John Bytheway: 00:00:00 Welcome to part two with Dr. S. Michael Wilcox. Luke chapters 12 through 17 and John chapter 11.

Dr. Michael Wilcox: 00:00:07 Now that was a parable for men, and so now we’ve got to have one for women. We want everybody to relate to this thing. So now we go to the women, verse eight. “What woman having ten pieces of silver, if she lose one piece, doth not light a candle, and sweep the house, and seek diligently till she find it?” Again, you don’t ever give up.

  00:00:30 “And when she hath found it, she calleth her friends and her neighbors together, saying … ” Again, he’s inviting the critics. Like I say, this is a world of a lot of critics, who even when people repent sometimes, they say, “Yeah. Well, but he made this mistake.” I think you’ve heard me say it. When I look at people in history, wherever, celebrate all the good and forgive everything else. That’s just the way we all ought to live.

  00:00:59 So, “Rejoice with me; I have found the piece which I had lost. Likewise, I say unto you, there is joy in the presence of the angels of God over one sinner that repents.”

  00:01:09 Now he’s set up the story. The proper response is joy, and the prodigal needs to know there’s going to be joy, not an interrogation, not a trial period. Let’s see if you learn anything out there eating with the pigs, rejoicing.

  00:01:27 We get that little financial fang here, the two sons. “And the younger of them said to his father, ‘Father, give me the portion of goods that falleth to me.’ And he divided unto them his living.”

  00:01:40 I don’t like to criticize anything, but if I’m going to try and pull a financial point out of it, once again, it may not always be wise to give a lot of money to somebody who can’t handle it. That’s not the purpose of the parable, so we’ll just leave it at that.

  00:01:54 “Not many days after the younger son gathered all together, and took his journey into a far country, and there wasted his substance with riotous living.” There’s a lot of different far countries. I love the phrase. A far country’s far from home. There’s a lot of people who are in different kinds of far countries. They’re not all wasting their substance. They’re not all doing riotous living. But there’s a lot of parents who have children, for one reason or another, don’t feel welcome or don’t feel at home, or want to go out and see something else.

  00:02:30 My mother went to a far country. She was young, 20s. That seems to be a time people want to leave. She left the church. She went to San Francisco. That was her far country. There she checked out what was in the great and spacious building for a while and eventually came home. Thank God she came home or where would I be?

  00:02:54 So there’s lots of far countries. Everybody knows what far country they’re in and every parent knows what far country. Now what happens to you in the far countries?

Hank Smith: 00:03:04 I was going to say, from verse 13, it sounds like he has no intention of coming back, if you take everything. He gathered all together. It’s not like he’s left a box, saying, “Oh, of course I’ll come back for this someday.” He has no intention of coming back.

Dr. Michael Wilcox: 00:03:18 I think you’re correct in that. Yeah. Well, what happens in the far country? Well, you spend everything. Good satanic style, good worldly style, good far country style is often to take everything and give nothing in return.

Hank Smith: 00:03:37 Mike, it reminds me of when you taught the Book of Revelation. Everything’s for sale.

Dr. Michael Wilcox: 00:03:41 Everything’s for sale.

Hank Smith: 00:03:42 Everything’s for sale.

Dr. Michael Wilcox: 00:03:43 Even the soul. That’s right. “And when he had spent all, there arose a mighty famine in that land; and he began to be in want.” There’s different kinds of wants in far countries. You can want love, companionship, health, faith, testimony, things that you used to believe in and don’t anymore. There’s lots of wants. We could spend hours just talking about some of these verses.

  00:04:06 “He began to be in want. And he went and joined himself to a citizen of that country; and he sent him into his fields to feed swine. 16 And he would fain have filled his belly with the husks that the swine did eat: and no man gave unto him.

  00:04:08 He began to be in want and he joined himself to a citizen of that country and he sent him into the fields to feed swine,” which would’ve been horrible for a Jew. “And he would fain have filled his belly with the husks that the swine did eat: and no man gave unto him.” That’s the last part of the style. You spend all and give nothing in return, because sometimes the world wants a lot from you, and once they’ve got it, they don’t give anything back.

Hank Smith: 00:04:36 The riotous living sounds like he had people around him, yet he’s left with no friends, nowhere to go.

Dr. Michael Wilcox: 00:04:42 He’s got the pigs, and sometimes people need to spend a little time with the pigs. Alma the Younger had to have an angel shake the earth. Sometimes tough things have to happen.

  00:04:56 But I love the first line of verse 17, when he came to himself. That’s a beautiful phrase. His real self. His real self wasn’t the inhabitant of the far country. His real self was not the product. His real self is the son of the father. Your real self is you at your best. I truly believe that. We’re going to see that dramatically in John 11, if we ever get there. We’ll get there.

Hank Smith: 00:05:27 We’ll get there.

Dr. Michael Wilcox: 00:05:28 We’ll see that. Just remember that when he came to himself, how much … We’re going to see two people in John 11, the real self that sometimes aren’t seen. “When he came to himself,” his best self, “he said … ” Now at this point I’d like to say the power of this parable, of all parables but certainly this one, is that you feel repentance, so you can do it. You feel forgiveness. Very few people feel like repenting when somebody gives a lesson on the five steps of repentance.

  00:06:05 I mean I’m being a little sarcastic. I don’t mean to be too sarcastic. I’m just … Jesus is teaching in parables to elicit an emotion. See, He’s trying to say rejoice … Feel it. Feel repentance, feel forgiveness, and then you’ll be able to do it, because you feel it vicariously through this story, which is what great literature does. So, “How many hired servants of my father’s have bread enough and to spare, and I perish with hunger!”

Hank Smith: 00:06:34 Even his employees have enough, right?

Dr. Michael Wilcox: 00:06:36 Yeah. “I will arise and go to my father. I will say unto him … ” These are poignant words that people who’ve been to far countries and want to come home often feel.

Hank Smith: 00:06:50 Yeah. I’ve done too much.

Dr. Michael Wilcox: 00:06:51 “Father, I have sinned against heaven, and before thee, and am no more worthy to be called thy son: make me as one of thy hired servants.” “I’m not a son. I’m not worthy. I’ve done too much.”

  00:07:10 I think a lot of the work in the spirit world, I know we talk about missionary work in the spirit world, is to convince a lot of people that they still have hope even though they blew life, that they are still sons.

  00:07:26 This parable asks the question, when you return, do you return as a servant or a son? Sometimes people say, “I’m not worthy to be a son anymore because I didn’t sin like my older brother.” “I am no more worthy to be called a son. Make me as one of the hired servants.”

  00:07:44 Then one of the most beautiful verses in all literature: “And he arose,” I’m sorry, “and came to his father.” Now who is that father? That is our Father in heaven, Father. “He arose and came to his father. And when he was yet a great way off, his father saw him, and had compassion, and ran, and fell on his neck, and kissed him.”

