Finding the ONE

Fishers and Hunters of Men

I am reading a chapter a day in Luke during the days leading up to Christmas. Thus the 15th Chapter is today! Luke asks, “What man having a hundred sheep, if he lose 1 of them, doth not leave the 99 and goes into the wilderness after that 1 until he finds it?” We all envision The Good Shepherd with that sheep as a lamb probably because he carries it on his shoulders. It very well could have been an older sheep, even one that has been hurt.

I've had this print since 1978 of an Eskimo who has been both fishing and hunting. It symbolizes both a culture that is not my own, but also the dual nature of fishing and hunting. It's more complex than you'd first think. Just ask any Eskimo. He will have to do a lot of hunting to find one seal or walrus. The fishing part is cut a hole in the ice and have patience. So how does this relate to Luke.

How do Luke 15 and Isaiah 41 relate to Lost Sheep?

Since my study of Isaiah 41:18-19 where the Holy One of Israel (v 14) makes a “pool of water” in the wilderness!  I have considered the wilderness to be not only the gentile world like the Eskimo above, but also the cyberspace of the Internet. Wow, is that a leap or what? Not so much… since I spend hours every day on FamilySearch.org, Ancestry, and MyHeritage researching my ancestors. Where… on my laptop, in my living room on the internet.

How Does My Mind’s Eye See That World?

This image of a binary world is how I see the world, blue and filled with Living water, or in other words Jesus Christ and his teachings of the gospel that will flow across the globe via missionary work, as well as on the other side of the veil, where it is preached to those who sit in spirit prison awaiting their release.

In Isaiah 41:19 the Lord plants the cedar, acacia, myrtle and olive trees in the wilderness. Then He goes on to set in the desert, the fir, pine and box trees TOGETHER. And God did this so that ALL would see and know that HE had done this.

All the different trees in this verse represent to me the wide variety of FAMILY TREES from the various countries in the world. On MyHeritage they are even now translating their records into 6 or 7 different languages to facilitate researchers understanding names, places, etc. The Book of Mormon is available in dozens of languages now so that missionaries, our “Fishers and Hunters” of men can find people. We have a young man from our ward serving in Cambodia and a returned missionary sister who served in the Ukraine.

But, about this Cyberspace idea…

This image reminds me of a waterfall or streams. isn't that what do via the net and call it streaming?

The Lord says He “will make a NEW sharp threshing instrument having teeth.”  (see Isa 41: 14) Perhaps reading this as our digital technology or COMPUTER that uses BYTES as basic units, will help you to see what I see.

In verse 17 the poor and needy seek water. The God of Israel won’t forsake or forget a single one of them. He will go searching for the ONE! (v 19) tells us He will do a new thing, even “make a way in the wilderness and rivers (of living water) in the desert.

Desert means something to me! He entreats us all, “Ye men of Israel, my servants,” to go out into the world and use the internet to find the ONE.

Now back to Luke 15:6 when the young son, comes back home, his father invites friends and neighbors to celebrate his homecoming. How many of you have gone to the airport when “your young missionary son” returns home? or attended their homecoming talk in sacrament meeting. Think how God and our ancestors will also rejoice at our “finding” our lost ancestors and performing for them a work they cannot do for themselves?

“Likewise, joy shall be in heaven over one sinner that repenteth” more than the 99 just persons needing no repentance. (Luke 15:7)

We Have Become the Fishers and Hunters of Men!

Jeremiah 16:16 says “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.”

First the Lord sends fishers who gather men into the gospel net by our missionaries. Then he asks those they find to become hunters of men, their ancestors. Now that takes the Internet, in our modern world. When Jeremiah talks about out of the holes of the rocks he is referring to the graves, or tombs, like where Jesus’ body was laid. Now, when we bury someone, the rock is over their grave. We use FindaGrave and Billion Graves to search or to hunt them.

We find them one by one! Whether we fish with the Net, the living or the dead by the  Internet, or from the mountains and hills of records threshed as chaff by our computers. 

