Well, hi everybody and welcome to Redeem Through His Blood.
In this podcast we discuss hope healing and redemption through the Atonement of Jesus
Christ.
I'm Scott Durfey, also joined today by my partner in this project, our teacher, Brother
David Durfey.
Good morning everyone.
Grateful to be able to share these thoughts with you this morning.
Just a couple of things that I'm going to ask real quick.
If you won't mind still sending us your questions.
We've had some great questions and comments that we'll be getting into in upcoming episodes,
one that we'll be talking about even today.
But you can send those questions, comments, encouragement, ideas, even give us your criticism.
We're trying our best to get better at this all the time and we want it to be as good
of experience as we possibly can make it for you.
We don't have a survey process, which is what I'm kind of used to in my professional setting.
And so we're just going to ask you to unofficially or yeah, just unofficially, if you wouldn't
mind just sending us some emails and give us some ideas on what you think would be better,
how we could do better and how we could definitely make it more engaging for you.
I know Scott that no one can criticize us more than we criticize ourselves.
I think we're our worst critics and when we listen to these and we listen back to them
as I did recently to one of one of our episodes, I feel always inadequate and in my inabilities
and my weakness, so don't be afraid to help us by bringing things to our attention that
maybe we might have overlooked even though again, where I think our own worst critics.
Yeah, and along those lines too, if you would just please try to listen to the message more
than the messengers here and we'll try to get better.
Yeah, we really do appreciate your participation and listening and you know, honestly, we have
received hundreds of great comments, both emails and from people in person, but you
know those great comments keep us going, but it's the comments that help us get better
that help us get better.
And so we invite that from you.
Last week we talked a lot about faith.
We're going to continue that again today.
I just want to recap quickly and I'll have Dave hop in here as he feels appropriate to
kind of emphasize and re re focus maybe on as we draw our focus deeper into this topic,
refocus again on some of the stuff that we talked about.
So you know, we talked a lot about the lectures of faith over the last couple of episodes.
We this is a great treatise treatise Dave called it to that has been written in the
school of profits back in Kirtland, Ohio at the school of the profits 1833 1833 at the
school of the profits.
I've been there.
In fact, that was their last fall with Dave and others of our family and other room of
the new K Whitney stores where that school of profits was held.
You know, just just real quick too, along that many years ago, my first visit to Kirtland,
Ohio was with a bunch of guys that I work with.
For those that don't know, I do speak professionally going around the country doing seminars on
financial things and we were in that area.
And while we were there, decided to make a visit to the Kirtland temple and to the school
of the profits and things of that nature.
And I had had such a reverence for the things that I had been studying that had been taught
in that school of profits that when I walked in that room, I felt the spirit and I felt
the spirit like this maybe a handful of times in my life outside of the temple.
But when I walked in there that first time and I was with other men that I was working
with and it was unusual, but they were all LDS as well.
But as we walked in there and they close that door and we stood in silence, the hair on
my arms just stood straight up.
The spirit was so strong and I think that the lectures on faith are an indication of
the type of things that were so spiritually revealed there.
But you know, we recapped that lecture number one talks about what is faith.
We talk about power, it talks about power and how it's an action word and how faith
requires action and then two through five, it talks about lectures that is two through
five, talks about the character attributes and perfections of God.
We have spent a lot of time talking about that in our early episodes of this podcast.
Encourage you to go back and visit those.
And then six talks about how he knows that are how we let me rephrase that talks about
how we can know that our life is pleasing to God.
I think that is, I think that through David to know that my life is pleasing to God.
I think that would solve every problem I have.
Yeah, for sure.
It's not easy to do, but that's kind of the third according to lectures on faith, the
third and final process that one must go through in order to have the faith of power to know
that the course that we are pursuing is pleasing to God.
That's not easy to do.
That's not comfortable either.
It's kind of putting your will on the on the altar of God.
Yeah, which is a big task at least, right?
Finally hard decision to make.
Yeah, because it's more than a decision.
It requires action.
It requires follow through.
It requires commitment and all those things that as humans, I don't know, I'm human.
I think everybody listening probably is too.
And I think that you would agree we struggle with those kinds of things as humans in general.
Finally in lecture number seven, it talks about the joys, the benefits, the results,
the blessings of living a life of faith and developing that faith and and learning more
about our Heavenly Father's will for us through it.
Well today we're going to be moving in to talking a little bit about faith again.
Before we do, we do have a question and can we pause for just a minute and let me kind
of bring us back one step back further, which is the reason we're doing this kind of this
is where we're at in the in our course of study is that we have talked about the events
of the atonement.
We've talked about the effects of the atonement conditional and unconditional.
