Finding Him Hiding in Plain Sight
The scriptures are not only stories. Underneath the stories is a purpose: the central aim of scripture is to build faith in Heavenly Father and in Jesus Christ. One of the ways the scriptures do this is by returning, again and again, to the same handful of ordinary objects — a lamb, water, bread, light, a shepherd, a vine, a rock, a stone, a sunrise — and using each one to teach something true about the Savior.
None of these are random, and noticing them is a skill that gets better with practice: notice an object repeating in the text, find where else it shows up, then try to explain — out loud or just to yourself — what it is actually teaching about Christ.
Ordinary Things
Take water. The prophet Jeremiah records the Lord's complaint against Israel:
"They have forsaken me the fountain of living waters, and hewed them out cisterns, broken cisterns, that can hold no water." (Jeremiah 2:13)
A cistern is dug by hand and holds only what gets poured into it; eventually it cracks and the water seeps away. A fountain never runs dry, because it is not a container — it is a source. Centuries later Christ tells a woman at a well in Samaria the same thing in his own words: whoever drinks of the water he gives will never thirst again (see John 4:14). Everything else runs dry. He does not.
The same pattern runs through the rest of the Bible and the Book of Mormon. John the Baptist names him the Lamb of God (John 1:29), and Christ calls himself the bread that actually satisfies (John 6:35), the shepherd who lays down his life for the sheep (John 10:11), and the vine that every branch depends on completely:
"I am the vine, ye are the branches: He that abideth in me, and I in him, the same bringeth forth much fruit: for without me ye can do nothing." (John 15:5)
Helaman tells the Nephites plainly that storms come for everyone, and only one foundation holds:
"It is upon the rock of our Redeemer, who is Christ, the Son of God, that ye must build your foundation." (Helaman 5:12)
And Malachi promises that for those who turn to him, the Lord rises "with healing in his wings" (Malachi 4:2) — not distant light, but light that actually heals.
Why It Matters
None of these images are decoration. Each one does real teaching: a lamb for his innocence and his sacrifice, a vine for the fact that nothing good grows disconnected from him, a rock for the fact that he is the only foundation that survives a real storm. Learning to see Christ in an ordinary object is not a trick for reading scripture faster. It is training your eyes to notice him everywhere else, too.
Try It This Week
Pick three ordinary things you will run into tomorrow — a door, a light switch, water, bread, your keys. Count how many times you actually encounter each one in a single day. Then take whichever one you counted the most and run the same three moves: notice it, find a verse that uses it, and explain — in your own words — what it teaches you about Jesus Christ.
- What object showed up in your day more often than you expected?
- Which of these images is closest to something you actually need from the Savior right now?
- Why do you think the Lord chose ordinary things instead of rare ones to describe himself?
The Lord built reminders of himself into an ordinary Tuesday on purpose. Go find one.
From the Church’s manuals
- Old Testament Seminary Teacher Manual (2026), “Focusing on Jesus Christ in the Scriptures”: the Church’s lesson this one was prepared from.
This lesson is one teacher’s preparation. The Church’s manual is the place to start, and it has more than any one class can cover.