LOVE AT FIRST SIGHT.....yea Lord I believe

Do you believe?

• Love at first sight
• Arranged marriages
• Found children

Adam and Eve had the first arranged marriage by their parents, it's true. Here it is in Matt 19:5, for this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife and the two will become one flesh. So they are no longer two, but one flesh. Therefore what God has joined together, let man not separate.

I have always thought that the proper translation of "one flesh" should be of one heart. I mean I am not a Bible translator, but one heart seems more relevant. Do you think Adam and Eve met on a blind date, or a speed date or some kind of heavenly dating service?  I think that Adam and Eve are patterns for Gods sons and daughters, to show us how to seek for those better things that he has promised for a loving relationship and marriage.

Did you think that they were married when they came here? Nope, I could be wrong, but maybe not. Jesus said ( in Luke 20:34-36)”The people of this world and present age marry and are given in marriage; but those who are considered worthy to gain that other world and that future age and to attain to the resurrection from the dead neither marry nor are given in marriage.”  Wait a minute, what? The marriage process is part of the eternal progression? It’s like part of the body package. 

“  For they cannot die again, but they are (^[a]angel-like and ^[b]equal to angels.) They are immortal and partakers of the heavenly gift of eternal life; they are sons and daughters of God.For this reason, a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife, and the two will become one (flesh) heart? So they are no longer two, but one (flesh) heart. Therefore what God has joined together, let man not (separate) cast asunder. (Matt 19:5-6)

Now in some translations, the word flesh is translated as heart, and to separate is translated as "cast asunder" What does it mean to cast asunder? It means to literally tear apart, to cast means throwing down and being trampled underfoot. It is like “cast not your pearls before swine, they are in danger of being trampled underfoot.

So the union of man and woman is such that it cannot be “torn apart” by the world, neither the sanctity of love between a man and woman is trampled underfoot.  

But wait, I am getting ahead of myself. Let’s talk about Adam and Eve and when they met. So romantic!!!!!!

So there is so much grief about Adam being created first, Eve being a help meet yada yada.  But let’s read that story again:  In the book of Abraham (lds)  1:26" And the Gods took counsel among themselves and said: Let us go down and form man in our image, after our likeness…..And we will give him dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of air, and over the cattle and over all the earth, and over every creeping thing that creeps upon the earth."  

 Adam was a man after Gods on heart, hard worker, responsible, loved animals etc. He was a man like David. This is what the Lord said of David:” I have found David, son of Jesse a man after my own heart: he will carry out my will in its entirety.” Acts 13:22.

Adam was beloved too, but was Adam alone in the garden? No he wasn’t, Eve was there too.

Abraham 1:27” so the Gods went down to organize man in their own image, in the image of the Gods they him, male and female to form they them. “

Have you ever wondered what Adam & Eve looked like? They were created in Gods own image, his own heart. David was described 1 Samuel 16:12 as having a healthy reddish complexion, and beautiful eyes and was fine looking. Anoint him for this is he.”  (So David was hot and so was Adam)

I know, we are getting to the good part. ”14 And the Gods said: Let us make a help meet for man, for it is not good that the man should be left alone, therefore we will form a help meet for him.” Was Eve in the garden? Did Adam have open heart surgery so that a woman could be “made” from him? The Lord said “And I will give them one heart, and a new spirit I will put within them. I will remove the heart of stone from their flesh and give them a heart of flesh, that they may walk in my statutes and keep my rules and obey them. And they shall be my people, and I will be their God. (That they shall united in one heart) Ezekiel 11:19-20

The Lord teaches in patterns. He prepares the heart and "creates" a human, like Adam waiting for Eve; he creates in the pattern of line upon line, precept upon precept. And that "here a little" and there a little seems to allow for humanness, and frailty and strength renewed. 

Oops, did I forget about the deep sleep and the rib? So I am no bible scholar, or Hebrew expert, but in Abraham 5:15 the Gods caused a deep sleep to fall upon Adam and he slept. I have often wondered if Adam was in the process of receiving deep truths thru revelation for the course of his life and his future wife Eve. That Eve too was in this “deep sleep” this revelatory process, being taught, having their hearts intertwined as one. This is a spiritual process.

I mean love is like that, hearts working as one. So now Eve is called Wo-man, which points to partner, helper. It isn’t noted as Co-man, or two working on the same project. Help meet denotes one who is like or complimenting the other. It is the image of the other, one heart that beats for both, so heart of my heart, bone of my bone.

And they lived, according to the plan of happiness, to become immortal and have eternal life.

I am a hopeful romantic. I know that the Lord is preparing my heart, and your heart for love. 

1 Corinthians 2: 9 But as it is written, eye has not seen, nor ear heard, neither have entered into the heart of man, the things which God, has prepared for them that love him. 

Here is a poem for you "hopeful romantics, and earnest seekers. 

