Hey there everybody welcome out to another episode of Redeemed Through His Blood.
Scott Durfey here joined us always by David Durfey
What's up Dave?
Oh so good to be here Scott.
It's good to have you.
Good to have you.
Everybody out there doing well.
Good to have you here.
Dave's been golfing already today.
I know that surprises nobody.
Yeah, yeah.
Had fun today.
Yeah, it's a beautiful day.
It's beautiful, a little warm but always good to be out on the golf course.
This is probably a little sacrilegious but I golf course I like God's outdoor temples
to me you know.
Nothing to do with ordnance and governments or any of that but I just always feel peace
and joy and even when I play bad I love it.
I hope people have stuff like that in their lives you know.
A hobby or things that they love to do that's clean and uplifting and things that they can
look forward to.
I think Heavenly Father thinks that's important.
I think Jesus had his diversions.
I think he was very balanced, grew in favor with man and God and he lived a really balanced
life Scott and golf kind of helps me with that.
And it's kind of a place where I can just connect the mental.
The thing about golf for me is it's the mental challenge and trying to get the mental in
alignment with the physical.
See the swing, see the flight of the ball, see the putt go in and then make that happen
physically.
It's kind of you know it's all of those things to me.
And it's a challenge and I love the competition.
Love to compete with other guys that I play with.
But it's also the challenge of it to improve.
Being like watching a nice well hit drive with a little draw on it.
I don't know.
Sorry.
Dave's face is just absolutely lighting up.
I don't apologize.
I think that's fantastic.
You know in the beginning of one of the episodes in the beginning of each of our seasons we
talk about the fall and we talk about how we should be thankful for the fall of Adam
and Eve, right?
And celebrate it and actually give thanks.
Give prayer.
Give thanks and prayer for it.
And so there's those things in my life too.
You know that I'm that way with snow skiing and that way with a lot of other horse training
and horses and a lot of other things as well.
What do any of those have to do with the fall though?
I'm not making the connection here because I think those things are all going to be
inevitable aren't they?
Well, I kind of, I would be debatable whether it would be heaven or not without it.
That's what I always said to my guy.
I always say, I would always say to my dad, dad, do you think we'll be able to ride horses
in heaven?
And he'll be like, I don't think so.
I was like, well then it's not heaven.
And I say, I say that, you know, I don't mean to be like minded about that, but I do.
To me that is heaven on earth.
I think the gods have their diversions.
Yeah.
Anyway, we'll be happy there and have a fullness of joy and sure.
Absolutely.
Can you create a golf course that you can't par?
That'll be my challenge, you know, in the heavens.
Now you're bragging.
One I can't par.
Yeah.
Anyway, I haven't met a golf course that I, you know, I had a problem.
Can you create a golf course that you can't par?
Yeah.
I've never had that problem.
Well, Deb and I were in the temple yesterday morning at very early and I was mindful and
thoughtful of the episode that we released this week, last week, actually, that we talked
about last week, we talked about temple covenants and all that takes place there.
And then this morning, this morning I get up.
My sweetheart has a just a really righteous habit of every morning about five, 36 o'clock
she gets up and does a scripture study.
And she's been extremely consistent on that for many years now.
And this morning she was so excited to share with me the parts of the covenants that we
make in the temple that are available for us to study and read on the on the gospel
library and in the LDS dot org.
Awesome.
Yeah, it was amazing.
It was great.
And we talked a little bit about that this morning, the joy that comes and that's good
Scott.
Yeah.
Yeah, that's wonderful.
And the real God's real temples are definitely dedicated, consecrated holy places worship.
And I hope people see temple tendons as being temple worship, temple work.
I think it was actually elder with so years and years ago.
We said we shouldn't talk about it as being temple work, nothing wrong with work, but
that we should think of it as temple worship and go there to worship and not just do more
work.
Although work is important and work can be sacred and consecrated to the Lord.
But yeah, it's quite a quite a wonderful place and hope I hope individuals who can
go will go those who are going can maybe see if they can go more often than those who are
yet worthy that they'll become worthy to go.
You know, one thing we've talked about the temple over the last couple of episodes.
And you know, one thing that I've been mindful of, mindful of and thinking about is, you
know, Dave, I don't always when I go to the temple, leave the temple feeling like I'm
walking five feet off the ground, you know, like I'm walking on air.
There are times I just leave the temple and I feel so edified and so blessed.
And there are other times when I don't necessarily feel that.
And I think that there's probably a lot of our listeners that experience the same thing.
But I've been contemplative about that and I have been.
