Jesus Christ Is the Great Deliverer!
Open talk in Gospel LibraryContents
Before Reading
Before reading or listening to the talk, consider the following questions:
- What does Jesus Christ’s suffering teach me about His ability to understand and help me?
- How do I respond when trials bring difficult questions or strong emotions?
- What is the difference between receiving an assurance of deliverance and receiving deliverance itself?
- How does the Savior’s grace help me endure difficulties that remain unresolved?
- What does trusting the Savior’s time and way look like in my present circumstances?
Topics
Trust Jesus Christ’s Power to Deliver
Jesus Christ descends below all things and suffers every kind of pain, affliction, and temptation. His perfect understanding, mercy, and infinite power make Him able to succor and deliver the righteous. Elder Hathaway teaches that His deliverance is certain, even when its timing and form remain unknown.
With perfect understanding and infinite power, He can deliver the righteous from all things, forever.
His deliverance is certain; the question for most righteous followers is not if He will deliver but how and when He will do so.
I testify that Jesus Christ is the Great Deliverer, now and forever
- How does the Savior’s experience of suffering prepare Him to succor us?
- What distinction does Elder Hathaway make between the certainty of deliverance and its timing?
- Why does trusting Christ’s power not require expecting immediate relief?
- What burden do I want to bring to a Savior who understands it perfectly?
- How does the knowledge that Jesus Christ understands my suffering influence my prayers?
- What experience helps me trust His mercy and power when I cannot see how deliverance comes?
Turn Toward Christ Amid Opposition and Questions
Opposition comes to everyone, including the righteous, and can bring grief, fear, and heartrending questions. Elder Hathaway teaches that these responses are not inherently sin or weakness. They can become a sacred space in which we exercise agency and choose to turn toward Jesus Christ.
Opposition comes to all, even the righteous.
Such questions and emotions are not sin or weakness; they can create a sacred space where agency is activated and we choose whether to turn toward Jesus Christ.
- What does Elder Hathaway teach about the relationship between righteousness and opposition?
- Why should grief, fear, or sincere questions not automatically be viewed as spiritual weakness?
- How can difficult emotions create an opportunity to exercise agency?
- What questions or emotions do I need to acknowledge honestly before Heavenly Father?
- What does turning toward Jesus Christ look like when I feel afraid, disappointed, or alone?
- How can I respond more compassionately to someone whose suffering includes difficult questions?
Seek Heavenly Father and Jesus Christ Sincerely
Sincere spiritual seeking means turning toward Heavenly Father and Jesus Christ through heartfelt prayer, purposeful fasting, and scripture study. Elder Hathaway points to Alma’s people and King Darius as examples of seeking divine help in distress. These acts of faith draw us closer to the Savior.
Sincere seeking means turning toward Heavenly Father and Jesus Christ through heartfelt prayer, purposeful fasting, and scripture study.
Alma’s people in bondage “began to cry mightily to God.”
Such acts of faith draw us closer to Jesus Christ.
- Which practices does Elder Hathaway identify as expressions of sincere seeking?
- How do Alma’s people and King Darius illustrate seeking divine help?
- What purpose does spiritual seeking serve beyond asking for a trial to end?
- How can I make my prayers more heartfelt rather than merely routine?
- What question or need can give greater purpose to my fasting and scripture study?
- What specific practice can I strengthen this week to draw closer to Jesus Christ?
Receive Assurances as You Keep Your Covenants
As we humbly and patiently keep our covenants, the Savior visits us in our afflictions and brings assurances of deliverance. Peace, faith, and hope can come before a trial ends. Sister Kenzie Brinkerhoff’s testimony illustrates how grief and sacred confidence in Christ’s healing can coexist.
As we humbly and patiently keep our covenants, the Savior will visit us in our afflictions and bring assurances of deliverance.
We were not immediately delivered from the trial, but that assurance gave us hope in the deliverance that would come.
I have never clung so tightly to my covenants. I know that Jesus knows what this feels like, and He will heal me.
- How does an assurance of deliverance differ from the immediate removal of an affliction?
- What role does covenant keeping play in Elder Hathaway’s teaching about assurances?
- How does Sister Brinkerhoff’s testimony show that deep grief and faith can exist together?
- What moments of peace, faith, or hope do I recognize within an unresolved difficulty?
- How can I cling more closely to my covenants without expecting them to prevent all suffering?
- What assurance from the Lord do I want to record and remember when discouragement returns?
Draw on Christ’s Grace to Endure
The grace of Jesus Christ supplies enabling power to endure what we cannot bear alone. It does not necessarily remove pain, but it gives strength beyond our own as we act faithfully and trust God. Prayer, obedience, and covenant keeping help us bind ourselves to Heavenly Father and Jesus Christ.
Enabled enduring comes through the grace of Jesus Christ
This grace does not remove the pain and difficulty of affliction; it is an enabling power that allows us, after all we can do, to receive divine strength beyond our own and lay hold on eternal promises through Jesus Christ.
That same enabling grace is available to all who turn to Jesus Christ.
- How does Elder Hathaway distinguish enabling grace from the removal of suffering?
- What does Doctrine and Covenants 123:17 teach about acting within our power and trusting God?
- How do prayer, obedience, and covenant keeping relate to receiving divine strength?
- Where do I need strength beyond my own rather than simply a change in circumstances?
- What lies within my power to do today, and what do I need to entrust to the Lord?
- How do I recognize the Savior’s enabling grace in the support, courage, or endurance I receive?
Wait Faithfully for Christ’s Time and Way
Jesus Christ delivers in His own time and way, and waiting can bring spiritual growth that an earlier rescue does not produce. Jairus’s experience shows that apparently final circumstances do not place anyone beyond the Savior’s power. Some miracles come immediately, others follow long waiting, and some await the Resurrection.
He has not forgotten you. He does not take joy in your suffering.
He knows that lessons learned while waiting can bring converting growth that an earlier rescue might not produce.
Be not afraid, only believe.
Some miracles are immediate, some come after long waiting, and some await the Resurrection.
I will seek that which was lost, and bring again that which was driven away, and will bind up that which was broken, and will strengthen that which was sick.
- What does Elder Hathaway teach about the Lord’s care for those who wait for deliverance?
- How does the account of Jairus challenge the belief that it is too late for Christ to help?
- Why is the Resurrection essential to understanding the promise of divine deliverance?
- How can the Lord consecrate afflictions for our gain without taking joy in our suffering?
- What unresolved circumstance invites me to trust the Savior’s time and way?
- What spiritual growth do I recognize as I continue to wait upon the Lord?
- How can I act on “Be not afraid, only believe” while honestly acknowledging my grief or uncertainty?
- How does the promise of the Resurrection shape my hope when a loss does not receive a mortal resolution?
