3.060 All the Nations of the Earth

In Matthew 5, Jesus calls us the salt of the earth and the light of the world, reminding us that our lives are meant to preserve, illuminate, and point others to Him. This season on Savory Salt, we'll walk through the Old Testament, one verse and one thought each day. Perhaps these moments will add greater savor and brighter light to our lives as we seek to truly live as savory salt.

Hello, my friends, it's a new day with new opportunities. Choose ye this day whom you will serve. What is it about the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints and their missionary work?

It seems like all of them want to do some missionary work. Well, my friends, as we wrap up this week in Genesis chapter 18 through 23, we're going to take a look at one more aspect of the story of Abraham and Isaac. It's going to come on the tail end of that challenge that Abraham faced from the Lord.

Before we get to our verse for today, I'd encourage you to go back and if you missed, I'm going to reference an episode that I talked about this just a little bit, kind of planted the seed, so to speak. In season 3, episode 49, we talked about the Abrahamic Covenant and how part of that covenant was that the people of that covenant, Abraham and his posterity, were going to be a blessing to the people of the world, right? Yes, they're going to be heavily blessed, but they're actually going to be able to be a blessing.

So I want you to kind of have that context a little bit as we look at the verse for today. If you need to go back and review that episode, you certainly can do so. But then we get this little segment here as the angel and Abraham are talking back and forth.

And the angel says this to Abraham in Genesis 22 verse 18. He says, "And in thy seed shall all the nations of the earth be blessed because thou hast obeyed my voice." Now, notice there that the blessing that's coming is not a blessing that's coming to Abraham because he obeyed the voice of the Lord. The blessing is that all the nations of the earth will be blessed because he obeyed the voice of the Lord.

Isn't that an interesting twist there? As we go back to the concept of the Abrahamic Covenant and the idea that those that are making and keeping these covenants with the Lord becoming blessings to literally the entire world, it starts to now put some of these puzzle pieces together as to why members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints have such a strong desire to do missionary work. I know that we get made fun of and mocked and harassed in other circles of the world.

I know that it seems odd to send 18, 19, 20-year-old men and women out to knock on doors, to walk in the streets, to seek out service opportunities, to help other people. It's certainly not what the world would tell us to do when we're 18, 19, 20, 21 years old, right? And yet here we have through the Abrahamic Covenant, a promise that all of Abraham's seed.

And if you have had a patriarchal blessing, you know that that includes you, all of us here, as Abraham's seed. Shall all the nations of the earth. Now, for those of you that perhaps have never had this opportunity, maybe you just listen to Savory Salt because you enjoy a little thought from the scriptures occasionally.

And that's great! I appreciate you for jumping on. In fact, I appreciate you these last couple of weeks as we greatly increased in our numbers of those that are listening.

So, if you're sharing it or people are finding it, please come join. This is awesome. I love it.

But if you never had an opportunity to meet missionaries of the Church of Jesus Christ. If you've never had an opportunity to see what it is that we believe in when it comes to obeying the voice of the Lord and how that can be a blessing to all the nations of the earth, what I've done in this podcast episode is I've provided the link, and it's the link that goes directly to inviting missionaries to your home. As I click on that link myself, as I do that, I'm doing this right now.

You can't see me because I'm not on video, but I'm doing this right now. The very top of the page says, "Grow closer to God, meet with missionaries." And then you can put in your information, your full name, and this list of nations. I'm going to scroll to the top.

You literally can select a country from Afghanistan to Zimbabwe and everywhere in between. Alphabet goes from A to Z. I have served my mission.

My formal mission I was called to was in Mongolia. My oldest daughter has served a mission in Argentina. My second oldest daughter, she's going to be serving a service mission here in South Salt Lake as she gets ready and prepared for it.

My friends, the desire that we have as members of the Church is to bless the nations around us and to be a blessing to all of the nations that we have the opportunity to be in and interact with. I bounced around this world and had an opportunity to find Latter-day Saints everywhere. And the places that I find Latter-day Saints, I find people trying to uplift and build and strengthen their communities, their families, their neighborhoods.

I love being a part of this work and it's a part of the work that was started. And I am grateful to be part of it. I hope you are too.

And if you haven't found yourself part of it in terms of the blessing side of things, meet with the missionaries, have them in your home and see how that blessing impacts your life and your family's life as well. I love it. I get fired up for this.

It puts a smile on my face. I hope you feel the energy through my voice that I have right now because it just gets me excited to bless the lives of others. I love helping other people out.

That's all for today, my friends. You and I have come here for such a time as this. Step forward in faith and let's be savory salt. We will be here tomorrow, and we hope you are too.