There is a story I love in the Book of Mormon about a man who had incredible faith in Christ. His name was Mahonri Moriancumer. Quite a mouthful, so he told everyone to just call him “The Brother of Jared.” He and his brother, Jared, lived during the time of the Tower of Babel. Because of Mahonri’s amazing faith in God, his brother asked him to pray to God that their language not be confounded and that their friends and family would be able to keep their language too.
The Lord answered the Brother of Jared’s prayer and promised to lead them to a promised land. The Lord instructed him how to build airtight barges with breathing holes to get them across the deep ocean and carry them to a promised land.
During their journey they needed light and The Brother of Jared asked God for some way to light the vessels. God asked him to devise a way for them to have light. So the Brother of Jared took 16 stones and molten and polished them until they were white, clear, and transparent. He carried the stones to a mountain and asked God to touch them and make them shine.
Because of Mahonri’s incredible faith, he saw the finger of the Lord as God touched the stones one-by-one and made them shine. In fact, because of the Brother of Jared’s great faith, he asked the Lord to show Himself fully to him and the Lord did. Jehovah appeared to him in the form he would later appear as Jesus Christ in the flesh.
This is one of my favorite stories in the Book of Mormon. There are so many lessons we can learn from the Brother of Jared about how to endure hardship, how to live by faith, how to ask and receive answers, and how the Lord molds and shapes us into the people He knows we can become. I have studied it thoroughly as a tutorial on how each of us can become Light Bearers of Christ’s light to the world. You can read his story online here.
Praying for Incredible Faith
In about 2012, I prayed and ask God to give me faith like the Brother of Jared. That may be the dumbest prayer I ever prayed or it may be the wisest one. From that point, my life radically changed. I took bold leaps of faith and left the comfort of the known to go where I felt God calling me. By 2015, in my impatience to receive what God had shown me, I listened more to what I wanted than what God was telling me to do. As a result, my life began to unravel. Quickly I found myself in a place of heartbreak and humbling pain.
In the middle of 2015, I threw up my hands and cried, “I give up! I surrender! You choose. I obviously don’t know what I’m doing!” This exasperated point of surrender was only a starting point. It was a frustrated, humiliated, deep loss of confidence in myself and my own ability to navigate life. It marked the death of something important – the death of my pride.
I believe this type of surrender is important, but it is not the ultimate surrender God desires of us.
After finding my footing and beginning to rebuild my life, I felt like I could finally rest with a bit of peace. Then, without warning, my second husband told me he wanted a divorce, and my mother died four days later. My heart shattered with the rejection, but my mother’s love enveloped me and carried me through those difficult days.
I began seeing my mother everywhere in the world around me. It became almost a game I played to look for her in the smallest things. I felt her love amplify with her passing.
As good things started to happen in my life, the explicit faith, love and trust I had in my mother soon transferred to God. I began to see my Father in Heaven as someone who loved me every bit as much and many times more than even my mother loved me. My ability to feel God’s love amplified. While the pain was intense, I felt wrapped up in a warm blanket of God’s peace and love. I began to believe that God wanted good things for me and that all my losses would be made up.
Finding Faith in Christ
My mother’s entrance into heavenly realms unlocked something critical in my faith. For the first time, I understood that surrendering to God is not white knuckled endurance, loss of confidence, or shattered brokenness. Faith and trust in God is 100% confidence in His love and in His desire to give good things to His children. From that point, my life rapidly began falling into place. Miracle after miracle after miracle unfolded until there is no way that I could ever deny the hand of God in my life.
Seeing the Finger of the Lord
Obviously, my faith is not on par with the Brother of Jared’s, but there is one thing we have in common. I see the finger of the Lord everywhere in my life. Every single day, I see His hand at work in my life and in the lives of those I love. I know that God works all things together for good for those who love Him and turn their lives over to Him.
He has touched my life and made it shine. He has touched my world and made it glow. I stand as a witness alongside the Brother of Jared in testifying that Jesus Christ lives. I have seen His glowing finger in my life, and He has shown His love to me in countless, incredible ways.
While the path to this place was excruciating, it was worth every bit of it to come to my own personal promised land. My promised land is so much more than a place. Like the Brother of Jared, it is who I have become and who I am becoming because of Jesus Christ and my faith in Him.