  00:08:22 He doesn’t wait for him to come. He doesn’t even know if he’s coming back. Maybe he’s coming back for more money. His son said to him, “Father, I have sinned against heaven, and in thy sight, and am no more worthy to be called thy son.” Notice what phrase does he drop.

John Bytheway: 00:08:42 Hired servant. Make me a hired servant.

Dr. Michael Wilcox: 00:08:45 He drops that because he’s obviously being greeted as a son. There are no hired servants in God’s kingdom. Only sons, only daughters.

Hank Smith: 00:08:54 It’s almost as if the father interrupts him. He’s got this speech prepared and he’s like, “I am not … ” Then he says, “Get that thought out of your mind.”

Dr. Michael Wilcox: 00:09:02 “But the father said to his servants, ‘Bring forth the best robe, and put it on him; and put a ring on his hand, and shoes on his feet: and bring hither the fatted calf, and kill it; and let us eat, and be merry.” Again, beautiful words. They’re so beautiful they’re going to be repeated.

  00:09:19 “‘For this my son was dead, and is alive again; he was lost, and is found.’ And they began to be merry.” This my son. Now you could end it right there-

John Bytheway: 00:09:41 Yup.

Hank Smith: 00:09:41 Yeah.

Dr. Michael Wilcox: 00:09:44 … because it’s just so powerful. All people … And we’re all prodigals in our own way; there aren’t very many older brothers, there are some … all need to know there is, at least with your Father in heaven … Maybe earthly parents are not going to be able to do it quite as well. But at least with their Father in heaven, the robe, the ring, and the shoes, the kiss and the embrace, are waiting. He’ll run to give it to you. That’s our Father in heaven.

Hank Smith: 00:10:18 I’ve often wondered if he says a ring, robe, and shoes, because these are all fitted blessings. Robe is not one size fit all. Ring is not one size fit all. Shoes are not one size fit all. I wonder if he’s saying, “I planned on you coming home and I have your size. I’ve already got it ready.”

Dr. Michael Wilcox: 00:10:35 Yeah, and they may have been his own.

Hank Smith: 00:10:36 Yeah, that he left behind.

Dr. Michael Wilcox: 00:10:39 “Now his elder son was in the field: and as he came and drew nigh to the house, he heard music and dancing. And he called one of the servants, and asked what these things meant. And he said unto him, ‘Thy brother is come; and thy father hath killed the fatted calf, because he hath received him safe and sound.’ And he was angry, and would not go in: therefore came his father out, and intreated him.”

  00:11:02 The father goes to both sons. He goes to both. The prodigal has his problem and the older brother has his problem, and the father goes to both. He goes out to them.

Hank Smith: 00:11:15 Mike, it seems this parable could be misnamed. It’s called The Parable of the Prodigal Son. The only character that’s in both sides of this is the father, the good father.

Dr. Michael Wilcox: 00:11:25 Yeah.

John Bytheway: 00:11:26 Or the prodigal sons.

Dr. Michael Wilcox: 00:11:28 The prodigal sons.

John Bytheway: 00:11:30 Yeah.

Dr. Michael Wilcox: 00:11:31 “He intreated him. He answering and said to his father, ‘Lo, these many years do I serve thee, neither transgressed I at any time thy commandment.'” I take that at face value. This is a Nephi person, at least in his life. “‘And yet thou never gavest me a kid, that I might make merry with my friends. But as soon as this thy son,'” not my brother-

Hank Smith: 00:11:52 Yeah.

John Bytheway: 00:11:52 Nice. Nice.

Hank Smith: 00:11:52 Your child.

Dr. Michael Wilcox: 00:11:53 “‘This son was come, which hath devoured thy living with harlots, thou hast killed for him the fatted calf.'” Then these beautiful words again. “And he said unto him, ‘Son, thou art ever with me.'” You are always in my heart. You have your problems, but I love you.

  00:12:18 I like Tyndale’s 1526 translation of it. He changes the verb tense. He wrote, “Son, thou wast ever with me.” “You have always been here. You didn’t eat with the swine. Either way, don’t be threatened. You are in my heart and all that I have is thine.”

  00:12:42 Then Tyndale, who translates this … The rhythm of verse 32 is really good rhythm. “It was meet that we should make merry.” Look at the alliteration there, meet, make, merry. And be glad: for this thy brother was dead, and is alive again; and was lost, and is found. That’s why it’s such a magical phrase and has such power.

  00:13:13 “‘We had to. It was meet that we should make merry, and be glad: for this thy brother was dead, and is alive again; and was lost, and is found.'” There’s a rhythm even in the syllables. I don’t want to teach an English lesson here, but, “It was meet that we should make merry and be glad,” is 12 syllables. If you make four, the fulcrum that balances the phrase, that, “This thy brother was dead and is alive again,” is 12. 12, 12, and then three, three, “And was lost, and is found.” The rhythm of it is what makes the magic of it.

  00:13:42 I remember a friend of mine telling me about their son had run off. He had problems in drugs and different things and he went off to his far country. They didn’t know where he was for the longest time. I don’t know if maybe I’ve shared this on another time before. They didn’t know where he was for the longest time.

  00:14:05 One day he was up in the canyons over an open fire, he was homeless, and heating a can of beans on an open fire. That was a Sunday. He knew that every Sunday his mother would fix a big special meal and all the family would all be there. He’s sitting there on his own. He is in his own pigsty there. He knows what’s at home and he knows his mother and his family.

  00:14:46 Just the memory of Sunday dinner with the family is enough. He stamps out the fire and walks home, opens the door. There’s the seat that he used to sit out at the table. He sat down at the table, welcomed back with love, given the robe, the ring, the shoes, the embrace, the kiss.

  00:15:11 You just don’t get truth more velvet, softer, more beautiful, more hopeful for parents who have children in a far country, or for people who are in a far country, and feel they’re not worthy to come, or for even older brothers who maybe feel a little bit threatened and also have to be reassured, “Thou art ever with me. You are always in my heart. I don’t love him more than I love you. My love for him is an intensity of love. My love for you is a constancy of love, and they are different qualities.”

John Bytheway: 00:15:49 Beautiful.

Hank Smith: 00:15:50 There’s a talk from Elder Jeffrey R. Holland way back in 2002 called The Other Prodigal. I encourage all of our listeners to go and read and listen to the whole thing. But he does talk about this older brother.

  00:16:04 He says, “This son is not so much angry that the other has come home as he is angry that his parents are so happy about it. Feeling unappreciated and perhaps more than a little self-pity, this dutiful son, and he is wonderfully dutiful, forgets for a moment that he has never had to know filth or despair, fear or self-loathing. He forgets for a moment that every calf on the ranch is already his, and so are all the robes in the closet and every ring in the drawer. He forgets for a moment that his faithfulness has been and always will be rewarded.

