Come, Follow Me Old Testament Lesson 1: December 27–January 2 “This Is My Work and My Glory” Moses 1; Abraham 3: Preparing to Read the Old Testament

Preparing to Read the Old Testament – powered by Happy Scribe

I’m looking forward to come follow me for 2022. The Old Testament is a favorite of mine because it teaches me first about how the Lord loves all his children throughout all time and eternity. Second, about how the Lord expects me to be perfectly obedient. And third, it teaches me about the latter days preparing me for the second coming of the Savior. We will be studying both our newest and our oldest books of Scripture this year.

At the beginning of our 2022 study, we will be reading Parts of the Pearl Great Price, which is the latest book of Scripture to be canonized. It was received by the Prophet Joseph Smith through translation and Revelation. I have heard many people worry about this year’s study claiming that the Old Testament is hard to understand and difficult to read. I want to share with you. Four Tips to reading the Old Testament think of the word Past While reading the Old Testament, we will learn from the past P-A-S-T.

Prophets atonement the Savior and Truth. While reading the Old Testament, we will understand the text through the past, parallelism analogy, symbols, and time. As you read the Old Testament with past in mind, you will find Christ in every page. Here are some suggestions for studying the Old Testament first Mark in your Scriptures. Every time you see the Word God, Jehovah, Lord, or any other reference to our Savior.

Remember that latter day Revelation has helped us to understand that Jehovah of the Old Testament is the premortal Jesus Christ. The Resurrected Savior taught the knee fights. Behold, I am he that gave the law, and I am he who CoVents with my people Israel. Therefore, the law in me is fulfilled. You may have already done this activity when you read the Book of Mormon, but as you do this in the Old Testament, you will find the Lord on every page.

Two pick different colors for prophets atonement Savior and Truth and Mary them as you find them in your reading. Three find symbols and analogies in stories and prophetic writings. Try to find connections with them in your own life. Four look to modern Scripture to help you understand the Old Testament. For example, as you read the different descriptions of the creation in the Book of Mormon, Abraham and Genesis, and even thinking about the temple endowment, notice the differences between the accounts and ask yourself, what can I learn from these differences?

Look to Joseph’s mistranslation of the Bible to gain a greater understanding of those truths which have been lost through time and various translations of the Old Testament. Finally, use the Topical Guide and Bible Dictionary to help you understand names and terms that you are unfamiliar with. As we look to the past, I hope we will find joy in the present. I am looking forward to centering my Old Testament reading on increasing my joy in the Lord. Every week, the Old Testament tells us that the Meek also shall increase their joy in the Lord and the poor among men shall rejoice in the Holy one of Israel.

Weeping may endure for a night but joy cometh in the morning and my soul shall be joyful in the Lord it shall rejoice in his Salvation. Increase your joy in the Lord this week and look forward to a joyful study of the Old testament.

Come, Follow Me Week 1, Part 1/6 (Dec 27 – Jan 2, Moses 1, Abraham 3) – powered by Happy Scribe

In these first eleven verses of the Book of Moses, we will gain a greater understanding of a Prophet’s, visionary experience with the Lord, the Savior as the Creator of the world and God’s dimension of time being different than ours as prophets of God. Both Moses and Joseph Smith had similar revelatory experiences. Moses was caught up into an exceedingly high mountain, and he saw God face to face, and he talked with him, and the glory of God was upon Moses. Note the similarities between Moses experience and Joseph Smith’s first vision.

Joseph Smith also saw God face to face and talked with God.

After Joseph’s first vision, he found himself lying on his back, looking up into heaven. When the light had departed, he had no strength. Moses description was very similar, and the presence of God withdrew from Moses. That his glory was not upon Moses. He fell onto the Earth, and it came to pass that it was from the space of many hours before Moses did again receive his natural strength like unto man.

Later in this first chapter, Moses will also have a run in with Satan, similar to Joseph’s misconcept with Satan when thick darkness gathered around him, and it seemed as if he was doomed to sudden destruction. During Moses revelatory experience, the glory of God was upon Moses. He makes the statement, but now my own eyes have beheld God, but not my natural, but my spiritual eyes, for my natural eyes could not have beheld, for I should have withered and died in his presence, but his glory was upon me, and I beheld his face, for I was transfigured before him.

