Spiritual Lambert

Lambert was a lion who was mistakenly delivered to a sheep by the stork. No matter how hard he tried, he couldn't fit in with the other lambs, and they made fun of him. When he was older, a wolf came after the flock. Lambert was scared and didn't know what to do. When the wolf started chasing his mom, and he heard her crying for help, something snapped inside him, and he was a raging lion. He roared and attacked the wolf, saving his mom and the rest of the flock. 

As members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, we know our identity. We learn from a young age that we are children of our Heavenly Father.  Satan can't tempt us while we are young until we come to the age of accountability (8 years of age) like a full grown lion like Lambert. The wolf comes in trying to take it away from us, or rather, trying to get us to give it to him. That's where fear comes in. Lambert was raised to be afraid of wolves, because wolves are predators of sheep. So when one comes, he instinctively feels fear, which we also do at times. I do it a lot. He hears his mother's cries yet he still hides, but when he SEE'S the wolf about to get her, a deeper instinct kicks in, a spiritual instinct where a need to protect his mother outweighed his fear.

I go off off fear sometimes as I go through life. I feel a lot like Lambert in that way. Raised with the need of fear to protect myself. Satan attacks more hoping I'll stay in my fear mode (there are many modes he hopes to keep us in but we'll focus on this one for now), keep hiding, cowering, and not notice he is taking our belief in our identity (or belief in who we are). No one, including Satan, can take away who we are and we can't give it away, it's only our belief and faith in who we are that Satan takes. We hear the adversary coming, even if we don't realize it. We cower in fear, whether that comes out as not defending the church when we hear it being attacked, or going along with the crowd even though we know their activities don't follow church standards. When we are able to SEE our spiritual identity, our spiritual instinct kicks in, and we let the spiritual lion inside us out! We take our "Mother" from the wolf and tell him where he can go. We call upon the power of our Savior Jesus Christ and are able to chase off the wolf, or cast Satan out of our presence.

What identity are we protecting? We are children of God. We are children of a Lion. There is nothing higher and holier than being a child of God. Satan wants us to believe we're nothing. He wants us to forget our identity because it's powerful knowledge against him. If we exercise our faith in being a child of God, we have power over the devil.

I challenge you, if you have doubts and fears concerning your spiritual identity,  to go back to what you've been taught as a young child. Remember the truths you've received, and talk to your Heavenly Father, who created you and loves you. I echo the words of Elder Kazuhiko Yamashita in the August 2014 edition of the Friend Magazine: "I am thankful that we know who we are so we can be strong - just like Lambert."

~Jessi Hill