Exodus 7-13 Part 2 • Brother Dave Hadlock • April 6-12 • Come, Follow Me

When we think about this idea of bondage in the Scriptures and release from bondage, my mind immediately goes to Nephi.

“When Nephi talks about the reason and the purpose behind his writing on those plates, do”

recall what he says, he has a very specific purpose for writing on these particular plates.

First Nephi, chapter 1 verse 20, about halfway through the verse that says, "But behold,

I Nephi will show unto you that the tender mercies of the Lord are over all those whom he ought to chosen because of their faith to make them mighty even under the power of deliverance." Nephi's whole purpose in writing is to show people what that God can change them to the point where they become mighty under the power of deliverance. Here we have in the book of Exodus, an account of a people who are delivered by the power

of Jehovah. Nephi says, "This is why I'm writing the Book of Mormon." I was asked one time by someone, "If I were going to read one part of the Book of Mormon, what would I recommend someone to read?"

I would recommend someone to read first Nephi because that's where we all start and

stop anyways. Jehovah says, "You may as well just go with your initial intuition. Start in first Nephi chapter 1 and read first Nephi looking for how God delivers Nephi." Think with me, out loud, some of the passages from the Book of Nephi in which he demonstrates God's deliverance in his own life.

We can go story by story. One of the first ones I would think of is he said, "The Lord softened my heart." That's early on that he would accept it as the Lord's will that they leave Jerusalem. Then you have his brothers, how many times, time up, he is delivered. The ship is delivered, labin and the plates, his brothers are beating him with a rod,

there's a pattern here. He is delivered.

You could even get into second Nephi, he is delivered from his brothers wanting to kill him.

That's multiple times, but that time specifically, Dave, I might even include second Nephi for the Psalm of Nephi that he's delivered from his grief and the pain of his soul. As I look through Nephi and his purpose in writing, we get towards in the second Nephi and we talk about the doctrine of Christ. Usually we talk about the doctrine of Christ being baptism for the remission of sins,

gift of the Holy Ghost.

“Nephi goes on to further clarify, I believe, what he means by the doctrine of Christ.”

This is second Nephi chapter 31 verse 19. Nephi says, "And now my beloved brother, and after you've gotten into this straightener of path, I would ask if all is done. Behold, I say unto you, nay, for you have not come thus far, save it by word by the Word of Christ with unshaken faith in him, relaying holy upon the merits of him who is mighty

to save." This is Nephi's doctrine of Christ in my opinion. Be relied holy in every aspect to be delivered, whether it was from his brothers, whether it was delivered to a promise land by a boat. As you mentioned, second Nephi chapter 4 is on spiritual and emotional deliverance, holy

delivered through Christ. These ancient Israelites had to come to understand that doctrine.

“I believe the book of Exodus is in part meant to teach this doctrine that we rely holy”

upon the merits of Christ as our deliverer. Look how Nephi concludes in 2nd Nephi chapter 33. In 2nd Nephi chapter 33 verse 6, He says, "I glory and kindness, I glory and truth, I glory in my Jesus." Now, Jesus the name Jesus, and Hebrew is Joshua, which means deliverer.

In the beginning, He says, "I'm going to teach about the deliverance and what Jesus can do for us." And now He's talking about His own personal relationship with His deliverer. He calls Him my Jesus. He saw God's goodness in His own life so much and so often that He felt like He had

to go back and write those down. Now as we talk about this idea being delivered and Christ is Joshua the deliverer, I want to go to Exodus chapter 17. And Exodus chapter 17, the ancient Israelites had been released, they had been delivered from bondage, they find themselves in the wilderness.

passages.

“Adam and Eve cast out into a lone and dreary wilderness.”

Lee Hei says to his son, "Oh, my son, born in the wilderness of my affliction."

Christ, after being baptized and receiving the Holy Ghost, it says He is led by the spirit He goes into the wilderness where He is tempted of the devil. The wilderness in Scripture is often metaphorical, and I'm going to read from doctrine and come in section 88, section 88 for 66, says, "Behold, that what you hear is as the voice of one crying in the wilderness in the wilderness because you cannot see Him, my

voice because my voice is spirit." It says it's the wilderness because we cannot see Him, Christ. We have to learn how to live by the voice of the spirit. Here we have the ancient Israelites in a wilderness experience that just been released from bondage and we'll backtrack in a minute and go and look and see how they were

ultimately released.

