The Valley of Decision, Joel 3:14 by Ann Y.

"Multititudes, multitudes in the valley of decision: for the day of the Lord is near in the valley of decision." Joel 3:14

The Valley of Decision

We stand in this valley, as a red dawn is breaking,

With our muscles clenched and our throats aching,

With our sweat dripping and our knees shaking;

Our weapons poised up high.

The pink light that heralds this new day approaching,

Shows a battlefield filled with soldiers uncertain,

Where the enemy lies, or danger is lurking;

We struggle to ascertain.

At our feet lie the bones of the soldiers before us,

Who died without knowing the hymn or the chorus,

Whose only mistake was not knowing the foe was

That serpent who snared Mother Eve.

And now, as we each face our own Armageddon,

We tremble, for the battle has suddenly risen,

Our time in the valley--how quickly is dwindling!

The Valley of Decision.

I read this verse in Joel last week sometime, and it stuck with me. It called out to me for days, and I had to go back and read it over and over again. It has, of course, many meanings (like all good scripture). One meaning is to be found from going back to the verse before. It tells people to "put ye in the sickle, for the harvest is ripe..." That is clearly a reference to missionary work. We see that phrase many times, particularly in the Doctrine and Covenants. So one meaning here is obviously admonishment to go out and do missionary work. And the connotation is to do it quickly, as "the day of the Lord is near."

But if you read the footnotes at the bottom of the LDS version of the King James Bible, you'll note that there is a reference to Revelation 16:16. This verse specifically speaks about Armageddon. So I did a little research about Armageddon. 

In the bible dictionary, Armageddon is listed as a Greek transliteration of the Hebrew word, Har Megiddon, which is the Mountain of Megiddo. The valley of this mountain is some miles north of Jerusalem. Many important battles took place there in ancient times, and apparently, the major battle of Armageddon will take place there as well. This will be a final, decisive battle where good will triumph over evil. So this is a literal place where a crucial decision for the future of mankind will take place. But like so many of the stories and prophecies in the bible, they have their literal time and place...and then they have either a type or shadow of things to come, or they have a figurative time and place.

As I read this verse over and over again, I could picture in my mind our time. I saw mists of darkness that surround us all. I saw our lost and confused brothers and sisters standing in a valley, armed and prepared for battle. They can hear the enemy approaching, and they know a battle is coming. Only they don't know who they're fighting, or why. They stand in this Valley of Decision and they don't know what decision to make.

I think, that in a larger sense, this earth life is the Valley of Decision for all of us. We stand here, and we face the onslaught of Satan, and we must choose for ourselves which side to fight for.

We have but a few years in this world to fight our own Armageddon, our own decisive battle for the outcome of our souls. Which side do we choose?

because thou did obey my voice Gen 22:1-18

Not too long after our son Robert was born, we moved to Tennessee. One morning while the children slept late, I took time and knelt in earnest prayer. I prayed for family, my husband, my children, my parents, and many of the dear friends I had made while living in Knoxville. As I lifted myself up off of my knees, I had the distinct impression that I needed to drop all of my plans for the day and drive over to visit Mary Anne. 


I gathered my children into the car and drove over to my friends home. I remember as I got out of the car I felt myself being wrapped with a love I had not known before. It filled me up, moved me to tears and as I walked toward the house it enveloped me.  I remember knocking on the door and having Mary Anne open the door with a look of astonishment upon her face. "What are you doing here?" she asked boldly but still trying to be polite. I stumbled upon my words, tried to hide my embarrassment and possible misjudgment and finally told her I didn't know, but I felt very impressed to come and ask if I could be of help. 


She then invited me in explained how only a few hours before she had been rear ended. Her car was severely damaged but mostly she was suffering from whiplash and was in great pain. She was angry and hurt because of the financial damage that the accident had caused. Her anger consumed her and  she had refused to pray. So why was I there? To help her pray? We enjoyed a long conversation and before I left I knelt in prayer with her. Her husband (not a believer) did not encourage prayer and she had been overwhelmed as she tried to handle everything on her own. When I first arrived, her anger seemed to be a living beast with which she had been struggling. By the time I left and we had time to talk about our faith and the power of prayer, she was much improved and the battle over anger had been won.