I've been thinking about that a lot over the last couple of weeks.
Well, I'm glad you're bringing it up because I feel kind of bad after one more episode
because I kind of said that, you know, it changes how I walked in the car.
And it's not always that way with me.
There's got, you know, it's not always that way.
No, for sure.
But but think, this is what, you know, and this is for me, this is again, I've been
contemplating this.
We spent some time where our ancestors grew up, Dave, down in, you know, Wayne County,
Utah over the last couple of days.
It's just a sacred place for me.
And, you know, and I go off and think and contemplate and pray.
And this is one of the things that was on my mind is, you know, how do I know?
I mean, because I can go to the temple one day, I can go to the temple one day and feel
like I have all my prayers answered.
And then I can leave another go another day.
And it's just like it just feels like another day and it's and it's even work sometimes.
But what I decided was is that, you know, those days where I'm blessed with the grace
of to have that, that's, that's a gift.
And I love that.
And I, and I appreciate that.
And I should give deep thanks for that when that happens.
The days when I don't feel that though, I'm still building, I'm building a foundation
from which when the, the trials of life come and they do that I am better fortified to
withstand.
It helps you to appreciate the times when you do feel the Holy Spirit and great.
You know, I mean, that's just part of mortality, Scott.
And we should be grateful for those days too.
Yeah.
You know, even when we maybe don't feel it.
And it causes us to examine ourselves, our situation, our conditions and see what we
can to, to change those.
And so I'm, we should be grateful for when we really do feel the Holy Ghost, fullness
of the Holy Ghost, as mentioned in doctrine comes section 109, when we don't feel a fullness
of the Holy Ghost, but we feel some of the Holy Ghost or when we don't feel any of the
Holy Ghost.
Even though I again believe pretty strongly that he's always with us, we don't necessarily
always feel him.
And when we don't, that can be a blessing too to cause us to really reflect.
And I, I, it's just not as, it's just not a straight line to heaven.
It's not a straight word upward graph to heaven.
You know, we have our ups and our downs and we continue to strive and to grow.
And there's something, there's something divine about that, Scott.
That's what mortality is really, really about.
As Brigham Young said, to learn to be righteous in the dark.
And sometimes the Lord gives us an opportunity to be righteous in the dark.
And we don't feel really the presence of the Holy Ghost, what, what choices will you make
then?
And so sometimes I think you can not feel the Holy Ghost and it not be your, your fault
at all.
Me, you know, I felt that I've felt kind of the absence sometimes of the Holy Ghost in
my life and reflect on my life.
And there's nothing I've done wrong.
But there's an ebb and flow to that.
There are some things that I maybe should have been doing that I wasn't doing.
But I think that it's just important that we have all kinds of mortal experiences and
even learn sometimes what, I mean, to the tiniest one millionth or one billionth of one
degree, you know, what it's like when Jesus declared, why has thou forsaken me?
Yeah, it's okay.
Yeah.
Well, and maybe sometimes when we feel forsaken, it's not really a forsaking too.
And sometimes we have to be aware of that.
You know, last week you talked about your, your sweet granddaughter, who's serving a
phenomenal mission, a great mission in the Northeast.
And she was talking about, you know, her struggle, which is common with perfectionism.
You know, I got a, I wrote her a long email and she wrote back a sweet email.
To all of the family and talked about how, you know, her week's going a little better
and what she's learning.
I mean, she's a great missionary, but I think, boy, the gospel of Jesus Christ, God, is not
to stress us out or it was never meant to do that.
It wasn't meant to be easy.
It wasn't meant that we would just be comfortable or that we should be complacent or any of
that.
But it is not pleasing to the Lord when we are stressing out, wringing our hands, sweating
to death, trying to live the gospel.
I know, I know we're engaged in a war.
I know there's a war between right and wrong.
I know that we're here to prove ourselves, to pass a test, to keep the commandments.
But ultimately, Scott, those who really read the Book of Mormon should understand this
and it's in the Bible and in all the scriptures that we believe in a gospel of redemption,
that it's about being redeemed and that's what it comes down to.
It comes down to redemption.
It is not a gospel of assimilation where we try, the goal is not to be like Jesus in
this life.
It's not about assimilation.
It's not about accumulation.
It's not about accumulating good deeds.
It's not about the act of trying to manipulate our behaviors or behavior modification.
The gospel of Jesus Christ is a system of redemption.
And I use the word system intentionally because I think there are several parts to it.
And I believe in the importance of systems.
Taking the gospel as a system of redemption, Scott, there's been a lot written about the
importance of systems in business organizational behavior books, atomic habits book, and all
of those other...
