At 5:15 this morning Venus rose.  Exactly an hour and a half later the sun rose.  Each clear morning finds me sitting on the couch and watching.  I’m anticipating these events, and suspect that I’m one of few in the valley who is doing so, or who has the opportunity.  Everyone else is either sleeping, or doesn’t have a living room and couch with the proper orientation, or is too busy with his or her own preoccupations to bother.

For example, my wife came out of the bedroom right at sunup and immediately set to work making bread sticks.  She’s going to take soup and bread sticks to her elderly friend today before she gives her first piano lesson in Baker.  That’s a wonderful gesture, but she missed the sunrise.  As the first ray flashed over the mountain, she was looking at a cookbook and measuring ingredients.—And that’s OK, but I was just then feeling sorry for everyone else in the valley who was missing this spectacular event.

I’d just been doing an experiment.  The sky was getting bright.  Thirty minutes earlier Venus was easy to spot, but now where was it?  I knew how fast it was rising in the sky, and I knew where to look; but for several minutes I couldn’t find it.  My focus was either too far away, or too close.  That little pinprick of light in a lightening sky was almost impossible to find.

But finally I spotted it.  After that I found that I could look away, concentrate on other things, look back, and readily find Venus.  I knew where to look, and how to hold and focus my eyes.  I could even do it five minutes after the sun rose.  It was easy for me to do, but trying to point Venus out to anyone else would have been utterly impossible.

Jesus Christ is like that.  If you’re looking for Him, you’ll find Him.  I can plead with you, beg you, and point Him out to you; but unless you’re looking for Him, you won’t find Him.  If you’re happy with your preoccupations, that’s your choice; but you’re missing the blessings—and they’re huge.

It’s one thing to just not know; but it’s quite another to purposely ignore, and even worse, to willfully oppose.

The gospel of Jesus Christ is loaded with blessings, while the scriptures are loaded with woes for those who won’t receive them.

“Wo unto the deaf that will not hear.”  (2 Nephi 9:31).

“Wo unto the blind that will not see.”  (2 Nephi 9:32).

“Wo unto the rich...(whose) hearts are upon their treasures.”  (2 Nephi 9:30).

“Wo unto them that rise up early in the morning, that they may follow strong drink” (instead of enjoying the sunrise).  (2 Nephi 15:11).

“Wo unto the wise in their own eyes and prudent in their own sight.”  (2 Nephi 15:21).

“Wo unto him that has the law given...that has all the commandments of God...and that transgresseth them, and that wasteth the days of his probation...”  (2 Nephi 9:27).

“Wo unto them that call evil good, and good evil, that put darkness for light, and light for darkness, that put bitter for sweet, and sweet for bitter!”  (2 Nephi 15:20).

I’m allergic to woes, but I need all the blessings I can get.

Every good thing in the world is tied to Jesus Christ.  If we want those good things, instead of woes, we must seek them.

“Seek and ye shall find,” Jesus said.  (Matthew 7:7).

Isaiah counseled, “Seek ye the Lord while he may be found.”  (Isaiah 55:6).

And again Jesus promises, “Draw near unto me and I will draw near unto you; seek me diligently and ye shall find me; ask and ye shall receive; knock, and it shall be opened unto you.”  (D&C 88:63).

The great secret for finding anything is that you have to look.

Nephi got upset with his brothers when they told him that they couldn’t understand the spiritual things their father was trying to teach them.  And he said to them, “Have ye inquired of the Lord?”

“And they said unto me:  We have not; for the Lord maketh no such thing known unto us.”

(Can’t you just see Lehi, and Nephi too, pointing and trying everything they can to get Laman and Lemuel to figuratively see Venus?)

“Behold, I said unto them:  How is it that ye do not keep the commandments of the Lord?  How is it that ye will perish, because of the hardness of your hearts?

“Do ye not remember the things which the Lord hath said?”  (And now Nephi tells them—and us—how to receive revelation, how to find the Lord).

“If ye will not harden your hearts, and ask me in faith, believing that ye shall receive, with diligence in keeping my commandments, surely these things shall be made known unto you.”  (1 Nephi 15:7-11).

"Surely these things shall be made known unto you:"

1. If you don’t harden your heart,
2. If you ask in faith (and Moroni adds, “with a sincere heart, with real intent.”—Moroni 10:4),
3. If you believe you’re going to receive and find,
4. And if you’re diligent in keeping the commandments.

It’s pretty simple.  The hardest part is making yourself begin the search.  If you want to be able to see Venus after the sun has risen, you’ll have to get up early while Venus is still plainly visible in the sky.  Thereafter you’ll have to periodically keep glancing back at it to note its progress.  An hour and a half after it’s risen, it’s high in the sky, and the sun is just coming up.  At that point if you take your eye off it for even a second, you’ll lose it.

Jesus is like that.  He’s easy to be found if you get up early, study your scriptures, don’t harden your heart, ask in faith, believe that you’ll receive, and diligently keep his commandments.

He wants to be found.

He wants to bless you.

But you have to do the looking.