And now we are speaking about how to access the atonement of Jesus Christ or the power
of Christ through his atonement through by our participation in the doctrine of Christ,
the doctrine of Christ being first faith in the Lord Jesus Christ, second repentance,
third baptism by immersion for their mission of sins and third or fourth, fourth receiving
the Holy Ghost and fifth to endure to the end.
So we're in just in the beginning stages of talking about the doctrine of Christ, which
is which is the key to accessing the power of Christ through his atonement.
Yeah, and I think I'm so glad you brought that up, David, because as we go through this,
these several podcasts and I've had this comment from many people say, I am just really grateful
that you build from one step or one concept or one precept to the next and then to the
next and so forth.
And so, you know, this is a good time to perhaps encourage you that if you are just now joining
us first off, we want to say welcome.
We hope that you'll stick around and find benefit and hope and healing in the things
that we have to offer here.
But we also would encourage you to go back.
I shouldn't say but I should say additionally, we encourage you to go back.
Maybe even start with the episode number one.
Now episode number one is about Easter, the Holy Week.
It has to do with the triumphal entry and everything that took place day by day, the
week of Easter.
That's when we started culminating first week week before Easter.
Yeah, and that Easter and that came out for Easter.
And then from there, we begin to build on knowing ourselves, knowing him, understanding
the importance of all of that.
From there, we move into the events.
We spend a whole podcast talking about the the Garden of Gethsemane, the experience there
and all things around it as best we can.
And then the subsequent one to that, we talk about the crucifixion, the subsequent one
to that we talk about the resurrection.
And now we're talking about so that was all about the events.
Events of the atonement of our Savior.
And now we're talking about the effects.
This is our, I believe this will be our fourth, maybe even our fifth episode as we begin to
talk about the events.
And so, you know, as we talk about not the events, the effects as we talk and how to
access and how to access it as we talk about these things, that's the key.
How do we access it?
Because that's what we get asked all along.
You know, this if we don't talk about how to access it, if we don't talk about how do
we apply this in our own lives, then we are in a really interesting academic endeavor.
If we learn how to put on the atonement of Jesus Christ through the administration of
the Holy Ghost, if we learn how to develop faith through study, through prayer, through
participation in covenants and so on and so forth, then we're really learning how to
put on the atonement of Jesus Christ.
My wife, Deb and I, and I've talked about this multiple times, have been doing for the
last two years what Dave here has been doing for 40 years prior to his retirement.
And that's teaching institute.
And as we've been teaching this, the question that we get, and we did this last week, we
opened it up to Q&A.
And what we do is we have people who will text us in the class, will text us questions.
More than half the questions have to do with how do I heal my life?
How do I repent?
How do I change my heart through the atonement of Jesus Christ?
We know about it, but how do we do it?
How do we put it on?
How do we actually participate more than just mentally?
How do we participate in those things?
And that's what we've been talking about.
So as we move into that, Dave, can I read this question and then we'll start moving
into the rest of the episode here?
Yeah, maybe just one comment comes to my mind, Scott, is that when we talked about the events
and all of the suffering of Christ in his willingness to live a sinless life, all of
his suffering in Gethsemane and the events between Gethsemane and especially the culmination
of his suffering on the cross being worse, even worse than Gethsemane, because there
were no angels there to strengthen him.
And then his resurrection, just thinking about those events fills me with immense gratitude
for Jesus Christ.
Then as we spoke about the effects of the atonement, we spoke about all of the unconditional aspects
of the atonement of Jesus Christ and how we are all covered unconditionally by the atonement
of Jesus Christ, not just because of a physical universal resurrection, but because of all
of the negatives in our mortal lives that are the result of a fallen world, of a telestial
world and all of the abuses that we suffer as a result of that.
All of that is covered unconditionally by the atonement of Jesus Christ.
We talked about the Hebrew word for atonement, which means to be covered.
In order to really understand that is to be filled with this immense vision of God's
plan of redemption, His mercy, His grace, His love, His perfect love.
I don't know what it does for others, but I know what it does for me.
Again it fills me with this gratitude for and love for my Heavenly Father, His plan of redemption,
my Savior and Redeemer, Jesus Christ.
And it's this gratitude and love for them, Scott, that gives me the motivation and the
desire to move a little further and not just be covered by the atonement, but using your
words just a moment ago to put on the atonement, which are the conditional aspects of the atonement,
which take a conscious effort and choice and work on our part, which moves us into the
doctrine of Christ to be able to choose and exercise and increase our faith in Christ
and in His name, which we'll talk about today, to be able to repent and participate in the
ordinances and the covenants of the gospel and do indoor to the end.
Those are choices that we must make in order to be able to put on the atonement and to
receive all of the full blessings of the atonement of Jesus Christ in our life.
But the motivation to do that comes by understanding the events of the atonement, His suffering
and the effects, unconditional aspects of His atonement.
Yeah, it's exactly right.
And that's exactly why I have extended the invitation to go back, go back to those early
episodes and really get a feel for what it is.
