Thoughts to Keep in Mind

“Jesus Will Say to All Israel, ‘Come Home’”

In the desert of Sinai, Moses gathered the children of Israel at the foot of a mountain. There the Lord declared that He wanted to turn this group of recently liberated slaves into a mighty people. “Ye shall be unto me,” He said, “a kingdom of priests, and an holy nation” (Exodus 19:6). He promised that they would flourish and prosper, even when surrounded by much larger and more powerful enemies (see Deuteronomy 28:1–14).

All this would happen not because the Israelites were numerous or strong or skillful. It would happen, the Lord explained, “if ye will obey my voice indeed, and keep my covenant” (Exodus 19:5). It was God’s power, not their own, that would make them mighty.

Yet the Israelites didn’t always obey His voice, and over time they stopped keeping His covenant. Many started worshipping other gods and adopting the practices of the cultures around them. They rejected the very thing that made them a nation, distinct from everyone else—their covenant relationship with the Lord. Without God’s power protecting them (see 2 Kings 17:6–7), there was nothing to stop their enemies (see 2 Chronicles 36:12–20).

The Scattering

Several times between about 735 and 720 BC, the Assyrians invaded the Northern Kingdom of Israel, home to ten of the twelve tribes, and carried thousands of the Israelites away captive into various parts of the Assyrian Empire (see 2 Kings 17:1–7).¹ These Israelites became known as “the lost tribes,” in part because they were removed from their homeland and scattered among other nations. But they were also lost in a deeper sense: over time they lost their sense of identity as God’s covenant people.

Because the Southern Kingdom of Judah was, at times, more righteous than the Northern Kingdom, it lasted longer.² But eventually the people there also turned away from the Lord. The Assyrians attacked and conquered most of the Southern Kingdom; only Jerusalem was miraculously preserved (see 2 Kings 19; Isaiah 10:12–13). Later, between 597 and 580 BC, the Babylonians destroyed Jerusalem, including the temple, and carried away captive many of the city’s inhabitants (see 2 Kings 24–25; 2 Chronicles 36; Jeremiah 39; 52). About 70 years later, a remnant of Judah was allowed to return to Jerusalem and rebuild the temple. Many, however, stayed in Babylon.³

As the generations passed, Israelites from all the tribes were “scattered … with a whirlwind among all the nations whom they knew not” (Zechariah 7:14; see also Amos 9:8–9). Some had been led away by the Lord to other lands (see 2 Nephi 1:1–5; Omni 1:15–16). Others had left Israel to escape capture (see 2 Kings 25:22–26; Jeremiah 42:13–19; 43:1–7) or for political or economic reasons.⁴

We call these events the scattering of Israel. And it’s important to know about the scattering for several reasons. For one thing, it’s a major topic of the Old Testament: Many Old Testament prophets were witnesses to the spiritual downward spiral that led to the scattering of Israel. They foresaw that scattering and warned about it, and some of them even lived through it.⁵ That’s helpful to remember when you read the books of Isaiah, Jeremiah, Amos, and many of the other books in the latter part of the Old Testament. With this context in mind, when you read their prophecies about Assyria and Babylon, idolatry and captivity, desolation and eventual restoration, you will know what they’re talking about.

Understanding the scattering of Israel will help you understand the Book of Mormon better too, because the Book of Mormon is a record of a branch of scattered Israel (see 1 Nephi 15:12). This record begins with Lehi’s family fleeing Jerusalem in about 600 BC, just before the Babylonians attacked. Lehi was one of those prophets who prophesied about the scattering of Israel.⁶ And his family helped fulfill that prophecy, taking their branch of the house of Israel and planting it on the other side of the world, in the Americas.