Now we're talking about Christ as the deliverer.

The Old Testament, the prophets and the law all test 5 of Jesus Christ and I want to take a look at a passage from Exodus in which Jehovah are account the narrative symbolically talks about Christ as the deliverer. Exodus chapter 17, the Israelites find themselves in a valley called Reffedim, then comes Amalek in verse 8 and they fought with the people of Israel in Reffedim.

In this passage we have two types of Jesus Christ going on here. We have Moses who then speaks to Joshua and as we just learned Joshua is Jesus. He drew the deliverer, we have Moses speaking unto the deliverer, both Moses and Joshua are symbols or types of Jesus Christ in this narrative. Moses said unto Joshua, "Choose out men and go out and fight with Amalek.

Tomorrow I will stand on the top of the hill with the rod of God in my hand." We have Moses on the top of the hill with the rod, symbol all like the power of God in his hand. Joshua did as Moses said to him and fought with Amalek and Moses Aaron and her went up to the top of the hill.

We have to envision this. We have Moses with Aaron and her on the side of him on the top of this hill while we have Joshua in this valley, verse 11 and it came to pass so when Moses held up his hands that Israel prevailed and when he let down his hands, Amalek prevailed. And when we think about this valley, I often think of the Psalm though I walked through

the valley of the shadow of death. We have Joshua down in the valley and the valley of the shadow of death and we have Moses on the top of the hill.

“Joshua was able to overcome Amalek and death as long as what?”

As long as Moses has his hands in the air up on the hill, no think about this typologically with Jesus Christ. Verse 12 but Moses hands were heavy and they took a stone and put it under him and he sat there upon and Aaron and her stayed up his hands. We have Moses the Christ type with Aaron and her a man on each side of him on the top

of a hill. Think about that as a type of Christ as Christ goes to the hill Calvary where his hands are in the air and as long as his hands are in the air, Joshua Jesus the deliverer overcomes death in that valley of death. Verse 15 to commemorate this event, Moses built an altar and called the name of it

Jehovah Nisi. Nisi and Hebrew is sin. This is a sin. This is a symbol of Jehovah Jesus. This biblical passage is a sin of Jesus the deliverer.

When we talk then about the Exodus as a deliverance from bondage and sin, Christ ultimately

is our deliverer. He becomes my Jesus, our Jesus, life he was from Nephi.

“Now as we think of this relates in the wilderness, how long were they there in the wilderness?”

Do you recall from the narrative? 40 years? 40 years? 40 years? 40 years in the wilderness.

Now think of the number 40 in scripture. I'm going to throw this out there. Can you think of other passages with the number 40? Well there's Noah, Noah, 40 days of reign, which actually becomes symbolically relevant as well.

There's Jesus fasting for 40 days or when he's in the wilderness. So it's 40 is often tied with wilderness events in the scriptures. Let me give you another one.

This is first Kings chapter 19.

“We introduced Elijah in the pre-saball, how Elijah conquers and overcomes those wicked”

pre-saball. After he does that, he is instructed of the Lord. This is in first Kings chapter 19. He is instructed of the Lord through this angel that says, "Rise and eat and drink." He went in the strength of that meat, 40 days and 40 nights unto horror of the Mount

of God. Where does Elijah go? Elijah takes off south from the Mount Carmel region in Israel. He goes to Sinai Mount Horror, which is where Moses meets with Jehovah on the Mount. Here we've got some parallel passages in our scripture.

Elijah goes to Mount Horror. He has this experience with Jehovah where he fills his earth quake, sees his fire, and

ultimately realizes Jehovah is in that peaceful feeling that he gets.

“After these 40 days, Elijah comes out of there and it says in verse 15 of first Kings”

chapter 19. The Lord said unto him, "Go, return on my way to the wilderness of Damascus." And when now comes, so now we've got Elijah coming back from the south. He says, "When you come back, you're going to Noint Hazail to be King over Syria." Jehovah, the Son of Nameshi, shout out to Noint to be King over Israel, and Elijah,

the Son of Shafat, thou shalt of Noint to be prophet in thy room. Elijah comes out of this experience on Mount Horror, and he comes out and he's anointing these different kings of Israel. Now let's go back to the account of the Exodus. We've got the ancient Israelites in the wilderness for 40 years, 40 in the scriptures

as a time of preparation. Typically, it's a time of preparation prior to entering sacred space. Here we've got Elijah, 40 days, then he enters into Mount Horror of this sacred space. We've got the ancient Israelites, 40 years in the wilderness before and preparing them to enter into the Promised Land.

