Lay Hold Upon Every Good Thing Part II

You know when I started this blog what I wanted to do was to be able to basically talk to people in a conversational voice and not be held back by some weirdness because I have to write in either poetry or prose. But have it become something that I could open up my heart and share what I feel inside and the light and knowledge that God is giving me about certain topics and that's the purpose of this blog. It's not about me. It's about my Friend, my Lord, and God.

So, originally I felt like writing my blog in some type of sequential order and trying to lay a foundation of easy prosaic thoughts and a way for people to be able to easily understand what I'm talking about. But as I've thought about how God thinks I realize he does not think it linear fashion - so why should I?  For he said, " For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways, saith the Lord. For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways, and my thoughts than your thoughts." (Isaiah 55:8-9)

The purpose of this blog really is to share my own thoughts about the words of Christ in a way that I can keep them organized, go back, and reflect on them and hopefully leave something for my children, my family, my friends and anybody who may be interested in words of Christ.  By discussing the words of Christ we can be able to lay hold on every good thing and try and make it part of them - to try to implement it somehow someway in their hearts.

I love the idea and concept of "laying hold".  The whole reason that I named this blog "lay hold" is because it means so much to me, so I figure "Hey, I'll just get the definition out and start talking about it."

Lay Hold – Greek - katalambánō (from 2596 /katá, "down, according to," which intensifies 2983 /lambánō, "aggressively take") – properly, take hold of exactly, with decisive initiative (eager self-interest); to grasp something in a forceful (firm) manner; (figuratively) to apprehend (comprehend), making it one's "own."

I love that! I think that we have this misreading of the book of Mormon where we read words like "lay hold" or "holding fast" or "clinging" to mean something benign - something like we are just "lightly touching" but yet when we read what it meant in the Greek we see that it meant to "hang on, to make it your's your own, to grab it aggressively".

In 1 Nephi 8 we read about Lehi's vision of the tree of life and he sees a group of people pressing forward to obtain the path which led to the tree and on that path there was this rod of iron and it said people press forward in verse 24 "they came forth and call hold of the end of the rod of iron; and they did press forward through the mist of darkness clinging to the rod of iron even until they did come forth and partake of the fruit of the tree".

The main point of all of this is that we each, every single one of us, lay hold upon every good thing. We everyone need to lay hold upon the words of Christ and make them are own, to take them possess them aggressively in our own heart. Then, by faith and with love unfeigned, we act upon the words of Christ - they fill our hearts, they fill our minds, then we go to work.