  00:16:38 No, he who has virtually everything and who has in his hardworking, wonderful way earned it lacks the one thing that might make him the complete man of the Lord he nearly is. He has yet to come to the compassion and mercy, the charitable breadth of vision to see this is not a rival returning. It is his brother. As his father pled with him to see it is one who was dead and now is alive. It is one who is lost and now is found.”

Dr. Michael Wilcox: 00:17:05 That’s exactly it. You can add just a little postscript, a little exclamation point on that, if we go to chapter 17. These are beautiful verses. These are two brothers.

  00:17:19 So now I go to verse three of chapter 17. “Take heed to yourselves: If thy brother trespass against thee, rebuke him,” correct him. Rebuke gives too much permission. I think correct might be a good one. “If he repent, forgive him.”

  00:17:38 Then verse four, “If he trespass against thee seven times in a day, and seven times in a day turn again to thee, saying, I repent; thou shalt forgive him.”

  00:17:52 Now I don’t think God expects a higher standard of us than He Himself will give. I could say it humorously, I guess I get seven sins a day. I get seven mistakes. I get to show my humanity and weakness seven times a day, and as long as I sincerely and truly…

  00:18:13 Some would say, well, repentance is not doing it again. I would say, yes, that’s the technical description of it, but maybe the seven times 70 sins is the same sin done over and over again that somebody’s fighting all his life to try and overcome, and is sincerely sorry.

  00:18:31 We forgive seven times a day. We worship a God who is so merciful, so forgiving. He’s a seven times a day. He’s a 10,000-talent forgiver, a 500-pence forgiver. He’s a scarlet to snow white forgiver. He’s as far as the east is to the west forgiver. Sometimes I need seven times a day in my life.

Hank Smith: 00:19:01 I cross-referenced our prodigal son and what you’ve mentioned here in 17 to Genesis 50. When Jacob dies, the brothers don’t believe they’re truly forgiven. So they say to Joseph, again, “Forgive us please,” and Joseph weeps when they speak unto him. His brethren said, “We will be thy servants.” Joseph said, “Fear not. Am I in the place of God? As for you, you thought evil against me, but God meant it unto good to bring to pass as it is this day to save much people alive. Fear you not, I will nourish you,” and he comforted them. Just a beautiful moment.

Dr. Michael Wilcox: 00:19:41 Same thing.

Hank Smith: 00:19:42 Am I really forgiven?

Dr. Michael Wilcox: 00:19:45 No servants in the kingdom, only brothers. No servants in the kingdom, only sons. That’s just the way it is. If I need it seven times a day, I’d get it. If I need the 10,000, I’d get it, even if I feel unworthy. And often people do. People often feel unworthy.

John Bytheway: 00:20:03 I have in my ward a man who is at the prison every week. That’s his calling. I’ve been out there with him before. I’ll tell you, I learned something, that the prison could be called a far country. I got up to speak and I saw the countenance of, I don’t know, 40, 50 guys was, “Give me everything you’ve got.” One of them said, “This is the best day every week. I look forward to this.”

  00:20:41 I didn’t see that same kind of fill up my cup as a bishop. It just taught me it’s not about distance, it’s about direction. You’re in prison, but are you coming or going? They were coming. You’re in church, but are you coming or going?

  00:21:00 It’s not distance. There are lots of far countries. It’s about direction and which way you’re trying to come. I’ll tell you that was life-changing to see how much they wanted everything that they could get each time they came to a family home-

Dr. Michael Wilcox: 00:21:18 Church service, yeah.

John Bytheway: 00:21:19 … even in prison, trying to come back. I loved what you’ve said. It reminds me of Section 64 in the Doctrine of Covenants. Just five words I underlined. “I the Lord forgive sins.” That’s what I do.

Hank Smith: 00:21:33 John, that is actually the section of the Doctrine of Covenants that Mike was with us. So we would encourage everybody to go back and listen to that episode. I brought up Joseph of Egypt. Mike was with us for that episode as well on Joseph of Egypt. So, Mike, all of your episodes with us have a beautiful thread running through them.

Dr. Michael Wilcox: 00:21:53 I say eastern religions, the great problem in eastern religions is suffering.

Hank Smith: 00:22:00 Yeah, not sin.

Dr. Michael Wilcox: 00:22:02 Not sin. The answer that the Buddha gives in others is selflessness and compassion. The great problem in western religions is sin, and the answer that Jesus gives in others is mercy and forgiveness. It’s a theme that comes up a lot, because we need it. We need it for ourselves. We need to bestow it. As Shakespeare said, you’re twice blessed. Forgiveness, mercy is twice blessed. Blessed is the one who gives it and the one who receives it.

John Bytheway: 00:22:33 Wow. Yeah.

Dr. Michael Wilcox: 00:22:35 Well, we have one wonderful little story, again, I love, the 10 lepers. That’s in chapter 17. We started in verse 12. “And as he entered into a certain village, there met him 10 men that were lepers, which stood afar off. And they lifted up their voices, and said, Jesus, Master, have mercy on us. And when he saw them, he said unto them, ‘Go show yourselves unto the priests.’ And it came to pass, as they went, they were cleansed.”

  00:23:04 “And one of them, when he saw that he was healed, turned back, and with a loud voice glorified God, and fell down on his face at his feet, giving him thanks: and he was a Samaritan. And Jesus answering said, ‘Were there not 10 cleansed? But where are the nine?’ There are not found that returned to give glory to God, save this stranger. 19 And he said unto him, Arise, go thy way: thy faith hath made thee whole.

  00:23:31 So that’s the simple little story about gratitude. I sometimes wonder if the one who came back came back because he was the least one to expect mercy from the Jewish rabbi. I mean think about the woman at the well, a Samaritan. She surprised Jesus. He even talks to her. Think of some of the things that James and John, ready to call fire down on the Samaritan village.

  00:24:01 There are some pretty deep prejudices between these people. Maybe of all the people who least expected mercy from Jesus was this one.

  00:24:12 We learn a little bit of a lesson in life. When you expect a lot, which we do in this nation and a lot of our lives, when we expect a lot and don’t get it, we can get bitter and disappointed and angry because we feel somewhat entitled. If we expect a lot and get it, it can create pride. We want to go build our better barns because we earned it and we deserved it and we worked. It’s when you don’t expect something and get it that the gratitude goes deep.

  00:24:41 One of the great solutions to the problem we talked about earlier, the wealth and thing … Is gratitude. You can’t feel pride and gratitude at the same time in your heart. You want to kill pride, you kill it with gratitude.

  00:24:54 When I was young, I didn’t feel very good at anything. It’s junior high school, which I know you’ve heard me say I think junior high was invented in hell by Lucifer.

Hank Smith: 00:25:05 It’s just a bad idea, really.

