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Well, I’m with Jill. I love this month, I love this season, I love that it lends itself to reading a cozy book by a cozy fire. And that’s my first thought today is, have you ever read a book that has moved you or entertained you or touched something in you so much that you just have this, just, a desire to tell everybody about it? You just kind of go on this little missionary moment thing where you just are bearing your testimony to everybody about how they need to read this book, and it’s the best thing you’ve ever read, and I’ve had plenty of these moments. There’s been so many amazing books that I’ve read that I just want to share with everyone. In fact, if I read on my Kindle, I can just highlight certain quotes or paragraphs in the book, and so I went back and I found one from a book that I read a couple of years ago that I absolutely loved, and so I’m going to share it with you.

This is from Theo of Golden that was written by Alan Levi, and this is the quote. And this is what the pair subsequently recalled when they spoke of their seven-mile walk from Jerusalem to Emmaus. Our hearts burned within us. Their hearts burned within them. Father Lundy allowed the phrase to linger in silence for a few seconds before he resumed. All, we all walk roads of various descriptions in life. The long and winding road, the road to ruin, easy street, the road less traveled. Along the way, there are questions, there’s news, there are concerns and fears and uncertainties that furrow our brows, trouble our souls, and break our hearts. Death terrifies many of us, but God in his sublime goodness has always sent others, mysterious others, to walk with us, prophets, preachers, friends, teachers, artists, storytellers, wives and husbands, children, songbirds and rivers, even hardship and loss, to help us see clearly. They are ones who make our hearts burn within us, who call us out of our indifference, our lethargy, our death and defeat. They call us to be fully alive, or at least more alive than we were before we met them. I mean, how beautiful is that? Are there certain books that cause us, that cause you to be more alive than you were before you met them?

Well, Nephi certainly thinks so. I can only imagine that with the trauma and the stress and the distress that he’s felt related to his family situation, that he has gone to those brass plates over and over again, searching for some sort of relief. Nephi is in pain. Ryan Sharp, who’s a BYU professor, pointed out that there’s one fairly relatable reason that might have led Nephi to pour over those brass plates. He said, in the absence of other consolations, physical comfort, familial solace, social and intellectual novelty, the words of Christ are sweet in his belly, and Nephi feasts on them without restraint.

Another person that delights in scripture is Elder Scott. And he gave one of these reasons that he reads scripture. He said, scripture can calm an agitated soul, giving peace and hope and a restoration of confidence in one’s ability to overcome the challenges of life. They have potent power to heal emotional challenges when there is faith in the Savior. Who doesn’t want potent power in their life? I think Nephi definitely was searching for that potent power, something to heal some emotional wounds in him.

Let’s look at 2 Nephi chapter 11. Verse 1 says, “I, Nephi, write more the words of Isaiah, for my soul delighteth in his words.” What’s the word that comes to your mind when you think of Isaiah? Is it delight? Nephi is definitely having this moment here, and he is wanting to share it with everyone. He wants to shout it from the rooftops. He really, really wants us to delight in Isaiah. So I started thinking, what is it that brings you delight? What brings me delight? Is there something that I just want to share with everyone, something that I really delight in? Do you delight in trail running? Do you delight in making sourdough bread? I started thinking of the last time I felt great delight, and I think it was when I was getting ready to sit down and listen to a prophet and apostles and our leaders teach us and inspire us and counsel us at General Conference. Just felt this delight.

I asked my oldest daughter this question. I asked her what brought her delight, and it had been a morning for her. There’d been some tears that morning, some from her two-year-old and some from her. And so I was maybe just a little bit surprised when she said the thing that brought her the greatest delight was motherhood. She said, “I know people look at this, at me with five kids and one on the way, and they think that looks hard. And it is,” she said, “it is hard, but maybe it’s in that hard that carves out the space for more joy and more delight,” which got me thinking it’s probably really difficult to delight in anything unless we’ve really invested a certain amount of time or effort. Maybe the delight comes exactly because it’s hard. It’s the effort made in mining that the gems are uncovered.