“Earlier in the years you had Rebecca Call, I believe on your podcast, unbelievably good”

presentation on the ideal liminal space, where it's this transitional phase going from one phase of life or one phase of being to a higher level being. In my terminology, I'd say we move from T-listal fallen beings to terrestrial beings back into the presence of God as celestial beings. That's the idea here is we've got days of preparation prior to entering into sacred space

or back into the presence of God. Now let's go back to the Exodus and finish up our Keys of Moses Exodus account. In Exodus chapter 12, we have the Passover.

First one in the Lord's Bacon to Moses and Aaron in the Land of Egypt saying, "In the

beginning of month, this shall be the first month of the year two. The Passover becomes the first day of the first month of the year two. It becomes a new day or a new day of creation. All new years, days in a sense, are days of new creations. Even in our world, this is when we do new year's resolutions.

It's where we become new people. We become better people. For the ancient Israelites this Passover day was meant to be a day of new creation. Anciently, it's the day you would crown kings. If we go back to our Elijah narrative, Elijah comes out of Mount Horab and he's anointing

kings. It's a creation and new birth of kings." Here the Passover then becomes a new year, a day of creation. On this day, you're going to take in verse 5, "A lamb, and it shall be without blemish. A male of the first year, she shall take it out from the sheep or from the goats."

You shall keep it up until the 14th day of the same month, and the whole assembly of the congregation of Israel shall kill it in the evening, and they shall take it the blood and strike it upon the two posts, and on the upper door post to the houses where they'll shall eat. Now, we go back to our creation elements.

All creation comes forth from waterblood spirit darkness, those are some of our elements. Here is our blood element. If this is a new creation, we have to have the element of blood. So here we have the element, a lamb's blood that's put around the door, which becomes a sign to the destroying angel, verse 12, "For I will pass through the land of Egypt this night,

and I will smite all the first born of the land of Egypt, both of man and beast against all the gods of Egypt. I will execute judgment, going back to what John taught us. He's going to execute judgment against all the gods of Egypt as well."

And the blood shall be to you for a token upon the houses where you are, and when I see the blood, I will pass over you, I will not destroy you, I will deliver you."

Here's our first element of creation, we've got the blood.

The Israelites are released from bondage, they head out into the wilderness. In Exodus, chapter 13, God leads the people out of Egypt, in chapter 13, verse 18, God led the people about through the way the wilderness of the Red Sea and the children of Israel went up harnessed out of the land of Egypt. So he takes him from Egypt, directs him towards the Red Sea, now the word "red sea" in Hebrew,

a "jam" "sulf", which literally translated to be sea of reads, but "sulf" might be a plan in words here, it could be like "sulf" or "the sea of chaos", "the sea of creation", "the sea of end". Here we have now then our water element, we've got the blood of the lamb, we're being taken to the Red Sea, here's our water element of creation.

The Egyptians follow in behind them, the Pharaoh again, hardens his heart, despite all these

crazy plagues, decides he's not going to let them go, Exodus chapter 14, as they are going, it says in verse 19, that the angel of God which went before the camp of Israel removed and went behind them and the pillar of plow went from before their face and stood behind them. This angel of God, this pillar of cloud, moves from in front of the Israelites, moves behind

them to protect them from the Egyptians, in verse 21, that it says, "Moses stretched out his hand over the sea". And the Lord caused the sea to go back by a strong east wind all night and made the sea dry land and the waters were divided. Here we now have the Israelites going through the waters, being born of water, jumping

to verse 24. Now as we jump forward, we see that pillar of cloud moving to protect the ancient Israelites and then in verse 4 says, "And it came to pass that in the morning watch the Lord looked on to the host of the Egyptians through the pillar of fire and of cloud and troubled the host of the Egyptians."

Now what saves the Israelites here? We've got this pillar of fire, fire symbolic of the Spirit. Here are our elements, blood of the Lamb, water of the Red Sea, fire of the Spirit, elements of birth and creation.