You have to understand the system.
And the gospel is a system, but it is not a system of assimilation or accumulation or
behavioral modification.
It is a system of redemption and to rely, learn to rely upon Jesus Christ as our Savior
and Redeemer.
Learn to rely upon His righteousness.
Learn to know Him, understand Him, trust in His grace, in His mercy, in His power.
That's what the gospel of Jesus Christ is all about.
Last time we talked about taking upon ourselves His name.
And that's part of the system.
Is that it's not about me.
It's about Him and about His name.
It's about me taking upon myself His name, having faith in His name, not just faith in
Him.
But that's part of the system, Scott, that I'm talking about.
And I just think it's really critical, helpful, not relaxing, but what's the word?
Comforting.
Comforting, yes.
Comforting.
Liberating.
There you go.
Yeah.
It's just liberating, Scott, to really understand the system of the gospel of redemption or
the gospel of Jesus Christ.
It's just about being anchored to Him.
That's Elder Renland.
We just need to be anchored to Him, a conference like he gave in 2019.
If we were just anchored to Jesus Christ, oh man, Scott, our life would go just so much
better.
I used to give the analogy of the gospel of redemption and relying upon Jesus Christ
and the act of repenting and the grace of being forgiven.
By talking about a man who lives in a harbor town and there's these undercurrents in this
one place where people like to swim.
And by the way, I read in the news not long ago some real tragedy of a family that was
lost in an undertow recently on a vacation somewhere just a few weeks ago.
Right away, there was this undertow in this place in this harbor town and there's signs
up, no swimming at certain times of the tide.
But this foolish man thinks that he's a great swimmer and he can do it by himself and that
he's beyond the sign or the warning.
So he jumps in and sure enough, the undertow begins to pull him out to sea and he's fighting
his guts out trying to fight against the current and to swim back.
But he's going out further and further and further.
But someone comes, someone comes God and throws him a life support and pulls him in and not
only pulls him in but dries him off, not only dries him off and cleans him off, but gives
him a change of clothes.
And there's a sign that if you're caught breaking this rule, the city ordinance that you have
to pay a $200 fine.
And this man who saved the other man takes him to the courthouse and pays the $200 fine.
I mean, what did the man do?
What did the man do to be saved?
What did the man do to pay the fine?
What did the man do to continue his life?
All we can do, Scott, really is to take hold, to just receive it, to accept it, to take
hold of the life preserver, Jesus Christ and his atonement, and to allow him to clean us
off, to give us new clothes, to put on those clothes.
I think I'm thinking of the temple right now, to put on those clothes and to allow him to
pay the fine.
Now we have to go, we have to do, there's things we have to do.
There's definitely things we have to do.
There's work that has to be done.
But really, how much of it can we do?
It reminds me of Lehi, old father Lehi, in, you know, really the last little bit of his
life when he's talking to Jacob, his firstborn in the wilderness.
This is in 2 Nephi chapter 2, that great chapter on the atonement of Jesus Christ.
And he tells, he tells Nephi, Scott, let me just turn to it real quick, 2 Nephi chapter
2.
And he's telling Jacob, you know, encouraging Jacob and telling Jacob what a good man he
is and trying to comfort him because of the affliction that he has been persecuted by and
persevered in because of his brother's lame and lameal.
And he says in verse 2, Nevertheless, Jacob, my firstborn in the wilderness, Thou knowest
the greatness of God, and he shall consecrate thine afflictions for thy gain.
Then in verse 3, Wherefore thy soul shall be blessed, and thou shall dwells, dwells
safely with thy brother Nephi, and thy day shall be spent in the service of thy God.
Wherefore, I know that thou art redeemed, why?
Because of the righteousness of thy Redeemer, for thou hast beheld that in the fullness
of time he cometh to bring a salvation unto men.
I just really love that, and that's the gospel system, that we are redeemed because the righteousness
of our Redeemer.
Not because of me or my righteousness.
If I have any righteousness right, it's because of all the blessings and all the sacred gifts
that I have received from God.
But it's only through Jesus Christ and His righteousness that we are saved.
In fact, one of His titles in the Pearl of Great Price, which I love, in the Pearl of
Great Price, one of His titles is Righteous, capital R. It's only through His righteousness
that we are redeemed.
I mean, Lehi tells Jacob, I know you need to be in service of your God, definitely.
But that's not to save yourself.
That is for us to try to show our gratitude for the redemption and salvation that we have
received from them.
