When the brother of
Jared is praying to ask the Lord to touch the stones to make them glow so they
can have light in their barges, he says some things about the power of God that
are very perceptive.
4 And I
know, O Lord, that thou hast all power, and can do whatsoever thou wilt for the
benefit of man; therefore touch these stones, O Lord, with thy finger, and
prepare them that they may shine forth in darkness; and they shall shine forth
unto us in the vessels which we have prepared, that we may have light while we
shall cross the sea.
5 Behold,
O Lord, thou canst do this. We know that thou art able to show forth great
power, which looks small unto the understanding of men. (Ether 3:4-5)
The brother of Jared notes that God is able to use great
power, which can look small to men. He probably was thinking about his request
to make the stones glow and realized that he might think it was a small and
simple thing because he didn’t know what was required to do that, and maybe the
thing he was asking for was more complex and required more power than he
thought it would.
It shows us that we really don’t have much of an idea of how
much power or effort it takes for God to do anything. We just know He has all
power, and we just hope He will do for us the thing we ask. But maybe spending a
little time thinking about what goes into granting us our petitions will help
us appreciate the power of God more.
Another thing that comes to me is how easy it is to dismiss
God when His power looks small to us. Yet we should know appearances are
deceiving, and we are simply ignorant of His ways and means. It’s like people who have never
programmed a computer saying, “Yeah, programming that operating system should
be no big deal.”
On a slightly different note, I like the type that is
suggested in the brother of Jared’s request, “touch these
stones, O Lord, with thy finger, and prepare them that they may shine forth in
darkness.” It’s very much what we should be asking for ourselves. Touch me,
Lord, with thy finger and prepare me so I can shine forth in the darkness of
this world. Or, if we are going
into a place in our lives where we can’t see the way, we can pray for the Lord
to touch someone and prepare them so they can shine forth in our darkness so we can have light.
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