Writing About Scripture. (Hoping in the Promises)

I recently heard something from Tad R. Callister where he mentioned, more than once, how much he likes to, not only study, but "write about" the scriptures. There was something pleasant and personal I felt each time he mentioned the scriptures and said "I like to write about them"--like getting a glimpse into his own private little habits--and it woke a desire in me to do more of the same. 

Certainly I've done so on occasion:

In Israel we had a weekly assignment, from one of our professors, to turn in five insights we'd received from our scripture reading each week. Perhaps that was my first experience with writing about scripture. 

Since then, I've had many occasions where I've recorded in my journals the answers or understandings that have come from scripture. 

Here, on this blog, I've, at times, written how various scriptures have spoken to me. 

And, I suppose, even the thoughts I type next to verses as I read my scriptures on the gospel library app are a way of "writing about the scriptures". 

But! I want to do it more. I want to, as Elder Scott often teaches, record the insights God gives me so that he knows I cherish them. And I want to, more consistently, participate in a practice that I have found helps words of scripture become, more fully, my very own. 

So ...

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For the last year I have been putting up a weekly Book of Mormon verse (just to keep the Book of Mormon more consistently a part of our family discussions during the years when we are focusing more on studying other books of scripture). (Mike might laughingly tell you how I have even begun putting a copy of our weekly verse on the wall in our bathroom directly across from the toilet! Ha. Well? And maybe I have! But I got the idea from Mike's own father [who use to put poems up for his kids across from the toilet :)]. I fancy we all know the verses better because of it.) 

Our verse last week was Alma 37:17 -- "For he will fulfill all his promises which he shall make unto you ..."

I've been thinking a lot about that verse. Each of us have many of our own individual promises from the Lord: promises from our patriarchal (and other) blessings, promises and reassurances whispered to our hearts through the Holy Ghost, and even promises spoken to us by loved ones under inspiration. (For heaven's sake! I've had the rather shocking experience my own self of powerfully assuring someone of a promise God has for them.) And, of course, there are promises made on a grander scale as well--promises that extend to all who covenant with God. As our prophet has instructed us, I have been making note of these promises whenever I find them in my scriptures.

A small sampling:

He will comfort all our waste places.
He will gather us.
He will give us knowledge by his Holy Spirit.
He will fight our battles and our children's battles.
He will arm us with power.
He will prepare a way to accomplish all his works.
He will prepare us in all things.
He will be in the midst of us.
He will take away our stumbling blocks.
He will manifest himself unto us in power and deed.
He will do all things which are expedient for us.
He will bless all the work of our hands.
He will cause mountains to flee before us.
He will cause all our children to be taught of the Lord.
He will keep us in all the places we go.
He will not leave us until he has done all he has spoken.
He will not forsake us.
He will give us instruction every time we inquire.
He will lead us in paths we have not known.
He will make darkness light before us.
He will have mercy on us.
He will bless all the earth through us.
He will turn us from our iniquities.
He will save our children.
He has graven us on his hands.
Our walls are continually before him.

My sister Shannon has been working on a cool project where she is stitching many of Israel's covenant blessings into a temple (she's far from done, but here it currently is):

This, combined with Alma's promise of God fulfilling all his promises which he shall make unto us, has made me want to do something similar. (I don't know what, as I don't have a lot of creative energy currently.) But I'd like to have Alma 37:17 up somewhere followed by many of these beautiful covenant blessings. (Any clever ideas of how I might do that are welcome. Perhaps my girls [I'm talking to you Dais and Gold] could come up with something.)

Today I was reading in 3 Nephi 1. Five years earlier Samuel, a Lamanite prophet, had prophesied a major sign of Christ's birth that would occur in five years. With the end of those five years coming upon them, many began to say that the time for the sign was already past. They niggled at the minds of those who had waited and hoped in the promise saying, "Behold ... the time is past, and the words ... are not fulfilled; therefore, your joy and your faith concerning this thing hath been vain."

And then, and I can relate so well to how this affected those who had been waiting and holding to that promise, it says: "... and the people who believed began to be very sorrowful, lest by any means those things which had been spoken might not come to pass."

I've felt that plying little fear before! That sinking little whisper that maybe the promises I've felt and been holding to aren't sure. Maybe I made them up. Maybe the actions of myself or others have taken them from me. Maybe the time is past when they surely should have become plain.

But I love what those believers did. Despite the anxiety and doubts that were plaguing their minds they "did watch steadfastly for that day [when the promises would be fulfilled] ... that they might know that their faith had not been vain."

Perhaps it's because I know so many right now whose struggles (and whose children's struggles) have them wondering if (and how!) those covenant promises and the personal promises they've been given can possibly really be fulfilled. But that last line--about steadfastly waiting so that they might come to know their faith had not been vain--makes me want to weep. It's just so beautiful. It takes such power and strength. It feels like hope and grit applied at once. A refusal to let go when all around suggests there is nothing left to hold onto. 

I love what Neal A Maxwell says about hope in these types of situations:

"Having ultimate hope does not mean we will always be rescued from proximate problems. ... Faith in Father's plan gives us endurance even amidst the wreckage of some proximate hopes. Hope keeps us 'anxiously engaged' in good causes even when these appear to be losing causes." 

It reminds me of Elder Scott saying, "When you feel that there is only a thin thread of hope, it is really not a thread but a massive connecting link, like a life preserver to strengthen and lift you."

And because the Nephites in 3 Ne. 1 held fiercely to that life preserver of hope--hope that somehow those promises were sure (despite the circumstances surrounding them that insisted they could never be)--eventually this message came. It is the same message that ALL of us will eventually receive concerning every promise we've clung to:

"Lift up your head and be of good cheer; for behold, the time is at hand, and ... I will fulfill all that which I have caused to be spoken."

This all brings to mind these scriptures that I will end with:

1 Ne. 21:14 (Nephi quoting Isaiah):
But, behold, Zion hath said: The Lord hath forsaken me, and my Lord hath forgotten me--but he will show that he hath not.

And Romans 4:20-21 (referring to Abraham):
He staggered not at the promise of God ... but was strong in faith ... being fully persuaded that, what he had promised, he was able also to perform. 

And there's my certainty! The time will eventually "be at hand". He will show that he has not forgotten us. And whatever He has promised, no matter how impossible it might currently appear, He is well able to perform!