What we'll be talking about today, I believe will be great.
What we talked about last week, I believe was great.
But standing alone, it's only so great.
With that deeper understanding, with that culmination of the things that we've talked
about beginning with even really episode number one up until now helps this to become more
complete.
Yeah, so I think you have a few questions we can discuss.
I have one.
I'm just going to read the question part of this.
This is written to us by a young lady that we both know and love.
She says, for years I have struggled trying to get a prayer answered and I don't understand
why I have not yet been granted this righteous desire.
I've tried asking a different way and still nothing.
So she's obviously Dave experiencing perhaps maybe a little frustration, perhaps maybe
even she didn't say this, but I can only imagine how I would feel and how I have felt as I've
experienced similar things, maybe even a little discouragement.
Maybe wondering, are you really there, you know, going back to that primary song, Heavenly
Father, are you really there?
You know, where do you, Dave, what would you say to this question?
Well, I think there are several parts that we need to kind of break down to understand
the question and to try to give a sufficient answer.
To be able to really trust in God and to exercise faith in him means that we trust more in his
will than in our own, that we desire his will more than our own.
We talked last time about the faith of power is not to get what we want, but to be able
to accept and carry out his will.
So this person says that they've been praying for, did they say righteous desire?
Righteous desire.
Okay.
So righteous is a relative term.
I'm sure it is righteous, but sometimes we want what we want and we don't take into consideration
what God really wants and especially when he wants it.
So to be able to really exercise faith in God through prayer, we need to not just have
faith in him and in his power, but we need to have faith in his timing.
And that's something that we don't always see.
That would be one, one part of this.
Another part of this is oftentimes our righteous desires include other people, other events
or people in our lives that we don't have control over.
And we don't have power over others agency and neither does God.
God cannot change the agency of others.
It's kind of like Elder Oaks once kind of explained in his, in his amazing article,
which we should all read and review from time to time.
It's called timing, the Lord's timing.
It's in the enzyme.
You can just Google present Oaks and the word timing and you'll find it.
But he kind of counsels missionaries that they better be careful about setting goals
for baptism.
Monthly, monthly baptism goals may not be appropriate because other people's agency
are involved in that.
And we can't, we can't control other people's agency and God chooses not to do that, to
do that as well.
This person says that they've kind of changed how they've kind of prayed about things, but
maybe instead of praying for an event to happen or for a change to occur or for some great
thing to take place, maybe we should pray to how to know our role in bringing about
an event.
How for example, I shared many, many episodes ago about the night I was praying that changed
my son, changed my son.
And I was chastised by the spirit and the spirit whispered, stop praying for me to change
your son and start praying for me to change you.
And I immediately, I immediately changed and I said, bless me that I'll be a better dad.
Help me to know how I can be a better dad.
And then Scott, we have to learn the discipline to listen.
If we're, if we're going to ask that question, and I think it's really appropriate not just
to pray to help me be a better dad, but maybe it's even more appropriate to pray, help me
to know, give me the knowledge I need to be a better dad.
Bless me with revelation.
Then we should pause and we should listen.
This is called inspired inquiry, revelatory response.
That was a talk given by Elder Bednar in general authority training many years ago.
And I know a area 70 who was at that training.
And I know after he told me what he had learned as a new general authority and being trained.
I remember turning, looking at his wife and saying to her, so has he, meaning the new
general authority, my friend, has he changed how he prays?
And she looked at him and he kind of nodded and she looked back at me and she said, yeah,
he now prays with a notebook.
Oh, wow.
Yeah.
Okay.
That's a different level of prayer.
Yeah.
To, he said, I've had to learn the discipline to listen.
And so he prays, and I think the brother and do this, and I think we should do this more
often than we do.
And some of us have never done it to pray with a concern, some, a righteous desire and
not just God do this, but with the prayer, how can I help bring this about acting in
faith?
How can I bring about thy will for a person or to cause an event?
And then listen, pause and listen and maybe write down a few notes.
One more thing I'll say about this and then you can take your shot at it is I've always
loved the scripture in Dr. and Covenants section 46.
It talks about the gifts of the spirit and a little bit at the very end of the section
on how we can receive the gifts of the spirit.
So this is a doctrine covenant section 46.
And I'm going to, I'm going to begin with verse 28.
And it shall come to pass that he that asketh in the spirit shall receive in the spirit.
Now, just think about that for a minute.
Maybe if we're not receiving in the spirit, maybe we're not asking in the spirit.
Verse 30, I skipped 29.
Verse 30, he that asketh in the spirit asketh according to the will of God.
Right.
Therefore it is done even as he asketh and again, I send to you all things must be done
in the name of Christ.
Talk about the name of Christ.
Maybe shortly whatsoever you do in the spirit and he must give thanks unto God in the spirit
in the spirit for whatsoever blessings you're blessed with and he must practice virtue and
holiness before me continually.
