Moses 1

Sunday, May 19, 2013


Something I have always found a difficult concept to grasp is that God loves us even more than our Earthly parents (verse 10). It is so hard to understand because our earthly parents love each of us very, very much. It is also incredible, though, to know that there is someone who loves us even more. He loves us no matter what we do, even when He is not pleased with our actions. This is always very reassuring to me because I know I will always be loved, even when my parents disagree with me on things such as spiritual beliefs.
In verse 16, God makes it very clear that there is only one God. This is incredibly important for Moses to know because he is later tempted by Satan who pretends to be something he is not. Knowing that there is only one God, Moses was able to draw strength from Him and resist the power of temptation from Satan. Moses had an encounter with Satan where Satan claimed to be the Only Begotten Son of God. We can think of this to be similar to the trials we have with our faith. Every day, we face trials. All of these trials are faith based. We must trust in the Lord and call upon Him for strength to help us through our daily lives. Some trials are harder than others. And sometimes, it does not seem like Heavenly Father hears us. But He does. We just have to remember that He will answer our prayers in His own time. One thing one of my friends has told me is sometimes we need to take a step back from our situation and look at it in the whole of things. I took this into consideration and realized that our trials are like a speck of dust in the big picture of things. Heavenly Father sees and knows the big picture. We need to trust that He will answer and help us when the time is right for Him, not necessarily what we think is the right time. Even when it seems that He does not answer us, we need to hold onto our faith and trust Him. We cannot allow ourselves to be tempted by Satan in any way.
I find it almost amusing that throughout this passage, Satan continuously tries to tempt Moses into thinking that he, Satan, is the Only Begotten. It's funny because Satan already knows he's lost. God wins. Always. Sometimes even Satan accidentally does the work for God without realizing it until it's too late. We can think of our trials like this. Each time we are tempted by Satan and we get through the trials, we can know that our strength and faith in the Lord has greatly increased. This, of course, is not what Satan wants. But in a way, he does God's work each and every time he tempts us.
In verse 26, God tells us that He is "always with thee." We can replace Moses' name with ours and know that God is always with us, as well.
The idea of The Plan of Salvation is referenced in verse 31 when God says that He has made the earth "For mine own purpose." He has made the earth so that we could go to a place where we could learn and become more like our Father. And if we do as He says and live our lives to the very best of our ability and follow Him, we can one day return to Him.