Area Presidency Message
A Tree Planted by the Water
As we put our confidence in the Lord, we shall enjoy His promised blessings and prosper as a ‘tree planted by the rivers of water’.
Jeremiah’s message to Judah in Jeremiah 17:8 is a message of hope for all who trust in the Lord Jesus Christ as our Savior. Even when we are weak, the Lord remains faithful, and even when we fail Him, He remains strong. His love and grace toward us is never-changing.
We are blessed when our hope is in the Lord, for we “shall be like a tree planted by the rivers of water, that bringeth forth his fruit in his season; his leaf also shall not wither; and whatsoever he doeth shall prosper”1. Such a person can always find peace and comfort in the midst of uncertainty, because his or her roots are extended into the lifegiving streams of the Savior.
A sister who comes to mind is Sister Caroline Masiliso Sifaya. She, her husband, and their children were baptized in the Lusaka, Zambia branch in 1994. A year later, they were sealed in the Johannesburg South Africa Temple.
Five years later in 1999, I visited Sister Sifaya at the Lusaka, Zambia University Teaching Hospital. She sat next to the bed of her eight-year-old son, Mwini Butala, who was in a critical condition. Mwini had survived an accident which had claimed the life of Sister Sifaya’s husband, Sondo Sifaya, who had been serving as the branch president in Lusaka.
I had traveled from Zimbabwe to console and to give a word of comfort to Sister Sifaya who was serving as the institute of religion instructor. Upon greeting her and extending my deepest sympathy to her for the loss of her husband and for a son who was lying almost lifeless on the bed, she smiled and said, “Brother Dube, I am grateful for the privilege we had as a family to be sealed in the Johannesburg South Africa Temple. The Atonement of Jesus Christ is a great blessing in our lives.”
Sister Sifaya’s reliance on the Atonement of Jesus Christ enabled her to carry on when her burdens seemed too heavy and too intense to bear. She truly depended upon “the merits, and mercy, and grace of the Holy Messiah”2.
Sister Sifaya seemed very confident and hopeful for what lay before her. Like a tree planted near the water, she did not fear when she was faced with almost insurmountable challenges, because she placed her hope in the Lord for strength and deliverance. As a covenant person, the Lord fulfilled His promise to her as He did to Alma and his people: “I will also ease the burdens which are put upon your shoulders, that even you cannot feel them upon your backs.”3
Sister Sifaya’s son Mwini died a few years after my hospital visit. She assumed the role of a single parent in the most amazing way. She managed to triple her modest schoolteacher’s income by converting part of her house into a preschool and enrolling children from a nearby community. She worked day and night to ensure that her children got the necessary education in life. She continued serving faithfully in the Church, inspiring the institute students who attended her class to serve missions.
Her children excelled in education, furthering their studies to university level both locally and abroad. Sister Sifaya now has three grandchildren and is currently serving as a stake Primary president in Lusaka. Sister Sifaya’s “leaf [has been] green; . . . neither [has it ceased] from yielding fruit.”4 She has assisted her children to be like a tree planted by the water, and she is doing the same for her grandchildren. Can you imagine what her posterity will be?
To be like a tree planted by the water means to search the scriptures diligently, to pray unceasingly, to pay an honest tithe, to keep the commandments and covenants, to learn our duties and to act in the office in which we are appointed in all diligence. The price we pay to be like a tree planted by the water is far less than the promised blessings.
I extend an invitation to you, my dear brothers and sisters to do all you can to be like a tree planted in the water. As you embrace this invitation, there are numerous promised blessings. Here are just a few: “Inasmuch as ye shall keep [the commandments of God], ye shall prosper in the land”.5
Consider this blessing promised to us and to our children: “Blessed art thou and thy children; and they shall be blessed, inasmuch as they shall keep my commandments they shall prosper in the land”.6
We are also promised that “the Lord in his great infinite goodness doth bless and prosper those who put their trust in him.
“Yea, and we may see at the very time when he doth prosper his people, yea, in the increase of their fields, their flocks and their herds, and in gold, and in silver, and in all manner of precious things of every kind and art, sparing their lives, and delivering them.”7
You and I need to lift up our heads and be of good cheer. We are like a tree planted along the refreshing waters of the river that sendeth out its roots by the river, because the Lord knows “the covenant which [we] have made unto [Him]”. When heat or drought comes, we shall not be concerned or worried because we are always bearing fruit and our leaves will always be green. The Lord’s promise is real: “I will covenant with my people and deliver them out of bondage.”8 We can be firm like David, and set the Lord always before us, knowing that he is at our “right hand, [we] shall not be moved.”9
My humble prayer is that we will be firm and immovable, and that we will look up to Him who suffered in Gethsemane, on the cross at Golgotha: He who overcame death that we may live again.
Elder Dube was sustained as a General Authority Seventy in April 2013. He is married to Naume Keresia Salizani. They are the parents of four children.