Elder Bruce Armikonki wrote, Transfiguration is a special change in appearance and nature which is brought upon a person or thing by the power of God. This divine transformation is from a lower to a higher state.

It results in a more exalted, impressive and glorious condition by the power of the Holy Ghost. Many prophets have been transfigured so as to stand in the presence of God and view the visions of eternity while talking with the premortal Jesus Christ or the God of the Old Testament. Moses is called my son by God three times in verse four. And behold, thou art my son in verse six, and I have a work for thee, Moses, my son, and thou art in this militude of mine only begotten, and mine only begotten is and shall be the Savior.

So Moses is taught about the earthly mission of Jesus Christ.

And in verse seven. And now behold this one thing I will show unto thee, Moses, my son. Moses will need to remember that he is a Son of God. When Satan comes to him, tempting him, saying, Son of man worship me. Moses replies to Satan, who art thou, for behold, I am a Son of God.

In this vision Moses has shown the creation of this world and all the beings who will live on it. Including our Savior. Can you imagine the Majesty of this vision? Moses testimony of the one true and living God becomes the foundation of Moses teachings to the children of Israel who had been living in an idolatrous nation for hundreds of years. Jehovah explains to Moses about eternal truth and God’s understanding of time.

He teaches Moses there is no God beside me and all things are present with me. Elder Neil A. Maxwell explains this statement of all things are present with me. God does not live in the dimension of time, as do we. We are not only hampered by our finiteness experiential and intellectual, but also by being in the dimension of time.

Moreover, God, since all things are present with him, is not simply predicting based on the past in ways that are not clear to us. He sees rather than foresees the future because all things are at once present before him. Moses temple experience on a mountaintop gave him an understanding of the true nature of God, an understanding that he was the son of God, and the realization that God is the supreme creator of heaven and Earth. We can learn these same truths as we attend the temple and have our own revelatory experiences.

As we read the Old Testament this week, we can develop the same faith that God, the eternal Father, is the truth, living God, and Jehovah is the creator of heaven and Earth.

Come, Follow Me Week 1, Part 2/6 (Dec 27 – Jan 2, Moses 1, Abraham 3) – powered by Happy Scribe

Welcome to Book of Mormon Centrals. Come follow me. I’m Lynn Wilson, and this year I will be having the opportunity to talk about how the Old Testament can be illuminated as we look through the lens of the Book of Mormon, not only do we find a clear doctrine in the Second Witness of Christ, but we also add the pro great price and find even more. Moses chapter One and Abraham chapter three are some of the richest chapters we have in all Scripture on the nature of God, the nature of Satan and the nature of man.

And I’d like to take each of those three and divide them into a separate week.

So this week, Moses chapter One is our best chapter in all Scripture on who is our adversary and how he works. So I’d like to talk about the nature of Satan, and then next week, the nature of God, and the week after the nature of man. In short, God seeks to bring us each to heaven and Satan seeks to keep us out of heaven. I was very surprised to find that in Genesis chapter One through three, there are no references to Satan. There’s no references to the devil or sin or temptation, or even transgression.

These are ideas that were added later. And as we look at the entire Old Testament, there are only 16 verses that reference Satan. Out of the 23,143 verses in the Old Testament, only 16 reference Satan, and most of those are in the Book of Job. There are a few other chapters, but they just have one reference. A biblical scholar, none of our faith has recently written, You’ll have a devil of a time to find Satan in the Bible.

I think the adversary took out who he is as part of those plain and precious truths. Any sports team knows that you have to know your adversary in order to come up to them. And our Prophet has encouraged us to learn how to have the spirit so that we can be more prepared to face the things in the future. I think the lack of understanding in the Bible on who Satan is is what has led to so much interesting artwork on how the devil looks. The gargoyles coming off the cathedrals and the artwork of a half goat are so different than what we understand.

But it’s not until we add the Book of Mormon and the prologue price in that we get this understanding. Look at this. So a total of 25 references to the adversary in the Old Testament, whereas in the Book of Mormon, look at these numbers, 26 for Satan, 89 for the devil, two for the serpent, three for the adversary, one for Lucifer. 121. That is eleven times more references to the adversary in the Book of Mormon than the Bible.