I remember this day not because of the pain and anger my dear friend went through, but because she had been cared for by a higher power. Her astonishment when she answered the door was not because I was there, but because of who my presence represented. I had come to serve her and help her remember God's love for her. She had been trying to handle life alone... until cornered she didn't know who to call or where to turn. God knew. God knew of her need. God had a plan to care for her. God had a plan to help her understand his love for her.  I had been listening and "because ... I did obey .."his" voice." I was able to act as a means to bring relief to my dear friend. As we sat and discussed how this all came about both of our testimonies grew. We realized that the sacrifice of both time and desire was needed for the miracle to occur. I had sacrificed my time and desire to do what I wanted. Mary Anne had sacrificed her need for independence and her will to be angry.

As I pondered what to write about I realized that the real thing that Abraham was being tested on was desire. What was his desire? To have his will over God's? or to have God's will over his own. It is a hard thing to master... this thing we call desire.

Abraham's faith was at a point where he was asked to give up the one thing that God knew he loved the most. He had spent most of his life praying for it: Gen as:2-3; 13: 14-16; 15:5; 17:2,4,7 all reveal the promises that God has made to Abraham concerning his progeny and eternal life. Genesis 22 is the climax of a great story of faith. Here he has all that he has wanted and God does not take it from him, but rather he asks Abraham to give it up. It is the ultimate test of loyalty, obedience and faith. It was meant to help Abraham understand the importance of not only loving and respecting the greater power of God, but also of giving all he had to it.

I could have brushed off my knees that morning and started one of my many projects. Or crossed off many of my "to-do" items that fill my errand list and  are always weighing on me, but I chose to listen.. I chose to follow the less traveled road ...I chose to obey...  and that made all the difference.

What if Abraham had not obeyed? What if he had become angry?  And what if the story had been played out before but we only got the condensed version? I don't mean to sacrilegious, but consider that Abraham might have had the prompting before and chose to ignore it until he was at a place in his faith that he had the strength to do what was required of him. The Lord teaches us "line upon line."I believe it's important for us to realize this possibility because the Bible Stories all come to us in a condensed version. We must consider the time schedule that were written in. We must realize that not all stories play out like a television sit com. We must also realize that this story in Genesis 22 represents the culmination of all of the faith trials that Abraham had endured. We surely did not receive all of them in the book of Genesis. As we surely can not know all of the times the Lord has spoken to him.

The Lord has blessings he will give us when we choose to obey the voice that answers our prayers. Part of the practice of prayer is learning to listen and then distinguish between the voice of our own will over that of the Lord. Consider that the angel of the Lord called a second time to Abraham that because he had not "withheld thy son, thine only son," he would fulfill all of the blessings that he had promised him.

My favorite line is "and in thy seed shall all the nations of the earth be blessed, because thou hast obeyed my voice." 

In my days... in my life... I can't bless "all the nations" by being obedient to the Lord, but I can bless
all the children of my family, all my friends, all of my family.  I can help those I love  remember the importance of not only listening and hearing the Lord's voice (or that of his angels), but of obeying.
It takes courage to overcome fear and discipline to forge courage. It is my prayer that my children, my children's children and my extended network of family and friends will all benefit from the blessing of my choices in life. It is my prayer that like Abraham, I will choose to "obey" my Lord's voice and counsel of wisdom.

Genesis 22 A Lamb for an offering

When God asks us to sacrifice, he always provides a lamb in the bushes.

It's been a long week for me. A week of second guessing myself and choosing direction.  A week of travel, meetings, and family time that has caused me to wonder why I read and ponder and study the scriptures the way I do.  Why am I on this scripture journey? And that led me to consider if Abraham ever wondered why his love for God had brought him to the place where he was willing to listen to obedience and love for God over ethical reason, over family security?  His faith was so sure that he didn't know how God would answer his pleas, but he knew he had to obey, and that his answer would come in and through his obedience. In practicing obedience he would find the answers and understanding of God's law that he longed for.  God had kept his promise before, why would God forsake him now? He didn't know where the Lamb for an offering would come from, but surely as he prepared and did all that God required of him, he knew that the lamb would be there. He trusted God. And in trusting God, he learned to trust himself. God knew how Abraham would respond. The test was for Abraham to learn how Abraham would respond. 

Concerning Abraham, President Hugh B. Brown said,  

"God commanded Abraham to sacrifice Isaac because "Abraham needed to learn something about Abraham" (in Truman G. Madsen, The Highest in Us [1978], 49). 

Elder George Q. Cannon spoke about Abraham in the April 1899 Conference. He said: 

“Why did the Lord ask such things of Abraham? Because, knowing what his future would be and that he would be the father of an innumerable posterity, he was determined to test him. God did not do this for His own sake; for He knew by His foreknowledge what Abraham would do; but the purpose was to impress upon Abraham a lesson, and to enable him to attain unto knowledge that he could not obtain in any other way. That is why God tries all of us. It is not for His own knowledge; for He knows all things beforehand. He knows all your lives and everything you will do. But He tries us for our own good, that we may know ourselves. ... He required Abraham to submit to this trial because He intended to give him glory, exaltation and honor; He intended to make him a king and a priest, to share with Himself the glory, power and dominion which He exercised” (GeorgeQ. Cannon, in Conference Report, Apr. 1899, 66).

