Amulek LAYS THIS DOWN.
He teaches the Zoramites to cry unto God wherever they may be – refuting their claims that they couldn’t worship due to being cast out of the synagogues.
Pray anywhere and pray everywhere.
Have your heart drawn out in prayer continually to Him.
But then he goes into the most important part of his sermon:
“Do no suppose this is all;
“For after ye have done all these things [praying everywhere], if ye turn away the needy, and the naked, and visit not the sick and afflicted, and impart of your substance… to those in need…
“YOUR PRAYER IS IN VAIN.” (Alma 34:28)
What a humbling lesson.
We can’t pray for other people to feel more love, and then ignore them.
We can’t pray for peace in the world, and then share divisive articles that demonize “the other side”.
We can’t pray for our children to change in some way, and then not adjust anything at home to facilitate the change.
It’s a tough pill to swallow, but I think sometimes we have to own up to the fact that we’ve prayed for a result, and then done nothing to achieve that result.
Or maybe we’ve even worked against it.
That’s what Amulek calls being a hypocrite.
Yikes.
(Sometimes there are situations where we literally can’t do anything else other than pray though, and I fully believe that God can still make miracles happen.)
So, as with all things, the best way to repent for past hypocritical actions is to change moving forward.
What’s a prayer in your heart right now?
Maybe it’s for yourself, or for your family, or for your community, or for the world.
“Pray as if everything depended on God, work as though everything depended on you”. – Saint Ignatius
If you’ve got the first half of the equation down, and you are realllly good at praying fervently about it, that is beautiful!
And now might be a great time to think about how you can act to make it happen.
What’s something you can do TODAY in order to move that desire forward?
Happy Studying!
-Cali Black