Made me think about this article that was in The Atlantic magazine. It’s a cover article. It was written by Rose Horowitz. She is a Yale graduate. She’s only 26 years old. The title of the article was “The End of Reading.” And maybe you know where this is going. She said, basically, there’s been this huge cultural shift in the way that we think about reading. Americans feel as though reading for pleasure is outdated. It doesn’t really suit their lifestyle. It doesn’t fit in their day-to-day life anymore. She said only about 16% of Americans say they read for pleasure on any given day. The nuance here is that reading as a pastime isn’t going away. In fact, book sales are up from a decade ago, but it’s just become really niche. In fact, about twenty percent of the adults who read make up for more than eighty percent of all of the books that are being read or bought. Her argument is that it’s not that we’re not reading. We read plenty. In fact, we probably read more words now than ever before with our emails and our text messages and the comments and the articles and papers that we’re going over. But it’s not the words that we’re reading, it’s what we’re reading and how we’re reading. She reports that the New York Times bestsellers today have sentences that are about one third shorter than they were a century ago. One third.

There was a symposium at BYU called “The Wonder of Scripture,” and in it, Tyler Gardner, who’s a BYU professor, he said, “If we don’t really value reading, are we able to value the scriptures?” He worries that the value that we place on those sacred texts directly relates to how we value reading. Then he went on to describe what he calls deep reading. This is where he said the problem is. Deep reading, he said, is the process through which the reader moves, harvesting information from the text, applying background knowledge, creating connections to our best thoughts and feelings, making critical conclusions and then arriving at insight, the uncharted leap into a cognitive space where we may upon occasion glimpse whole new thoughts. This is problematic, he said, not just because reading is awesome, but because a mind trained in deep reading is a mind cultivated for personal inspiration.

Nephi really wants us to engage in these texts. He wants us to have a love of not just reading, but deep reading. Why? Why? What is the end goal? I think that he wants us to love the word, lowercase word, but he also knows that it is the lowercase word that is going to draw us to the Word with an uppercase W. To our Savior Jesus Christ. And this is so important to him, and I think we’re going to see why.

Turn to 2 Nephi chapter 11 verse 4. Nephi describes this fourfold pleasure that he finds in Isaiah’s words. He said, “Behold, my soul delighteth in proving unto my people the truth of the coming of Christ, for this end hath the law of Moses been given, and all things which have been given of God from the beginning of the world unto man are the typifying of him. And also my soul delighteth in the covenants of the Lord which he hath made to our fathers. Yea, my soul delighteth in his grace, and in his justice, and power, and mercy, in the great and eternal plan of deliverance from death. And my soul delighteth in proving unto my people that save Christ should come, all men must perish. For if there be no Christ, there be no God. And if there be no God, we are not. For there could have been no creation, but there is a God, and he is Christ, and he cometh in the fullness of his own time.”

Twice in here, Nephi tells us that something that he delights in about Isaiah is his ability to prove something to us. Where is the proof? What’s the proof? Can we have proof on the written page with the written word? Is that proof enough? Where’s the tangible evidence? Do we need tangible evidence? How does he think he’s going to prove to us that Christ will come and that he is our savior?

I remember hearing about this woman talking about this missionary experience that she had with a friend. And she told the friend about Joseph Smith and the plates, these brass plates being recovered from a mountain, and how he took these brass plates, and with God’s help, he was able to translate these plates. And she said her friend was right there with her. And her friend said, “Yeah, okay, I love this. I can get behind this.” And she said, “Okay, so where are the brass plates now? Are they in a museum? Like, where can I go to see these brass plates?” And the friend had to turn to her and say, “Well, here’s the thing. We don’t have them.” So, where’s the proof? Where’s your evidence?

I remember years ago attending this scripture class taught by Tina Peterson. Tina, when she was thirteen years old, decided that she wanted to learn the languages that the scriptures had been originally written in. So she decided to learn, among other languages, Greek, Aramaic, and Hebrew, and can read the scriptures in each of those languages. All I can remember thinking is that that was not what I was thinking when I was thirteen years old. But in this particular lesson, which I will never forget, she told us about a Hebrew word that she wanted to teach us, two Hebrew words, gnosis and epignosis. And in order to teach us about the difference between the two, she brought up two different women to the front. She asked them if they knew anything about Jerusalem. They both said they did. They both shared common facts that they knew. One woman said that she could tell you about the geography, certain events that had taken place, especially recently. The other one said very similar things. And then when Tina asked them how they knew these things, the first woman said that she knew because she’d read something online. She’d seen the news in a video. And when she asked the other woman how she knew these things, she said, “Because I was there. I’ve been, I experienced it. I know firsthand.”

Tina’s diagnosis is the general awareness or discovery of a concept. It has intellectual and factual data, whereas epignosis is precise, correct, or experiential knowledge. It requires a relationship with or direct experience of the object being known. It is evidentiary knowledge. It is proof. It’s proof.

