"Look to God and Live"

     One bible story that has always amazed me, especially the way it is talked about in Alma 33, is the story of the fiery serpents and the brass serpent.  The account in Numbers 21 explains how many of the people of Israel were sinful, so the Lord sent serpents as punishment.  Many of the people were killed from being bitten by these serpents, but Moses prayed and was instructed to make a brass serpent for the sick people to simply look to.  That's it.  All they had to to do was look at it and they would be healed.  The accounts in Alma are my favorite.  Alma 33: 19 - 22 says, 

19.  Behold, he was spoken of by Moses; and behold a type was raised up in the wilderness, that whosoever would look upon it might live.  And many did look and live.  

20.  But few understood the meaning of those things and this because of the hardness of their hearts.  But there were many who were so hardened that they would not look, therefore they perished.  Now the reason they would not look is because they did not believe that it would heal them.   

21.  Oh my brethren, if ye could be healed by merely casting about your eyes that ye might be healed, would ye not behold quickly, or would ye rather harden your hearts in unbelief and be slothful, that ye would not cast about your eyes, that ye might perish?

22.  If so, wo shall come upon you; but if not so, then cast about your eyes and begin to believe in the Son of God, that he will come to redeem his people, and that he shall suffer and die to atone for their sins; and that he shall rise again from the dead, which has bring to pass the resurrection, that all men shall stand before him, to be judged at the last and judgment day, according to their works.   

     1Nephi 17:41 reads:

41.  ...[the Lord] prepared a way that they might be healed; and the labor which they had to perform was to look; and because of the simpleness of the way, or the easiness of it, there were many who perished.  

     Those who refused to look saw the healing power the Lord had prepared for them and I'm sure they were happy for their loved ones being healed, yet they wouldn't be healed themselves.  Why?  It's so easy just to look!  They just had to look.  In the past whenever I have read this I have just been dumbfounded at...well...how dumb they were NOT to look!!!  However I look back at the last several months and realize that I have related to them as well.  Their hearts were hardened, perhaps mostly against themselves.  We can be so hard on ourselves.  Perhaps they didn't believe they were deserving of such healing.  

     I think of how often I will sit down with a dear friend and testify with all that I am that the atonement of Jesus Christ can work for them - that if they keep their covenants they can be happy - these are things I know with all my heart.  Yet, when it comes to my sorrows, insecurities, and hurts, I forget that the plan of happiness is not just for everyone else, but it is for me.  Christ will heal even me.  

     This has been a humbling yet empowering realization for me.  Our Savior and older brother is in this with me - not just the people around me.  We are in this together and I am His.  Making a constant effort to have my focus and vision be on Him has made such a big difference for me in the last several nights.  I too can be healed.  

     I need Him and the way is simple.  It is through Him and only Him.  Whatever else I don't "understand" at this time...whatever else may not be "simple" in my mind...well, I still look.  Eye on the target, I will believe that Christ's miracles will work for me too - that He loves ME enough to make me happy as well.

I will allow myself to do as it says in Alma 37, and "look to God and live."