“How are they being created, jumping forward now to Exodus chapter 19?”

This is where climaxes, this is what this is all building to. Exodus chapter 19 verse 4, Jehovah says to the Israelites, "You have seen what I did unto the Egyptians and how I bury you on Eagles' wings. This will take us back to the very beginning of this presentation. Here we have Eagles, the elect.

I have borne you the Eagles on my Eagles' wings and brought you unto myself. The keys of Moses bring us unto him and to Christ, the elect gather unto Jesus." Verse 5, "Now therefore, if you will obey my voice and keep my covenant, keep these covenants which he's going to lay out throughout the rest of the book of Exodus, keep my covenants and then you will be brought unto me."

Then shall you be a peculiar treasure. Now we read this passage and sometimes we talk about how the latter day saints are kind of an odd peculiar weird people. That's not what this verse says.

“Whether or not that may be true, I think we're no more odd than any other people.”

But this verse, when it says we will be a peculiar people, the word peculiar comes from the Latin word "pacus" which is sheep. Paculior is the diminutive, it's a small sheep, it's a lamb. He says, "If you will keep my covenant, I'm going to be your shepherd and you're going to be my little sheep." All of the earth he says is a treasure, all of the earth is mine,

but you're going to be my special prized treasure, my little sheep. Verse 6, "And if you will do this, ye shall be come unto me a kingdom of priests and a holy nation." These are the words which I shall speak unto the children of Israel. We've talked about the keys of gathering and how we gather to Christ, but this teaches us what the keys of Moses allow us to become, which is kings and queens priest and priestesses.

Moses goes to Mount Horab and comes out of those with the keys to make us kings and queens priest and priestesses.

“Elijah goes to Mount Horab and it comes out of Mount Horab and what does he do?”

He avoids kings and queens over the kingdom of Israel. I noticed something I wanted to ask you both about. We've talked about this last plague. John, you mentioned that each plague knocked down a god of Egypt. If you're in Israel, you're watching the gods of Egypt fall around you.

All these gods that you've watched basically reign over you and perhaps over your parents

I feel like this is beautiful. They're first lesson of their new theology is take a lamb.

Sacrifice it, take its blood, put it on your house. You will be saved. That's lesson number one. They've been surrounded by a culture that embraces all these other gods and in conjunction with shedding the blood of the lamb, there are commanded to partake of unleavened bread for seven days. The way you would love and bread is like a sourdough bread inch and let you take part of the bread from one day, save up for the next and you'd love in the whole loaf with

that portion of bread and at the end of the day you would save a portion of that dough for

“the next day. Why would they go with unleavened bread for seven days? I think it goes back”

to what you're teaching here. This is a strong cultural break that they've got to make here. If we go to Christ teachings, he warns the people to beware of the leaven of the Pharisees and he says that's their doctrines or teachings. The same thing is going on here for the ancient Israelites, beware of the leaven of the Egyptians, their teachings, their doctrines, their cultures, their gods. We've got a distance ourselves from that. We don't want to

bring the past into our present. We're going to make a big break here and part of that break. I think it's like what you're saying, Hank. It's like this new practice. It's this Passover ritual. I like that a lot. Jesus does. He says, beware of the leaven of the Pharisees

“and the apostles think, have we not bought enough bread? He says, oh, you guys, that's not”

what I meant. I meant the doctrine. Let's not bring that with us. It reminds me of what John frequently says, which is it was pretty simple to get Israel out of Egypt, but it's

very difficult to get Egypt out of Israel. And there's their first lesson. A strong cultural

break. I really like that. Yeah, somebody smart said that night just repeated it. Josh Sears when he came on. We sing in in primary. I'm trying to be like Jesus and tell me the stories of Jesus and what Josh Sears was like, yeah, but Jesus is Jehovah. Jehovah is a deliverer. It's not just New Testament. Jesus we want to know about. It's Jehovah. Look at how he delivers people. I've been loving this year going to the Old Testament watching for the title deliverer

and thinking in our modern day, how many things we need to be delivered from? I'm not frog-headed goddesses, but so many things that we need deliverance from, as you've said so beautifully, Dave, that title. When we think about the problems in our world, we need a deliverer who can deliver us from this and he can do it. Passover is so cool. Was it Elder Holland that said, think of the sacrament as our Passover? It's in the Passover at the last supper when Jesus says,