Sometimes it feels like when I sit down to write I am listening to obedience over reason. I don't have a clue how many people I am reaching?   Do my words matter? Is it a wise use of my time, my faith? But I know, like Abraham,  that God is reaching me: one person, one mother, one daughter, one sister, one grandmother, one handmaiden of the Lord, one family.  When there are so many other things I can with my time I wonder why I write so deeply about what I learn? The beauty is that every time I write... every time I am obedient to the promptings to analyze and present my thoughts on the scriptures, I find "a lamb" in the bushes, some surprise that God has prepared for me that I would not have seen if I had chosen to disobey. Usually it comes in a learned principal that raises my spirit up, or stabilizes the ground I stand on. Or it might teach me a new perspective that becomes imperative in my own families peril of survival, but not always. Sometimes it merely brings me peace. A peace that I am certain Abraham felt when he realized where his loyalties lay and the rewards that his faith would bring him and all of his likewise obedient progeny. 

The sister missionaries in my daughters mission

I have a daughter who is currently on a mission for our church. Her leaders have kept a mission blog and I read it from time to time. Tonight when I read through it I was amazed at how much sacrifice is given by each missionary and by each leader. There is one photo of the mission president and his wife washing dishes. Mission Presidents come from all walks of life: wealthy, poor, educated, not so educated, successful businessmen, farmers, sportsmen, educators, etc. When they come to serve the Lord they come to serve. The only prerequisite they need is a willing heart to sacrifice what or whom they love so that others can learn and feel of God's love.  Fortunately the law of blood sacrifice passed with the atonement by Jesus Christ. God now proves us by asking us to present our willingness to serve and love one another. It starts in our family with our spouse, our children, our parents and then moves to our neighbors our church community, our school or city of residence. We are asked to forsake selfish pleasures and desires for the welfare of something larger than ourself.  When we do this we find .... our own joys.  But mostly.. we find ourself. We discover what we hold dear. Each choice to serve and obey defines us. It draws us into the circle of God's love. 




It's not because God needs to know who we are and what we are capable of, it's because like Abraham who was given a commandment to sacrifice the very thing he had lived his entire life for, the very promise that God had given him, we are brought to our own personal trials so that we too might know where our loyalties and our joys lie. 


I have found that when I read and contemplate the scriptures each week, I am able to make my relationship with him more active. No longer am I a passive receiver of words.  By writing what I learn the lessons become imprinted on my heart and act as a guiding star in my daily decisions. How often have I considered Sarah and Abraham and their love for one another, their epic story of love, fidelity, faith, and what they sacrificed for me so that I might have a higher understanding of God's law. How grateful I am to my friend who challenged me a year ago to read Genesis. Never in my wild imaginations could I have conceived how profoundly this book of holy scripture would forever change me. By making a consistent effort to commit to feast on his words I have found great peace and comfort in my trials. I have learned to let anxiety pass me by and understood better what it means to trust in the Lord with all my heart, might, mind and strength. I have not known fewer trials, but I have had the strength to use my trials as stepping stones. And isn't it true that with each trial we face if we don't make it into a stepping stone, it becomes a stumbling stone that stresses us and causes us to loose our way. 

Concerning the stress and trials that Abraham went through to discover these truths Elder Neal A. Maxwell  said our lives “cannot be both faith-filled and stress-free....

“Therefore, how can you and I really expect to glide naively through life, as if to say, Lord, give me experience, but not grief, not sorrow, not pain, not opposition, not betrayal, and certainly not to be forsaken. Keep from me, Lord, all those experiences which made Thee what Thou art! Then let me come and dwell with Thee and fully share Thy joy!” (in Conference Report, Apr. 1991, 117; or Ensign, May 1991, 88 ).

Most focus in Genesis 22 is on  the fact that he is offering his son, that he has ignored the moral law of not killing your own, that it goes against everything God had taught him, or that it is just so horrible to consider that he would give his son. We focus on Isaac and his grief and pain. Abraham's sacrifice is hard to consider because Abraham's trial is our own. It is why we have a hard time pondering it. It is the sacrifice we forsake to serve another, to stand as a witness, to show God and ourself that the love within us is the love we believe it is.