Even so, amen.
I think that's a great recipe on how to receive answers to prayers or how to pray.
And so when we say we pray with righteous desires, are we are we following that formula
and recipe given to us in doctrine covenants 46?
Yeah, I like that.
Something that we've talked about really is about aligning our will with our Heavenly
Father's will and his will, you know, you you said it and so I won't readdress it, but
I will mention it again.
You said it that oftentimes when we have these types of prayers and I don't know what the
situation is here exactly.
I'm projecting my own personal experiences into this question because, you know, when
I hear questions like this, I'm like, Oh, boy, I can definitely relate to that.
And when I have been able to when this has been relatable to me, it's usually because
there's another person involved.
It's usually my prayers and righteous desires for another person and that those prayers
and righteous desires for that other person are always to come back to Heavenly Father
to get on the path, whatever that is, which is definitely a righteous desire.
And that's a righteous desire and so how can how can I be convinced otherwise?
Right.
And so when I say I have a righteous desire and then I think, Well, are my righteous desires
in a line with his his desire would also be that that would be the case.
And so you brought up the whole, Well, yeah, but God can't take that will from him.
When you said that your friend, a new general authority at that time was now praying with
a notebook, it reminded me, you know, my experience in the church has been pretty vast, but quite
limited because of my sin, because of my decisions, because of things that I've done wrong, which
drove me, thankfully, actually, Heavenly Father led me, thankfully, 23 plus years ago, two
rooms of recovery where I have still where I still participate quite regularly, weekly,
at least, and usually daily in contact with other people who I'm helping and who I'm serving
and by so doing, helping myself.
But we have steps and the there's 12 of them, the 11th step, I'm just going to read it verbatim,
we sought through prayer and meditation to improve our conscious contact with God as
we understood him.
I'll pause right there.
There's there's a there's a really important component here that we need to understand
him going back again to our podcast several podcasts ago when we begin to talk about how
important it is that we know him so and we know how he knows us.
And then it goes on praying, praying only for a knowledge of his will for us and the
power to carry that out, his will for us and the power to carry that out.
I know for sure that a righteous desire that I sometimes have, I have it in this moment
and I maintain it most of the time.
But that right to my most righteous desire is to align my will with his know what that
will know what his will for me would be.
And then I pray for that power to carry that will out when I've done that.
It's not always looked exactly how I would have designed it.
But when I've done that, it has without fail led me to a peaceful resolution, regardless
of the outcome I've learned it's important for me not to be in the outcome business when
it comes to others.
The only outcome business that I have any business participating is is in the outcome
business of my own.
I do that by trying to understand his will for me and praying for the will to pray for
the power to carry that out.
Yeah, that's that's really awesome.
I love that.
That's kind of a description.
What you just read is a description of the power of faith or the faith of power to know
the will of God.
And I just think sometimes we pray I do this too.
I think we all do this.
We're we're just human.
And we always kind of pray for this kind of want list.
And some of those wants may definitely be righteous.
But we we should strive to pray to know the will of God.
And as we learn to ask by the spirit, we will receive by the spirit.
That's I've I've experienced that a few times in my life where my prayers are less wordy,
less me speaking and more me listening and really feeling what God feels.
I really think the greatest miracle that we can experience is being able to see ourselves
the way God sees us and to be able to see others who we love as God sees them.
Right.
And sometimes got just experiencing that will fulfill our righteous desires and will totally
change our relationships and will totally change our prayers when we understand that
this isn't just God's son or God's daughter or this is I mean this isn't just my son or
my daughter, but this is also God's son and God's daughter and that he's got them.
And I've shared some experiences with about that with my own son who went to prison to
be able to see him the way God sees him.
That then goes above faith into what we call hope, which is an assurance of God's promises
for that individual.
And eventually to see them as God sees them is the gift of charity to be able to see someone
and feel for someone what God sees, how he sees and what he feels for them.
I believe that is the definition of the gift of charity and maybe what we should be praying
for more often is seeking revelation on how we can obtain the gift of charity to see ourselves
and others the way God sees us and those we love.
That kind of clarity would alleviate so much turmoil, so much heartache and you know anxiety.
You know we live in a world David where anxiety is so prevalent.
One of the main issues that is brought up frequently as we're teaching young single
adults at Brigham Young University and UVU for Institute, one of the main things that
gets brought up is anxiety.
Well that anxiety comes because we aren't sure of our future.
We aren't sure, which none of us can be completely sure, but we're lacking the most important
component of that.
Being assured of our future is nice, but it's not important.
What is important is knowing that we are connected to our Heavenly Father, that we're living
our life according to His will and His direction and there comes the comfort of the Spirit.
Well you know in Moroni chapter 7 what you just described is hope.