"This is my body. This is my blood." Here's Jesus saying, "That's me. I'm the deliverer. I am the

Lamb." First time when John the Baptist season behold the Lamb of God, here is the Passover Lamb

that's come. I love that. What Dave is showing us here is the first Passover. What you're talking about is the last one. Yeah, and the connection between the two. Where he says, "That's me. We all know Jesus came to the righteous in the New World in 3 Nephi 11. But two chapters earlier in 3 Nephi 9,

“this voice says, "No more animal sacrifice, no more shedding of blood." That's how important”

it was to say, "I am the great and last sacrifice." I'm the Lamb of God. I'm your deliverer. The fact that that would happen in 3 Nephi 9 has to be super important before he would come in person to say, "That's about me and now this sacrifice you bring is a broken heart and a contrite spirit." As I think about this, these Israelites were putting the blood of the Lamb around their homes. Like, how do we apply that? How do we put the blood of the Lamb on us so that that destroying

angel passes over us? This is the Old Testament lower lot. The higher law is, in my opinion, the sacrament. You've got the blood, the water of the Lamb, you've got the unleavened bread, you've got the bread, the sacrament. If we can make that part of our daily living and when we partake of the sacrament,

to apply some of these Old Testament stories and narratives. I love the Old Testament.

Part of the reason I love the Old Testament, it's like putting a puzzle together. I know all these things are teaching me about Jesus. The Lamb of God in some way, I just got to figure out how it does that. That's wonderful. When Elder McConke commented on their Nephi, he so succinctly said, Sacrifice stopped and sacrament started. That was at the resurrection. That is our Passover now,

“is the sacrament, which we must remember, which is what the word sacrament means.”

Sacrament comes from Latin, soccer, or mentee. It's the idea of turning our minds and thoughts over to God. How do you overstate Passover? I mean, it's why the last supper came because it was Passover and what that transitioned into for us to be invited to the sacrament table every week, to have supper with the Lord. It's also an altar to remember, I just think, Passover's huge. John, you brought a quote from Elder Holland earlier, that's from a talk given in 1995,

called this due in remembrance of me. I have more of that talk here. Speaking of the sacrament, he says that this particular ordinance, with all its symbolism and imagery, comes to us more readily and more repeatedly than any other in our life. It comes in what has been called the most sacred, most holy, of all the meetings of the church.

Perhaps we do not always attach that kind of meaning to our weekly sacramental service,

how sacred and how holy is it? Do we see it as our Passover? Rememberance of our safety and deliverance and redemption? With so very much at stake, this ordinance commemorating our escape from the angel of darkness should be taken more seriously than it sometimes is. It should be a powerful, reverent, reflective moment. It should encourage spiritual feelings and impressions. As such, it should not be rushed. It is not something to get over, so the real purpose of sacrament

meeting can be pursued. This is the real purpose of the meeting and everything that is said or sung or prayed in those services should be consistent with the grandeur of this sacred ordinance.

“I think he feels strongly about this. What do you guys think of? I think so.”

You talked about the last supper in Matthew chapter 26. There's another tie here. I want to pull to the Passover. Matthew chapter 26. If we think about some of the blessings that come by for taking of the sacrament, here in Matthew chapter 26 with the institution of the higher law of the sacrament, I actually sometimes will call this the chapter of two cups. In this passage, when he institutes the sacrament in verse 27, he says, "Do you took the cup and gave

thanks and gave it to them saying drinky all of it? For this is my blood of the New Testament." Later on, he talks about another cup. Matthew chapter 26 verse 39, it says, he went a little further and fell on his face and prayed saying, "Oh, my father, if possible, let this cup pass from me. Nevertheless, not as I will, but as thou wilt." In other passages of scripture, he talks about that cup being a bitter cup. Now in the Passover and Exodus chapter 11,

they were supposed to eat unleavened bread, and this is in Exodus chapter 12 verse 8, "With bitter herbs shall they eat it." We partake of the sweet sacrament cup to avoid the bitter cup of our sins and transgressions. Christ takes upon Himself the bitter cup so that we can have the sweet cup. These ancient Israelites had to take the food with bitter herbs to remind themselves that if they would allow the Lamb of God and His blood to protect them, they wouldn't have to

