Take The Gift and Say Thank You (1 Nephi 5:2-9)

Lehi has sent the boys back to Jerusalem to get the plates. Sariah is not happy about this. The wilderness is a rough place. They could trip over the desert equivalent of a gopher hole, fall down and break their neck. They could be attacked by rabid camels. They could be mugged in the city. They would be hot and hungry and tired. Tempers would flare. Why, they could kill each other!

Sariah’s sons were gone a long time. Best estimates put travel time at around 2 weeks each way. Add in a day, maybe two, spent in town and they would have been gone for more than a month. Plenty of time for Mom to work herself into a stew. If Sariah was like me, she probably had their journey timed to the minute—and when they didn’t return…well, her imagination provided no limit to the number of reasons they might not make it back to her.

So Sariah complained to the only person available—Lehi. Nearly out of her mind with worry, she blamed it on the person closest at hand. That seems to be a universal human reaction to stress. Taking it out on someone else is so much easier than patiently accepting life on life’s terms.

Waiting for the miracle while in the midst of the wilderness is a hard thing to do. It’s hard to stay positive in the face of hardship, especially when the hardships are a result of doing what the Lord wants you to do. You start to think you “deserve” to be blessed.

It doesn’t work that way. That kind of thinking just makes it worse. All we can do is patiently submit and let the Lord ease the strain, lift the burden. And when the miracle happens, we take the gift and say thank you. Like Sariah did.

And when we had returned to the tent of my father, behold their joy was full,
and my mother was comforted. And she spake, saying: Now I know of a surety that
the Lord hath commanded my husband to flee into the wilderness; yea, and I also
know of a surety that the Lord hath protected my sons, and delivered them out of
the hands of Laban, and given them power whereby they could accomplish the thing
which the Lord hath commanded them. And after this manner of language did she
speak. And it came to pass that they did rejoice exceedingly, and did offer
sacrifice and burnt offerings unto the Lord; and they gave thanks unto the God
of Israel. (1 Nephi 5:7-9)