Hank Smith:                      00:03                   Hello, everyone. Welcome to followHIM Favorites. If you’re new to the podcast, each week John and I will share a story that we don’t share on the podcast to go with each week’s lesson. John, our lesson this week is a little bit different. We don’t have a scripture block. It’s basically an overview or a introduction to the Old Testament. The Old Testament, even in the manual, it says you might be scared to approach the Old Testament. And it made me think of a story. It made me think of something that happened to me when I was a kid. I’m excited to tell you this story. A little bit scared. It reminded me of something that happened to me when I was young.

                                           00:44                   My parents loved to visit the cemetery every Memorial Day. I was not a fan. It was usually the first day of summer. I did not wanna get in the car and drive a long ways to go put flowers on graves, which I, as a kid, thought, what a waste. They’re just gonna throw those flowers away anyway. But we would go to the store and pick up flowers and then we’d go over and we’d always pick up my grandmother. Who I loved, John, but I didn’t want to sit next to her in the car for hours. You would see me and my brother on either side of her in the backseat leaning towards the door. We loved our grandma, we loved hugging her. We loved when we got gifts from her, but we didn’t wanna sit arm to arm with her because we didn’t know if being old was contagious. I remember this particular year, we get to the cemetery. I don’t know how old I was. I must’ve been 11 or 12 years old. I’m walking around the cemetery. I thought they were so boring. My grandma was on the other side of this big bush.

                                           01:42                   I was coming around it and I could hear her talking. I thougt grandma’s lost it. She’s talking to herself because my other family members were other places and she was alone. She saw me and she said, “Oh, hello, Hank, come here.” And I came over and I said, “Grandma, who are you talking to?” And she said, “My family.” And I’m looking around going, “No, your family’s right here.” She said, “No, right here on the ground.” And she pointed to some headstones and she said, “These are my parents. This is where my parents are buried, and these are my siblings.” She was the youngest in her family. It hit me, John, for the first time, here I am 11 or 12 years old, and I’m looking at my grandma and looking at these headstones, and I thought, “Wait, you were young once.”

John Bytheway:               02:28                   I remember those realizations coming, like I just thought everybody had a grandma and grandpa and I remember the day when it was like, wait, to my own mom. That’s your mom? You had a mom?

Hank Smith:                      02:41                   I said, “Grandma, these are the people you had dinner with. These are the people you went on vacations with. ” She said, “I know, yes, I know. ” And I said, “Grandma, this is so sad.” And she was funny, John. She said, “Well, don’t worry, dear. I knew they were gone before we got here.” I was like, “Oh, okay. That’s better. You just didn’t, you didn’t just find out.” It changed my perspective on her to realize that at one point she was young in living color, living her life with all the emotions of a young person. I think about that a little bit with the Old Testament. To us, it’s always been old, but at one point, it was alive.

John Bytheway:               03:26                   Yeah. And it was like your grandmother’s family was present. They weren’t old. They were there. For whose world was the Old Testament old? Maybe ours, but in Jesus’ world?

Hank Smith:                      03:39                   Right. When Jesus says, “Search the scriptures.” He’s talking about the Old Testament.

John Bytheway:               03:43                   That’s what the scriptures were, the Torah. The first five books.

Hank Smith:                      03:48                   When Nephi goes back to get the brass plates, what’s he getting? They’re not old. He’s getting what you and I call the Old Testament. One thing that can happen this year as we study the Old Testament is we can have this realization that these are real people in real situations who believe in the same God that we do, who worship the same God that we do.

John Bytheway:               04:11                   There’s great stories in the Old Testament. That’s what I’m looking forward to people learning about God, interacting with God.

Hank Smith:                      04:18                   In fact, John, I think that’s the time where I became more interested in my grandmother. What happened when you were younger? What was happening in the world? What did you do for fun? What was your world like? She would tell us those stories. In fact, that was my grandma Madelyn. John, you know my oldest child, my daughter, her name?

John Bytheway:               04:36                   Is Maddy.

Hank Smith:                      04:37                   It is Maddy, is Madelynn.

John Bytheway:               04:39                   When we look at the Old Testament this year, it doesn’t have to feel so old, this was their world. I like what you said. These are people that believed in the same God that we do. What did they know and how did they interact and what do we know now?

Hank Smith:                      04:52                   Their lives were different than ours. Their circumstances were different, but many of the things they had to do in regards to believing, in regards to trusting in God, very similar to what we have to do.

John Bytheway:               05:07                   We can be inspired by them.

Hank Smith:                      05:09                   We can get into these stories and all of a sudden that which was old becomes new. I remember Elder Maxwell said, with the Old Testament, you find relevancy in antiquity. It comes alive for you.

John Bytheway:               05:20                   Yeah.

Hank Smith:                      05:21                   Yeah.

John Bytheway:               05:22                   And these scriptures can become new friends.

Hank Smith:                      05:25                   We hope you’ll join us on our full podcast. It’s called followHIM. You can get it wherever you get your podcast. Maybe someone in your life has said, “Hey, have you ever listened to Hank and John’s podcast?” We hope you’ll give it a try this year. Each week, we bring on a new guest, someone who has an expertise, usually in scripture, but sometimes in other areas. This week, we’re with Dr. Josh Sears. He has written a new book on the Old Testament. He has spent his career studying scripture, specifically the Old Testament. You will love the things he shares and the motivation he gives and the new insights, the new way you’ll see the Old Testament by the time you’re done, and then come back here next week. We’ll do another followHIM Favorite.