The Destruction of Jerusalem by Nebuzar-adan, by William Brassey Hole, © Providence Collection/licensed from goodsalt.com

The Gathering

The scattering of Israel, however, is only half of the story. The Lord doesn’t forget His people, nor does He fully forsake them, even when they have forsaken Him. The many prophecies that Israel would be scattered were accompanied by many promises that God would one day gather them.⁷

That day is today—our day. The gathering has already begun. In 1836, thousands of years after Moses gathered the children of Israel at the foot of Mount Sinai, Moses appeared in the Kirtland Temple to commit to Joseph Smith “the keys of the gathering of Israel from the four parts of the earth” (Doctrine and Covenants 110:11). Now, under the direction of those who hold these keys, the tribes of Israel are being gathered from every nation where the Lord’s servants are able to go.

President Russell M. Nelson has called this gathering “the most important thing taking place on earth today. Nothing else compares in magnitude, nothing else compares in importance, nothing else compares in majesty. And if you choose to, if you want to, you can be a big part of it.”⁸

How do you do it? What does it mean to gather Israel? Does it mean restoring the twelve tribes back to the land they once inhabited? Actually, it means something much greater, much more eternal. As President Nelson explained:

“When we speak of the gathering, we are simply saying this fundamental truth: every one of our Heavenly Father’s children, on both sides of the veil, deserves to hear the message of the restored gospel of Jesus Christ. …

“Anytime you do anything that helps anyone—on either side of the veil—take a step toward making covenants with God and receiving their essential baptismal and temple ordinances, you are helping to gather Israel. It is as simple as that.”⁹

This happens, as Isaiah said, “one by one” (Isaiah 27:12) or, as Jeremiah predicted, “one of a city, and two of a family” (Jeremiah 3:14).

Gathering Israel means bringing God’s children back to Him. It means restoring them to their covenant relationship with Him. It means reestablishing the “holy nation” He proposed to establish so long ago (Exodus 19:6).

Come Home

As a covenant keeper, you are part of the house of Israel.¹⁰ You have been gathered, and you are a gatherer. The centuries-long epic story that began with a covenant between God and Abraham is building to its climax, and you are a key player. Now is the time when “Jesus will say to all Israel, ‘Come home.’”¹¹

This is the message of the gatherers: Come home to the covenant. Come home to Zion. Come home to Jesus Christ, the Holy One of Israel, and He will bring you home to God, your Father.

Notes

1. The ten tribes that were taken captive by Assyria were Reuben, Simeon, Issachar, Zebulun, Dan, Naphtali, Gad, Asher, Ephraim, and Manasseh. Members of the tribe of Levi were spread throughout the other tribes’ territories in order to perform their priestly responsibilities.

2. The Southern Kingdom consisted primarily of the tribes of Judah and Benjamin. However, members of several other tribes lived there too (see 2 Chronicles 11:14–17). For example, Lehi, who lived in Jerusalem, was of the tribe of Manasseh.

3. See Ezra 1; 7; Nehemiah 2. The Babylonian Empire had been conquered by the Persian Empire. It was the Persian king, Cyrus, who allowed several groups of exiled Jews to return to Jerusalem.

4. In AD 70, Jerusalem and its temple were again destroyed, this time by the Romans, and the remaining Jews were scattered throughout many nations of the earth.

5. See Jeremiah 29:18; Ezekiel 22:15; Hosea 9:17; Amos 9:9; 1 Nephi 1:13.

6. See 1 Nephi 1:13, 18–20; 10:12–14.

7. See Isaiah 5:26; 27:12; 54; Jeremiah 16:14–15; 29:14; 31:10; Ezekiel 11:17; 34:12; 37:21–28; Zechariah 10:8; 1 Nephi 10:14; 22:25; 3 Nephi 16:1–5; 17:4.

8. Russell M. Nelson and Wendy W. Nelson, “Hope of Israel” (worldwide youth devotional, June 3, 2018), supplement to the New Era and Ensign, 8, ChurchofJesusChrist.org.

9. Russell M. Nelson and Wendy W. Nelson, “Hope of Israel,” 15, ChurchofJesusChrist.org.

10. See 2 Nephi 30:2.

11. “Now Let Us Rejoice,” Hymns, no. 3.