Turn to chapter 11, verse 8. “I, Nephi, write more the words of Isaiah, for my soul delighteth in his words, for I will liken his words unto my people, and I will send them forth unto all my children, for he verily saw my Redeemer, even as I have seen him, and my brother Jacob also has seen him, as I have seen him. Wherefore, I will send their words forth unto my children to prove unto them that my words are true. Wherefore, by the words of three God hath said, I will establish my word. Nevertheless, God sendeth more witnesses, and proveth all his words.”

When I read that last part, this is how I heard it. God send more witnesses. Prove all your words. Send more witnesses. Isaiah has seen the Lord. Nephi has seen the Lord. They are both companions and conversation partners in this. The impact of epignosis is that you are changed. You can’t ever go back to the way you were before you had, where you just had an intellectual knowledge of something. Both Nephi and Isaiah and Jacob are adding their witnesses, and in doing so are inviting us to have our own personal encounter with God, and to be one more to add our witness of the Savior, Jesus Christ.

Okay, we’re now in chapter 12. And I love how these chapters are organized. Second Nephi chapters 12 through 15 coordinate with Isaiah 2 through 5. Chapter 16 is Isaiah’s commission or calling from the Lord to be the prophet of God. So why didn’t they put that first? Why don’t we start out with Isaiah’s calling as a prophet and then go into what’s going on? I thought about it, and I thought maybe the delay in introducing Isaiah’s commission is so that we can kind of reflect on all the problems that Judah and Israel are experiencing right now. And then we can learn how the Lord’s going to intervene. So it’s the Lord kind of setting this up. Isaiah 2 through 5 paints this pretty bleak picture of Israel and Judah’s distance from God. We get to see about how the poor are suffering, the corruption of justice, worldliness, and pride. And then all of this is interrupted just occasionally with a little bit about how the Lord is going to come and the covenant people will be cleansed and prepared to fulfill their responsibility. And then you get to see that although there’s, you know, all these problems, all these issues going on, it’s pretty terrible. Destruction, exile are looming on the horizon. It’s coming. It’s clear that the Lord says there is always a way. There’s always a way because God’s promises and his graceful purposes always come to pass. God always keeps his promise.

So here we go. We’re in 2 Nephi 12:8. “And now I write some of the words of Isaiah that whoso of my people shall see these words may lift up their hearts and rejoice,” which seems a little ironic considering what we just learned these chapters are. You’re going to lift up your hearts and rejoice because no matter how bad things seem, the Lord always provides a way back to him. So now these are the words, and ye may liken them unto all men. I read that and just felt gratitude. It felt a little bit like permission to me, that we can liken them unto us. I think that Nephi would say that there is a lot of value in studying the historical context. It’s important for you to understand how to read Isaiah. There’s a lot of guides and tools for you to learn allegory and symbolism and his prose and his chiasmus and all the things. That’s important. But so is understanding symbolism. And Isaiah uses a lot of symbolism. And symbolism can be a vehicle for us to be able to take that and figure out how that applies directly to our own lives. It can relate to us personally now through the symbolism, as if the Lord is speaking directly to you.

So chapter 12, verse 2. “And it shall come to pass in the last days,” today, these last days, “when the mountain of the Lord’s house shall be established in the top of the mountains, and shall be exalted above the hills, and all nations shall flow unto it. And many people shall go and say, Come ye, and let us go up to the mountain of the Lord, to the house of the God of Jacob, and he will teach us his ways, and we will walk in his paths.” And then he goes on to say, and this will be a time of peace. What does the mountain of the Lord’s house refer to? All nations are going to flow unto it. Unto what? The Lord’s house is a temple. Are there any temples in the mountains? Are there temples in the Wasatch Mountains? Do we have a temple in the Wasatch Mountains that are bringing all nations unto it? This is a place of peace and becomes this epicenter of peace, and they’ve said this about temples throughout the world, that when you place a temple in a location, it becomes an epicenter of peace. That country is changed, and that nation is changed, and temples will change the world.

