Faith to Succeed

One of the most famous scriptures for members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints comes from the very beginning of The Book of Mormon. A prophet named Lehi is asked to send his sons on a seemingly impossible task of retrieving a record from a very rich man that does not want to give up the record. When Lehi asks his sons to do this, some of them complain but Nephi says, “I will go and do the things which the Lord hath commanded, for I know that the Lord giveth no commandments unto the children of men, save he shall prepare a way for them to accomplish the thing which he commandeth them.” (1 Nephi 3:7) After several failed attempts, the brothers are ready to quit and go home but Nephi still presses forward. Eventually God prepared a way for them to succeed and they were able to accomplish the impossible task.

To me this is a perfect example of faith. One of the most important parts of faith is that we cannot just have the faith to try but we must have the faith to succeed. God will never ask anything of us that we are not capable of doing. Lehi and Nephi are amazing examples of the this kind of faith. As Lehi’s wife is waiting for her sons to return Lehi comforts her by saying, “But behold, I have obtained a land of promise.” (1 Nephi 5:5) This was before he had acutually reached the land of promise. However, he had so much faith in God that he knew that he would gain that land of promise.

Nephi and Lehi not only had the faith to try to accomplish the difficult tasks that were laid in front of them, they had faith to the point that they knew that God would make it possible. In my life, I am easily disheartened by the failure that I have in keeping the commandments. I need to look to the examples of Nephi and Lehi and realize that it is ok to fail and as long as I have faith and keep trying I will succeed. I hope that we can all develop this level of faith and trust in God.