Dr. Michael Wilcox: 00:25:07 Yeah, I just didn’t feel good in anything. I had my mother … I wasn’t good at sports. I could get good grades, I was a good student, but I didn’t count in the social sporty of teenage life. In fact, it could go against you that you were a smart guy getting A’s.

  00:25:28 I told my mother I didn’t think I was very good at anything and she told me a story about another boy in the stake who went to his mother and said to her, “I’m not good at anything.” I knew this boy. He’s a little younger than me. His mother said, “I want you to think and you come back to me. I want you to think and come back and tell me one thing you are good at.”

  00:25:53 And so, he thought and he came back later and he said to his mother two words: “I’m honest.” She said, “Don’t you think it’s better to be good at being honest than hitting a baseball?” which was the big sport at the time we all wanted to be good at.

  00:26:11 My mother’s telling me this story. So I’m thinking in my life, I mean what do I want to be good at? I decided I wanted to be good at gratitude. Now maybe I chose an easier one. I just never wanted to be one of the nine. That was it. I always wanted to be the one, not only to God to be grateful but to people. If I could gain perfection in something on earth, maybe I could do one, that I could learn to be grateful. Every now and then God takes me on a little journey to remind me of that commitment.

  00:26:52 When I was a missionary in the mission field, France, maybe the check didn’t come and I sat down for dinner. I had a bowl of yogurt. Plain yogurt, no fruit in the bottom. Just plain French yogurt. I remember saying a prayer on it, “Father in heaven, thank you for this yogurt. Please bless it. In the name of Jesus Christ, amen.” Sometimes the ending of a prayer can be one word. But I didn’t feel really grateful.

  00:27:19 And so, the Lord took me on a little visual journey in my imagination. From time-to-time in my life He does this with me. The first stop that we went to was … It’s different stops, different times. The first stop on the journey is always some beautiful place in nature, different places. But on this particular time, He took me to the beach off Southern California where I grew up. The sun is setting in all those beautiful colors, reds and corals and pinks and orange. You can hear the gulls cry, feel the sea breezes, smell the salt air, that wonderful feeling of bare feet on sand. The Lord says, “With your bowl of yogurt, Mike, I give you all the beauty of the world.”

  00:28:18 Then we’d go to a place of poverty. Like I say, I’ve seen a lot of them. One of the first ones that I ever saw was a man sleeping in a street when I was a little boy, covered by newspapers, and asking my mother what was the matter with that man and her telling me that he had no place to live. I mean I’ve seen a lot of poverty. The Lord says, “I’ve never known a day of hunger, have you? I’ve never known a day of insecurity.” The Lord says, “With your bowl of yogurt, I give you security and freedom from want.”

  00:29:05 Then I was in France, then we … Again, different places, different journeys … go to Normandy. You walk on that beach and you go to those crosses, that cemetery where young men gave their lives. When we say young men give their lives for their country, and young women, it doesn’t mean their breath and heartbeat. It means their life. They gave their life. They’re never going to hold a wife in their arms or hear a child say daddy or a child say grandpa. You give a whole life. The Lord says, “With your bowl of yogurt, I give you freedom and independence paid for by the sacrifice of thousands.”

  00:29:54 Then we go to Carthage, to that stone building. I look up the window where Joseph Smith fell out. The Lord says, “With your bowl of yogurt, I give you goodness and truths to give you stability in life and a frame.”

  00:30:21 Then I go to South Pass, Wyoming and I watch those handcart pioneers pulling up that pass in the snow. The Lord says, “With your bowl of yogurt, I give you a heritage built on the sacrifices of thousands who came to give you your BYUs and your churches and temples and institutes and houses in warm valleys.” I start to get pretty humble about this time.

  00:30:50 Next we go to my grandfather’s house, or my mother. I hear that magical sound the three of us all love, that butterfly wing sound of scriptures turning. I hear my grandfather tell me a story, or my mother, and the Lord says, “With your bowl of yogurt, I give you wisdom, wisdom of the ages, of the finest men and women who ever lived, to guide your life through their experiences.”

  00:31:28 Then we go to a temple, an altar, and I look across at that young woman, Laurie. I hear those wonderful words, and the Lord says, “With your bowl of yogurt, I give you eternal love and all its promises.”

  00:31:50 Now you can imagine the last spot we go. I go to other places, but the last spot is always Gethsemane, always, and the Garden Tomb. I see Jesus kneel and offer that prayer and I see the hope and the new beginning of life that we’ll talk about in chapter 11, because it’s a prelude to it.

  00:32:18 The Lord says, “With your bowl of yogurt, I give you beauty and mercy and forgiveness and holiness and sanctity and devotion. I give you my son. What more can I give you to make you happy?” I say, “Father in heaven, if you don’t mind, I’d like to bless the bowl of yogurt again.”

  00:32:50 Now I’ve been on that journey a lot. Sometimes it’s not when I’m ungrateful and I need it. It’s just good to go on it sometimes. It’s especially good to go on it when, as we looked at earlier, we aren’t discerning the spirit of our age and we just need a little gratitude to help us with the spirit of our age and understand what this gospel of this church is really all about, and the goal and where we’re trying to take.

  00:33:30 We never want to be one of the nine. We always want to be that one who turns back maybe because he got more in life than you ever expected. I can’t think of anybody on earth more blessed than me, just can’t think of it. Maybe you don’t have troubles and problems, but I just can’t think of anybody who’s been given more with his bowl of yogurt than I’ve been given. That’s what I think Luke 17 is all about, that gratitude.

Hank Smith: 00:34:09 I’m sure you both remember Elder David B. Haight. Whenever I mentioned that name to my students, they don’t know who that is. I feel bad for them because that was a bright spot in general conference was having Elder Haight get up and talk about he and his wife Ruby.

  00:34:24 He gave a talk in October of 2002 called Were There Not 10 Cleansed?, in which he says it’s so easy in life for us to receive blessings, many of them almost uncounted, and have things happen in our lives that can help change our lives, improve our lives, and bring the spirit into our lives. But we sometimes take them for granted. How grateful we should be for the blessings that the gospel of Jesus Christ brings into our hearts and souls.

  00:34:50 I would remind you all, if we’re ever going to show gratitude properly to our heavenly Father, we should do it with all of our heart, might, mind, and strength, because it was he who gave us life and breath. As that gratitude is magnified and developed and expanded, which is what I think you’ve shown us here, Mike, you can magnify, develop, and expand your gratitude, it can bless our hearts and our minds and our souls to where we’d like to continue to carry on and do those things that we are asked to do. Just an excellent talk from a great soul.

John Bytheway: 00:35:22 Elder Merrill J. Bateman, who was president of BYU for a while, he made an observation I’d never noticed about this. He said nine were cleansed, but only one was made whole. The difference there being the gratitude and-

Hank Smith: 00:35:36 Gratitude expressed.