So we have, in the spring of 2024, they refurbished the plaza in Temple Square. And they featured the international flags of countries where the church is recognized. And then they unveiled this plaque that’s right here in this photo. And on the plaque are the words, “and it shall come to pass in the last days that the mountain of the Lord’s house shall be established in the top of the mountains, and shall be exalted above the hills, and all nations shall flow unto it.” What happens next year? Next year, during the Salt Lake City Temple open house, they’re expecting between three to five million visitors over a six-month period of time. And then in 2034, Salt Lake City is going to be the home of the Winter Olympics, and thousands of dignitaries and visitors and athletes from around the world will flow unto this place. This is definitely one manifestation of this prophecy of Isaiah being fulfilled. And then we can take it and we can zoom in. What does a mountain symbolize for you personally? Where is your mountain of the Lord? Is a mountain a place that can separate you from the world? That can give you perspective because you’re away from the world? They’re beautiful. They encourage reflection. They turn our hearts to God. They put us in a position to receive revelation and inspiration. To get to the top of any mountain, you need some sort of physical ability to get to the top of your spiritual mountain. You might need a little spiritual fitness as well. Moses and other prophets went to the mountain. What did they do in the mountain? They had encounters with God. What opportunity do we have when we go to the mountain?

The second picture on the right is a picture of my brother. I have this among hundreds of other pictures that look a lot like this. He spends a lot of time at the top of a mountain. And I think that for Eric, mountains are the place where he goes in search of peace, in search of renewal, and even though he hasn’t said, a place where he connects with the divine, but at least where the divine can connect with him.

So we get to pause for just a minute, enjoy the sweetness about the mountain of the Lord’s house and being taught, because then we go into chapter 12, verse 5, and this is what we read. “Yea, come, for ye have all gone astray, every one to his wicked ways.” So now I get to introduce you to my new favorite poetic writing style of Isaiah. You probably all are familiar with this, but this is the first time that I really understood this. And I think that my kids might tell you that there’s some similarities in this writing style with the way that I would kind of deliver counsel to them when they were teenagers, and that is that you take this concept, and then you find another way to say it. And you repeat the concept in a new way, and then you keep doing this over and over again, just in case they didn’t catch it the first time, and then you can repeat it, and maybe they’ll catch it the second or third time that you say it. And this is very similar to Isaiah.

He says, this is verse 6, “Therefore, O Lord, thou hast forsaken thy people, the house of Jacob, because they be replenished from the east.” These people are not from there. “And they hearken unto soothsayers like the Philistines,” also not from there. “And they please themselves in the children of strangers,” people not from there. “Their land is full of silver and gold, neither is there any end of their treasures. Their land is full of horses.” Then we repeat it. “No, neither is there any end of their chariots. Their land is full of idols,” repeat it. “They worship the work of their own hands, that which their fingers have made, and the mean man boweth not down,” repeat it, “and the great man humbleth himself not. Therefore forgive him not.”

These people are not keeping good company. They’re not surrounding themselves with other believers. Their associations are introducing them to darkness and temptation. They’re incredibly materialistic. They’re acquiring more and more possessions, and they’re so enamored with those possessions that they’re starting to worship them. It’s making them full of resentment, full of themselves, full of pride. The great man won’t humble himself, therefore forgive him not. I can’t forgive you because you have repented, and why haven’t you repented? You don’t think you’ve done anything wrong. This is pride speaking. Obviously, Isaiah feels that this is a root cause of their wickedness, because he repeats these phrases over and over again.

Verse 11, “And it came to pass that the lofty looks of man shall be humbled, and the haughtiness of man shall be bowed down.” Verse 12, “Yea, upon the proud and the lofty, and upon everyone who is lifted up, and he shall be brought low.” Verse 17, “And the loftiness of man shall be bowed down, and the haughtiness of man shall be made low, and the Lord alone shall be exalted in that day, and the idols he shall utterly abolish.” Beware of pride, beware of pride, beware of pride.

When President Benson gave his landmark talk on pride, he started with these words, “I earnestly seek an interest in your faith and prayers, as I strive to bring forth light on this Book of Mormon message. The sin of pride. This message has been weighing heavily on my soul for some time, and I know the Lord wants this message delivered now.” I have to wonder if we have any more need for this message now than we did then. You get the sense that this is weighing heavily on Isaiah’s soul. The proud cannot accept the authority of God giving direction to their lives. They pit their perceptions of the truth against God’s great knowledge, their abilities against God’s priesthood power, and their accomplishments against his mighty works. And then he goes on to say, our enmity towards God takes on many labels. Rebellion, unrepentant, puffed up, easily offended. The proud wish God would agree with them. They aren’t interested in changing their opinions to agree with God. The proud make every man or woman their adversary by pitting their intellects or their opinion or their possessions or their families against others. And Isaiah wants to know this. If you think you know better, if your opposition to God puts you in a position of thinking that you know more than God, then what is your source of knowledge and intellect? Where are you going for your information, if not to God?

