Subjecting the Flesh to the Will of The Father

This past week I had the opportunity  to take care of Joe Briskey since his mother was out of town   - Many of you know him.      (There is a lesson on humility right there)
    I am humbled as he teaches me what truly matters.  He will teach you to love everyone  He will teach you that you can do hard things - along with his brother Julian. 

I went to take Joe home for the night.  Julian hadn’t come home from work yet and so I decided to go to the pet store - Joe loves animals.   He was so excited there were cats and kittens there and he was able to pet them for a little while.

I  took him over to the fish tanks to watch them swim and then we walked around the reptile cages.  

First we saw a snake - Joe noticed that they had shed some skin off

so we talked about that  - how they took off the old skins yet they had shiny new ones underneath.   We saw some cool chameleons     Reptiles really do have things to teach us.

We also some some crawly crab-like creatures in colorful painted shells.  Some were empty and it looked like they may outgrow one shell and move into another.

The thoughts of reptiles leaving their home and serpent snakes shedding skins reminded me of a story    ………

Once upon a time there was a child, dwelling in the Father’s kingdom

(It could be you or me.)     The child loved living in the kingdom but the parents knew the child must become like them and so 

The Father King and Mother Queen sent the child forth after they had made preparations 

they took off  the child’s glittering golden robe, which in their affection they had made for him   And they made a compact with him, and wrote it in his heart, that it might not be forgotten:

That if the child could retrieve one pearl - which was in the middle of the sea surrounded by a loud-breathing serpent, then

-The child could come back into the kingdom and again put on the golden robe again   He could live with them and  with their brother, the second in command, and the child would be heir in the kingdom.”

So here we are on the earth -without our glorious garment - but clothed in  a garment of skin and we must find this pearl of great price  and remember our covenants so that we can once again be arrayed in that beautiful garment we left in our parent’s kingdom.

Our Savior also descended down    - left his glorious kingdom  and left his glorious garment -  and as King Benjamin  (Mos 3:5) prophesied:  “he shall come down to dwell in a tabernacle of clay, and shall go forth amongst men working mighty miracles, such as healing the sick, raising the dead, causing the lame to walk, the blind to see, the deaf to hear and suffer all things……temptations, pain of body, hunger, thirst, fatigue, even more than man can suffer except it be unto death, for behold, blood cometh from every pore, so great shall be his anguish for the wickedness and the abominations of his people…..

Christ left his Glorious home  to come down to live in a body of clay - meaning earthy and  temporary—In Hebrew the word is (ADAM - MAN/ADAMAH-EARTH, RED  BLOOD אדמ) and show us by example how we too must live.  If Christ were to come today,  what is the first thing he would say to a people who had been waiting for his coming for 1000’s of years?

We  have his words.  The prophets wrote them down:

"And now it came to pass that there was a great multitude gathered together round about the temple in the land Bountiful."     They heard a voice and then saw a man descending out of heaven and he was clothed in a white robe -   It is a glorious display!!   He emanates light and life -His garment of glory is back!     He speaks in a voice that penetrates into your soul

   (3 Nephi 11:10-11)

“Behold I am Jesus Christ, whom the prophets testified shall come into the world.   And behold, I am the light and the life of the world; and I have drunk our of that bitter cup which the Father hath given me, and have glorified the Father in taking upon me the sins of the world, in the which I have suffered the will of the Father in all things from the beginning."

 he chooses first to speak of his obedience  loyalty and submission to his father.  This is the first and most important thing he wishes us to know about himself.  

The ideas that jump out at me in this scripture, is that the Father gave him the cup and that he suffered.   T
The Father must be saying suffering is necessary.   

Each of us suffers the trials of a fallen world.   How do we respond to these sufferings?

Elder Neal A Maxwell taught us that  “The submission of one’s will is the only personal thing we have to place on the altar.  Anything else he has already given or loaned us." 

My daughter Jenessa’s letter this week spoke of her investigator She has several people she is teaching who struggle with addiction. This week she told me that Jerry -hasn’t had anything that is against the word of wisdom this week.  She said

“I’m grateful for people with willing hearts that will submit to God’s will, whatever the commandment is.  Even if it is difficult for them and they don’t understand it! “

We submit ourselves to him with our individual wills being swallowed up in God’s will.”  

But this IS hard.  We have the natural man.  It’s natural to give in easily to an addiction   It’s natural to stay mad when we are angry.  It’s natural to stay offended.   I want to stay annoyed!!   But the natural man is an enemy to God and has been since the fall of Adam and will be forever and ever, unless he yields to the enticings of the Holy Spirit and putteth off the natural man  —-through the atonement of Christ the Lord.   

The words are  “Putteth off”!.  We must PUT OFF the natural man.  TAKE OFF those skins and clothes.  They are prickly and scaly.  