I've always loved this, even though it's kind of nonsensical really in a way, because it
would be impossible.
That Brother Matthews, you still we say, Brother Matthews who wrote the Bible dictionary for
those who might be listening for the first time.
He used to say, you know, David, even if you kept all the commandments, even if you kept
all the commandments and never sinned, you'd still go to hell.
I mean, that's just an extreme way of understanding the system of the gospel of Jesus Christ and
the system of redemption is that commandments don't save us.
Ordinances and covenants don't save us.
Only repentance doesn't save us.
Only Jesus Christ, our faith, our trust, our reliance, dependence in Him, on Him, is what
saves us, God.
And any work that we do should be focused on one thing.
One thing is needful, Jesus tells Martha, focus on me.
Don't go about being encumbered about by all of this stuff.
All these things that you're supposed to do.
If you're doing those and you're not focused on me, then there's no redemption or salvation
in it.
I mean, there's so many great people in the world, some agnostics and atheists, but if
they're not focused on Jesus Christ and they're just into behavioral modification or self-mastery,
wow, they can become great individuals and have no redemption to show for it.
So I just, I love that idea that even if we never committed a sin, we'd go to hell.
Because only through Jesus Christ, a God who lived a sinless life, who died and suffered
for all the, not just sins of the world, but the consequences of all the sins of all the
world and through the power of His resurrection, we are redeemed.
If we were not resurrected, and this is why Brother Matthew would always say, if you don't
give commandments or if you keep all the commandments, you'll still go to hell, because if we were
not resurrected, then we would become the sons and daughters of the devil, right?
That's Jacob's teaching in 2 Nephi chapter 9, that without the power of the resurrection,
without Jesus Christ, we would have all become sons and daughters of Satan, even if we did
keep all the commandments.
So I just think that to really live the gospel system, and this is what I tried to tell my
sweet granddaughter, you have to focus more on Jesus Christ, less on your efforts and
more on how you can tap in to His strength and His power, His grace, His mercy.
That's what you have to focus on.
In fact, as a missionary, Scott, he, one of the, this is another one of his titles, he
is the Lord of the harvest.
We may sow some seeds, but we don't harvest anything or anybody.
Jesus Christ is the harvester.
I know President Kimball said that Jesus Christ will bless many people through us.
No doubt about that.
And we are His instruments.
We are His, we can be little ass saviors on Mount Zion, right?
We can do all these things to try to help do God's work and help God bless His people.
But anything that we do should be focused upon our relationship with Jesus Christ, and
we should understand that any power or strength that we have comes through Jesus Christ and
His atonement, His grace.
Grace is the enabling strength of the atonement of Jesus Christ and mercy is the forgiveness
of sin.
So I just, I just think that there's too many people in the church who just wring their
hands and sweat bullets and.
It's easy to see why though.
I mean, we have a, you know, kind of a standard and we focus on the standard because it's
difficult sometimes to focus on what we can't see, you know, what we must develop faith
in, you know, we can, we can measure how well I'm doing at keeping the commandments just
by, you know, keeping a checklist or whatever.
But what I can't measure Dave, not quantitatively, you know, qualitatively I can measure my relationship
with him.
Now you use a word and you've used it frequently, you know, not just today either, but throughout
the podcast, but this, but you say the gospel of Jesus Christ is not a gospel of assimilation.
Yeah.
Can you explain what you mean by that?
Well, it's, it's not assimilating good deeds, good habits.
It's not a system of trying to improve and be something else.
That's not this.
So it's not a self-help programs.
It's not a self-help self-development program or system.
It is how can I tap in to the atonement of Jesus Christ and receive as a gift redemption?
It's not something that I earn, Scott.
It's not something that I am entitled to by jumping through all of these hoops or checking
off all the boxes or taking all the different steps.
It's not that.
It's a system of redemption, not assimilation or accumulation.
So when we say a system of redemption, we are literally saying that we, you know, so
let's break down the word redemption.
We've been purchased.
Yes.
We have been purchased.
Ransomed.
The currency by which we have been purchased is the blood of Jesus Christ.
Yes.
In fact, I was just, you know, that's an ax.
Yeah.
That's an ax I think is it 20 verse 28.
But if you'll go there, I'll go to another place in Corinthian 6.
And I found mine first here.
Listen to this.
What know ye not that your body is the temple of the Holy Ghost, which is in you, which ye
have of God, and ye are not your own?
For ye are bought with a price.
Ye are bought with a price.
Therefore glorify God in your body and in your spirit, which are gods.
So we're, we're bought with a price, Paul says in Corinthians.