So verse 22, this is what he’s wondering. Are you going to man? He said it in verse 22, “Cease ye from man whose breath is in his nostrils, for wherein is he to be accounted of?” Who are you putting your trust in? Are you putting your trust in men, in someone whose breath is given to him by God? You think that you have any control over whether you live or you die? The very breath that you breathe is a gift from God, and you’re going to trust man over God?

Verse 13, “For behold, the Lord, the Lord of hosts doth take away from Jerusalem and from Judah, the stay and the staff, the whole staff of bread, the whole stay of water,” all of your supply and support, “the mighty man, the man of war.” Here we go. Here’s our list of who’s going. The judge, the prophet, the prudent, the ancient, the captain of fifty, the honorable man, the counselor, the cunning artificer, the eloquent orator, pretty much any leader that has any sort of real intelligence or stability or wisdom or discernment, gone. And instead, who do you have to lead you? Verse 4. “And I will give children unto them to be their princes, and babes shall rule over them.” And my people, “children are their oppressors,” this is verse 12, “and women rule over them. O my people, they who lead thee cause thee to err, and destroy the way of thy paths.” All the stable, capable leaders are gone, immature, irresponsible leaders take over. Does this feel relatable at all? They will cause you to make mistakes, and they will cause you to leave your covenantal path. Who do we follow, then? Who are we following? Where is our source of knowledge and direction?

I keep asking this question, the language around social media feels pretty convicting here, because you choose to follow certain people on social media, and those people promote or encourage certain ways of thinking or believing. And many of those people who have accrued a certain number of followers become influencers. And that is exactly their goal, is to influence you into thinking or believing or buying a certain thing or a certain way. And then those followers who are following the influencers now become influencers that are in their own way when they choose to interact with the posts with commenting or liking. Social media has the ability to turn an individual’s opinion into a perceived truth. Simply because thousands or maybe even millions of people repeat it. But let’s be clear. The number of people that believe something tells us how widely a belief is shared, but it does not tell us whether or not that belief is true.

A peer-reviewed study in 2025 that was titled “Going Viral: Sharing of Misinformation by Social Media Influencers,” says this, the researchers essentially demonstrated that the social environment surrounding a post can influence how people evaluate its credibility. And then a separate 2025 study presented at the American Academy of Pediatrics conference found this. The majority, these are researchers and medical professionals, found that a majority of the medical and parenting videos that they examined contained misinformation. So what becomes the result of this? I think we find a little bit of it in chapter 13, verse 5. “And the people shall be oppressed, every one by another, and every one by his neighbor. The child shall behave himself proudly against the ancient, and the base against the honorable. For Jerusalem is ruined,” verse 8, “and Judah is fallen, because their tongues and their doings have been against the Lord, to provoke the eyes of his glory. The show of their countenance doth witness against them, and doth declare their sin to be even as Sodom, and they cannot hide it. Woe unto their souls, for they have rewarded evil unto themselves.” You, they can’t even hide it anymore. They just, they look evil. They look like they’re not living righteously. And you’re rewarding evil unto yourself.

Our access of this information puts us in this really precarious position. There’s no question that children and babes in age and maturity are being chosen by people to lead, to have influence, but we have our agency and how we’re going to use it, and how are we going to use it to discern. President Nelson taught, Tony, if you’ve heard this before, in coming days, it will not be possible to survive spiritually without the guiding, directing, comforting, and constant influence of the Holy Ghost.

Verse 11. “Woe unto them that rise up early in the morning, that follow strong drink, continue to the night, and neither consider the operation of his hands.” Verse 13. “Therefore my people are gone into captivity, because they have no knowledge, and their honorable men are famished, and their multitude dried up with thirst.” Why are they in captivity? They have no knowledge, and they’re experiencing a famine. What kind of famine? A spiritual famine. So we have this kind of role reversal, and it’s kind of like, no wonder God is sending prophets. He wants us to increase our knowledge. No wonder Jesus himself says that in order to know the truth, it’s the only way you’re gonna be free. And the opposite is true. If the truth sets you free, then the lack of knowledge is what brings captivity. I’m locked in this prison of my own ignorance, and I don’t have a key. Guess who does? Prophets. And God is calling prophets. And we’re going to see this in the very next chapter, that in order to send this good news of redemption, it is the way out of our ignorance.