Speaking with the Tongue of Angels

The Spirit of Elijah Like a Fire is Burning Within My Heart

A letter I wrote to the Missionaries serving from my Ward

March 13 2016

     As missionaries you often speak with the “tongue of angels” when testifying of Christ and His church. Yesterday it was my privilege participate in this glorious, joyous, and sacred gift of the Holy Ghost while working at the FamilySearch History Center.
     I’d prayed several times in days previous that I might be helpful to the patrons who were going to come. Then I began to pray for people to be prompted to come that “needed” to be there. Finally, I prayed for a specific member who had called me saying, “You are the only one who has ever gotten me the least bit interested in doing my own family history,” so can we get together again? I met Rafael in my water aerobics class three years ago and invited him to begin working on his family history at the center; he came once. This time, I gave him homework (get a three ring binder, notepaper, pen to bring) and any documents he might have, and come to the center at 9 am, Saturday. His reply was, “He didn’t have any documents, and that we’d put everything he knew into FamilySearch already.”
     He came and miracles happened. He was born in Brooklyn, New York and never knew his father, who left his mom when he was about three. His dad was born in Puerto Rico. Rafael was there promptly at 9:00 a.m. when we opened. We always have a prayer with the volunteer workers before we begin. I was just sitting down with him at a computer, when in walks a non-member patron, Juanita, who had a microfilm she had been viewing for the past few weeks. Juanita is an expert in Puerto Rican genealogy. She helped found a Puerto Rican Genealogy group in New York City when she lived there!
     I introduced the two, left them together as she began teaching him the importance of documenting sources, recording and organizing his research, finding census, death and marriage records, birth records and even translating them in full for him for the next four hours. Just before closing, she rushes in to me saying, “This really is God’s work, I just found Rafael’s second great grandmother and she was born on March 12, 1890…. March 12th…. March 12th … Oh, my gosh!” “126 years ago exactly!”
     At this point I testified that this was true and that our ancestor angels attended us as we worked on finding them in the records they left on earth. Both Rafael and Juanita found joy in their discoveries. She never got to read her microfilm, but she didn’t care.
Now, this was not the only sacred event that happened at the center. Another woman, Darlene, a non-member that I’d also met at water aerobics and helped her to get started on family history several months ago at the center, came in to look for immigration records for her Swedish line. She’d told me how she’d just gotten hooked on this new hobby and couldn’t stop doing it! She’d say to her husband, “Just a minute, just one more thing, and an hour later….” I know the feeling. “It’s addictive, she said.” Yes, I know, and had previously told her about the Spirit of Elijah, and how that was the Holy Ghost testifying of the divinity of the family. She is planning a trip to Sweden in August with her son to go see their ancestor’s church and homeland!
     I sat her at a computer, next to another non-member patron, John, who never puts anything into FamilySearch but is an engineer who methodically has documented his family including sending away for naturalization records…via snail mail and ordering microfilms. I asked John if he would help Darlene find some immigration records. Four hours later, they were both so excited at having found what she was looking for and more. I apologized to John that he didn’t get to do much of his own work and he said, “Actually at the last minute I found a record that I’d spent years searching for. It was just right there!!!!” I testified to him that this was a reward for the generous help he gave Darlene, and that God was indeed helping them both! Both were uplifted and edified.
     I shared both these stories with the other volunteer workers testifying of the power of prayer in this work. And I “speak with the tongue of angels,” again to you, that I know if we pray diligently for patrons to come into the center, they WILL come. God prompts them to come, then prompts others who can help them to come. We are a Center for feeling the Holy Ghost as powerful as when missionaries testify in the homes of members and investigators.
     So missionaries, bring your investigators to the local FamilySearch Center. Arrange for special hours to visit with the Center director, if regular hours aren’t convenient. Listen to the promptings and include members who can help, youth who can help, to come at the same time. God will work miracles for you, too. It is all part of the Plan of Salvation and angels will assist.
With all my love,
Bev Field