And in the ax 2028, it says that we are purchased by his blood, I think.
Take heed therefore unto yourselves and to all the flock over the witch, the Holy Ghost,
hath made you overseers to feed the church of God, which he hath purchased with his own
blood, which he hath purchased with his own blood.
And there you know, Scott, really, there is a certain humility that I think that truth
when it really settles in our heart that we are not our own.
We have been purchased by his blood.
We have been purchased by a price, which is the atonement of Jesus Christ.
There there's just a certain humility and gratitude that washes over you when you really
have understanding and faith in that.
So I, if that's what people need to come to, you know, we've done this whole course on
repentance and forgiveness, starting with identity, knowing who we are and whose we
are.
And this all of it, the whole, the whole course comes down to this larger perspective or the
bigger picture to understand really what redemption is.
And if people could understand, see it that way, understand it that way, it changes your
approach to living the gospel for sure.
It changes your approach to repentance.
It changes your whole approach to how you worship.
Well, and it can change your approach to just the everyday comings and goings in life, you
know, when life gets hard.
Sometimes it's hard for us to find joy in the gospel when life gets hard.
But if we have that focus and if we have that understanding, Dave, where we understand that
it was through his blood that we've been purchased, that we've been redeemed, not assimilated,
not accumulated, but redeemed, that can help us if we can maintain and really develop a
solid relationship with the idea that finding the gospel or finding joy in the gospel, even
when life gets difficult, really may center on our ability to understand our redemption.
Yeah, for sure, Scott.
And you said something about, or just a few moments ago, about it's sometimes hard to
see it.
What do you mean by that?
It's understandable because people don't see it.
See and joy in the gospel even when life's hard.
Yeah, so I think that it is difficult for some of us, and maybe for all of us from time
to time, to find joy in the gospel even when life gets difficult, when life gets hard,
you know, it's super easy.
I gotta be careful because somebody will always have an exception.
They'll, you know, get an email and say, yeah, Scott, maybe super easy for you, but not for
us.
So I'm, and so strike that.
But it sometimes is acceptably more easy for some people to find joy in the gospel when
life is just going great.
You know, I'm saying my prayers and I don't have any challenges.
I'm going to church and I don't have any challenges.
I'm serving in my callings and I don't have any challenges.
I'm going to the temple and I don't have any challenges.
But when life breaks loose and it will, I mean, it just will.
We all have to have the experience to carry our cross and to find a way to yoke with him.
So that that cross can be lighter.
I mean, I get all that, but it's difficult sometimes when we are facing challenges, you
know, when we have the things that come along, say a car accident, we've talked about that,
you know, say the infertility problems and the death of children and, you know, those
kinds of things.
So we, the choices that some children make to not be part of the gospel that can create
some.
And I think that beautiful couple that that we interviewed a few seasons ago, you know,
who they're in the temple and they lose their daughter, lose their baby daughter.
Yeah.
Jorian.
What's up with that?
Yeah.
I mean, in doing good things in worshiping.
Wow.
I remember of another instance where that happened when we lived in in Highland and they still
had all these opened irrigation ditches and a couple in the temple and their their little
two year old, you know, breaks away or goes outside and the babysitters unaware and drowns
in it in a ditch.
And you know, what's up with that?
And Scott, I just we have to stop seeing the gospel as a vending machine.
So many people think that if I do this, then I get that.
And if I do that, then I'll get this.
And they see it as as as though I mean, and I I know the scripture.
It was your grandpa's and my dad's.
It's going through my head right now.
You know, yeah.
Any blessing you obtain.
There is a lie rather completely decreed before the foundations of the earth.
I have a memory.
Yeah.
I mean, he's caught that so many times, right?
Yeah.
And that's kind of the system.
That's kind of the gospel system that he was most aware of and and operated in.
That was his operating system.
And he really worked hard in the gospel of the righteous life.
And I know in all of that that he's redeemed.
But Scott, that can create so much pressure and stress for other people, even other people
that those people live with.
Yeah.
Right.
I totally know you mean I have pictures to go with those words.
And and I just we have to not see the gospel as a vending machine put in a coin and out
comes the blessing.
It it's not it's it doesn't work that way.
It's a it's about being redeemed.
It's not about receiving an easy life or that our life is somehow so much better than than
the life of a Buddhist or a Muslim or anyone else, you know, that's not how one should
see the gospel of Jesus Christ.
I think that there's a great scripture story that kind of illustrates this, Scott.
And it's in Luke.
It's one of my favorite scripture stories in Luke in Luke chapter 19.
