It’s taken from the 24 gold plates found by the people of Limhi (Mosiah 8:8 and 9) The book starts at the tower of Babel, that would be about the time recalled in Genesis:11verses 1 to 9 in the Bible.

Let’s make a contrast between the tower of Babel made by men with their own wisdom and devices and the poor consequences which followed and what happened with Enoch city, the result of God relationship with a prophet and a people: it requires communication with the Lord to progress.

Here the story starts with Jared and his brother. This «brother» with no name, is “hignly favored by God” which means has open communication with the Lord, and we’ll see that as long as the brother of Jared is in communication with the Lord the people make forward progress …

The latter-day Saint theology has come from this person, one of the greatest prophets of all time and his name is not mentioned in the book!

Thanks to him we learn more about prayer, faith and revelation, what it really means «hear him».

At first, he cried unto the Lord for Jared and himself and the Lord had compassion Ether 1:34 35

Then again, he cried unto the Lord for their family and friends and the Lord had compassion: verse 36, 37

A third time, he cried unto the Lord (verse39) to find their promised land (verse40)

What can we learn from these prayers? Are we looking for a result or for a relationship with The Lord? Is our goal in prayer a relationship and trusting the Lord whatever the response?

Here we have a tutoring on talking to God who shows compassion.

Let’s look at verse 42: the Lord is going to meet them in the valley “there I will meet thee ,I will go before thee, There I will bless thee, All this because you have cried unto me” (verse43)

Here we can see the sort of promise the Lord gave to Jacob in genesis 28:14 and 15.We can add that the Lord never abandonned his people even in the desert where they stayed 40 years ( Deuteronomy 2 verse7).

Prayer is a long process with a pattern: problem, revelation, response.

The Lord talked to the brother of Jared for 3 hours!

Jared and the people followed the Lord’s advice and travelled into the wilderness and built barges and arrived to that «great sea» (chapter 2 verse 13) and remained 4 years (verse14). They could have stayed here as they felt so blessed and happy there but Jared’s brother was visited by the Lord who had something better for them. On this shore they were stuck and not progressing, they were missing the fulness of the Lord’s blessings.

Jared’s brother repented and went to work (verse14 and 15, 16)

And he trusted God, confident that the Lord’s will is good.

After building the barges, 3 problems are mentioned: no air, no light, no steer. (verse19).

Thanks to his state of heart (repent, humility, reverency, faith) Jared’s brother had revelations. 3 types of revelations:

1) For the air the response came immediately: how to breathe verse 20. Cut a hole in the barge.

2) For light the response came step by step. The brother of Jared went unto the top of this very high mountain and moltened 16 small stones until they were clear and transparent. He didn’t just picked stones here and there See chapter 3 verse1. «What will ye that I should do? » the Lord had asked (so great was the relationship between the Lord and this man) chapter 2 verse 23; and the man cried again unto the Lord showing humility and vulnerability (verse 2 and 3) and expressing his entire trust and confidence (chapter3, verse3,4,5).

The response is beyond all we can imagine: the Lord touches the stones one by one (verse 6). The Lord does things line upon line; precept upon precept …And so great was this man’s faith that he could see the Lord’s finger (verse 6 to 9) and when he asked (verse10), the lord showed himself to him. Elder Jeffrey Holland spoke about the brother of Jared as «an uninvited although not unwelcome guest into the presence of the Lord». And the brother of Jared knew with no doubt, chapter 3:19.

Thanks to him we learn so much about the Lord...

3) For steering the boats, the revelation never came. They had to trust the Lord, see chapter 6 the end of verse 4» commending themselves unto the Lord «We can do all the preparing, all the work, there are times in our life when we just have let God work and lead. Here they will spend nearly one year in terrible storms but will arrive safely on the promised Land …

Here are some questions we can ask and meditate: Where has the Lord met us recently and how has He blessed us? Has there been a time in our life when we were prepared beforehand? So, trust in the Lord to prepare the way before us. What do we already believe the Lord is capable of doing with our future?