8 And verily I say unto
thee, thine heart is now right before me at this time; and, behold, I have
bestowed great blessings upon thy head;
9 Nevertheless, thou hast seen great sorrow,
for thou hast rejected me many times because of pride and the cares of the
world.
Doctrine & Covenants
39:8-9
Sections
39 and 40 are very interesting sections of the Doctrine & Covenants. James Covill
was a Methodist preacher who had pastored for forty years, but when he heard
the Gospel of Jesus Christ, he accepted it and said that he would obey any command
given from the Lord through the prophet Joseph Smith. So Section 39 is the Lord’s revelation to him
where he is told, “thine heart is now right before me at this time;” Yet in Section 40 we learn that James Covill
changed his mind and rejected the Gospel.
So here is the question: why did an omniscient, all knowing God, give
this beautiful revelation to James Covill, if He knew James would shortly turn
around and reject it? For that matter,
why does God work with so many people that He knows will later turn their
hearts away from Him?
It is because of this important principle: God
works with us in the present tense.
Although He sees all of the past, present, and future clearly, God works
with us in the present. You could go to
a Patriarch and find many beautiful revelations from the Lord to people who have
now turned far away from God. So why
were the beautiful blessings given?
Because if those young men and women would have continued on the path
they were on that day as they got those blessings, then all of those things
would have come true.
God does not work with us based on
our past. He does not work with us
according to what He knows we will do.
He works with us how we are today.
Today’s Takeaway:
So when is the last time you recommitted yourself to the Lord? Did you do it on Sunday with the
Sacrament? How about this morning?
Today, are you fully committed to Him?
God doesn’t care so much about how you have run the race, as much as how you are running the race of life today. How can you live for the Lord today?
Good thoughts. I find myself planning things out that I'm GOING to do, and then I never get around to them. Good intentions aren't as good as DOING.
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