John Bytheway: 00:35:38 Yeah. What was the thing that you said? A cure for pride is gratitude? Because I’ve always felt like gratitude and humility go together, because you realize I have a lot of undeserved blessings and they fit together. But I like the way you said that, and that the one who turned and gave thanks was made whole, not just cleansed but made whole.

Hank Smith: 00:36:03 I think it’s important to notice too that I bet the other nine felt grateful.

Dr. Michael Wilcox: 00:36:08 I’m sure they did.

Hank Smith: 00:36:09 But this one came back and expressed it.

John Bytheway: 00:36:12 Another just sequence thing that I love about this is and it came to pass that as they just stood there, no, as they went, they started making tracks. You don’t show yourselves to the priest until you are healed. They weren’t healed yet, but as they went, they were cleansed. I think Elder Bednar talks about, yeah, the feet getting wet before the water parted in the Jordan, that “as they went” aspect.

Dr. Michael Wilcox: 00:36:39 Some of the most beloved stories in my heart in the New Testament you gave me in Luke, The Prodigal Son and The 10 Lepers. If we’d gone on another chapter, we would have gotten Zacchaeus and the tree. Then I’d have my top three. Well, let’s go to chapter 11.

John Bytheway: 00:36:59 They’re unique to Luke, aren’t they? They’re not in the other gospels. I think that’s interesting.

Dr. Michael Wilcox: 00:37:05 Yeah. Prodigal Son, 10 Lepers, and Zacchaeus. Luke is my favorite gospel. I mean if we can have one … Maybe we shouldn’t. I love them all. They all have things. But Luke is great.

  00:37:19 If we go to John 11, I’ll just show you, since we’re on gratitude, sometimes you learn a lot just by listening to Jesus pray. I go through the New Testament in different ways. Sometimes I go through saying, “Give me Jesus’ eyes and let me see as He sees.” Then I look at all that He beholds, how He looked at people to try and learn how He looked at people, how He listened to people, how did He pray, and just read all His prayers.

  00:37:46 Look at his prayer in verse 41 and 42, just before He raises Lazarus from the dead. It’s a beautiful little prayer. I’m just going to do the two first phrases. “Father, I thank thee that thou hast heard me. And I knew that thou hearest me always:.”

  00:38:09 That’s a magnificent prayer. Sometimes the answer to our prayers is simply the acknowledgement and understanding that God has heard us. That’s all I need. I just need to know that He heard me and I know that He hears me always.

  00:38:27 Well, there’s a couple of points that I love in this. This is the raising of Lazarus. This is the miracle that is going to set the stage for the resurrection. This is where, again, He says, “What I’ve done for one, I will do for all. I heal all blindness, make all people whole. I will bring you back to life.”

  00:38:48 Remember in The Prodigal Son, we looked at when he came to himself, his real self. So now I like to ask people this. Jesus was what I call a lifter. He lifted people. He was just a lifter. One of the ways He lifted people was by giving them a nickname. Peter is a nickname, The Rock, Sons of Thunder are nicknames, James and John. John was the beloved. He was just a lifter.

  00:39:16 He lifts Zacchaeus in the tree. He’s always lifting. He’s trying to help people feel good about themselves. We’re not a lifter society. That’s part of discerning the times. We’re a putdown society, a critique society. We’re not a lifter society always. But He was a lifter.

  00:39:33 There is an apostle who does have a nickname that Jesus didn’t give him. We gave it to him. What apostle is that?

John Bytheway: 00:39:42 Thomas.

Hank Smith: 00:39:43 Doubting Thomas.

John Bytheway: 00:39:44 Yeah. Yeah.

Dr. Michael Wilcox: 00:39:44 That’s Doubting Thomas. Poor old Thomas. We remember him at his worst moment.

John Bytheway: 00:39:48 Yeah, that’s terrible.

Dr. Michael Wilcox: 00:39:50 There’s a woman that we usually think about at one of … I think it’s because we misinterpret her story, the dinner at Bethany. Who gets the short end of the PR relationship in the dinner at Bethany story between Mary and Martha?

Hank Smith: 00:40:07 Martha, yeah.

Dr. Michael Wilcox: 00:40:08 Poor old peevish Martha complaining to Jesus. Now I think the paintings all have that wrong. I think there were probably a lot of people there. That’s not an intimate little tete-a-tete, Jesus and the two sisters. Somebody’s going to finally paint that story correctly.

  00:40:25 So let’s look at Thomas and Martha here in chapter 11. So as Jesus in chapter 11 has gone across the Jordan River into what was another jurisdiction in the Roman Empire at the time, the Jordan River becomes a barrier. He’s safer over there. The last time He’d been in Jerusalem, they had tried to stone Him. So He would let things cool off from time to time, not that He’s ever afraid of anything. But He leaves.

  00:40:57 He’s over across the Jordan River in present day Jordan, and Mary and Martha send Him word that their brother Lazarus is sick. That’s the setting of this story. They give Him a pretty strong hint in the letter, or the messenger, verse three, “Lord, behold, he whom thou lovest is sick.” That’s a pretty strong hint.

  00:41:19 Now we’re told in verse five, “Now Jesus loved Martha, and her sister, and Lazarus.” They are the center of calm in a very hostile environment. Bethany’s right off the backside of Mount of Olives. You guys know that. You’ve been there. You can walk over the Mount of Olives onto the Temple Mount in 15, 20 minutes.

  00:41:42 So He loves them, but we’re told in verse six He stays two more days in the same place deliberately. Now He knows what he’s going to do. He needs the visual of resurrection, to tell, “What I did for Lazarus, called him out of the grave, brought him back to life, I’m going to do for everybody. I’m going to show you what I’m going to do myself.”

  00:42:05 So He wants him dead and buried, and that happens. He has a little conversation with the disciples for a while, and they don’t understand. He says, “He sleeps, but I go to wake him.” They say, “Well, if he’s sleeping, it’ll be well.” Then Jesus … Because the disciples always took Him too literally. We always do that. We take Jesus way too literally sometimes.

  00:42:28 Verse 14, let’s pick it up there, “Then said Jesus unto them plainly, ‘Lazarus is dead. And I am glad for your sakes that I was not there, to the intent that ye may believe.'” Believe what? “Believe that I will bring the resurrection.” “‘Nevertheless let us go unto him.'”

  00:42:47 Now sometimes when I teach this, ask people, they all know Doubting Thomas. Then I’ll ask them, “Do any of you know any other story about Thomas in the New Testament?” and I never get a hand. Yeah, maybe once or twice, and usually from somebody who’s heard me already teach this. They don’t know another story about Thomas.

  00:43:08 But here’s the story, verse 16. Now before we do verse 16, let’s go to verse eight. “His disciples say unto him, ‘Master, the Jews of late sought to stone thee; and goest thou thither again?'” “Don’t go. It’s dangerous.”