“protect those bitter herbs into the eternities. Something I think we can also focus on as we”

protect the sacrament each Sunday. Anytime I can learn something new about the sacrament,

I appreciate it because I'm just intrigued with things the Lord has to repeat. I never want it to

get routine. Thank you for that. That's really interesting. The bitter cup. We usually associate that with so that they would remember their bitter bondage, but what you're saying is we don't have to protect them because Jesus did the will of the Father and took the bitter cup.

backward but point us forward to a great feast one day with the Lord. Can I go back to Elder Holland

“here? He says that Christ wounds are what He invites young and old then and now to step forward”

and see and feel. Then we remember with Isaiah that it was for each of us that our master was despised and rejected. A man of sorrows and equated with grief. All this we could remember when we are

invited by a kneeling young priest to remember Christ always. We no longer include a supper

with this ordinance but it is a feast never the last. We can be fortified by it for whatever life requires of us and in so doing we will be more compassionate to others along the way. He talks about sacrament and sacrament meeting. He talks about the disciples on the night of Christ's anguish and grief and he asks this question could you not watch with me one hour? He says perhaps

“every Sabbath day we can watch with him. He says I think he asked that again of us every Sabbath”

day when the emblems of his life are broken and blessed and past. Dave so far today you have walked us through more scriptures and I think I ran all along time. I've got notes all over walking us through Exodus and paralleling it with the Genesis account returning to Eden. Now we're looking forward we're looking at the sacrament we've really covered a lot today. We have listeners out there who we hear from all the time who are struggling. They're in the dark parts of their lives. They want

a deliverer they're praying for a deliverer. Sometimes when our guests come on John there's maybe

an assumption that hey look they look great they're obviously doing great they've never had a

problem in their life. Those we invite on our show John are often good friends of ours. We know Dave has seen difficult times so Dave what would you say to someone who is back where each of us have been and a portion in the time of our lives. We're in bondage in Egypt and we're crying for deliverer. Let me walk through a little bit of my history. My need of a deliverer, my need of a redeemer, my need of a Joshua, my Jesus, handful of years ago. I talked a little bit in my introduction

about part of what motivated me to do scriptures in the first place. There's a side to me that didn't know how to feel loved by God. A lot of my acts were coming out of a place of fear. I went through a time period in my life where I was angry, resentful, depressed, I could hardly get

out of bed. I would get out of bed early on. This was quite a while ago with my first business

“phone call. That's what would get me up and going for the day. I was in a dark place. I didn't know”

how to get out of it. I was in desperate need of a deliverer. I had the fortune of meeting a therapist who was brilliant. I'll walk you through a little scripture journey. I'm going to start in John, not Saint John but first John. My therapist helped me discover a lot of my actions and behaviors were driving from fear. She's kind of of the theory that almost all of our behaviors come from either a place of love or fear. This is from first John chapter four. First John chapter four verse

18 says there is no fear and love but perfect love casteth out of fear because fear had the torment. Our actions are usually coming out of one of these two emotions. I'm either acting out of fear based in fear or I'm acting out of a place in love but I struggled to feel love. I struggled to feel God's love. I was in a dark place. This is what we've worked on with my therapist. The two great commandments. Bouch out what? Love the Lord thy God with all thy heart and thy neighbor like unto thy

self. There's kind of a hierarchy of love going on here and it's not a hierarchy necessarily of importance but of order. I have to love God and if I love God then I will love myself and if I love myself then I can love my neighbor. I was struggling with that first part. I couldn't get to the love God and here's why this is first John chapter four verse 19. John goes on to say we love him

hierarchy. I have to first know that God loves me in order for me to love him back. If I know God loves

“me then it becomes natural to love him back and then it becomes natural for me to love my neighbor”

because I love myself. King Benjamin talks about this. This is where I had to go and what I had to work on with my therapist and my own personal life. King Benjamin, this is in Messiah. Messiah chapter four verse 12. In Messiah chapter four verse 12 we have kind of a causal relationship going on here. He says, "Behold, I say unto that if you will do this you will rejoice and be filled with the love of God." I needed to do something in order to be filled with the love of God when I could start then

to begin to act from a place of love instead of fear in my life. But what's the this? What's the anisine to this? We go all the way back to Moses chapter four verse five. He says, "If the knowledge of the goodness of God at this time has awakened you to a sense of your nothingness, your worthless and fallen state." We have to come to know God's goodness. We have to come to know that God loves us in order to be filled with love. We go back to Nephi and first Nephi chapter one. This is how he

starts. The whole book of Mormon. Look what he says. He wants to teach us about the deliverer

and becoming mighty and powerful under deliverance. But look what he says in first Nephi chapter one

verse one. He says, "I have been born of goodly parents. Therefore I was taught somewhat in all the learning of my father and having seen many afflictions in the course of my days. Never the less having been favored of the Lord in all my days, having a great knowledge of the goodness

“of God." Why was he in a place where he could be delivered because he knew God's goodness?”