Verse 18, “Woe unto them that draw iniquity with cords of vanity, and sin as it were with a cart rope.” There’s this idea that you’re carrying around this heavy load. You feel it, you know it, you’re connected to it by your vanity. But the inner imagery is that it’s really heavy, you’re worn down, but you’re not going to let go of it. You’re just going to drag it along. Why will you let go of it? Just open your hands, he’s saying. Acknowledge that this is heavy, but in order to let go of it, you first have to acknowledge that you’re the one carrying it, that you kind of brought it onto yourself, that you kind of need help in overcoming this.

Verse 19, “Let him make speed, hasten his work, that we might see it, and let the counsel of the Holy One of Israel draw nigh and come, that we might know it.” And then he repeats it. If you’re really a God, show us a sign, prove it. If you want us to choose differently, give us a good reason. In verse 20, he says, “Woe unto them that call evil good and good evil. That put darkness for light, and light for darkness, that put bitter for sweet, and sweet for bitter, woe unto the wise in their own eyes, and prudent in their own sight.” Can you think of any examples in these latter days where there is something in the world today that is called good that is evil, or evil that is good? How do we even know the difference anymore? And how do people determine whether or not what they’re doing is good or evil? I think if you were to ask somebody that you felt was doing evil, if they were doing evil, they would definitely say no. So how do we discern what’s good and evil if everybody thinks they’re doing good? I don’t think Isaiah is talking about blatant evil here. Sometimes I get the feeling that it’s almost hard to tell what’s real or not real anymore.

Talking about this with a couple of my kids, there are so many things now that we partake of that are fake. We have fake food. We have substitutes for certain, for sugar. I just learned that Pringles potato chips don’t even have potatoes in them. And Chick-fil-A’s ice dream can’t be called ice cream because it’s not real ice cream. We wear clothes with synthetic fibers, don’t even have real cotton, real wool in them. We have fake grass in a house in St. George. We have fake money, cryptocurrency. We have singles ward bishops that are expressing concerns over some of their singles who are struggling with artificial relationships with AI girlfriends. We have a lot of popular video games where you can create your own fake world, complete with neighbors and friends and possessions. Sometimes I worry that Satan’s up there just excited to convince us to partake of more and more fake things because then he kind of gets to use us as pawns in this, like, weird utopian, you know, fake video game that he’s controlling from this other universe.

Recently I came across this article that was titled “How to Resist the Normalization of Family Dysfunction.” And when I heard, after studying this lesson, kind of what I heard was how to recognize darkness or evil masquerading as light. And the article was sparked by an ad for this Alexa type device called HomeView. And the beef wasn’t really with the device as much as it was with the ad. And I have debated whether or not to play this for you, but I am going to go ahead and play the ad. This is the HomeView ad. I’m not trying to sell anybody anything. And it’s only, it’s three minutes long, I think, so I’ll go ahead and play it.

[Ad plays]

Speaker 0: So it’s a cutting edge device that’s meant to what? Solve problems. Did you feel like it solved problems? Did you feel like it brought order from chaos? Did you feel like it brought a sense of harmony or peace because it was able to solve some of those problems that add to that? They, the daughter removes something from the schedule, the mom adds one without the dad knowing, private conversations are held that no one has access to, music’s turned on, turned off, the family isn’t united on what they want, each family member uses HomeView how they want, it really does nothing to deliver solutions. In fact, it does everything to just exacerbate. Later on. And the problem is we can relate, right? It’s relatable. I mean, I saw it and I just, I mean, it was entertaining, it was amusing, and there’s a lot of it that is relatable. But the author of this article said that she thinks maybe that is our first problem, is that we as a culture are putting a lot of emphasis on the need and the desire for us to be relatable. That’s what we want more than anything now. We want to be viewed as somebody that gets it, right? But if you’re relatable, sometimes it gets in the way of renewal. And is that in some way substituting dark for light?

