followHIM - God Has the Earth on TiVo • followHIM Favorites • June 2-8 • Come Follow Me

Starting point is 00:00:00 John 58, verse 3 Hello, welcome to Follow Him Favorites. This is where John and I share a single story to go with each week's lesson. John, we are in section 58 and 59. The saints get to Missouri. The Lord says something to them that I want to read to you. I want to tell you a story about how I learned this lesson that's in this verse. It's section 58, verse 3.

Starting point is 00:00:23 The Lord is saying, I know that you think this is going to work out perfectly, but hold on. You cannot behold with your natural eyes, your human eyes, the design of your God concerning what's coming up, and the glory which shall follow after much tribulation. The Lord basically is saying, you can't see what I see. I've got the big picture When things get hard, it's okay. I learned this lesson John with a new technology. You might remember it It was called TiVo. Do you remember TiVo? Yeah, it was like a VCR, but it was digital you could record live television and you could rewind it right there digital. You could record live television and you could rewind it right there. Before you could put a cassette tape in and you could record a show and then later go watch it. But this was, it's recording as it's happening and then right in the middle of the show.

Starting point is 00:01:14 Sure, I can pause the show, pick it up later. This was huge, John. I don't think the young people out there understand the trials we went through before. Yeah, we went through the VHS years. We suffered through commercials. Do you remember commercials? Oh, kids see those now on YouTube and they're like, dad, what happened? The TV broke, you know, that's called a commercial. Commercials if you remember, John, they always came at the wrong moment in the show. The part where it's just a cliffhanger.

Starting point is 00:01:44 The guy's got the knife. he's coming after the other guy. And then we all knew you had two and a half minutes to go make popcorn, go to the bathroom. We all knew it. John, did you ever call it when you were watching a show as it was getting up to this moment? You're like, commercial, commercial, I guarantee it commercial. And it would, it would go to commercial. I watch really old shows if you're watching Sometimes you see a white circle go boop blip onto the film It's a mark for the film to stick a commercial in

Starting point is 00:02:13 So if you watch Andy and Barney and Mayberry, you know boop when a commercials coming I don't even think the youth today understand how hard it was to watch one episode a week You have to wait. Yeah, you had to wait until next week. My students, they watch entire season one day. They binge watch. What would we have given? TiVo comes out.

Starting point is 00:02:35 I can't afford TiVo when it comes out, but my buddy Lin Bowler, he could afford TiVo. He said, do you want to come over and watch Utah Jazz basketball with me? That's also been much tribulation, by the way. I said, Yeah, he says, What we'll do is I'll put it on TiVo. We can start the game late. We can fast forward through all the commercials. Amazing. We're watching the Jazz game, John. This was a playoff game. If the Jazz lost, they would be done for the season. We're fast forwarding through the commercials and watching fast forwarding through the commercials. The second half starts. This is not looking good, John. The Jazz were going down.

Starting point is 00:03:16 They were down by double digits. They're down by 15 or 16 point. The crowd for the other team is so happy. They're high fiving each other. I'm starting to weep. I just can't do this. Can't have the jazz break my heart again. We get to this point where it goes to a commercial. Lynn pauses the game, runs out of the room. He's going to go do something. I don't know what it was. He had a quick error and he needed to run. I don't know. His wife, Haley, says, oh, we can fast forward to the commercials, get it ready. When he gets back, we can start it again. we can fast forward to the commercials, get it ready when he gets back, we can start it again. But instead of hitting fast forward through the commercials, she hit the live TV button.

Starting point is 00:03:57 You got to see the game where it actually was. Well, right when she hits the live TV button, the game had ended, not two seconds before. There's the Jazz. They are jumping up and down because there's the final score. The Jazz had won by three points. She's no no no no no no no she hurried and went back to where it was. She said you didn't see that. Yes I did. She said well don't tell Lynn. She and my wife left. They know the end. I'm sitting there. Lynn comes back and he said hey word Haley and Sarah go I said oh I think they're gonna go do something else he said oh they think it's over you know

Starting point is 00:04:31 sort of something like that he started the game again and there the Jazz were down by 16 the other team is fans are cheering so loud the other team is so excited to be up by that much He looks over me Lin and he says so who do you think's gonna win? And I remember thinking something like yeah, I got a pretty good feeling I got a pretty good feeling He said you really think so. I said, yeah, I don't know. I don't know. Some people have told me John you should have bet him

Starting point is 00:05:03 Can't do that. He was my friend. Plus he was my bishop. Can you imagine when he's like, are you honest in your dealings with your? But John, when the game was on, I remember being so calm. I think the jazz went down even further. I just was calm as a summer's day. He's looking at me going, you seem okay.

Starting point is 00:05:27 Before I was yelling at the TV and crying. I said, I just feel good about this. I feel fine about it. And John, it happened exactly as I had prophesied. The Jazz slowly came back, hit a bunch of threes in a row. Pretty soon the game is over. Just as I had foreseen, they won by three. I remember watching the opposing team's fans cheering towards the end of the game. I almost felt badly for

Starting point is 00:05:51 them. All this is all going to turn around on you. You're not going to feel good in here in a few minutes. I ended up telling Lynn. We laughed about it. I went home and I talked to Sarah and I said, I think the Lord just taught me using TiVo how he sees us. Because you don't get a lot of panic from him. You don't get him yelling at us in our lives saying, what are you doing? What are you thinking? Maybe John because he knows the end. You cannot see what I see. You cannot behold for the present time the design of your God. When we go to the Lord and

Starting point is 00:06:26 say, Lord, I don't think this is going to work out, we get back from him, be still, know that I am God. We can trust he's seen the end. Great analogy when we think about in the midst of tribulation before the second coming, but we know how this is all gonna turn out. We can watch things unfold in a calmer way. Trust that he sees the end. The Lord has the earth on TiVo. Maybe we can even look up and go, are you seeing this? Are you fast forwarding through this part? I wish I was. We hope you'll join us on our full podcast. It's called Follow Him. You can get it wherever you get your podcast. We are with Sister Whitney Johnson this week. She is phenomenal. She brings in some expertise that John and I just don't have. You're going to love what she does

Starting point is 00:07:15 with these sections. Then come back next week. We'll do another Follow Him favorites.

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followHIM - God Has the Earth on TiVo • followHIM Favorites • June 2-8 • Come Follow Me

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