Recently, I’ve been studying the story of Moses’s experience with God as it’s recorded in the Pearl of Great Price. One of the things that’s striking to me about the Book of Moses is that, in the story, we learn that a significant portion of the Old Testament Book of Genesis comes from what Moses learns from God during this encounter. Much of what we know about the creation of our world, the heavens, and all life is revealed to us through Moses and was given to him “face-to-face” with his Creator.As I’ve read and reread the verses in this book, a few significant principles and fundamental truths have been impressed upon my mind.First, almost immediately in Moses’s encounter, God helped Moses understand his relationship to Him when He declared, “Behold, thou art my son.” These five simple words help all of us here on earth understand who we are as children of a glorified Heavenly Father, whose individual reflection should remind us of our divine spiritual DNA. God’s prophet on the earth today, President Russell M. Nelson, has taught that having our true identity imprinted upon our hearts can rescue us when we’re confronted with temptation and can affect almost every decision we will ever make.Second, God calls us to help in His work and provides us with the vision we need to accomplish it. Moses’s life work included recording scripture and delivering God’s people out of bondage and through the wilderness for 40 years. And in this encounter with God, Moses was shown the greatness of God’s creations and given insight into their purpose to aid him in accomplishing the work he was called to do.Certainly, what God specifically asked of Moses isn’t what’s required of us. But God does call each of us to “come unto Christ, and be perfected in Him” — or otherwise changed so we too, like Moses, can receive blessed guidance and understanding from God for our lives. And further, as we make and keep our covenants with Him, He gives us His Holy Spirit to be a constant companion, ever near, to communicate to us what we need to accept our Savior’s call to come to Him.For Moses, no sooner had he had this miraculous experience than the opposition that comes to all of us arrived in the form of the adversary, immediately seeking to undermine Moses’s divine identity and to draw him away from being obedient to and worshipping God.
But Moses’s response to this challenge is where I found the next set of important gospel principles that added to the power he gained from being so close to God and learning the truth about who he really was. He placed his trust and proclaimed his faith in God, remembered His commandments, and called upon Him and received strength. And being filled with power from God, Moses was able to withstand the distractions and disruptions of the adversary.
Moses climbed a mountain to have his experience with God, and, my friends, God invites us to climb towards Him as well. You ascend on your climb towards God when you open your scriptures to learn about your Savior Jesus Christ, placing your trust and proclaiming your faith in Him. You’re climbing as you reach out to God in daily prayer, believing that your appeals to Him reach His ears because of the merits, mercy, and grace of our Advocate, Jesus Christ, who has promised that He is in your midst even when you cannot see Him. Express gratitude as you recognize His hand in your life, and ask Him to bless you with what He knows you need for your life.You’re rising towards God as you head to church each week, remembering and renewing your covenants through the ordinance of the Lord’s sacrament. And you soar towards Him as you earnestly try to keep those sacred promises made through covenants and make small and simple everyday efforts to be a little better than you were the day before. You will gain more and more of God’s power to help you accomplish the things He guides you to do.
God has promised that each day as we go forth trying to do His will and keeping His commandments, He will go with us. He will be found “on [our] right hand and on [our] left,” and His Spirit will be in our hearts as He faithfully sends His “angels round about you, to bear you up.”In the name of Jesus Christ, amen.