So the author made this observation. She said, women want commiseration, but they don’t want change. It doesn’t matter how much commiseration has been offered, there’s never enough of it. And if you try to draw it to an end, you’re mean and unrelatable, which is the worst possible thing you can be. But if you’re relatable, nothing can be renewed. And if all you want is relatability. Christ did not come just so he could relate to us. Where’s the end of that? He came to renew, restore, and to heal all things. The gospel of Jesus Christ, or the law, as Isaiah keeps referring to it, is our mountaintop perspective. It allows us to have a vision and clear direction. This Apple family has no clear direction. There’s no leader. And if there is a leader, it’s the mom, but she’s incredibly stressed out. She’s feeling a lot of panic and overwhelm, and getting out of the door is the only priority. There’s no mission, there’s no direction, aside from what she offers. There’s no time for discussion around the table, no one eats together, there’s no time to answer a call from the grandparents, who are irritating, who are cutting into their routine. Remember the scripture from chapter 13, verse 5, “the people shall be oppressed, everyone by his neighbor, and the child shall behave himself proudly against the ancient. And the base against the honorable,” quit permitting verbal destruction, and honor your imperfect elders. Let us not confuse darkness for light. Without a vision, the people perish, says Proverbs, and this is as true for families as it is for kingdoms. But sometimes it’s really hard to see it when you are in it. So where can you go to get greater perspective? Where is your mountain where you can connect with God and receive greater light?

Chapter 14, verse 5. “And the Lord will create upon every dwelling place of Mount Zion, and upon her assemblies, a cloud and smoke by day, and the shining of a flaming fire by night. For upon all the glory of Zion shall be a defense, and there shall be a tabernacle for a shadow in the daytime from the heat, and for a place of refuge, and a covert from storm and from rain.” What does a cloud remind you of? Does it remind you of the children of Israel, the Lord, and the tabernacle in a cloud? And the smoke, what can smoke symbolize? Smoke that just can go anywhere and be everywhere can symbolize the spirit, or our prayers ascending to heaven, the shining of a flaming fire. How did the Lord appear to the Israelites at night? The appearance of fire, to light, to enlighten us, to direct us, to give us purpose and direction. All this for a defense in our homes. Do we have our homes with the cloud, with the smoke, and with a flaming fire by night? So that our homes can be a defense, they can be a shadow. In the daytime from the heat, and they can be a place of refuge and a covering from the storms. Is that what our homes are? Is that what this Apple family’s home was?

My daughter told me this would happen, and I can’t. My son sent me this picture of his three kids sitting around a dining table. It might not look like much to you, but to me, it is a picture of a hope realized. In this picture, I see three kids who are experiencing a certain amount of peace. There’s homework being done, dinner was served, it’s being cleared from the table, there are placemats. There seems to be a certain amount of a covering, of a protection, of a refuge. This table in this picture was my son’s first purchase as a single father. It is a tabernacle and an altar. The purchase was a financial sacrifice. But my son felt an incredibly strong need to create a gathering spot where he could, with his children, have a place to gather and connect with each other. This to me is a picture of a father who is trying his best to create upon his own dwelling place, a place of refuge, a place of safety from the storm and from the rain. And sometimes the best place to start is with a table.

How do we persevere amidst all of this wickedness, all of the woes and the worldliness and the sins of omission, all at the expense of the poor seeking for our might and laying up horses and chariots, all the worldly wealth that we’re trying to lay up? The first part of Isaiah tells us how we get into this mess. The second part tells us how we’re going to get out of it. And then we get Isaiah’s commission. So we have, for, chapter 16 of Isaiah. And you know how they always say the book is better than the movie? I mean, this is definitely one of those situations where you just really don’t want to be limited by anything you’ve seen. You just want to let your imagination just soar here. So let me read part of this to you and just picture whatever you can in your mind.

“I saw also the Lord sitting upon a throne, high and lifted up, and his train filled the temple. And it stood, above it stood the seraphim, each one had six wings, with twain he covered his face, and with twain he covered his feet, and with twain he did fly. And one cried unto another and said, Holy, holy, holy, is the Lord of hosts. The whole earth is full of his glory. And the posts of the door moved at the voice of him that cried, and the house was filled with smoke. Then said I, Woe is unto me, for I am undone, because I am a man of unclean lips. I am not worthy.” Have you heard this from any other prophet? “I am but a lad. I am slow of speech.” Here’s Isaiah. “I am not worthy.” Are we, do we ever feel, I’m too old, I’m too young, I’m not knowledgeable enough to accept any sort of calling from the Lord? And he says, “I dwell in the midst of people who are unclean. None of us are worthy. For my eyes have seen the King, the Lord of hosts.” Then flew one of the seraphim, which angels, unto me, having a live coal in his hand, which he had taken with the tongs from off the altar. What happens on the altar? Sacrifice happens on altars. Where do you find what happens when there is a sacrifice that has been offered? It burns, and what’s left? Burning coals. Who was sacrificed on this altar? And he took that burning coal, and verse 7, “and he laid it upon my mouth and said, Lo, this has touched thy lips, and thine iniquity is taken away, and thy sin purged.” Whose sacrifice would have purged or cleansed his sins and taken away his iniquity? You have to wonder, was it a little bit painful, a burning coal set on his lips? Can our cleansing and purging be a little painful or a little uncomfortable?