If we want to learn who our enemy is, open up the Book of Mormon and there we find that Satan is trying to usurp our Savior’s role. He wants to be the God of this world. He wants to take the place of God. But the Book of Moses teaches us that Satan knew not the mind of God. As I studied each of these verses, each of these 120 verses in the Book of Mormon, it’s very clear that Satan is the Father of lies, that he has power allowed to be used.

And our first reference to him is in the Tree of Life vision of Nephi and Lehi, where Nephi describes the mists of darkness are the temptations of the devil which blind us the eyes. But we learned just a chapter or two later that the day will come when the wrath of God is poured out upon the devil, he will lose his power, and he will be bound by the righteousness. But my favorite chapter in the Book of Mormon to understand who the adversary is and how we can combat him is Lehi, and he does this beautiful job of compiling and connecting in a concrete fashion.

All these ideas of Satan in the Old Testament. He is studying Isaiah 14 about Lucifer and in his commentary.

In two Nephi, chapter two, he combines Lucifer with this fallen angel with the devil and the Father of lies and Satan. And finally the serpent and Eden listen to how he connects them in the yellow you can see here on my chart. These are words that are added that are not in the Old Testament. The angel of God had fallen from heaven, whereas he became the devil, having sought that which was evil. All the information on Lucifer in Isaiah does not say that he was the devil or that he was Satan.

He continues on that Satan had become miserable forever. He sought the misery of all mankind Wherefore he set into Eve. Yet even that old serpent, who is the Devil. So see, we’re combining them all the time. It’s Lehi that takes this concrete connection for us, the Father of all lies.

We also see in the Book of Mormon corehor, who has this confrontation with the devil. And he says that Satan’s words were pleasing to the carnal mind, and he says they were so pleasing that I started believing them. And hence I taught them, if you just want to get a short synopsis of who the adversary is, there are four chapters that are especially helpful. First, Niki 14, 2nd Niefi, Two and second, Ni Fi Nine and Alma five. Those four have the majority of the messages, but going through 120 is very interesting, but better than all of those, I think, is understanding the Book of Moses.

Chapter One from the Joseph translation of Genesis, the Lord revealed this beautiful text. But both the Book of Abraham and the Book of Moses, I feel, are temple texts because they talk about entering the presence of God Jesus Christ’s. One begins, Moses was caught up into an exceedingly high mountain, and he saw God face to face. He records these sacred experiences. And then he goes on to teach what we need to know before we are tempted.

And this is crucial. Our Prophet will teach us what we need to know before, as well as the Spirit of the Lord. And as I look back in my own life, so many times, I have a prompting. Before I have a temptation, or before I’m tempted, or before the natural man comes to pass. We learn in Moses one that Satan is the tempter.

And often his tempting is about materialism or money. It’s Hugh Nibble who says that Satan’s first article of false faith is, you can buy anything in this world for money. But I see that part of Satan’s role is to usurp. Christ in the timing. Do it on my timetable.

Turn these stones. Now don’t wait till you want to feed the 5000. Feed yourself first. Do it on my timing or no need to wait till you’re married. Satan is the great tempter.

Moses one also teaches us that Satan uses fear to have us forget who we are and what God expects and what God can do. So when Satan comes to usurp God’s authority and says, I will be likened to the most high. Moses identifies him and says, Where is thy glory that I should worship thee? I can look upon thee in the natural man. I can judge between thee and God.

Moses identified the counterfeit because he knew the Lord. And so I have to ask myself, Do I know the Lord? Can I identify counterfeits? We have to learn what Moses. Chapter One, verse 18 teaches that we are nothing on our own.

It’s only when we call upon the name of God that we are given power over the evil. One. Next week I would like to talk about the nature of God, and that is best described in Moses one, verse 39. This is my work and my glory to bring to past the immortality and the eternal life of man. If we understood this one verse, I believe with all my heart that the world would be more unified.

And I look forward to that day when every knee shall bow in the name of Jesus Christ. Amen.