And I just want to maybe we should just read it.
Chapter 19 verse one.
When Jesus entered and passed through Jericho, did you go to Jericho when you went to Israel?
We didn't get down there.
It's down there.
We were like 600 feet below zero.
Right.
We did get down to the Dead Sea and we got above Jericho, but we definitely down there.
Anyway, and it's hot.
And anyway, Jesus entered and passed through Jericho.
And behold, there was a man named Zacchaeus, which was the chief among the publicans.
And he was rich.
So you know, he's rich.
He's a publican.
He's a little bit of an outcast being a publican, you know, a tax collector.
And he probably doesn't have the greatest social relations with some of the Jews in Jericho.
Verse three.
And he sought to see Jesus who he was.
So he wanted to see Jesus, Scott.
He wanted to see it and could not for the press, the press.
That's a that's an interesting word because, you know, and then the footnotes, it's Greek
for crowd or multitude.
All of these people who were trying to see Jesus and he couldn't because he was short
of stature, he couldn't seem.
And he ran before and he climbed up into a sycamore tree to see him for he was to pass
that way.
And I think so what's his motive really?
But what's what?
Why is he climbing up into the sycamore tree?
Why is he doing this?
And I don't know.
I don't know socially what that looks like when the publican and who's rich climbs up
into a sycamore tree.
Maybe that would take a little humility or an extra special desire.
It would in today's culture wouldn't it?
Yeah.
Anyway, he climbs up into this tree.
There's a lot more commentary that we could give on this, but let's get to the main part
here.
When Jesus came to the place he looked up and he saw him and he said unto him, Zacchaeus,
make haste and come down for today.
I must abide at thy house.
Wow.
So Zacchaeus, because of his desire to see Jesus, Jesus seeing him invites him to receive
him in his house.
So I must abide at thy house in those great words.
And he made it.
And this is this what I really love verse six and Zacchaeus made haste and came down
and received him joyfully.
That is the essence of the gospel.
Scott, come down out of the tree.
Could just trying to get a glimpse out of me.
Give the invitation that he's given to all of us, not just Zacchaeus, but to you, to
me and all of us that I stand at the door and knock.
And he, you know, Revelation three and he who will open all sup with him.
All we got to do, Scott, is come down out of the tree or open the door and learn how
to how to receive him and and to do it joyfully.
And if we receive him, it will be joyful.
I know, I know something of the joy of receiving him.
That's the essence of the gospel.
And then, and then after he in verse seven, it says, and when they saw it, they all murmured
saying, wow, that he was gone to be a guest with a man that is a sinner.
All these self-righteous Pharisees and Sadducees.
Yeah.
Well, so time out.
How often have we been that person?
Right?
No, really.
How many times do we self-righteously misjudge others?
Verse eight, then Zacchaeus stood and said unto the Lord.
So this is when he's getting ready to leave after having spent some time with him in his
house.
Look at the effect it has on Zacchaeus.
Zacchaeus says unto the Lord, Behold, Lord, half of my goods I give to the poor.
And if I have taken anything from any man by false accusation, I restore him fourfold.
And Jesus said unto him, This day is salvation or redemption.
Come to this house for as much as he also is a son of Abraham, for the son of man is
come to seek and to save that which was lost.
We're all lost, Scott.
We're all lost.
And the whole gospel system is to allow Jesus to find us, to not keep running away from him,
but to come down out of the sycamore tree, to open the door, to hear the knock, and to
receive him.
That's the system of the gospel of Jesus Christ and the system of redemption.
Well, I wonder what our own sycamore trees are.
I mean, we have a pattern here.
Jesus provides for us a pattern of what we should also do if we want to abide with and
have the Savior in our lives on a permanent basis.
First thing he does is he seeks him.
And you mentioned out of humility, here's a guy with some stature climbing a tree.
I don't know what culturally that would have looked like then, but culturally now that
would be a little out of place.
It was somewhat shunned already.
Yeah, sure, because he's a publican, right, a tax collector.
And, you know, and that's just determined.
Yeah, he is no matter the circumstances and no matter the cost, he's willing to seek Jesus,
climbs the tree, the press.
So that's that.
The second one is, is he's willing to welcome him into his life.
He allowed Jesus, now Jesus, you know, said, Hey, let me into your life.
And he makes that invitation or that plea to each of us to allow us into allow him rather
into our lives.
So, you know, he welcomed Jesus into his life.
He did it with joy, with openness.
We need to probably follow that same pattern if we want same benefits.
Yeah, I'm not, I'm not trying to be critical, but sometimes even the church can be a second
mortuary.
