Being reconciled to God requires us to recognize Him and what He does for us. We must also recognize ourselves and what we can do for Him. The concept of being chosen to represent God is borne out in the scriptures and in a future lesson supplement, #43 - A Chosen Generation we will examine the concept closer. Both Jews and Latter-day Saints consider the "House of Israel" as chosen. Some of the most important characteristics of reconciliation are mercy and forgiveness.

 

"How odd of God, to choose the Jews." W.N. Ewer, who wrote this jingle, could not understand why Israel is God's Chosen People. Moses, in Deuteronomy 7:7--8, explains it thus: "The Lord did not set His love upon you because you were more in number than any people . . . but because the Lord loved you, and because He would keep the oath which He had sworn to your fathers." The rabbis insist that Israel was elected because it voluntarily accepted the Torah whereas other nations would not. Mercy and forgiveness, says the Talmud, are distinguishing characteristics of Abraham and his seed, and these characteristics motivated God to choose Israel as His people." (Encyclopedia Judaica Jr.)

 

The value in forgiving and being forgiven affects the whole health of a person. The Lord required us to forgive because He forgives us.

 

"Asaph was a religious doctor and tried to harmonize science and religion. He believed that since many diseases came as punishments for sins, a patient could be cured only by praying hard, asking forgiveness and giving charity, because God was the true healer, only God could give doctors the power to use properly all the medicine they had learnt. He also taught that forbidden food was a cause of disease, while kosher food prevented it."

 

There is a mistaken idea that if one truly repents and truly forgives that he will forget. The scriptural verses about remembrance indicate that the Lord is the one who will forget our mistakes. Apparently we need to have memory, because it is from our memory of good and bad that we learn. As we remember our sins and the sins of our forefathers, we can prevent ourselves from making the same mistakes again.

 

"But this shall be the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel; After those days, saith the LORD, I will put my law in their inward parts, and write it in their hearts; and will be their God, and they shall be my people.

And they shall teach no more every man his neighbour, and every man his brother, saying, Know the LORD: for they shall all know me, from the least of them unto the greatest of them, saith the LORD: for I will forgive their iniquity, and I will remember their sin no more." (Jeremiah 31:33-34)

 

There is a great value in being reconciled with God through the process of remembering. The memory leads us to seek forgiveness and imbues within us a sense of forgiving.

"It is natural for someone who has endured a terrible disaster to want to bury his painful memories along with the dead and forget the past. But the Jews, being only a tiny minority in the world and having a long history of persecution, cannot afford to forget that Nazism brutally murdered six million of their people. Thus in 1953 the Knesset, Israel's parliament, established Yad Vashem, the Martyrs' and Heroes' Remembrance Authority, to perpetuate their memory."

 

". . . the old-fashioned candle will continue to symbolize for Jews the spirit of God, the light of the Torah, the conclusion of the Sabbath and the memory of those who have passed away."

 

"The rabbis of that generation enacted new laws whose purpose was to fulfill the biblical verse, "If I forget thee, O Jerusalem . . . " (Psalm 137). They decreed that a corner of every house, a part of every meal, even some of every woman's jewelry, be set aside --- in memory of the Temple. Special prayers were formulated to express the yearning of the people to return to Zion and to worship once again in the Temple of God. Instrumental music was banned from the synagogue service, a glass was broken at every wedding, and the words "Next year in Jerusalem" were recited on Passover and at the end of the Day of Atonement --- all in memory of the Temple. Most historians believe that these prayers, customs, and hopes helped to unite the Jewish people and kept alive the hope of returning to Zion, a hope which was fulfilled in our days."

 

"In addition to belief in God, one of the important articles of faith of the Jew is that God is good. Often human beings cannot appreciate God's goodness, because no human being can see the whole course of events as God does. A unique aspect of the Jewish faith is that although God rules the world with absolute justice, He is also merciful and forgives sins against Him. The doctrine of repentance is based on this belief."

 

"The exercise of mercy is an obligation for all Jews. By this it is meant that they must act with compassion and forgiveness towards all mankind, and perform deeds of charity and kindness. This quality is an essential characteristic of God who is known as Rahum ("Merciful") and, in accordance with the tradition which sets as man's goal the imitation of God: "As He is merciful, so be you merciful." Just as God is bound by His covenant of mercy with His people, so is the Jew bound by specific commandments to act mercifully to the oppressed, the alien, the orphan, the widow, and indeed, every living creature. (Encyclopedia Judaica Jr.)

 

On one occasion, a professor of religion went to the Western (wailing) Wall, microphone in hand and began asking religious Jews why they were chosen. One responded, "We are chosen to suffer." Later, in making a point, about the suffering of the Savior, the professor said, "No one is chosen to suffer other than the Lord." Yet, the difficulties, calamities and sufferings of the Jews will ultimately bring them closer to the Lord who covenanted to remember and save His people. Our sufferings bring us closer to Him and those that have the highest responsibilities of serving Him often suffer greatly. They "sink to new heights."

 

"And if thou shouldst be cast into the pit, or into the hands of murderers, and the sentence of death passed upon thee; if thou be cast into the deep; if the billowing surge conspire against thee; if fierce winds become thine enemy; if the heavens gather blackness, and all the elements combine to hedge up the way; and above all, if the very jaws of hell shall gape open the mouth wide after thee, know thou, my son, that all these things shall give thee experience, and shall be for thy good.

The Son of Man hath descended below them all. Art thou greater than he?" (Doctrine & Covenants 122:7-8)

 

"Ecclesiastes or Kohelet, is one of the five Megillot. It has won enduring popularity because of its wise maxims and its counsel on life. "Ecclesiastes" from the Greek and "Kohelet" in Hebrew, mean leader or teacher of a group. The Book reveals the wisdom acquired by Kohelet on his journey through life. He experiences joy and sorrow, faith and doubt, vanity and humility, hypocrisy and truth. The struggle to find meaning and purpose in life was as baffling for him as it is for us today. Kohelet arrives at the conclusion that the true joy of life lies not in wealth nor in vain pleasure but in the spiritual riches of fulfilling mitzvot, God's commandments. Love and reverence for the Almighty help man to accept his fate and to overcome the obstacles and temptation that continually beset him." (Encyclopedia Judaica Jr.)

 

Once reconciled to God, the adversity in life brings His peace. That gives a spirit of fulfillment, completeness and serenity that enables us to comfort and bless others in their difficulties.

 

" It is generally thought that the Hebrew word shalom means peace, but it is really much more than that. The main problem in understanding shalom is that there is no single word for it in English, and even many words when they are strung into deep philosophical theories, cannot capture the full meaning of the simple Hebrew. Shalom in Jewish thought has a positive connotation and, as such, is central to Judaism. Peace, on the other hand, is a negative concept; the absence of war, strife, and fighting. Shalom is more like fulfillment, completeness, serenity, or security. Its opposite is not only war and strife, but adversity, injustice, fragmentation or disunity." (Encyclopedia Judaica Jr.)