And then, verse 8, “Also I heard the voice of the Lord saying, Whom shall I send, and who will go for us?” Then, after all this, his “I am undone, I am not worthy,” this is what Isaiah says. “Here am I, send me.” Isaiah stands in the presence of God, feeling very insecure, very unworthy. His experience, then he experiences God’s purging, cleansing, transforming power, and atoning sacrifice of the Lord Jesus Christ, and he is changed.

Do you remember Tamara Runia’s conference address last April, titled “Shine Through, Let His Radiance Shine Through You”? And she talked about the transforming power of an encounter with and a connection to God. In it she said, it’s all about the joining of hearts. Our human heart with his divine heart. Think about it, she says. We feel love from God, and it causes us to have love for God. In other words, it creates this vertical relationship with God. Then the byproduct of that relationship is charity, which is a desire to turn sideways, to look horizontally, and to love outwardly, to love like him, to love others. First we go up, and then we go out, and what did we just form? This is a cruciform way of living. A prayer I offer regularly for my children is, “Heavenly Father, may my children be so filled with your love that it overflows out of them and into the lives of others.”

When we put ourselves in proximity to God, when we read or engage in ancient texts, when we go to the mountain of the house of the Lord, when we attend FSY or girls camp, or we go on a mission, or we accept the calling, or we work in the temple, we set ourselves up to be able to have an encounter with God. And then we become on fire for the Lord. Isaiah changed, he was on fire for the Lord. “Here am I, send me,” let me serve the mission, let me accept the calling, take the steps towards sobriety. Say, “I’m sorry,” release resentment. Because when you encounter God and it changes you, it also changes the trajectory of your posterity, right? Generational bonds of sin and weakness are broken, and I personally cannot think of anything that I want more for my posterity than for them to not have to carry the weight of my sins and my weaknesses.

Verse 9 says, “And he said, Go and tell this people, hear ye indeed, but they understood not, and see ye indeed, but they perceived not.” Then said I, “Lord, how long?” Isaiah is saying, you’re telling me that I’m going to preach repentance to the people, I’m going to teach these people, and they’re not going to see, and they’re not going to hear, and they’re not going to listen to me? And the Lord says, yes. And Isaiah says, well, how long is it going to be like this? And the Lord says in verse 11, “until the cities be wasted without inhabitant, and the houses without man,” till there’s nothing left.

Isaiah’s just had this incredible encounter with God. He’s on fire for the Lord, but he’s about to reenter that long and dreary world. And he’s faced with the reality of his own weaknesses, his own sins, and the weaknesses and sins of others. “Here I am, Lord, send me,” and then you have to leave your temple experience, your temple session. You have to go back to your health challenges or your teens that are struggling. “Here I am, Lord, send me,” and then you return home from your mission. “Here I am, Lord, send me,” and then you leave girls camp or FSY, or the accident happens, or your husband relapses. You go back down the mountain. You reenter the long and dreary world, and the temptation is to think, all is lost. You get discouraged. And you start to feel as though life is a little less sparkly than it was that moment that you had that encounter. It feels a little flat.

Kerry Molstein said in his book, “Did we really think we would finish?” And that is the point. Verse 13, “but yet there shall be a tenth, and they shall return.” He’s saying, I don’t need everyone. There’s going to be a remnant. Keep going. There will be a tenth. There will be a portion. And they will give up, they will return. So don’t give up. Over and over again, we read, “because my arm is outstretched still.” Doesn’t matter how bad things get. It doesn’t matter how wicked. It doesn’t matter how many mistakes, how many times you have to start over again. The Lord’s arm is outstretched still. There will be a righteous remnant. It will be this group of the stalwart, the faithful, the unshaken, that God will perform his marvelous work and a wonder to gather the rest of the family back home into the covenant, into the tabernacle, into the covering from the storm. And you, in the last days, you are this remnant.

And would you discover who he is? Would you learn how to communicate with him? And do as Isaiah did. Would you feel his power? Would you become filled with his love? And would you, more than anything, become a witness, a witness of God? Put yourself in proximity to God, to his power, and become a witness, which is my prayer for myself and for each of us, and I make these things with you in the name of Jesus Christ. Amen.

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