You know, we go to church to try to see Jesus, but we never receive him.
We try, we do all kinds of things, trying to see Jesus out of curiosity or out of hope
or out of some expectation or something.
And yet we, we, it's just a system of receiving Jesus into our hearts and the Holy Ghost allowing
the gift of the Holy Ghost to receive the Holy Ghost, to administer his grace and mercy
into our lives.
And honestly, Scott, that's, that's what it comes down to.
I think another verse of scripture that really describes the gospel of Jesus Christ is Mosiah
chapter 3 verse 19.
King Benjamin, I think this, this one verse, I think describes the system of redemption
in the gospel.
It starts out talking about that because of the fall, we're all enemies.
Yeah, let me just read it.
This is a Mosiah chapter 3 verse 19.
For the natural man is an enemy of God and has been from the fall of Adam and will be
forever and ever unless he yields to the enticings of the Holy Spirit.
There we go.
And less.
See, that's the condition.
Yeah.
You know, is just to yield to the enticings.
Just open the door, open your heart.
Just, just receive the Holy Ghost.
But Dave, here's part of the problem.
How do we define enticings?
Really, I mean, literally, you know, if we have this checklisted out, it makes it easy
for us.
Well, and it becomes.
And so, what do you think enticings?
Well, enticing means promptings.
Anytime I feel a prompting or an enticing or an invitation from the Holy Spirit to do
something, and that could look like a whole bunch of different things, right?
I mean, that's a whole podcast in and of itself.
But you know, when I respond to those enticings and allow the enticings of the Holy Spirit,
response to the enticings of the Holy Spirit, that it, that's the first step in me putting
off the natural man.
But let me, let me just say something about that because I know God entices us every day.
Yeah.
I do, Scott.
Yes.
Through the light of Christ, at the very least, and through the Holy Ghost, even, even more
so.
Oh, we're, we're enticed.
Now we may, we may be past feeling.
If we're not keeping the commandments or we have addictions or all these other problems,
we may be past feeling.
We may not be able to see it.
We may be able not hear it.
We may, may be not able to feel it.
But I know God loves his children and he is enticing them every day to come unto him and
be saved every day.
And people may not see it or feel it, understand it like lame and lame.
Daniel sure didn't and it's all around them with the prophet, father and brother that
they have and all the angels that appear to them and all the, oh my goodness, Scott, we
all are enticed every day by the Holy Spirit.
I wouldn't want it to look like if we paid attention to those enticings.
I, you know, I, I, the gratitude journal you would have.
Right.
You know, I, we've talked about this before as part of my recovery process.
I do what's called a step 10, right?
And then that's part of the things I do.
What if I included the enticings from the spirit that I felt that there you go.
And how was I able to respond to that?
That's the goal we should be keeping.
And that's a great invitation for our listeners.
We should be keeping an enticings.
Yeah.
The enticings of the Holy Spirit.
Yes.
How was God enticing me today through the Holy Spirit?
You know what that will do for us?
That will make us aware of it, but it will also, it will seem like we have a greater
abundance of those enticings from the Holy Spirit available to us because we focus on
that.
Whether they become more abundant because of our focus or maybe our focus makes us aware
of the abundance that was already there.
I don't know.
And it doesn't matter.
But the point is, is that it will make us aware and it will allow those enticings to,
to forge our lives to give us a direction.
So this scripture goes on and says, if we learn to, to become a the saint through the
Atonement of Jesus Christ and become an, become a, as a child.
Okay.
So here's some of the characteristics and attributes that it would require.
This is the gospel system.
Exactly.
Become a, as a child, submissive, meek, humble, patient, full of love, willing to submit to
all things which the Lord seeeth fit to inflict upon him, even as a child does submit to his
father.
See, so sometimes we're inflicted or afflicted and sometimes it's of God and sometimes it's
not.
Sometimes, sometimes it's just the result.
You know, bad things happen to good people and that's just part of mortality.
It's just part of being, you know, in a hellish, commercial world as a mortal, bad things are
going to happen.
And some of these things are perhaps an infliction.
Is that the word?
Inflicted.
Yeah, but inflicted and afflicted are not necessarily the same thing.
No, they're not.
Okay.
That's, that's my point.
Right?
Yeah.
We may be inflicted and we may be afflicted, but if we have learned to receive the enticings
of the Holy Ghost and to become a saint through the Atonement of Jesus Christ and to become
a, as a child, submissive, me, humble, patient, full of love.
Scott, how we experience inflection and affliction, totally different.