  00:43:26 So with that in the background, look at Thomas now in verse 16. “Then said Thomas, which is called Didymus, unto his fellow disciples, ‘Let us also go, that we may die with him.'”

  00:43:40 Now why don’t we know that story? Why don’t we call him Devoted Thomas? Sacrificing Thomas? Courageous Thomas? This is Thomas at his best, and this is the way I think Jesus saw him. He had his moment. I understand Thomas wanting to see someone he loved and is alive again literally. I understand Thomas’s heart only too well. But somehow it’s in the human nature and, again, it’s part of the spirit of our times to remember people at their … Maybe not their so best moments or to assess them at their not so bests moments. But I don’t think Jesus did that. I think Thomas was Devoted Thomas to him. I want to remember this Thomas, Devoted Thomas.

  00:44:34 Then we see Martha, poor Martha who gets the bad PR at the dinner at Bethany. He comes into town and Martha goes out to meet Him. Verse 21, “Martha unto Jesus, ‘Lord, if thou hadst been here, my brother had not died.'” Now Mary’s going to say the same thing in verse 32 when she comes, “‘Lord, if thou hadst been here, my brother had not died.'”

  00:45:01 There’s something really poignant and moving about those words. Often we have the phrase … I don’t want to discredit the phrase or challenge the phrase or say the phrase isn’t true. I just want to think about it a little bit. People say, “God is always there for me.” I don’t ever question that, but sometimes we, like Mary and Martha, say, “If you’d been here, something bad wouldn’t have happened to me, or something wouldn’t have happened.” Sometimes He’s not here and life comes.

  00:45:41 Now He’s going to fix it. He’s going to fix it for Mary and Martha and He’s going to fix it for all of us, and Lazarus. He’s going to make it good. That’s his promise. “No matter what happens, I’m going to make it good.” He’s going to make it good sooner than Mary and Martha think He’s going to make it good. He’s going to raise him from the dead.

  00:46:00 But there is something very human about all of us occasionally in our lives we may find ourselves saying, “Lord, if thou had been here, something wouldn’t have happened. Where were you? You could have fixed it. You delayed. You waited two days.” Shakespeare says it beautifully. I felt it at the killing fields. I was at Hiroshima. That’s a moving place to be.

  00:46:27 One second it’s a bright August day and three seconds later 80,000 to 100,000 people are dead just like that. I don’t judge the dropping of it or the non … It’s a controversial thing. It’s not something I want to get into. But it’s just things happen. Shakespeare writes … When Macduff’s family are killed by Macbeth, he writes, “And did heaven look on and would not take their part?” Sometimes we feel that way.

  00:47:00 Elizabeth of York says … When her two sons are killed by Richard III, she says, “When did heaven sleep when such a deed was done?” Even poor Juliet, when everybody abandons her, “Is there no pity sitting in the clouds that looks into the bottom of my grief?” So there are times that we might say, “If you’d been here, but you weren’t here. Why weren’t you here?”

  00:47:35 Now His promise is, “I make all things good. I’m going to make it all good.” I just understand Mary and Martha’s words really well. I hope people can relate and understand those words really, really well, that God’s job isn’t always to stop unpleasant things from happening, or suffering. God’s job is to get us through it and to make it good eventually in the end some way, and He always does.

  00:48:04 Now we see Martha. Here’s Martha saying, “If you had been here.” She didn’t get what she wanted, what she hoped for. But then she gives this magnificent testimony as good as Peter’s. “‘But I know, that even now, whatsoever thou wilt ask of God, God will give it thee.’ And Jesus saith unto her, ‘Thy brother shall rise again.’ And Martha saith unto him, ‘I know that he shall rise again in the resurrection at the last day.'”

  00:48:34 Then those beautiful words we quote all the time, “‘I am the resurrection, and the life: he that believeth in me, though he were dead, yet shall he live. And whosoever liveth and believeth in me shall never die. Believest thou this?’ She saith unto him, ‘Yea, Lord: I believe that thou art the Christ, the Son of God, which should come into the world.'”

  00:48:58 Even though He was not there, and something that she didn’t want happened that she felt He could have prevented happened, her faith is as strong. So why don’t we call her Faithful Martha, Testifying Martha. See, it’s that dinner at Bethany. This is Martha at her most magnificent. This is Thomas at his most magnificent. These are the ways I think we want to remember them. We want to do with everybody what we are invited to do in the New Testament with Thomas and Martha.

Hank Smith: 00:49:34 What was that phrase again you used, Mike? Celebrate the good?

Dr. Michael Wilcox: 00:49:39 Oh, celebrate the good and forgive all the rest.

Hank Smith: 00:49:41 Forgive all the rest.

Dr. Michael Wilcox: 00:49:42 Yeah. Now we get the beautiful … Jesus comes in, Mary goes out to see Him. They know it’s dangerous for Him being there, so that’s why they go out of Bethany to see Him. Verse 33, “When Jesus saw her weeping, and the Jews also weeping which came with her, He groaned in the spirit, and was troubled.”

  00:50:05 It’s nice to know that we worship a weeping, groaning, troubled God, who weeps and groans and is troubled by our sorrows. Now He knows He’s going to bring Lazarus back to life in just a moment or two. He knows what He’s going to do. He knows this sorrow’s going to be healed, but He still … Shortest verse in scripture, verse 35, “Jesus wept.” He still feels it. He feels their sorrow as though it were His own sorrow, even when He knows it’s not going to last.

  00:50:39 That’s the Savior we all love and believe in, the groaning, weeping, troubled God who feels our pain even when He knows that pain isn’t going to last much longer. So He raises Lazarus from the dead and brings him back.

  00:50:58 The last thing that I would do … You’ve got an English major, unfortunately. I thought a lot about Lazarus. He’s the one that we don’t know a lot about in this story. There’s pictures of him coming all bound. There are stories of people are being called back from the dead and thinking, “Oh, it was so good on the other side. Why’d you call me back?” I’ve heard people say, “Poor Lazarus, he had four days in the spirit world. Now he’s got to come back to this world.”

  00:51:29 Maybe that’s true. Maybe life is just so good over there. But there’s something wonderful about just being alive. We’re taught in LDS theology that the dead long for their bodies, that it’s seen as a bondage.

  00:51:47 And so, I came across a poem a while … Just a little bit of it, by Edna St. Vincent Millay. She’s a 20-year-old entering this in a contest. It’s just amazing that a 20-year-old can write something this deep and this beautiful, called Renascence. In a sense, every time I read Renascence, she takes me right to Gethsemane and right to the resurrection morning. She just takes me there every time, even though she’s not writing about Gethsemane or the resurrection.

  00:52:18 It’s really a profound, profound 20-year-old. I’ve been on the mountain where … I sometimes think this had to be an epiphany, something that really happened to her. It’s just so profound.