You know the gift of hope.
You know we use hope in our vernacular, in our culture as kind of a weak word.
We synonymous with hope is the word wish.
I wish, I wish, I wish.
I hope.
It's not used that way in the scriptures at all.
And actually you know the Hebrew, the Greek, the way it's used in the Book of Mormon is
hope means assurance.
Hope means we can, we get a glimpse of the end from the beginning.
And I love how Moroni describes it in Moroni chapter 7 when he talks about the gifts of
faith, hope and charity.
And he says here, and again my beloved brother, and this is verse 40 in Moroni chapter 7,
I would speak unto you concerning hope.
How is it that ye can attain unto faith, save ye shall have hope?
Well he begins this discussion, I won't read more, our readers hopefully can go and review
this, but he talks about the connection between faith, hope and charity.
You know these are separate gifts of the Spirit but they are inextricably linked.
And I, in verse 40 he says how is it that ye can attain, he doesn't say obtain.
Attain.
Attain unto faith, save ye shall have hope.
Well I've looked up the word, I've studied the history etymology of the word attain.
It means to endure.
So what he's really asking here is how can ye endure in faith if you don't have hope?
And it's really true, if I can't kind of see, get a glimpse by the Spirit as a gift of the
Spirit, I can't do this on my own, it comes by revelation.
If I can't kind of see the end, something of the end, something of a glimpse of how
through the atonement of Jesus Christ and His mercy and grace, how this is all going
to turn out, man it would be really tough to endure in faith.
But when we can receive revelation and obtain the gift of, obtain the gift of hope, we can
attain unto faith or endure in faith.
So if we're struggling with that, that is your recipe, that's the anecdote.
If we're struggling with that to have the Spirit to attain that type of hope through
a conscious effort, through a conscious contact, like I just read a few minutes ago, praying
only for a knowledge of His will for us and the power to carry that out, there can be
great benefit to that.
So.
Takes great revelation, takes patience, we can't dictate or manipulate revelation in
our life.
We've learned that.
It comes in really quiet moments, we need to spend more time in not just expressing
our righteous desires and our will, we need to spend more time listening for His desires,
His knowledge and receiving His will.
That takes listening and revelation, lots of meditation.
Well, so we move now into more on faith.
And I think this is a perfect jumping off point to do that as we conclude that part
of it.
Hopefully that answer was helpful.
Hopefully it can provide some perhaps some insight and so forth.
So for those of us who sometimes struggle with that, maybe that can can be of help.
Last week in the week prior, we began to talk about faith and we did talk somewhat about
faith in the name of Christ.
So so far we we know that the first principle of the gospel and the first principle of the
doctrine of Christ is faith, faith in the Lord Jesus Christ and faith in the Lord Jesus
Christ might some be somewhat different than faith in the name of Christ, faith in His name.
I just want to read real quick, this will be recognizable to many to those who aren't.
This is a prayer that is part of prayer.
I'm not going to read the whole thing just because of the sacred sacred nature of the
prayer.
But I am going to read a portion of it.
This is a prayer that's offered upon our sacrament or upon our our last supper remembrance that
we participate in as members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints on us
on a weekly basis every Sunday.
We do this in remembrance of as we were as he commanded us to do it actually at his last
supper.
And this is part of it.
We're making covenants.
We're actually renewing covenants here.
And this is what it says with it and witness unto thee that they are willing to take upon
them the name of thy Son and always remember him and keep his commandments which he has
given them.
And here's the promise back to us that they may always have his spirit to be with them.
Now what does that mean?
To always have his spirit to be with them, to always have his spirit to be with us.
We go back to the administration of the Atonement of Jesus Christ.
That is how it is enacted in our lives.
That's how we put it on.
And so again, that they are willing to take upon them the name of thy Son.
That's a requirement for us in order for us to be able to participate fully in the blessings
of this covenant that we are here by renewing.
So David, where do we go?
Well willing, willing to take upon them the name.
That obviously is looking forward or into the future.
So what does it mean to really take upon ourself his name?
And what does it really mean to have faith in his name or faith on his name?
So that's what we can discuss, Day Scott.
I've just been impressed over many years of study and I think it goes back to a book
that I read.
I think I've been studying this, thinking about this, pondering this for probably 25
years, Scott.
Half your life.
I wish.
Maybe, maybe a little less than half a year.
Or yeah, quite a bit less.
So anyway, in 1997, I happened to be in Rexburg, Idaho and I saw this book for sale.
It was at Bia Walmart, which I thought was kind of weird, but Utah town and being there
at BYU Idaho for some meetings.
You called it a Utah town, which folks in Rexburg may take exception to that.
Sorry to our Idaho friends.
Certainly a influence, right?
A Mormon town in Rexburg at BYU Idaho and I had some time to kill one evening.