This scripture  tells us The answer -of how to take off those clothes - it’s through the atonement of Christ.      So we take off those earthy clothes  what are we then supposed to put on instead?    The Hebrew word caphar means “to cover”  but it is so beautiful that the same word also means “atonement”.    Caphar to cover/atonement.  We PUT ON the atonement.  

Just as the beautiful snow we woke up to yesterday morning, covers the earth  - Our stained, blood red-earthy (dam), Adam clothes can be made white as snow.   We are covered by Christ.  We can put on clothing white as wool.   Of course the most wonderful way to put on the atonement is in the Holy Temple.  

The Atonement, as most know, can also be read  AT - ONE - MENT

God wants us to be  AT ONE with him

God wants us to be AT ONE with our family members

God wants us to be AT ONE with everyone around us.   For this is Zion

The pure in Heart     Those in zion are AT ONE in all things.

I have learned that although it may be true that I am in my family because they need me - it is even more true that I need them.   

Difficult children, each child in their own way causes me worry and stress  Yet what I am learning, albeit slowly, is that they are there for  ME to LEARN about the atonement. 

They are there for ME to PRACTICE the atonement.   For how can I be at-one with the Savior and the Father ——if I am not at- one with all of those around me?

Submitting to the Father’s will means using the atonement to AT ONE

Abinadi told us that God himself shall come down among the children of men   And because he dwelleth in the flesh  he shall be called the Son of God, and having “subjected the flesh to the will of the Father “  Yea, even so he shall be led, crucified, and slain, the flesh becoming subject even unto death, the will of the Son being swallowed up in the will of the Father.”     It was profound when I saw again here  THE FLESH - the temporary FLESH  or SKIN subjected to the will of the Father.  He wants our flesh to be covered in the atonement.  Our Savior’s flesh was subjected to pain and piercing so that our’s may be covered.

There are blessing in submitting to the Father’s will.  The most important is that through the covering of the atonement we are given power!  The enabling power to help us through our trials.

When we submit, we are also blessed with less worry and more peace!  Who wouldn’t want that!    If I turn over my worries to the Savior and let him cover me and heal me I have peace.    So we must trust Him!

With that thought, a final story.   Remember C’S Lewis’ character Eustace?   For those who don’t know, he was a rich, selfish, spoiled boy.   He was on a dangerous voyage with his friends.

Yet wasn’t much help to them with his attributes.    One night he sneaked off and found a dragon’s lair filled with treasure.  He imagines how he will enjoy his new life and in his comforts he falls asleep with his treasure. When he awakes, Eustace is no longer a boy but a dragon

The gold bracelet he had put on his boy arm was now constricting his dragon leg, and the pain was piercing. Even worse, he is all alone.  He begins to weep large, hot dragon tears.

In mercy and compassion, The Great Lion Aslan arrives and leads him to a spring of water.  Eustace looks at the water and knows if he could just get into the water the pain in his leg would be soothed.

But Aslan says he will have to be undressed first….

“I was just going to say that I couldn’t undress because I hadn’t any clothes on when I suddenly thought that dragons are snaky sort of things and snakes can cast their skins.  Oh, of course, thought I, that’s what the lion means.

With his new claws, Eustace begins tearing at his dragon skin. He peels off one layer only to discover another nasty, scaly, and rough layer underneath. And then another. After three layers, he realizes it’s vain — he will never make himself clean or get rid of his pain or shed the nasty skin.

“You will have to let me undress you,” says Aslan the Lion.

“The very first tear he made was so deep that I thought it had gone right into my heart. And when he began pulling the skin off, it hurt worse than anything I’ve ever felt. The only thing that made me able to bear it was just the pleasure of feeling the stuff peel off. . . .

Well, he peeled the beastly stuff right off — just as I thought I’d done it myself the other three times, only they hadn’t hurt — and there it was lying on the grass: only ever so much thicker, and darker, and more knobbly-looking than the others had been. And there was I as smooth and soft as a peeled switch and smaller than I had been. Then he caught hold of me — I didn’t like that much for I was very tender underneath now that I’d no skin on — and threw me into the water. It smarted like anything but only for a moment. After that it became perfectly delicious and as soon as I started swimming and splashing I found that all the pain had gone from my arm. And then I saw why. I’d turned into a boy again. . . .

After a bit the lion took me out and dressed me . . . in new clothes.

The Savior wants to make us more glorious than we can ever know.  Yes, it hurts to shed the skin, the scales.  But as we submit to him we become new creatures.    Our garments of glory await us as we use the atonement in our own life. 

I testify that the Savior has the power to cover us.  He lives!!

Sacrament Meeting talk given on January 22, 2017

© 2017 JENNIFER LYNNE SOUTAS ALL RIGHTS RESERVED