  00:52:28 She’s on a mountain in Maine. It’s a very easy cadence to understand. She says at the beginning, I’ll give you this, “All I could see from where I stood was three long mountains and a wood; I turned and looked another way, and saw three islands in a bay. So with my eyes I traced the line of the horizon, thin and fine, straight around till I was come back to where I’d started from; and all I saw from where I stood was three long mountains and a wood.

  00:53:03 Over these things I could not see: these were the things that bounded me. And I could touch them with my hand, almost, I thought, from where I stand! And all at once things seemed so small my breath came short, and scarce at all. But, sure, the sky is big, I said; miles and miles above my head. So here upon my back I’ll lie and look my fill into the sky.

  00:53:27 And so I looked, and after all, the sky was not so very tall. The sky, I said, must somewhere stop. And, sure enough, I see the top! The sky, I thought, is not so grand; I ‘most could touch it with my hand! And reaching up my hand to try,” and she reaches up her hand to touch the sky, and she cried to feel it touch the sky, because now this little bounded world … Sometimes we live in these little bounded worlds and we don’t see beyond our own little horizons. And so, God is going to say, “let me give you my view.” “Infinity came down and settled over me.”

  00:54:11 First of all, she hears the whirl of the universe, and the planets and the stars, and the clockwork motion that God controls in there. Then she feels all the sins of all the world. She feels all the pains. “For my omniscience paid I toll in infinite remorse of soul. All sin was of my sinning, all atoning mine, and mine the gall of all regret. Mine was the weight of every brooded wrong, the hate that stood behind each envious thrust. Mine every greed, mine every lust. And all the while, for every grief, each suffering, I craved relief with individual desire.”

  00:54:55 I’m not feeling this as a body. I’m feeling every individual’s grief and sorrow and sin. Then she feels people burning in a fire. She feels people starving. She sees a shipwreck at sea and watches people drowning.

  00:55:14 She said, “No hurt I did not feel, no death that was not mine; mine each last breath that, crying, met an answering cry from the compassion that was I. All suffering mine, and mine its rod; mine, pity like the pity of God. Ah, awful weight! Infinity pressed down upon the finite me!”

  00:55:39 So from this little tiny perspective, which sometimes we have our little bounded lives, suddenly she sees from God’s perspective, feels the weight, the pain, the sorrow, the suffering, the sin, the grief. To me, that’s Gethsemane in a sense.

  00:55:58 It crushes her. She wants to die. The weight is so great that she can’t get the last breath out. Maybe you’ve been with somebody when they died. I’ve been with my father and my wife. There’s that last breath, the giving up of the soul, that last … It always seems to be relaxed and just that last emptying of the lungs slowly.

  00:56:26 But the weight is so great, she can’t. The weight pushes her down into the grave. Now down into the grave, she’s dead. Finally, the weight rolls off her of all this pain and all this sorrow. The final breath goes out and she’s buried.

  00:56:47 So can you picture under the grave now? So there she is. “Deep in the earth I rested now. Cool is its hand upon the brow and soft its breast beneath the head of one who is so gladly dead.” Then she hears it raining.

  00:57:05 Now Edna St. Vincent Millay, who wrote this, loved New England springs. She loved the smell of the orchards and the freshness of the rain and the sunshine and the blue sky. She loved the beauty of nature.

  00:57:24 Sure, she is down in the grave and she can hear it raining. She says, “I lay and heard each pattering hoof upon my lowly, thatched roof, and seemed to love the sound far more than ever I had done before. For rain it hath a friendly sound to one who’s six feet underground; and scarce the friendly voice or face, a grave is such a quiet place. The rain, I said, is kind to come and speak to me in my new home.” Now we begin to understand maybe Lazarus, and maybe all of us.

  00:58:02 “I would I were alive again to kiss the fingers of the rain, to drink into my eyes the shine of every slanting silver line, to catch the freshened, fragrant breeze from drenched and dripping apple trees. For soon the shower will be done, and then the broad face of the sun will laugh above the rain-soaked earth until the world with answering mirth shakes joyously, and each round drop rolls, twinkling, from its grass-blade top.

  00:58:41 How can I bear it, buried here, while overhead the sky grows clear and blue again after the storm? O, multi-colored, multiform, beloved beauty over me, that I shall never, never see again! Spring-silver, autumn-gold, that I shall never more behold! Sleeping your myriad magics through, close-sepulchred away from you! O God, I cried, give me new birth, and put me back upon the earth! Upset each cloud’s gigantic gourd and let the heavy rain, downpoured in one big torrent, set me free, washing my grave away from me!”

  00:59:29 Just the joy of a spring day in New England is enough. I’ll pay the price of all that weight. I just want to be alive again. Easter asks us a question, is the joy of Sunday worth the pain of Friday? That’s what Easter’s all about. It’s that question. Is the joy of Sunday at the Garden Tomb worth the pain of Friday in Gethsemane and on the cross?

  01:00:06 Edna St. Vincent Millay is going to say, “Yes, yes, it’s worth it. The joys of life is worth it.” So she prays, “Put me back on earth.” A rainstorm develops and lightning flashes and the thunder comes. New England can have really heavy rains, and a rainstorm comes washing down and hits her grave.

  01:00:41 Notice as we go through how her senses awaken one-by-one. “The big rain in one black wave fell from the sky and struck my grave. I know not how such things can be; I only know there came to me a fragrance such as never clings to aught save happy living things; a sound as of some joyous elf singing sweet songs to please himself, and, through and over everything, a sense of glad awakening.

  01:01:18 The grass, a tiptoe at my ear, whispering to me I could hear; I felt the rain’s cool fingertips brushing tenderly across my lips, laid gently on my sealed sight, and all at once the heavy night fell from my eyes and I could see, a drenched and dripping apple tree, a last long line of silver rain, a sky grown clear and blue again. And as I looked a quickening gust of wind blew up to me and thrust into my face a miracle of orchard breath, and with the smell, I know not how such things can be! I breathed my soul back into me.”

  01:02:07 You can see that moment, the moment when the breath left. Because the weight was so great, the Friday so great pressing, now just the joy of a New England rainstorm. She breathes in that beautiful smell of the orchard. We’ve probably all been in an orchard, especially after rain. The fragrance just … I used to like to walk in the orange groves in Southern California.

  01:02:34 “Up then from the ground sprang I and hailed the earth with such a cry as is not heard save from a man who has been dead, and lives again. About the trees my arms I wound; like one gone mad I hugged the ground; I raised my quivering arms on high; I laughed and laughed into the sky.”

  01:03:00 Then she remembers who gave it all to her. I can see Lazarus coming out of the grave and looking at the faces of his sisters, and the joys of the green of the fig trees and the gray green of the olives, and the fresh breezes that flow over the Mount of Olives, and the sheep feeding on the grasses and the wildflower, whatever it was for him, certainly the faces of those two sisters.