I went in there and there was this book that I'd never seen before and it was entitled
His Holy Name by Elder Dallin A. Chokes, who had been an apostle for 13 years, was called
in 1984 and one of my favorites and I picked up his book and I thought, well, this is probably
just some conference talks he's given and I read the preface and this preface really
affected me, Scott.
And so it's become kind of a personal study of mine.
This is what Elder Oaks writes.
When I was called as an apostle, I went to the scriptures for illumination on my responsibilities.
I found that I was called to be one of the special witnesses of the name of Christ in
all the world.
Dr. Incom's 107, verse 23, a witness of Christ I could understand, but why a witness of the
name of Christ?
Sensitized by this unanswered question, I have been amazed at how often scriptural teachings
on very important subjects refer to the name of Jesus Christ rather than to just the Savior
Himself.
There is something important here, something here to for rarely discussed in our literature.
Then he continues.
This is the paragraph that really got me.
This book, this little book and I think it's 99 pages long.
This little book is the product of more than a decade, 10 years of prayerful study and pondering
on the meaning and significance of scriptural references to the holy name of Jesus Christ.
Wow, I got thinking about that.
And of course I purchased the book and couldn't wait.
I read it before I ever left the Rexburg Idaho and went back to my home in Lakeville, Minnesota.
I read the book, I pondered it, I looked up the scriptures.
It's just been a passionate study for me for 25 years now.
And I think it's really significant.
I hope it will be to our listeners.
But it was amazing to me as I began to make this study of how many times, how sensitized
I became by the phrase that is over and over again, dozens of times in the scriptures,
let's say faith in his name.
It doesn't just say faith in Christ or faith in our Savior or faith in our Redeemer.
It says faith in his name.
I'll give you just a couple of examples of this.
We just read from Moroni 7 and in that chapter alone, it's multiple times in this chapter.
So just briefly, I'll skip around.
In Moroni 7 38, for no man can be saved according to the words of Christ, save they shall have
faith in his name, faith in his name.
And then it talks about redemption and in so many other places throughout the scriptures,
New Testament, Book of Mormon, Doctrine and Covenants, it talks about the power of faith,
not just in Christ, but faith in the name of Christ.
In King Benjamin, you remember in King Benjamin's address, he called all the people together,
not just to reign his son as king, taking his place.
But we learn in chapter one of Mosiah that he brought them together to bestow upon them
a name.
And over and over again in King Benjamin's address, he talks about the importance of
the name in verse nine of chapter three, he says, and lo, he, speaking of Christ, cometh
unto his own, that salvation might come unto the children of men, even through faith on
his name.
Faith on his name bringeth exaltation, which usually the word salvation means in the Book
of Mormon, salvation exaltation, I believe in the Book of Mormon are almost always synonymous.
And over and over again in this amazing discourse of King Benjamin, he talks about the power
and the importance of the name of Christ.
In verse 17, he says, there's no other name given nor any other way nor means, whereby
salvation can come unto the children of men only in and through the name of Christ, the
Lord of omnipotent.
In chapter, if I skip over to chapter five, and I think we've read this verse before,
after all of those who have taken upon themselves the name, which King Benjamin bestows upon
these people, which I believe is more than just being baptized, Scott, in this experience
with King Benjamin and his people, they're near the temple, they face the temple.
I think this is really a temple discourse.
You know, maybe I'll pause here for just a minute.
There's two ways for us to take upon ourselves the name of Christ.
And one of those is by baptism.
And he describes that here in Mosiah chapter five, verse seven.
And now because of the covenant which he have made through baptism, ye shall be called the
children of Christ, his sons and daughters.
For behold, this day he has spiritually begotten you, for ye say that your hearts are changed
through faith on his name.
Through faith on his name, are you changed?
For ye are born of him and have become his sons and daughters.
So we can become the sons and daughters of Christ through baptismal ordinance and becoming
members of his church.
And verse eight goes on and says, and under this head ye are made free.
And there is no other head by whereby ye can be made free.
There is no other name given whereby salvation.
Or we could say exaltation cometh.
Therefore I would that ye should take upon you that ye should in the future take upon
you this willingness to take upon ourselves the name of Christ.
Which I would that ye should take upon you the name of Christ, all you that have entered
into the covenant with God.
And over and over again he refers to the importance and the power of taking upon ourselves the
name of Christ.
So when we, when you read the scripture of the sacrament prayer, that we are willing
by partaking of the sacrament, we show that we are willing to take upon ourselves the
name of Christ.
We took upon ourselves the name of Christ when we were baptized.
But when we renew that covenant as we participate in the sacrament, the ordinance of the sacrament,
we are looking forward to the temple.
And when we go to the temple, Scott, we are told in doctrine, covenant section 109 in
the dedicatory prayer of the Kirtland temple, the first temple in this dispensation.
