Mom's Moment
January 25, 2009

Somewhere in the back of my mind I had not paid attention to the fact that Jesus Christ is the great I AM. For some reason I was thinking it was God, the Eternal Father. As I think of it though, the Son does the Father's will in everything... in one of the verses of scripture I remember without looking up the reference it says, "if you have seen me, you have seen the Father..." In nearly all references in the scriptures, when it says "God" it is referring to Jehovah, or Jesus Christ.

Now, getting on with my point, we know Lucifer was not happy or pleased with Christ being chosen for our Heavenly Father's plan in the pre-mortal existence. Did you know that Lucifer means "son of the morning" as well as "light bringer"? He was very important, and yet, because of his choices to rebel against our Heavenly Father, he was cast out, never to receive a mortal body. His name became Satan, which means "slanderer" and "spoiler." Instead of bringing light, he sets out to deceive, to make miserable, and to destroy each of our Heavenly Father's children! And he's having a lot of success!
Satan wanted our Heavenly Father's glory...Satan wanted to be chosen over Christ–he wasn't. So, being the spoiler, the slanderer, he settles for deceiving us into thinking "wrongly" -- he presents his thoughts in our minds as if they are really our thoughts. He is the great liar, the great deceiver -- he is NOT the great I AM.
Satan does everything in his power to belittle us, degrade us – doing so most effectively by what we hear in our heads and think we are telling ourselves. LISTEN to what gets said, then consider the source!! If it is negative, discouraging, self-deprecating (putting yourself down!), frustrated, irritated, angry, impatient, etc. etc., I guarantee you it's NOT from our Heavenly Father!!!

Many times we think it is "us" with those thoughts - - "I am so mad"; "I am so frustrated"; "I am so irritated"; or how about "You make me so mad!" "You are so stupid!" "You are so selfish!" "You are so stubborn!" – the list goes on and on. The adversary is expert at his endeavors!! But we are not helpless. The gospel truly does have the answers, but sometimes we don't recognize them because they are so simple!!
In the Bible Dictionary it says the following:
Since the devil and his premortal angels have no physical body of flesh and bones, they often seek to possess the bodies of mortal beings. There are many such instances recorded in scripture (Matt. 9: 32; Matt. 12: 22; Mark 1: 24; Mark 5: 7; Luke 8: 30; Acts 19: 15; cf. Mosiah 3: 6).
Such can be evicted by the power of faith in Jesus Christ and the exercise of the holy priesthood. Jesus gave this power to his disciples.
(Matt. 10: 1; Mark 16: 17; Luke 10: 17; Acts 5: 16; D&C 84: 67).
So, I hope we learn to be very careful when we start thinking thoughts of "I am..." statements. If they are derogatory, demeaning, or negative we can pretty well bet they come from the adversary. Sure, there are lots of things that we can work on and improve upon. But our Savior, and our Heavenly Father NEVER talk in that way.
We may get reprimanded at times, being told directly to stop, or to change, or whatever! But it is NEVER done in a deceptive way, making us think badly about ourselves. When we receive revelation from the right source, it is always (in my experience) from the outside in. I KNOW it isn't "my thoughts"; even though sometimes they may be very quiet inspirations that come. True revelation/inspiration never deceives!