Day 348 Humility Brings Rain and Revival

In Matthew 5:13, Jesus tells his followers that they are the salt of the earth, and in the same sentence offers a warning that savorless salt is good for nothing. Join me in an attempt to be savory salt as I share each day one verse of scripture and one small thought. Perhaps this small daily emphasis can lead to greater savor in your life and ultimately you and I can be savory salt.

Hello, my friends and family, wherever you're listening from. Thank you for joining me and know that I'm cheering for your every success. If we were to poll 100 people and ask them when they're most likely to pray, what do you think the answer would be?

Welcome to day 348 on our 365-day journey through the Book of Mormon together. Today, we're going to be reading Ether chapter 9, verses 29 through 35. We'll finish that chapter.

And Ether chapter 10, verses 1 through 12. And I got to admit, here's where we put on these glasses and say, Moroni, you saw our day and you wanted to tell us this story and you had to pick from thousands of stories over this Jaredite history. Why did you include the ones that you included?

I think that might change the way that you see this rise and fall of the Jaredites over the years. The one that I've chosen today comes from Ether 9, verse 35. And it's on the tail end of actually a pretty crazy story.

We have a dearth in the land, right? There's a huge famine. There's no rain because of the wickedness.

And then we have these poisonous serpents that just kind of come out of the woodwork and chase the flocks and then the flocks run away and then the people run away and people are dying because they're trying to fight these poisonous serpents. And I mean, it's kind of a crazy story. But then we get to the tail end of at least this story in verse 35.

It says, "And it came to pass that when they had humbled themselves sufficiently before the Lord, He did send rain upon the face of the earth, and the people began to revive again. And there began to be fruit in the north countries, and in all the countries round about. And the Lord did show forth His power unto them in preserving them from famine." Going back to our original question at the front end of this episode, when do people tend to turn to the Lord?

My guess would be when they're in trouble. That's when we tend to pray the most to God. When we're experiencing something that is not going our way and we start to say, "Please, Heavenly Father, help us!

Please, Heavenly Father, help us!" And that's what's happening inside of 34 and 35. The people are being attacked by these poisonous serpents. They're dying from the famine.

They don't have any more animals left. And then they turn to the Lord. And it's interesting to see what happens here.

The Lord answers. He allows the repentance process to come into play and He blesses them abundantly with rain and with fruit and everything they need to revive again. My friends, why does it take us to get to dire circumstances for us to continue to remember the Lord and turn to Him?

This is a check for us to be able to pause and say, when do I talk to the Lord? Do I talk to Him when things are going well and when things are going bad? Or am I constantly using a 911 phone call to Heavenly Father asking for help in the moment?

I think that's worth digging into. You know, it got me thinking about a local occurrence that happened here a couple of years ago. Our state, the state of Utah, it's a desert-based state.

We do have mountains and such, but we're basically a desert climate. And we had gotten to the point where our rivers and lakes and reservoirs were running very, very low, historically low. And we receive typically enough snow to replenish those reservoirs year over year.

They gathered together, they humbled themselves, they joined in prayer and in fasting for the Lord. And the last two winters that we had have been significant enough. In fact, the one immediately after was significant enough that it raised kind of some alarms of sorts across some of the media platforms.

And there were people that actually spoke into the fasting and the prayer that had occurred to bring snow and water here to this valley. And some of them even did it in a mocking way, making fun of the prayers and fasting of others. The Lord is here to answer our prayers if we will but humble ourselves and seek to serve Him.

He is there in the good times and the bad times. And remember, some of the things that we're choosing to do are bringing about our own consequences. Turn to the Lord and find success and rest in Him.

That's all for today, my friends. Remember that by small and simple things are great things brought to pass. Keep it small, keep it simple, and always seek to be savory salt. I'll be here tomorrow, and I hope you are too.