Where Had Jesus Grown Up?

In May of 2014, I went to Egypt, Jordan, and Israel with a Christian tour group. 

While touring through Israel, our guide Ruthie had us on the lookout for small fuzzy creatures that were native to Africa and the Middle East. She had a name for them, but I can’t remember it. She told us that it was rare to catch a glimpse of them, but we all hoped we would.

We visited a vast grove of date trees south of Jerusalem. The bus driver made a couple of loops around the area in hopes of seeing some of the animals, but we didn’t even see one.

A few days later we were in the more northern parts of Israel around Nazareth and Mount Hermon. Traffic was heavy in the city of Nazareth. It was crowded and full of modern-day buildings, cars, and ornate churches. A couple thousand years of history was built on top of what once was a remote village nestled into the hills above the large fertile Jezreel Valley. I wanted to visualize what life would have been like in this place where Christ grew up. Some archaeologists believe Nazareth was very small back in the first century with something like 400 people.

I really wanted to get a feel for the home where Jesus had grown up, but it wasn’t happening. Yet I kept praying for it and holding out hope. 

We continued moving north in the following days and visited Caesarea Philippi, the place in the New Testament where Jesus asked his disciples, “Whom do men say that I the Son of man am?” (Matthew 16:13-20)

After we visited the grotto area and talked about this event in Jesus’ life, the tour guide allowed us to explore the area on our own. Normally when we explored, we stayed together, but this was a place with short hikes and trails. So, this time I felt safe enough to go on my own.

I turned my mind to the Lord’s like usual and he immediately pointed me to a pathway that led up into a little forested area. I just followed him. After crossing over the creek on a wooden bridge (see the image at the top of the blog), I hiked up the side of the bluff. I was the only one who had gone this way. The pathway didn’t seem to be “well-travelled”. 

When I got to the top, I saw them – more than a half dozen of the elusive fuzzy creatures we had been searching for! They were nested in the trees and the crevices of a rocky outcropping. There were a couple of mamas with babies. It was delightful! 

I later found them online. They are called Hyraxes. They live in parts of Africa and the Middle East in forested areas, vegetation zones, and areas with large rock outcrops. They eat mostly leaves, twigs, fruit, bark, and grass. Their feet are equipped with rubbery pads, which allow them to climb trees very quickly and jump great distances (Treehouses).

I walked quietly and cautiously through the trees so I wouldn’t scare them. A couple of mamas hissed at me. I took some pictures so I could show the rest of the group when I got back, but I was thankful that I could experience this peaceful sacred place alone with Him. I wondered if this less trodden place, away from the ornate churches, was more like the place where he grew up. I wondered if these animals were around when he lived in the area. Whatever the case, I knew he was answering my prayer. He had brought me to a quiet place in nature to catch a glimpse of him.

I Was on a 500-mile Bike Trip to Disneyland and Had Lost my Money

When I was 16 years old, I went on a 10-day bike trip from San Jose, CA to Disneyland in Southern California with a group of young men, young women, and adult leaders from our church. For a total of 500 miles, we journeyed in increments of 25-70+ miles a day on our bicycles (not motorcycles). I still think this was pretty incredible of an adventure to have gone on.

When we camped near Hearst Castle in San Simeon, I spent a little money at the store there. That’s the last time I remember having it. When I went to look for it later, I couldn’t find it anywhere. 

I was stressed. At this time in my life I didn’t have a lot of money. Neither did my mom. She had given me a little spending money for the trip and I had spent it carefully knowing that was all I had.

That night at the camp ground in San Simeon, I zipped myself into my sleeping bag and prayed for help to find the money. The next day, we had a very long and hot ride to San Luis Obispo. I still hadn’t found it. 

We stayed there for Sunday and went to church in town. On Monday, we rode to El Capitan State Beach. Before I went to bed that night, I asked again. Everyday we got closer to Disneyland. The money was all I had to spend when we got there, so I was seriously bummed that I might never find it. Still I held out some hope in my prayers.

The next morning, during that time between sleeping and waking, I had a dream. I saw a pair of my shorts and me putting the money in the pocket. 

When I woke up, I fished around in my duffle bag for the shorts. When I found them, I checked the pocket. I felt a small wad of bills and breathed a sigh of relief. Relief. Rejoicing relief. And gratitude. I was so grateful for the recovery of my money, but there was also something else. A kind of magical feeling. A tingling inside me. I knew that God was aware of me and that I was connecting with him.

I Was Having Nightmares and They Scared Me

When I was a little girl, maybe five or six years old, I often had nightmares. They scared me. They were about bad people intending to hurt me or other people. A reoccurring dream was that there was a bad man climbing through my bedroom window. When I woke up in the middle of the night after having one of these dreams, I lay awake listening for a creeping in the house, too afraid to get out of bed and go to my parents for comfort. Because of this, I had a difficult time getting to sleep each night.

This problem continued throughout my childhood until one night, my mom taught me how to pray. She said I could ask Heavenly Father to help stop the bad dreams. Before this, I had participated in family prayers, prayers at meal time, and prayers at church, but I hadn’t learned to pray to Him personally. 

So that night, I said a very simple prayer and asked, Please don’t let me have any bad dreams. I lay back down on my pillow and felt safe. Safe.

The bad dreams decreased. They went from being very frequent to occasional. If I ever woke up in the middle of the night, I would whisper to Him, asking Him to protect me and help me to sleep. My fear would decrease and I would fall back to sleep. The problem never escalated into anything serious.

