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The Unconditional Love of God

3 Nephi 13:19 states:


"No man can serve two masters; for either he will love the one and hate the other, or else he will hold to the one and despise the other. Ye cannot serve God and Mammon."




In this LDS scripture mastery verse, Jesus of Nazareth is teaching his gospel to the Nephites just as he did with the Jews in Matthew 6.

After some analytical interpretation of this verse, it was impressed upon me that even though we may reject God at certain times or in certain aspects of our lives, God will never stop reaching out to his children in love.

The Savior seems to repeat himself in the middle part of the verse. Or he is trying to communicate two separate ideas. In the first phrase, the Savior refers to "[loving] the one and [hating] the other". I believe "the one", in this case, refers to God while "the other" implies Satan. I understand the scripture this way because the emotions described therein can be felt reciprocally between the reader and God or the between the reader and Mammon. We chose to serve God because he loved us first. (1 John 4:19) We hate the Devil when we chose to take the more difficult road of living the laws of God. And Satan certainly hates and will continue to hate us unconditionally.

The second phrase uses the words, "hold to the one" and "despise the other". In this case I felt that "[holding] to the one" referred to our possible relationship with Satan and his worldly allures. When we hold to Satan's temptations, we despise God. The fascinating thing about these relationships is that despite how much we cling to the devil and strive to follow and love him, he will still hate us (Alma 12:6). Whereas, even when we despise the Savior and his teachings, like the apostates of the early days of the Restored Church, his mercy and love will continually be upon us. (Isaiah 53:3-5)



The choice is ours (2 Nephi 2:27):

1. We can become the dog/devil that is kicked around by his owner, the Devil, for all eternity (2 Nephi 9:9), or

2. We can receive all that the Father hath in an eternal spiral toward glory and perfection (D&C 84:33-39).

There is one last principle I found in the end of the verse. "Ye cannot serve God and and Mammon." Again, this is the old walking-up-the-down-escalator-toward-heaven analogy. The Savior is teaching us that if we do not actively choose God by serving him, we have made a choice to be subjects to the Devil for that time. Many of us do not even know that we are being carefully being led down to Hell (2 Nephi 28:21). Screwtape, a Master Deceiver, alliterated in his letters to his nephew, Wormwood, that as long as man is still permitted to attend church, or maintain some semblance of religion, he is justified in lying a little or dig a small pit for his neighbor.


I find inspiration in the words of President W. Woodruff's rallying hymn, Awake, ye Saints of God, Awake! (LDS Hymnal p.17)

"Awake, ye Saints of God, awake!
Call on the Lord in mighty prayer
That He will Zion's bondage break
and bring to naught the tempter's snare.
Awake, ye Saints of God, awake!

[Tho Zion's foe have counseled deep,
Although they bind with fetters strong,
The God of Jacob does not sleep;
His vengeance will not slumber long.
His vengeance will not slumber long.]

With constant faith and fervent prayer,
With deep humility of soul,
With steadfast mind, and heart, prepare
To see th'e ternal purpose roll.
With steadfast mind, and heart, prepare!

Awake to righteousness; be one,
Or, saith the Lord, 'Ye are not mine!'
Yea, like the Father and the Son,
Let all the saints in union join.
Awake to righteousness, be one!

Awake, ye Saints of God, awake!"


To end, I love the final verse about unity. Though salvation is a personal pursuit, we need friends and loved ones to help us through our times of trial. I believe that is the reason why God instituted Zion communities. Our progression is accelerated by the support of others.

Merry Christmas in only 17 days!

Comments

  1. Somehow you always have just the right picture to go with what you say. How do you do it?

    ReplyDelete
  2. I retract what I said on the phone last night about the amount of time involved in each post...I see it's kind of like an on-line class. You are learning and practicing different techniques and it cements things you will probably call on over and over! Good stuff! Soon, you'll be creating those billboards on the web yourself!

    ReplyDelete

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