Search the Prophecies of Isaiah

I find it significant that as Mormon wandered by himself, mourning the destruction of his people and the death of his father, he gave us this counsel: “Search the prophecies of Isaiah. Behold, I cannot write them. Yea, behold I say unto you, that those saints who have gone before me, who have possessed this land, shall cry, yea, even from the dust will they cry unto the Lord; and as the Lord liveth he will remember the covenant which he hath made with them” (Mormon 8:23) As he struggled alone, he turned to the words of Isaiah, finding I believe comfort and companionship in that great prophet. He seems to have been paraphrasing this passage from Isaiah: “And thou shalt be brought down, and shalt speak out of the ground, and thy speech shall be low out of the dust, and thy voice shall be, as of one that hath a familiar spirit, out of the ground, and thy speech shall whisper out of the dust” (Isaiah 29:4). Moroni’s voice would one day speak out of the ground to millions of people even though at that point he was utterly alone. Later as he put his final words in the book he would bury in the ground he declared, “And awake, and arise from the dust, O Jerusalem; yea, and put on thy beautiful garments, O daughter of Zion; and strengthen thy stakes and enlarge thy borders forever, that thou mayest no more be confounded, that the covenants of the Eternal Father which he hath made unto thee, O house of Israel, may be fulfilled” (Moroni 10:31). This was a paraphrase of another passage of Isaiah: “Awake, awake; put on thy strength, O Zion; put on thy beautiful garments, O Jerusalem, the holy city: for henceforth there shall no more come into thee the uncircumcised and the unclean” (Isaiah 51:1). When Moroni had no one, he found a companion and comfort in Isaiah.

                We see something similar in the experience of Abinadi. Though not physically alone, he was indeed a lonely witness of the Savior in the midst of the wicked priests of King Noah. They sought to kill him for his testimony, but the Lord preserved him to deliver his message, and who did he turn to when he had no other mortal to help him? Just like Moroni, he turned to the prophecies of Isaiah: “Yea, even doth not Isaiah say: Who hath believed our report, and to whom is the arm of the Lord revealed?... He is despised and rejected of men; a man of sorrows, and acquainted with grief” (Mosiah 14:3). The words of Isaiah were a second witness of the Savior to Abinadi’s testimony, and the fact that this Nephite prophet was in chains before the court of King Noah likely means that what he quoted of Isaiah was all memorized. The ancient Israelite prophet was the missionary companion to Abinadi in that moment. After quoting what we have today as Isaiah 53, Abinadi expounded upon it and quoted from the previous chapter: “And these are they who have published peace, who have brought good tidings of good, who have published salvation; and said unto Zion: Thy God reigneth! And O how beautiful upon the mountains were their feet!... Yea, Lord, thy watchmen shall lift up their voice; with the voice together shall they sing; for they shall see eye to eye, when the Lord shall bring again Zion. Break forth into joy, sing together, ye waste places of Jerusalem; for the Lord hath comforted his people, he hath redeemed Jerusalem. The Lord hath made bare his holy arm in the eyes of all the nations; and all the ends of the earth shall see the salvation of our God” (Mosiah 15:14-15, 29-31; see Isaiah 52:7-10). As he suffered alone, approaching his own painful end, he found strength in the powerful promises of Isaiah that the Lord would one day bring Zion and redeem His people.

                Surely these two examples in the Book of Mormon stand as invitations for us to similarly seek comfort and strength in the words of Isaiah in our difficulties. For example, we can find peace in this passage: “[The Lord shall] appoint unto them that mourn in Zion, to give unto them beauty for ashes, the oil of joy for mourning, the garment of praise for the spirit of heaviness; that they might be called trees of righteousness, the planting of the Lord, that he might be glorified” (Isaiah 61:3). As we are true to the Lord, He will turn ashes into beauty, mourning into joy, and heaviness into feelings of praise. Or when we feel lonely we can turn to this promise: “Fear thou not; for I am with thee: be not dismayed; for I am thy God: I will strengthen thee; yea, I will help thee; yea, I will uphold thee with the right hand of my righteousness…. For I the Lord thy God will hold thy right hand, saying unto thee, Fear not; I will help thee” (Isaiah 41:10,13). We can set aside fear knowing that He will strengthen and help us. And when we struggle to wait for the blessings of the Lord we seek, we can put our trust in this promise of the prophet: “For since the beginning of the world men have not heard, nor perceived by the ear, neither hath the eye seen, O God, beside thee, what he hath prepared for him that waiteth for him. Thou meetest him that rejoiceth and worketh righteousness, those that remember thee in thy ways” (Isaiah 64:4-5). Indeed, “great are the words of Isaiah” and as we “search” them like Moroni invited us we can find strength in the promised blessings of the Lord (3 Nephi 23:1).