I remember this so well because from that night on, throughout my childhood, teen, and even young adult years, I said the same prayer. I added more to it as I encountered more things that were outside of my control. There were things that I wanted and conflicts that I couldn’t solve. When I prayed for them, He would help. Being young in experience and endurance, I didn’t always recognize when He answered or that He had actually answered. The way He answered was often so gradual that I wasn’t aware enough to notice. 

When I got older, I started to pay more attention to this asking/answering relationship. The more I recognized the patterns in our communication, the stronger my faith grew.

Born Again

In the past few posts, I've been telling the story about how the Savior has been changing me from someone who had the habit of Turning and Reviling Again to someone who Stands Steadfast in Him. While my entire life has been a training period to develop this skill, the level of training began to increase in 2005. That was when I finally had had enough of the way I had been living. It was when I stopped putting my trust in man and in the arm of the flesh and started putting it more in God. 

“O Lord, I have trusted in thee, and I will trust in thee forever. I will not put my trust in the arm of flesh; for I know that cursed is he that putteth his trust in the arm of flesh. Yea, cursed is he that putteth his trust in man or maketh flesh his arm.” ~2 Nephi 4:34

In the beginning of 2005 I began to write my prayers down and take my communication with Heavenly Father much more serious. I felt prompted to read a book called Drawing on the Powers of Heaven by Grant Von Harrison, which my mom had given me a few years earlier. Thanks to my mom and this author, I learned how to see my life as one goal achievement process after another. I learned how to use my prayers to work with God on each one of them. My daily prayers were official meetings with Him to which I needed to come prepared. These meetings took place in my prayer journal. I wrote my goals down and made them the topic of each of my prayers. I believed these goals were in sync with the things he wanted me to work towards. Here's the list I wrote down in May of 2005:

• Health: Get Well 
• Weight loss
• Mother: be a better mother, patient, loving, steady, wise spiritual instincts in every situation
• Writer/Teacher: finish my book, teach others what I've learned about nutrition and balance
• Marriage: Fall in love with my husband again

Then I wrote down all the things I promised to do on a daily basis that I knew Heavenly Father wanted me to do. These were things I had personal control over.

• Read scriptures (personal, w/husband, w/family)
• Read parenting book
• Pray (personal, w/husband, w/family)
• No yelling at kids or husband
• If I'm upset, leave the room
• Attend all meetings
• Act upon every spiritual prompting
• Make schedule, stick with it or revise
• Sleep for 7-9 hours
• Exercise--walks

These things became my commitments--my promises to God. His promise to me was to help me obtain my goals. 

“Ask, and it shall be given you; seek, and ye shall find; knock, and it shall be opened unto you:” ~Matthew 7:7

“Verily, verily, I say unto thee, blessed art thou for what thou hast done; for thou hast inquired of me, and behold, as often as thou hast inquired thou hast received instruction of my Spirit. If it had not been so, thou wouldst not have come to the place where thou art at this time.” ~D&C 6:14

Each day I would report on the commitments I kept. I would then write about the conflicts that came up in trying to keep them. I had questions about these conflicts so I wrote them down. In response, a scripture would come to my mind. Sometimes it was a song I knew or a story I had previously read. I realized he was answering me! And the method by which he was answering me was bringing things that I had read, heard, or seen in the past into my mind. So it was a good thing I had spent years reading the scriptures. He had a large volume of stories and key verses to choose from.

See another post on this topic: I Need To Communicate!

Whenever we repeat any process we become more efficient at it. It becomes an ability. A strength. So in the beginning of writing down my prayers, it took a little longer to receive the answers. And when they did come, it took me some time before I recognized them for what they were. More often than not he answered them through other people, their writings, teachings, conversations, and creations. As I continued this process, my faith increased incrementally. I was able to receive his answers much more quickly. In addition to the scriptures, songs, and stories, I started hearing answers straight in my thoughts--in an original idea or impression. I wrote them all down. So now he usually communicates what he's thinking through pure meaning almost like our minds are one. Then, when I write down what he 'thought to me' I use my own words to describe it.

“When it is for the Lord’s purposes, He can bring anything to our remembrance. That should not weaken our determination to record impressions of the Spirit. Inspiration carefully recorded shows God that His communications are sacred to us. Recording will also enhance our ability to recall revelation.” ~Elder Richard G. Scott

See blog post: The Voice Inside My Head

Listen: When You Say Nothing At All by Alison Krauss

I began each prayer with, "Dear Heavenly Father..." and then continued with the rest of the prayer. In time I became more organized. We had an agenda for each meeting and it was important for me to stick to it as much as possible. 

I formed a new relationship with God, a closer one. It was more personal than it had been before. It was like he was committing to accept me into his family as one of his children. He would play the father role to me and I would play the child role even though I was almost 36 years old and married with 4 kids.

He is there for all of us no matter how old we are. He is our Redeemer. That means that he can make us whole even if other relationships have left us feeling alone, unable, and worthless. He will be our Father, our Friend, our Family.

“And the Lord said unto me: Marvel not that all mankind, yea, men and women, all nations, kindreds, tongues and people, must be born again; yea, born of God, changed from their carnal and fallen state, to a state of righteousness, being redeemed of God, becoming his sons and daughters;” ~Mosiah 27:25

Listen: "Born Again" by Newsboys