We are told multiple times in that section in that dedicatory prayer that when we go
to the temple, the house of the Lord, we take upon ourselves his name.
And it's in the house of the Lord through the ordinances and the covenants that are
received there that we become joint heirs with Jesus Christ.
Dave, let me, let me read those, can I?
I think it's important because I think that in order for us to really catch the enormity
of what you're about to say or what you're currently saying here, it would help us to
read this.
So remember, this is the dedicatory prayer at the Kirtland temple.
And I'm going to start in verse 21.
I'll do a little bit of skip.
Actually I'm going to start in verse 22.
I'll do a little bit of skipping around.
I'll try and let you know when that happens.
But it goes on, and we ask the Holy Father that thy servants may go forth from this house,
from this house armed with thy power, and that thy name may be upon them, and thy glory
be round about them.
It seems like that those two things may be kind of conjoined there, the name and the
glory, right?
About them and thy angels have charged over them.
And then I'm going to skip to verse 24, we ask the Holy Father to establish the people
that shall worship and honorably hold a name and standing in this thy house.
And then again in 26, that no combination of wickedness shall have power.
This is going to be comforting, and I think that we can derive a great deal of hope and
inspiration in our own personal lives as we consider this final verse that I'll be sharing.
Here, that no combination of wickedness shall have power to rise up and prevail over the
people upon whom.
Now let's just pause for a second.
What kind of combination of wickedness shall have power to rise up and prevail over this
thy people?
Let's consider that in our own lives.
What combination of wickedness shall have power to rise up and prevail over me, Scott
Durfee, over my family, over my friends, what combination of wickedness shall have power
to rise up and prevail?
Yeah, so this is one of the great promises, right?
That President Nelson and the prophets and the brother and sisters are leaders within
the church.
Keep reiterating and repeating is this promise that if we go to the temple more often.
We'll have greater power to overcome the temptations of the adversary.
So go ahead and read that verse again.
I'm going to read the entirety of 26 that no combination.
So this again is in 109 section 109 of the Doctrine and Covenants Restoration Scripture
verse 26 that no combination of wickedness shall have power to rise up and prevail over
thy people, what people upon whom thy name shall be put in this house.
Yes, what a promise.
What a promise.
The name shall be put upon us.
We take upon ourselves the name.
So Scott, in our culture, almost all cultures of the world, we take upon ourselves a name
and that name is sacred, especially in the ancient cultures, Semitic Middle East cultures.
Name was sacred and it has great meaning and great significance.
For example, if I'm born, I take upon myself the name, the surname of my father.
And I must, so my last name's Durfee, your last name's Durfee.
That's really sacred.
That means something to have that name, right?
Put upon us to have that name and to try to hold that name in honor and to keep that
name honorable.
Now in our culture, when one is married, a woman takes upon herself the name of her
husband.
They share the same name in order that they may become one.
They take on the same contractual covenant relationship.
One of the things that come from that, Dave, is they're identified one by the other.
I mean, their identification, they become one.
So as we take up on the name of Christ, that becomes part of our identification.
Yes.
And we're promised that we will be joint heirs.
We're joint heirs with Christ.
When I go to the temple, this is the thought that motivates me the most, that I ponder
continually when I'm in there, is what I'm doing.
And it's in a way, it represents, and is symbolic of the ancient marriage of Israel to God,
to Yahweh in the Old Testament, or Jesus Christ, Jehovah.
And when I'm going to the house of the Lord, I'm reenacting this marriage or this covenant
relationship.
So we're not just no longer are we when we go to the house of the Lord, are we just
sons and daughters of Christ as we become when we're baptized.
But when we go to the house of the Lord, we become more than sons and daughters.
We become joint heirs with Christ.
So when we talk about the name of Christ, and when we talk about having faith in Christ
versus having faith in the name of Christ, Scott, think about what that means and the
power and the difference that can make in our life, that we are his and he is ours,
that we are one joint heirs in Christ.
There's just so many sacred things that could be said about this that I hesitate that we
can't really talk about because we'd have to be in the house of the Lord and the temple
to talk about them.
But as our listeners maybe return to the house of the Lord, or maybe some of our listeners
haven't yet gone to the house of the Lord, the whole purpose of that is to be able to
enter into a relationship with Christ that is more intimate than just being baptized
and to take upon ourselves his name.
So everything that the gospel is about is to enter into a covenant relationship with
Jesus Christ, becoming a joint heir with him that we may return to our heavenly Father
and our heavenly home with Christ as a joint heir.
I think it's important that we understand the differentiation here and it's complex,
it's multifaceted for sure, but I think that we can begin understanding the difference
between faith in Jesus and faith in the name of Jesus by understanding the power that's
attached to the name of Jesus.
Not that there's not power in Jesus, there is power in Jesus, that's where the power
of the name comes from.