He knew that God loved him. I had to figure out how to find out if God loved me and it became part of a daily ritual for a long, long time where I would sit with my scriptures and this is probably a little weird, but I would do an in bathtub. I would sit in the bathtub every morning, take a bath. This is my meditation place. I would do a tender mercy journal every day. I had to think back to the previous 24 hours and find something where God was merciful and showed

his love to me during that time period. Took months and months and months, but I started to soften and I started to feel God's love. Then once I felt God's love, now I'm acting from a whole different place and I'm in a place where God can deliver me. When I'm like the Pharaoh, when I'm hard, angry, bitter, resentful, I'm not in a place, really where God can deliver me. He doesn't deliver Pharaoh, but if I seek God, if I seek His goodness, if I look for His goodness, if I'm grateful,

now I'm putting a place where God can deliver me. So took a lot of time with the therapist, I do believe in God that deliver, He's personally done it for me. He is my Jesus. He's my Joshua. He's delivered me in times of darkness and times of sadness and I bear witness of Him as the

“deliverer and creator. Amen. Thank you, Dave. This has been a wonderful day, John, are you tired?”

Like I am? I'm like spiritually tired. I've walked through so many scriptures. This is great and I'm just thrilled that people have got a taste of David today because I am

always amazed when I hear the teach about and it's all motivating. I want to be like Pablo

and I'm going to be like Dave, but more importantly, thank you, your tender mercy journal. What a great idea. If you look for that, you will find it to set President Nelson. Focus of your life. The joy we feel has less to do with the circumstances and everything to do with the focus of our lives. That's kind of what you did. You could find things every day. That was really beautiful and just glad people got to meet David today. Yeah, me too. Appreciate being here. I just start to fall

back into this fear place. I was getting really anxious about doing this and I had to find myself focusing on why I'm doing this. I hope your listeners feel uplifted by it. I hope they feel like it's delicious. I hope it's good to them. This isn't about me. I actually was anxious because I

perceived and hopefully this is something that the listeners appreciate and is delicious to them.

“Now, one thing we have are wonderful listeners who are going to write in. Come over to YouTube and”

leave David message or come on to our website follow him.co. Send David message. We'll make sure he

gets it. It's been a perfect day. For me personally, I see these stories in new ways. The scriptures have

been opened up to me in a new way. That's an eaten place for me. It's this spend time in scripture. He is our deliverer. Without we want to thank our good friend, Dave Hadlock for being with us today, we want to thank our executive producer, Shannon, Sourntzen, our sponsors, David and

“Verlas Sourntzen, and every episode. We remember our founder Steve Sourntzen. We hope you'll join us”

next week. John, I don't know if you know what's going to happen, but they get up to the red sea. I don't know if you've ever read ahead, but it's a pretty big one. It's not a cliffhanger. It's a water stopper. What would you call us? It's a water stopper. We can't walk any further. What do

“we do? There's something in between us and where we need to go. What is going to happen? We'll”

show you next week on follow him. As a thank you to our wonderful listeners, we'd love to gift you the digital version of our book, Finding Jesus Christ in the Old Testament. It offers short, meaningful insights drawn from our past Old Testament episodes. Visit follow him.co. That's follow him.co to download your free copy today and you'll also find the link to purchase the print edition. Thank you for being part of our follow him family. Of course none of this could happen without

our incredible production crew. David Perry, Lisa Spice, Will Stokedon, Crystal Roberts, Ari Elquoadra, Heather Barlow, Amelia Cabuica, Sydney Smith, and Annabelle Sourntzen.

What are your questions or problems you have? The answer is always found in the life and teachings

of Jesus Christ. Turn to him. Follow him.