The Wild Cousin

      "The voice of one crying in the wilderness" has always held a special place in my heart! He suffered so much as a child, in the sense that his father was killed and he lived with his mother in the wilderness! Yes, John the Baptist did not have an easy childhood nor life, but he did not let that stop him from fulfilling the responsibility given to him to "prepare the way of the Lord". And interesting enough he was a cousin, of that Lord, he was preparing the way for. A "wild cousin" perhaps since he was raised in the wilderness and not brought up in a home of so called "respectable means". BUT he was a good, strong, courageous man who never denied his calling and carried it through to the very end. He had the courage to speak out against even the high-up leaders of the area and was jailed for it. But that did not stop him. He continued to call people to repentance and was very specific about it, enough so that a woman with a guilt-ridden conscience, who refused to repent of her wickedness, used her wicked ways to cause her "so called" husband, the leader at that time in that area, to have John beheaded. And she used very devilish and wicked ways to do so, drawing other people into her plan! But John did not falter in his faith and in fulfilling his calling.

     Also I am grateful to him for coming back as a resurrected being in our day to restore the keys of the Aaronic Priesthood so that the correct power of God, to baptize those who repent, could truly wash away our sins and allow us to take that first step back to our Heavenly Home! 

     Yes, John the Baptist is another of my favorite people from the New Testament!! I only hope that I can learn to have the courage and strength he had, in fulfilling any of the responsibilities that God gives to me!