Sabbath Devotional :: Advocate

*Christ and the Woman Taken in Adultery* by Pieter Bruegel the Elder

As I stood to exit a meeting at the school, the teacher said, “Your daughter is lucky to have you as her advocate.”

Advocate. The word caught my attention.

In that situation, I was teaming up with teachers and administrators whose purpose was to help my daughter be successful. Her success was a shared goal. But without my advocacy, they wouldn’t have known how to help.

As I drove home, I dwelt on the word advocate.

One of Christ’s titles is Advocate. This title makes me feel especially loved by him.

In the Doctrine and Covenants, Christ says, “Lift up your hearts and be glad, for I am in your midst, and am your advocate with the Father” (D&C 29:5). How could we not be glad knowing that Jesus Christ — the son of God and the Savior of the world — is our advocate?

Merriam Webster lists at least three definitions for advocate:

1. One that pleads the cause of another; specifically: one that pleads the cause of another before a tribunal or judicial court

2. One that defends or maintains a cause or proposal

3. One that supports or promotes the interests of another

I have often imagined Christ pleading my cause before God. I have imagined him pointing out my strengths and successes, explaining why I am worthy to be saved. I have imagined him overlooking my weaknesses. I have even joked (mostly to myself, because I think I am very funny) that he would say, “She was pretty horrible during these months, but she was pregnant. It doesn’t count.”

But then I learned more.

Gerald N. Lund wrote, “In one of the most beautiful images in all of scripture, we find the solution to that awful dilemma we all face as sinners. We are standing before the bar as defendants, facing the great judge, God the Father. Our defense attorney — our ‘Advocate with the Father’ — steps forward, not to refute the charges or to hold up a record of good works on our part to counterbalance our guilt, but to plead our case in a different manner:

‘Listen to him who is the advocate with the Father, who is pleading your cause before him —

‘Saying: Father, behold the sufferings and death of him who did no sin, in whom thou wast well pleased; behold the blood of thy Son which was shed, the blood of him whom thou gavest that thyself might be glorified;

‘Wherefore, Father, spare these my brethren that believe on my name, that they may come unto me and have everlasting life’ (D&C 45:3-5).

“Nothing man could do for himself could bring him past that judgment bar successfully without such an Advocate. That is why eternal life is always a gift, and those who receive it do so by ‘inheritance.’”

The Savior, my Advocate, pleads my cause not by pointing out my merits, but by pointing out his. It is by his merits that we are saved. Learning this deepened my testimony and changed my outlook.

Following this recent meeting where I was an advocate for my daughter, I thought more about what that means. We are supposed to try to be like Jesus. If he is an advocate, then I should be, too. But I want to advocate in a way that brings me and others closer to Christ, never to detract from his role. It’s his grace, mercy, love, and power that I most want to promote.

Because we use the terms advocacy and advocate in our work here at MWEG, I decided to study and further understand how to make sure my advocacy stays true to my desire to be like Christ. I made a chart of various scriptural passages about Christ as our advocate with three columns: Merits of Christ, My Responsibilities, My Blessings. In summary, I found that Christ can be our advocate because of his divine sonship, his righteousness, and his sufferings. Our responsibilities are to have faith, to repent, and to follow the teachings of Christ and his prophets. The blessings are forgiveness, joy, and salvation.

This was helpful in understanding more of what it means that Christ is my advocate. But what about me? How do I become an advocate?

Elder Paul B. Pieper spoke about taking upon us the name of Christ. He taught, “The word take can also mean to align oneself with a name or a cause. Most of us have had the experience of taking on responsibility at work or taking up a cause or a movement. When we take upon ourselves the name of Christ, we take upon us the responsibilities of a true disciple, we advocate His cause, and we ‘stand as witnesses of [him] at all times and in all things, and in all places that [we] may be in.’ . . . In the process of taking the Savior’s name upon us, we must understand that the cause of Christ and of His Church are one and the same.”

When speaking of being valiant in the testimony of Jesus, Elder Quentin L. Cook warned against elevating causes “many of which are good, to a status superior to basic gospel doctrine.” He counseled us to not “look beyond the mark” by putting our devotion to a cause above our “commitment to the Savior.” Jesus Christ should be the focus of our lives.

Combining these two statements, I find that the simple answer to my quest is that I need to be an advocate in a way that brings others to the Advocate.

As I have increased my political advocacy, I have found that I can trust Christ to lead me. I have felt him guide me in what I say and how I feel about others. I have been led by the Spirit in carefully writing political Facebook posts and in responding to friends when they are angry with me. I have felt his guidance in writing op-eds and meeting with elected officials. I realize that advocacy has brought me closer to Christ. I am primarily motivated by my testimony that we are children of God and that every single person on the earth has a divine nature and destiny. Advocacy has increased my ability to see good, divine characteristics in more of God’s children and to feel God’s love for them.

One of the things I have loved about being a part of MWEG is the variety of voices, experiences, and causes that we bring to the table. I learn so much from listening to what matters to others. I have worked to extend peacemaking skills learned from MWEG to other spheres and it has helped me to replace condescension, condemnation, and contempt with generosity, grace, and goodwill. In this way, I believe my personal advocacy is helping to bring me and my friends closer to Christ.

I have been especially, unspeakably, grateful to join hands in advocacy with other members of MWEG who are willing to do their best to advocate the cause of Christ first. There are so many worthwhile causes in this world. There is so much work to do. Reflecting on Christ as my advocate and how my advocacy should reflect Christ is helping me determine which causes to support.