  01:03:29 She remembers who gave it all to her. “I laughed and laughed into the sky, till at my throat a strangling sob caught fiercely, and a great heart throb sent instant tears into my eyes; O God, I cried, no dark disguise can e’er hereafter hide from me thy radiant identity! Thou canst not move across the grass but my quick eyes will see Thee pass, nor speak, however silently, but my hushed voice will answer Thee. I know the path that tells Thy way through the cool eve of every day; God, I can push the grass apart and lay my finger on Thy heart!”

  01:04:16 She sees him everywhere, and all the joys, all the beauty of life. What a wonderful grand thing life is with all of its smells and senses and touch and sights, its people.

  01:04:30 So I don’t think Lazarus came back thinking, “Oh my gosh, the spirit world was so wonderful.” Maybe he did, but life is a pretty wonderful thing. This is a reminder of the resurrection. Like I say, I can’t think of any description of the resurrection better than Edna St. Vincent Millay’s.

  01:04:48 Whatever those moments in your life where it was just a wonderful day to be alive. You were just glad for senses and the beauty around you, for the people around you, Sunday’s joy is worth the pain of Friday.

  01:05:08 Sometimes in our life we understand that. I’ll just give you one example. When I was engaged to Laurie … She’s always in my brain. She’s always in my mind. She’s just always there.

  01:05:22 Anyway, I went back to Southern California, she went back to Canada. We were going to be married in Canada. We were gone six, seven weeks. And I was beginning to forget what she looked like and what her voice sounded like. I had her picture.

  01:05:37 Long distance was too expensive in those days for us to afford it as students. So I drove up. The week we were going to be married, I drove all day to Salt Lake to pick my father up, and I was going to spend the night and then drive the next day. But I was just too eager. I just couldn’t sleep. I had to go. I had to …

  01:05:55 So I told my dad I’m going to drive all night. “I’m not tired. I’ll be fine. I’ll just make the drive. I’m going to just drive.” I called Laurie on my dad’s phone. He could pay for it. I told her I’d be there in the morning.

  01:06:11 So in the morning, she was getting ready, and I got there a little before she expected me. She was in the bedroom in front of the mirror, getting her hair down. Her mother tried to keep me out of the room, but I just was … She was dressed. She was fine. She was almost finished, just needed to get that hair down a little bit more and combed. I burst into the room.

  01:06:39 I can remember sitting on that bench next to her. I can feel her warmth still. Laurie’s hair, it was long and fell almost to her back. Laurie’s hair was like a fresh mountain stream flowing down from high places. You could bury your hands in the brown flow of it. I could smell the perfume and the shampoo.

  01:07:12 I kissed that little silk spot on her temple and looked in her eyes and saw there’s a look, especially when we’re young, that says, “I love and I am loved.” It’s a look of joy. I heard her say, “I missed you.”

  01:07:39 Laurie and I used to do a little … I just said, “Can I just have one? Just one?” and then she would kiss me. I said, “Can I just have one?”

  01:07:49 That was a good day to be alive. The God who can give all that back to me, the God who can return the sights and the smells and the touch and the warmth and the voice who can restore all that is a God worth all my love and all my devotion.

  01:08:20 That is what the resurrection’s all about. That is what he’s trying to teach the disciples in John 11 with Lazarus. “What I’m doing with Lazarus and Mary and Martha, restoring all the joys of his life and restoring the loves of his life, I’m going to do to everyone. I’m going to do that for all of you. I thank my Father that He lets me do it.”

  01:08:52 Millay ends her little poem. She doesn’t end it there. She goes back to standing on the hill with the mountains on one side and the islands and the other, the little small world she started in. Sometimes our little selfie worlds.

  01:09:10 There’s a big broad world out there with a lot of joy and a lot of goodness and a lot of people, and a lot of love, a lot of truth. She’s felt a lot of pain of her fellow men. She’s understood how good life is, just in the simple spring rain of a New England orchard.

  01:09:36 And so, now she says, “The world stands out on either side no wider than the heart is wide; above the world is stretched the sky, no higher than the soul is high. The heart can push the sea and land farther away on either hand; the soul can split the sky in two, and let the face of God shine through. But East and West will pinch the heart that cannot keep them pushed apart; and he whose soul is flat, the sky will cave in on him by and by.”

  01:10:16 The world is as wide and wonderful and beautiful as we want it to be, as we allow it to be. We just push it further and further apart to include more and more the joys and the pains, the heartaches and the triumphs. The soul can reach as high as God himself and commune with him and let him into our lives, or we can let the world pinch us and live in a very flat world if we want.

  01:10:46 But the Savior came to open us up to all things and all people, and help us see the world and feel the world as He did. One day we will all know deep, deep, bone deep, soul deep, heart deep, mind and memory deep that Sunday morning is worth Friday, whatever your Friday is. If your Sunday morning hasn’t come yet, it’ll be worth it.

  01:11:19 I think that’s what the raising of Lazarus is all about. I think Lazarus would tell us that. It was just good to be alive again.

  01:11:27 Thank you for letting me talk about some of my most favorite scriptures and stories about Jesus. One of the poems I love very much, and very few people understand the resurrection or Gethsemane, but Edna St. Vincent Millay was one who did. Anyway, thank you very much.

Hank Smith: 01:11:48 Yeah, that was absolutely wonderful, Mike. I loved it. John, it’s been a great day.

John Bytheway: 01:11:54 Yeah. I was so excited to see the chapters we had, just knowing this is going to be great. But it was better than I imagined. So thank you.

Hank Smith: 01:12:02 Yeah, absolutely wonderful.

Dr. Michael Wilcox: 01:12:05 Happy to be here.

Hank Smith: 01:12:06 Mike, thank you for being here. Thank you for taking time with us.

Dr. Michael Wilcox: 01:12:10 It’s nice to be in town occasionally. It’s nice to see the world. It is.

Hank Smith: 01:12:16 Yeah, occasionally. Come back to Utah every once in a while. Come see us.

01:12:19 We want to thank Dr. Mike Wilcox for being with us today. We want to thank our executive producer, Shannon Sorensen. We want to thank our sponsors, David and Verla Sorensen. We always want to remember our founder, Steve Sorensen. We hope you’ll join us next week. We have more New Testament coming up on followHim.

  01:12:38 Today’s transcripts, show notes, and additional references are available on our website, followhim.co, followhim.co. You can watch the podcast on YouTube, with additional videos on Facebook and Instagram. All of this is absolutely free, so be sure to share with your family and friends.

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  01:13:05 We want to thank our incredible production crew, David Perry, Lisa Spice, Jamie Neilsen, Will Stoughton, Krystal Roberts, and Ariel Cuadra. We also love hearing from you, our listeners.