With Healing In His Wings

I love reading the 25th chapter of 2nd Nephi.  Like many great chapters of scriptures, it illuminates several different topics concisely. Here are just a few of my thoughts as I read it this morning,

Verse 13, "Behold, they will crucify him; and after he is laid in a sepulchre for the space of three days he shall rise from the dead, with healing in his wings; and all those who shall believe on his name shall be saved in the kingdom of God. Wherefore, my soul delighteth to prophesy concerning him, for I have seen his day, and my heart doth magnify his holy name."

I marvel that after Christ ministered to many for three years, including countless healings, that one of the great things He would do immediately when resurrected is to rise with healing in his wings.  I understand this to mean healing with great power, with His healing available to all of us (compared with being available just to those He was able to meet in His mortal ministry).

I also love Nephi's enthusiasm.  I picture him having visions of Christ's ministry to come, as vivid and detailed as if he were watching a well-done DVD documenting highlights of Christ's life featuring Christ himself, and the actual people and conditions included in his life.  I believe that Nephi was so deeply touched by the experience of seeing and hearing the details of Christ's future life and ministry that he loved talking about it, loved writing about it, loved bearing testimony of it, loved singing of it, and more ... as often as possible. 

I get excited as I feel this level of enthusiasm in Nephi.  Jumping to verse 26, it is no wonder that he says,

"And we talk of Christ, we rejoice in Christ, we preach of Christ, we prophesy of Christ, and we write according to our prophecies, that our children may know to what source they may look for a remission of their sins."

I smile as I think of how many times I enjoyed reciting these words as part of our stake theme in meetings over most of the past decade.

Returning to verse 23, Nephi illuminates further,

"For we labor diligently to write, to persuade our children, and also our brethren, to believe in Christ, and to be reconciled to God; for we know that it is by grace that we are saved, after all we can do."

We can not hope to be saved without the grace of Christ, and without faith and hope in His grace and mercy.  To think that any amount of our works could save us without His grace is impossible (King Benjamin, among others, reminds us wonderfully of that). 

What Christ does expect is that we will strive to develop charity, His pure love, by doing all we can.  He does not expect us to do more than we can, and surely we can do nothing of eternal importance without His help.  But he does expect us to try.

Nephi explains this so well!