Burning Bush

This is probably one of the most profound thoughts I myself have had.

I'll be the first to say that my testimony of Joseph Smith took some dings in my fling with the Baptists. They certainly aren't kind to him. Unfortunately.

But as taught this week in YWs, you can't really have a testimony of this gospel without Joseph Smith.

I completely agree, and have been working hard to build up my testimony of him and his character as a person. It's been going pretty well. I feel deep sorrow for all that he went through and I have always known that he was a prophet of God, and that's why he went through all that he did. Which was terrible.

So I bet right now you are thinking, how does this relate to a burning bush?

Good question!

Well it does! I had to teach a lesson a while ago about Joseph Smith and I thought I was going to die. Me teach on the one subject that my testimony seems to be lacking on, no way. I went forth with it with a determination to strengthen my testimony of the subject. Being a teacher can be hard in that sense. I cannot teach something that I disagree with or don't myself believe. It's impossible. Neil took it upon himself to help me and introduced me to Truman G. Madsen. I started listening to his oration called Joseph Smith the Prophet.

I sat and listened to a little of it and as I sat there had a huge epiphany. Truman G. Madsen was talking about the first vision and different things that Joseph Smith said about the account.

Here is what we have from scripture.

Joseph Smith History 1:16

16 But, exerting all my powers to ^acall upon God to deliver me out of the power of this enemy which had seized upon me, and at the very moment when I was ready to sink into ^bdespair and abandon myself to destruction—not to an imaginary ruin, but to the power of some actual being from the unseen world, who had such marvelous power as I had never before felt in any being—just at this moment of great alarm, I saw a pillar of ^clight exactly over my head, above the brightness of the ^dsun, which descended gradually until it fell upon me.

Let's focus on the part that says, "Just at this moment of great alarm, I saw a pillar of light..."

Truman G. Madsen talks about how when Joseph Smith looked up he thought that the trees were on fire it was so bright. I wish that was part of the Joseph Smith History, because it would add so much to the point I am trying to make.

Maybe now you get where I am going. I sat there listening to that and thinking why is it so easy for me to just accept the things that the Bible says. For example, let's move on to Exodus 3.

This is the account of Moses and the burning bush.

Here is what it says.

1 Now Moses kept the flock of ^aJethro his father in law, the ^bpriest of Midian: and he led the flock to the backside of the desert, and came to the ^cmountainof God, even to ^dHoreb.

2 And the ^aangel of the Lord appeared unto him in a flame of ^bfire out of the midst of a ^cbush: and he looked, and, behold, the bush burned with fire, and the bush was not consumed.

3 And Moses said, I will now turn aside, and see this great sight, why the bush is not burnt.

4 And when the Lord saw that he turned aside to see, God ^acalled unto him out of the midst of the bush, and said, Moses, Moses. And he said, Here am I.

5 And he said, Draw not nigh hither: put off thy ^ashoes from off thy feet, for the place whereon thou standest is ^bholy ground.

6 Moreover he said, ^aI am the ^bGod of thy father, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob. And Moses hid his face; for he was^cafraid to ^dlook upon God.

Just as an extra little thought, in verse two where it says angel, the JST says that word should be presence of the Lord, which if you read the whole section you'll see that that really does fit better because we see that Moses is talking to Jehovah.

I've never doubted that story once in my life and in fact, it's one of my favorite. I love that he went to the mountain of the Lord and was on holy ground and removed his shoes. (Maybe it's just because of my obsession with feet).

Anyway, are you seeing the similarities. Not it a weird the first vision is a made up thing, but it the fact that they both saw similar things and described them similarly. (As Becka put it in her comment some things have been greatly lost in the translation of the Bible). I wonder if maybe he clearly said something like I saw God, and he was so bright he looked like a bush that was on fire. Just like Joseph Smith said that when they first appeared to him, it was so bright he thought the trees above him were on fire.

Having this epiphany really changed my thought and increased my faith. Seems so silly too, but I love it.

(If you want I've already blogged on this once, but I don't think I did it as well. But here is the old post. The interesting part that I was point to is the picture at the bottom of this post where is has Michelangelo's statue of Moses, and he has horns. The reason being was the improper translation of part of the Old Testament which said that Moses had horns. Silly concept, but maybe we could say that he is really Mormon since there are those silly ideas that we shave our horns off. Seriously!)