Hank Smith: 00:04 Hello my friends. Welcome to another Follow Him Favorites. My name is Hank Smith and I’m here with the incredible John Bytheway. Welcome John Bytheway.

John Bytheway: 00:12 Thanks. Incredible, Hank.

Hank Smith: 00:13 Hank. It’s awesome to be with you again.

John Bytheway: 00:14 It’s good-

Hank Smith: 00:15 We’re going to take one question from this week’s lesson, John. We’re in Matthew 15, 16, and 17 and in Mark 7, 8, and 9. Very similar stories this week. And our question is how do I gain a testimony? There’s a section in Matthew chapter 16, Jesus says, “What do you think about me?”

  00:34 And Peter says, “I know that you are the Christ, the Son of the living God.”

  00:40 Then Jesus answers and says, “You are awesome, Simon. Flesh and blood hath not revealed it unto thee, but my Father, which is in heaven.” I think the Savior gave us our key right there, John, that you didn’t get it from another person, you didn’t get that information from another person. You got that by revelation right out of the manual. A testimony of Jesus Christ comes by revelation. What do you have to add, John?

John Bytheway: 01:04 Yeah, my brother-in-law, Jeff, he teaches seminary and he uses this formula that Jesus uses. He’ll ask his classes often, “Okay, what have you heard out there? Because Jesus says, ‘Whom do men say that I am. Okay, but what do you think? And then what has the Lord told you? Because Simon, you got that from God.'” I love that it’s not even, “Simon, you got that from me,” Jesus seems to be saying, “But you got that from God.”

  01:29 There’s so many different clues in the scriptures of how to gain a testimony. The John 7:17 verse, “If you’ll do His will, you will know of the doctrine.” That comes by revelation as well. I hope that what people take away from this is yeah, ask and seek and knock and ask God to tell you. Lots of different clues in the scriptures about how to gain a testimony. I love John 7:17. “If any man will do His will, he will know of the doctrine,” and I think that’s what Peter was doing. He was striving, he was trying to follow Christ and Peter made mistakes, but he kept trying and the Lord told Him. I loved when Jesus asked that question. This could be, don’t you think, Hank, one of the shortest best testimony meetings ever right there?

Hank Smith: 02:17 Absolutely. Yeah. One thing you’ve taught me, John, is if you lack information, there’s plenty of places to get information. You can ask Google for information. Where’s the closest pizza place to me? What time does the store close? There’s so many places you can get information, but if you want wisdom, if you want a testimony, that’s going to come by revelation and you can’t Google a testimony, it doesn’t work that way. We want it fast, right? Google can give us information so fast, it can give us billions of answers in half a second. That’s not this process. If you tried that, that avenue to get a testimony, you’re going to end up frustrated.

John Bytheway: 02:57 Yeah. I tell my students, “My worry for you is that you want Google speed answers to golden questions and sometimes the Lord answers in His own way, in His own time.” But Peter’s doing what he’s supposed to be doing, he’s where he is supposed to be. That answer will come.

Hank Smith: 03:13 Yep. John, wouldn’t we say we absolutely encourage our listeners to go to the Lord with any question, but especially a testimony. If you want a testimony of Christ, of the church, you have got to go to the Lord and be patient with Him and come with what Moroni says, is a pure intent with sincere heart.

John Bytheway: 03:36 I really think He wants to tell you, but we’ve got to trust Him how He does it, because it’s by study and also by faith. We’re going to study and we’re going to learn and we’re going to wrestle, but we’re going to keep on asking too.

Hank Smith: 03:48 Yeah, and I think part of getting an answer from the Lord is, are you willing to do what comes with that answer?

John Bytheway: 03:55 Yeah. Maybe that’s the real intent part in Moroni’s promise. Yeah.

Hank Smith: 03:59 Check your willingness. Well, we hope you join us for our full podcast. It’s called Follow Him. We have Dr. Kerry Muhlestein joining us on our full podcast. You can get it wherever you find your podcast and then come back here next week. We’ll do another Follow Him Favorites.