See you when I see you

I want to meet someone who makes my heart flutter and gives me sweaty palms. Not because he’s charming or says all the right words because he knows the game-but because he is kind and because he thirsts for Jesus in a very authentic way. 
Someone who is funny-who can make my stomach hurt from laughter because the world needs more of that. Someone who is flawed but relentlessly seeks after God in their humanness. Someone who knows darkness and therefore knows the depths of light.
I know that in today’s world, this kind of person is very few and far between. But I won’t give up in holding out, I won’t settle for anyone to compensate my loneliness.
I am not a half looking for someone to make me whole, I am whole now, I have joy now.
But I hope to do this life thing with you someday, and I hope this waiting is deepening you into a better, stronger person as it is for me.  I can’t wait to not be strangers.
See you when I see you.

Oh yes and I can't leave you with out at least one song from the heart. 
Keith Urban: Making Memories of us

Happy New Years everyone, turn your love light on, sweep the earth for that person that God is creating a new heart just for you.

THURSDAY DEVOTIONAL: speak Lord for thy servant hereth

“Life is full of voices of God, only we lack the spiritual faculty which discerns them--The responsibility of life lies in listening for Divine voices, and in the response to them that we give. We may cultivate the spiritual faculty that hears God’s call, or we may make it obtuse. We may cherish God’s call, or we may silence it; obey it, or rebel against it.”

The Lord never stops talking to us; we just choose whether or not we hear him. In the book of Moses he tells Moses this: 

And God spake unto Moses, saying : Behold IAM the Lord God Almighty, and Endless is my name, for I am without beginning of days, or end of years and is not this endless? 4 And behold, thou art my son, wherefore look, and I will show thee the workmanship of mine hands, but not all, for my works are without end, and also my words, they never cease. 

He is a good, good father, a loving parent, who is always, endlessly looking out for us, and working on our behalf. His work and glory is to bring about the immortality and the eternal life of man.  The Lord has been whispering in my ear for a long time, and it has been only recently, that I recognized that voice. For a moment I felt like Samuel, when as a toddler, the Lord called out to him, when he had been put down to sleep. And it wasn’t in a dream state that the Lord called out to Samuel, but the scripture says that the “Spirit of Lord”, stood at the foot of his bed.

1Samuel 3 And ere the lamp of God went out in the temple of the Lord, where the ark of God was, and Samuel was laid down to sleep;4 That the Lord called Samuel: and he answered, “Here am I.”

But Samuel was like a lot of us, he heard the voice and it sounded familiar; so we ask others if they have spoken to us. So Samuel ran into the old Priest Eli’s room, to find out if he had called. Now Eli was “going blind”, his eyes had “waxed dim”, he said, I called not my son, lie down again.  So Samuel went back to bed, and 2 more times during the night he heard this familiar voice calling his name. 

We many times receive revelation without recognizing precisely how or when we are receiving revelation David A Bednar: The Spirit of Revelation

The scripture says that Samuel did not “know” the Lord yet and the word had not been revealed to him (yet). It is amazing those words that Samuel had not been taught about the Lord, he had not been properly introduced to Him, neither had the adults who were in charge of him, bothered to teach him.  But the Lord did make his presence known to little Samuel,

10 And the Lord came, and stood, and called as at other times, Samuel, Samuel. Then Samuel answered, Speak; for thy servant heareth

Moroni 7:48…. that when he shall appear we shall be like him, for we shall see him ashe is; that we may have this hope; that we may be purified even as he is pure. 

The scripture says that the Lord came, and stood and called. What is the significance that the Lord stood? Does standing mean that in this posture, his voice and message will be clearer? Does it mean that the Lord is presenting himself as the authority?  And in that posture of standing he called. What does the Lord say when he calls, what is that call? Is it a request or is it a statement. I believe that the standing or proclaiming of himself, the authority, is the bid to come unto Christ. When he appears to us in the form of “revelation” or communicating, it can take on various forms of an established pattern. 

When I was a child growing up, my biggest problem, according to my mother at least, was that I “did not listen”, that my “mouth was always running”. She feared that I would suffer because of this obvious defect and I was pronounced “hard headed. But lately, I have tried to overcome this. I have felt like Samuel and maybe Joan of Arc; hearing voices, exploring ideas that clearly I had not focused on previously. The Lord has revealed a plan for my life, that when I look at it, I am sure I have imagined it, that I wished for it like children do. So surely it is not true, right? I have had very “low “expectations for my life, or no expectations of anything changing, and I feel like, the Father decided to stage an intervention, to help me in my unbelief.  He sent messengers, so in effect he “came and stood and called “out to me. He sent 2 priesthood holders, who being guided by the Holy Spirit, asked to know who needed prayer, who needed some interaction in their lives. So they came to my house and said, “We don’t know why we are here”, and I said “I know why you are here, please give me a blessing”.  It was a teaching moment and I did my best to lean into it.

Thursday Devotional: Pass me not O Gentle Savior, Speak Lord, for thy Servant hears

Pass Me Not O Gentle Savior- Hasan Green