Daily Thoughts

In the Old Testament I read that Ezra could not ask the king for an army guard to protect him because he'd alredy told the king that the power of the Lord would be upon all those who sought Him. He wanted to glorify the Lord and knew that if he became a prey to enemies, the religion he professed would look false and weak and vain. He had more anxiety for the glory of God than he did for his own safety. So since he couldn't ask the king's armies to help defend him, after representing his God to be all powerful and capable of saving him, he fasted and prayed and asked God to save him. And indeed, God delvered him from his enemies who lay in wait by the way. Ezra 8: 21-23, 31 "Then I proclaimed a fast there, at the river of Ahava, that we might afflict ourselves before our God, to seek of him a right way for us, and for our little ones, and for all our substance. For I was ashamed to require of the king a band of soldiers and horsemen to help us against the enemy in the way: because we had spoken unto the king, saying, The hand of our God is upon all them for good that seek him; but his power and his wrath is against all them that forsake him. So we fasted and esought our God for this: and he was intreated of us. Then we departed from the river of Ahava on the twelfth day of the first month, to go unto Jerusalem: and the hand of our God was upon us, and he delivered us from the hand of the enemy, and of such as lay in wait by the way."


In the D&C I read that if we do our best to do what the Lord tells us to do but are hindered from accomplishing it because of the wickedness of others, the Lord will accept of our offerings. D&C 124: 49 "Verily, verily, I say unto you, that when I give a commandment to any of the sons of men to do a work unto my name, and those sons of men go with all their might and with all they have to perform that work, and cease not their diligence, and their enemies come upon them and hinder them from performing that work, behold, it behooveth me to require that work no more at the hands of those sons of men, but to accept of their offerings."

Some verses with a thought booklet tell that people would fall away from the true gospel--they would believe fables rather than believe the truth and not endure sound docrtine. We can be very thankful for the restoration of the gospel so that we can know the same truths that were given in Jesus' day. 2 Tim. 4: 3-4 "For the time will come when they will not endure sound doctrine; but after their own lusts shall they heap to themselves teachers, having itching ears; And they shall turn away their ears from the truth, and shall be turned unto fables."