I Prepare You

This week in our Book of Mormon class we covered the history of the prophet Ether and his posterity back to the confounding of the languages at the Tower of Babel.  The beginning of the story contained in the Book of Ether focuses on two brothers: Jared and the Brother of Jared - who through modern revelation we know as Mahonri Moriancumer.  The two brothers were the leaders, physical and spiritual respectively, for their kin. 

After the confounding of the languages the Lord led the Jaredites to the Promised Land, much like the family of Lehi.  And also like the Lehites the people of Jared had to cross a great body of water in order to reach their land of inheritance.  To accomplish this they build barges that were 'exceedingly tight'.  But the trip across the vast waters, and the barges they would travel in, presented some interesting problems such as lack of air, darkness, and no way to steer. 

In going to the Lord, Mahonri received guidance on how to solve one of the problems, and the answer to not worry about another.  Mahonri would have to use his abilities, along with faith in Christ, to accomplish the third.  But the Lord's answer to this Brother of Jared I find to be a great parallel to our lives.  In Ether 2:25 the Lord tells the Brother of Jared that:

And behold, I prepare you against these things; for ye cannot cross this great deep save I prepare you against the waves of the sea, and the winds which have gone forth, and the floods which shall come.

The Lord knew of the physical trials and hardships that were awaiting the Jaredites upon the waters.  He knew of the cold waters, the fierce waves, and the terrible tempests that would pummel the ship throughout the 344 day voyage.  Much in a similar way, we as children of God are on a perilous voyage through mortality and the Lord knows fully well of the dangers that we are surrounded by.  And the Lord, in his infinite love, tries to prepare us and guide us so as we can cross these mortal waters safely and reach our Promised Land.  Much like the Jaredites couldn't skip the sea-crossing experience to reach the Promised Land, we can't skip mortality if we want to become more like our Heavenly Father.  Amid the storms of life we must remember that the Lord will prepare us against these things, and we must heed his guidance.  If we do we have the Lord's promise that if we are faithful "[The Lord] will bring [us] up again out of the depths of the sea".