Return unto me you heavy laden
And I will give you rest.
Return unto me you who are oppressed
And I will give you peace.
Return unto me you who are scarred by sin
And I will make you free.
Return unto me you who are dejected
And I will gather you
Under the shadow of my wings.
Return unto me you who sorrow
And I will give you a brighter tomorrow.
Return unto me you who have forsaken me
And my sons and daughters you shall be.
- CATHRYNE ALLEN
God intends to consummate the great latter-day
work in five steps: 1. The literal gathering of Israel; 2. The restoration of
the Ten Lost Tribes; 3. The building of Zion (the New Jerusalem) upon the
American continent; 4. Christ’s personal reign upon the earth known as the
Millenium; and 5. The renewal of the earth in its paradisical glory. (see Hugh
Nibley, Approaching Zion, p 1-2)
We are currently engaged in the first step. The
gathering began in 1836 when Moses, the great lawgiver of Israel, appeared in
the Kirtland Temple to give Joseph Smith “the keys of the gathering of Israel
from the four parts of the earth” (D&C 110:11).
What exactly is ‘the gathering’. It is proclaiming
the Gospel of Jesus Christ to the nations of the earth for one reason: there is
none else beside Him through whom salvation can come. There is none else in heaven
above, or earth beneath or waters beneath the earth, nothing, nobody, nowhere,
beside Him there is no saviour, there is none other name given under heaven
save it be this Jesus Christ whereby man can be saved (Isaiah 43:10-11; 45,5,6,14,18,22;
46:9; Deut 4:35,39; 5:8; 1 kings 8:60, 2 Nephi 2:8; 25:20; 31:21; Moses 6:52; D&C
76:1)
To be gathered means to come into the fold of
Christ and be baptized in His name. It means that all who will receive their
salvation have to belong to the House of Israel, through Him who is the God of
Israel. The tribes of Israel are being gathered from every nation where the
Lord’s servants, under the direction of the Prophet of the Church, are able to
go. This gathering is happening in fulfillment of Jeremiah’s prophecy:
“Therefore, behold, the days come, saith the
Lord, that it shall no more be said, The Lord liveth, that brought up the
children of Israel out of the land of Egypt; But, the Lord liveth, that brought
up the children of Israel from the land of the north, and from all the lands
whither he had driven them….Behold, I will send for many fishers, saith the
Lord, and they shall fish them; and after will I send for many hunters, and
they shall hunt them from every mountain, and from every hill, and out of the
holes of the rocks….Hear the word of the Lord, O ye nations, and declare it in
the isles afar off, and say, He that scattered Israel will gather him, and keep
him, as a shepherd doth his flock.”
(Jeremiah 31:7,8,10-12)
As complete as was the scattering , so shall be
the gathering of ‘treacherous Judah’ and
‘backsliding Israel’ (Jeremiah 3:11):
“Though smitten of men, a large part of them gone from a knowledge of the
world, Israel are not lost unto their God. He knows whither they have been led
or driven; toward them His heart still yearns with paternal love…” (James
Talmage, Articles of Faith, p 328-9)
I know something of paternal love of Christ. After
I was baptized into the Church at the tender age of 18, I had a very
significant dream. In the dream, I was in a high rise building with my parents
who opposed my baptism. As we conversed, there arose some commotion on the
street below us. We hurried down to see the cause and as we reached our
destination a white matter akin to snow fell on top of us. We had to burrow our
way to the top. My parents never made it but I did. As I emerged I surveyed the
street and saw it covered everywhere with exquisite whiteness. When I turned to
my right I saw the Saviour coming towards me with His outstretched arms saying:
“Where are my children?” I knew from that moment that my baptism was my
re-birth and that through it, I belonged to Him.
When we are baptized we take upon ourselves the
name of Christ and become His spiritually begotten children (Mosiah 5:7-12). The
baptismal covenant instituted by Jesus himself during his ministry fulfilled
the law of Moses and opened the way of spiritual re-birth and salvation for all
by joining the House of Israel through baptism.
When the scattering of the Ten Tribes happened,
some members of these tribes were scattered throughout what we now know to be
Europe. My patriarchal blessing tells me I am a true Israelite by birth being
of ‘the seed of Abraham’. This is one of my most prized blessings of this life.
It makes me grateful for my Croatian roots because I am one of the sheep of the
House of Israel and I have come home to the Shepherd….
Bethlehem,
the City of David, holds more importance symbolically than most of us know. That
importance came through a noble woman named Ruth.
It
is said by oral tradition that women in ancient Israel lived with a hope that
the Messiah would come through their line. Ruth from Moab had no blood of
Israel running through her veins. She
was a convert to the Lord, God of Israel ‘under whose wings she had come to
trust’ (Ruth 2:12). When her Israelite husband died and left her with no
children, Ruth became one of the lowliest of the earth, devoid of security or
livelihood.
Ruth’s
mother-in-law Naomi also became destitute losing her husband and both of her
sons. When Naomi encouraged her daughters-in-law to return to their kin and
their ‘gods’, they wept. Orpah left but Ruth remained with these words on her
tongue: “….whither thou goest, I will go; and whither thou lodgest, I will
lodge; thy people shall be my people, and thy God my God.” (Ruth 1:16) Makes
you want to weep…..
Ruth
and Naomi left Moab and returned to Judea….to a small town called Bethlehem, no
less. Once there, Ruth consented to a
‘levirate’ marriage with Naomi’s next of
kin, as was the custom in Israel. Through a levirate marriage, the woman was
provided with children and restored to security and society.
Here
is where things become interesting. The Hebrew word for a man who would step up
to this responsibility was GO’EL. The King James Version of the Bible
translates it as simply ‘kinsman’ but the proper and literal meaning of GO’EL
is ‘redeemer’ (Rasmussen, “Introduction to the Old Testament”, 1:157)
This
is how Ruth, a lowly woman of Moab became the symbol of Christ’s redemption:
Her GO’EL was Boaz, an Israelite kinsman of Naomi. Boaz became Ruth’s redeemer
and restorer of all she had lost. Boaz and Ruth had a son whose name was Obed,
who became the father of Jesse, who was the father of King David, who was a
progenitor of Mary, who was the mother of Christ……
This
is why the importance of Bethlehem…..and righteous Ruth through whose line came
Christ the King. Consider for a moment how Christ redeems us from our fallen
state and restores us to the presence of the Father, AND grants us eternal
posterity through His power of exaltation. The Saviour himself affirms His role
as the GO’EL when He refers to himself as the bridegroom and us, Israel, as the
bride (Matthew 25:1-13; D&C 33:17; 65:3; 88:92; 133:10).
He
is the greatest GO’EL of all….. the Redeemer, the Restorer, the Hope of Israel,
the Rock of our Salvation, the Son of God who will one day sit on the throne of
His ‘father’ David (Luke 1:32).
And
it all started in a little town called Bethlehem…..
- CATHRYNE ALLEN
(Art: Birth by Dan Burr)