Totally different.
Yeah, we see it different because it means something different to us at that point.
And our long game vision that has come now because we know who we are, we know who's
we are, we understand the fall of Adam and Eve and our own effects and on and on, you
know, on and on.
And our inflection will understand to be part of our redemption.
Correct.
And in our affliction, if we understand redemption, we can even endure those as well.
And know that because of our redemption, those will be consecrated for our gain, the compensatory
powers of the Atonement to kick in when we are afflicted and grace or the enabling power
of Christ kick in when we are inflicted.
You know, that the system, the gospel system, Scott, is just, wow, you know, come unto me,
I'll eat the labor and our heavy laden and I will give you rest.
Take my yoke upon you and learn of me for I am meek and lowly of heart and ye shall find
rest.
I just don't know how many people are finding rest these days, Scott, in living the gospel
of Jesus Christ.
And so take my yoke upon you and learn of me.
You know, climb the tree, learn of me.
Take my yoke upon you and I will, he's inviting us to come unto him and ye shall find rest.
I think it's interesting in actually those two verses.
This is Matthew 11, 28, 29, verse 30.
In the first verse, he says, come unto me, all ye the labor and our heavy laden and
I, I will give you rest.
Okay.
That's one level of redemption.
And the second verse is, if you will take my yoke upon you and learn of me, that takes
effort, Scott, that takes effort, that takes work and learn of me who am meek and lowly
of heart, you shall find rest to your souls.
So he gives us his rest and we find rest.
And then it says, for my yoke is easy.
Well, it's always that has always bothered me.
I think you know what I'm going to say.
That's always because I don't think it's easy.
So I looked up the Greek for that and I love the meaning of that word, which is fitted,
that the yoke is fitted just for you in your conditions, in your circumstances.
The yoke is fitted.
It may not be really comfortable, but it fits you.
You feel good.
You feel good in this yoke.
You know, you should feel good in this yoke.
It shouldn't be too loose that it causes blisters or too tight that it cuts off the blood flow,
you know, the yoke has to fit you.
And your yoke may be different than my yoke, Scott, but the Lord has invited us to be yoked
with him.
For my yoke is easy and my burden is light and light to me isn't just weight.
It's light as in the opposite of darkness.
You know, we can see.
We can finally see.
Anyway, that's the gospel system.
So again, I hope that our listeners can find great joy in living the gospel of Jesus Christ
and understanding the Father's plan of redemption and to which is another name in the Book of
Mormon, the plan of happiness or the great plan of happiness or the plan of mercy or
the plan of salvation.
I mean, all of that's the same thing, and it's it really just comes down to receiving
him, accepting him, accepting his invitation, you know, to make haste, make haste, come down,
make haste.
I'm going to abide with you.
Right.
And then to do that and to do it joyfully.
Right.
I love Zacchaeus's sycamortory.
And I hope that we all have it within us if we haven't already.
And even if we have, there's it's appropriate for us to seek again and still those sycamore
trees in our own life.
So that animals trees so that we can see him so that we can abide with him so that we
can accept and and fill the invitation comes up with me.
Yeah.
You know, I just love that so much.
I'm so grateful that we have the restoration of the gospel.
I'm so grateful that we have this spirit of the Holy Ghost in its fullness available to
us through the covenants that we make as we've talked about over the last several episodes.
But above all of that, I'm grateful for the invitation, you know, comes up with me.
All the commandments, all the covenants, all the ordinances, all of the principles, all
of the policies, all of the doctrine, everything of everything in the restored gospel of Jesus
Christ.
Scott just comes down to one point and that's having a relationship with deity, the Father,
the Son and the Holy Ghost and to be anchored and to be anchored to them.
I love that scripture in ether 12 verse four about the through our faith in Jesus Christ,
we can be be anchored.
Maybe maybe we should just end on this verse, Scott, because I think again, this is another
verse describing the system of the gospel of Jesus Christ is everything in the gospel,
everything in the church is to help us to be anchored, bound, anchored, bound, connected
and have a relationship with Jesus Christ ether 12 for.
Wherefore, whoso believeth in God might with surety hope for a better world, yea, even
a place at the right hand of God, which hope cometh of faith, maketh an anchor to the souls
of men, which would make them sure and steadfast, always abounding in good works, being led
to glorify God.
It's our prayer that this will be the case for each one of us as we focus on him and
as we seek our own sycamore trees in our own lives.
Please, please answer the plea that he gives to each one of us.
Come follow me.
Thanks for being with us today.
We look forward to being with you again next week, and until then, be well.