That's where the power of the name comes from, but it is through the name.
It is the power and the faith in the name of Christ that allows us to become as you said
at joint heirs.
Well, I invite our listeners to make a study of this.
It doesn't have to be a 25-year study off and on as I have done or Elder Oates, a much
more intense study for 10 years, which he did, to understand his call as an apostle and
what it means to be a special witness of the name of Christ in all the world.
I invite our listeners to make maybe something of a study and to begin to at least identify
how many times in the scriptures they read the term in the name or on his name, faith
in his name, faith on his name.
That is over and over and over again in the scriptures and for many it's somewhat hidden
and it's part of the mystery that I think is hidden.
I think the word mystireia in the Greek means kind of an ancient ordinance or a kind of
acting out, reenacting the marriage, the covenant marriage.
So I just invite our listeners to begin to notice it as they study their scriptures and
to begin to give it more attention because I think it can help us to increase our focus.
We talked a lot about that a few times ago, in order to have faith in Christ we must change
our focus.
Well to focus on the importance of what it means to take upon ourselves the name of Christ,
our willingness and our actions taking upon ourselves the name of Christ changes my focus.
I think of this often and it uplifts me, it inspires me, it draws me closer I know to
Jesus Christ when I ponder what it means to take upon ourselves his name.
Wow, an awful lot to talk about this week and we are bumping right up against our commitment
to trying to keep these at about one hour.
Great stuff today.
You think maybe we will need to talk more about this next time?
You know something else that I have kind of a passion about, it's a discussion which we
should have some time about what it means to call upon the name.
Over and over in the scriptures we read that phrase, to call upon the name of the Lord.
Well that will lead us into what it really means to repent because calling upon the
name of the Lord means more than just praying in the name of the Lord.
I know it means that in the very simplest, lowest level, calling upon the name of the
Lord means to pray.
But it's a much more active prayer filled with faith and Amulet describes it calling
upon the name of the Lord is faith unto repentance that we go to him with a broken heart and
contrite spirit.
So I don't know maybe that's all we need to say but it's an interesting study to really
study what it means to call upon the name of the Lord.
I think we need to talk about that.
I think that I've just made a note.
I think in our next episode we will talk about calling upon the name of the Lord because
you know if we think about it, what are we talking about here?
Our purpose and our mission here is to understand how to invoke the blessings and the power of
Christ through His Atonement in our lives.
And if we understand how to call and the importance of calling upon His name, I think that will
further enhance our development around that, don't you?
Yeah.
It's an important part of what our title of our podcast is, is redemption through His
blood and calling upon His name includes that.
All right.
Any final thoughts for us today?
I've probably said more than I should have today.
And you have left us wanting more so we're looking forward to that.
I hope our listeners will study it.
There are so many scriptures we could have read on this subject that we did and I hope
they'll be led by the Spirit in their study and find those verses.
It was just a few months ago that David introduced this book that he's been making reference
to to me very beginning when we even first started talking about and entertaining the
idea of doing a podcast like this.
And I can tell you, he may have read it in one sitting, but there is he didn't study
it all in one sitting.
It's so full.
Yeah, I didn't sleep that night.
I didn't sleep that night when I started into this.
It really had a profound effect on me.
And you know, one last thing.
In essence, what Elder Oaks kind of concludes in his book is that we are saved by faith
in Jesus Christ.
But we are exalted by faith in the name of Jesus Christ.
Yeah.
So faith in the name of Jesus Christ is what allows us to participate in the crowning ordinances
of the gospel within the walls of the temple.
It's a covenant relationship.
Exactly.
What a great podcast.
It's I think it's been again to it's been that way for me.
These all are.
I learned so much.
I learned so much from the spirit right here in our little recording studio slash office
in my home.
And we're just grateful for the opportunity.
We gave gave us a couple of challenges last week.
I just want to remind you of one.
He reminded us that it would be important or a good exercise for us to consider the things
in our life that we could eliminate things that we should stop doing or things that we
should start doing in order for us to have our will swallowed up by our Heavenly Father's
will.
He extended that invitation to us last week and I hope that we've participated in it.
If we haven't.
Here's another reminder and this is something that perhaps would be an ongoing participation
maybe part of a daily study in meditation and now now today he's also invited us to
study what it means to take upon us the name of Christ to understand what it means to do
things in his holy name and all of that.
So great day today.
We're looking forward to being with you again next week.
My invitation to you would be to do all that we can to maintain that conscious contact
with our Heavenly Father to deeper under our understanding of him as we go along in every
possible way that we can and then by so doing letting his will be ours and praying only for
an understanding of that just to understand what his will is for me and then the power
to carry that out empowers me to live a life of peace a life free of turmoil even when
things get challenging and I'm grateful to know that today.
Thanks for being with us.
We look forward to being with you again next week.
May God bless you until then take care.