Bring Him Home

My wife and I attended a production of the musical Les Misérables last night, and it was an incredible experience. We happened to be sitting about ten feet away from where Jean Valjean sat on the top of the barricade and sang his powerful prayer to God, “Bring Him Home.” As I watched him and heard him pour out his soul in song, I thought of how this scene is symbolic of the Savior’s plea to the Father for each of us. His life was devoted to bringing each of us home—He came live and die for us so that we could each be saved. Jean Valjean sings these words to God:

 

Let him live

If I die, let me die

Let him live

Bring him home

 

That is what the Savior offered as well—He died so that we could live. After the song Jean Valjean picked up the injured Marius and carried him through the sewers to bring him home. He symbolically “descended below all things” like the Savior to save the life of the one Cosette loved (Doctrine and Covenants 88:6).  

As I listened to this song I thought of these words of Jesus to His disciples shortly before He gave His life: “Verily, verily, I say unto you, Except a corn of wheat fall into the ground and die, it abideth alone: but if it die, it bringeth forth much fruit” (John 12:24). He gave up His life in order to provide life for us, both temporally and spiritually. Samuel the Lamanite told the Nephites, “For behold, he surely must die that salvation may come; yea, it behooveth him and becometh expedient that he dieth, to bring to pass the resurrection of the dead, that thereby men may be brought into the presence of the Lord” (Helaman 14:15). He died so that we could all be resurrected and live again. The Savior also was “wounded for our transgressions” that we could find everlasting life in the presence of the Father. He shared with us in our dispensation this prayer that He offers to the Father for us: “Listen to him who is the advocate with the Father, who is pleading your cause before him—Saying: Father, behold the sufferings and death of him who did no sin, in whom thou wast well pleased; behold the blood of thy Son which was shed, the blood of him whom thou gavest that thyself might be glorified; Wherefore, Father, spare these my brethren that believe on my name, that they may come unto me and have everlasting life” (Doctrine and Covenants 45:3-5). He pleads to God for us, offering His perfect blood so that we can return to the Father and have eternal life, just as Jean Valjean pleaded for the life of Marius and then offered his own in return. As Jesus prepared to offer His life He said to the disciples, “Greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends” (John 15:13). Perhaps this scene of Jean Valjean is so powerful to me because he was doing just that. Not only was he risking his life in the barricades and in the sewers to save Marius, but he was also giving up the one thing he loved by so doing: Cosette would be married to Marius and he would go away from her. He was willing to lay down everything, including his life, for Cosette and her future. He showed truly what it means to love, and I believe his story gives us a glimpse of how the Savior loves us and seeks to bring each of us home.