1 Nephi - Chapter 21

This chapter is so full of promise and comfort for me.

5 "And now, saith the Lord—that formed me from the womb that I should be his servant, to bring Jacob again to him—though Israel be not gathered, yet shall I be glorious in the eyes of the Lord, and my God shall be my strength."

When I read this verse I thought about all those days spent trying to help the kids at the Detention Center.  Many many of which I wondered if our efforts were accomplishing any thing.  This verse seems to say that even if your efforts don't accomplish what you set out to do, just the fact that you made the effort is pleasing to God.  Of course, God is the strength of the effort and that does amount to something.  Jacob is being brought again to the truth - even at the Detention Center.

10 "They shall not hunger nor thirst, neither shall the heat nor the sun smite them; for he that hath mercy on them shall lead them, even by the springs of water shall he guide them."

25 "But thus saith the Lord, even the captives of the mighty shall be taken away, and the prey of the terrible shall be delivered; for I will contend with him that contendeth with thee, and I will save thy children."

Just a few of the great promises held in this wonderful chapter.  I grew up in an era when the threat of disaster was used as a whipping stick.  Every few months our youth leaders would trot out someone to scare us into submission with scary predictions of the second coming.  How, much more motivating, would a careful reading of this chapter of Isaiah have been.  How, blessed we'd have been to have been taught that God is on our side, that He will go to any lengths to rescue, defend, care for and redeem us.

 How comforting it would have been taught that He would never give up on us nor forget or abandon us.

15 "For can a woman forget her sucking child, that she should not have compassion on the son of her womb? Yea, they may forget, yet will I not forget thee, O house of Israel."
 
16 "Behold, I have graven thee upon the palms of my hands; thy walls are continually before me."

It comforts me greatly now and the burden of my service these days, is to pass that message on to others, who likewise need to know that, as lost as we may be, there is always one who won't give up on us, who is determined to rescue us.

1 Nephi - Chapter 20

How troubling it must be for God to reach into our lives with blessings just to have us explain them away with words like luck, karma, fate, destiny, or to do even worse, and attribute His blessings to some other source like mother nature, government, money, intellect, scholarship, or genius.  Or worse yet, to attribute His blessings to our own strength and power.

All He wants to do is bless our lives and still we reject Him by failing to recognize His great gifts and their divine source.  How ungrateful Israel is today as well as in the past.  We are by nature, condemned to the dither of seeking some other explanation for life's circumstances.  I think the Lord is inviting us here, to put off that nature.

18 - "O that thou hadst hearkened to my commandments—then had thy peace been as a river, and thy righteousness as the waves of the sea."

Why are we so willing to settle for less?  When I am living life on God's terms instead of my own, life is always better, always.  Yet too often, like the rest of Israel, I tend to drift back to taking control, instead of giving control to He who is the only one who truly has it.

1 Nephi - Chapter 19

I love it when Nephi speaks of the Lord's "loving kindness and long suffering."  A sister lamented a while back in Gospel Doctrine Class, "When I was in Primary, Jesus loved me, but by the time I got to Seminary, I was scared to death of Him."

I myself grew up with the notion that God held me, by the scruff of the neck out over Hell, just waiting for an excuse to drop me.  I think we are moving away from scare tactics in the Church nowadays and thankfully so.  What a horrible task master is fear.  What a sweet motivation comes of love.

How blessed it is that as I read the scriptures these days the kind, sweet, hand stretched out still, image of the Master is the one that is highlighted for me.

He is not like us.  When He suffered, His thoughts were not ones of resentment towards us for the pain we caused Him.  His thoughts were ones of love and compassion and gratitude that He could actually do for us what we could not.  What joy Nephi must have felt to have envisioned the Redeemer's life and to witness for himself Christ's kindness and love.  No wonder he felt such desire to record and preserve these things for his posterity and for us.

1 Nephi - Chapter 18

Wouldn't it be a fun archaeological discovery to find that ship!  I suppose that since the Nephites and Lamanites stopped being mariners for several generations after their arrival, that the revealed technologies used in its construction are lost to us.  Clearly, ship building technology was not considered by Nephi to "be of worth" to the children of men, but it would be interesting.  Over the years, I've noticed that even in temporal things, God's methods far exceed man's.  One example was my first visit to a Bishop's Storehouse.  Another, can be found in a neat book called "The Mormon Way of Doing Business."

I was, initially, curious why Nephi attributed Lehi and Sariah's illness to Laman and Lemuel's pride and wickedness.  In my mind I thought, "Anybody who'd ridden a terrible storm in a relatively small ship would be horribly sea sick."  I hate to admit that the natural man in me was not at all unlike Laman and Lemuel.  I'm sure they didn't take credit for the storm or their parent's illness.

I have been like this so many times in my life.  During the long years of my addiction, I blamed the addiction.  I would never blame the real cause; my pride, my determination to have life on my terms rather than the Lord's.  In other words, I was loathe to take the blame and quick to find other explanations for my choices and their consequences.  Of course that became easier and easier as Satan's flaxen chords became chains and I surrendered more and more of my freedom to choose.  It would have been easy for Laman and Lemuel to convince themselves that the storm was just one of those things and that it had nothing to do with their own choices and behavior.

Even as a nation we do this all the time.  We blame and deride Congress for giving us exactly what the majority of us are asking for.  We despise ear tags unless they are meant to develop something locally beneficial.  We cuss Wall Street, when we ourselves are often buried under a mountain of debt.  The societal storms that beat upon us are brought on by our own choices, but like Laman and Lemuel we are loathe to see our own fault in bringing about the storm.

How about in our own personal relationships.  If I am honest, every storm in my marriage that I was so quick to blame on her, had a larger component of error on my part.  Every one!  But, again like Laman and Lemuel, I was just too proud to admit it.  That is until, and this too is selfish, I thought I might actually come up the loser in the deal.

Lehi and Sariah were truly sick and upon their death beds and Laman and Lemuel, not the storm, were truly the cause.

Today, Sweetie and I are on a little road trip, enjoying one another's company and so thankful the storms in our marriage are so far in the past.  I'm thankful too, that even on the road, I can keep up with blogging.  You may never know how much your participation in studying The Book of Mormon here, means to me.  Hopefully, more of you will be willing to share your insights.  Every comment lifts, teaches and inspires me.

1 Nephi - Chapter 17

You know, if we view the lives of Laman and Lemuel thus far, they have been more obedient than they have not.  Sure, they have murmured and complained and occasionally rebelled, but mostly, they have done what they were asked.  They have done hard things.  I can't imagine the hardships they faced and endured.  Much of the time, they must have conceded to what was expected of them.  What they never managed to accomplish was to cross over from being driven to being lead.  There is a world of difference.  Sheep that are led, go forth willingly, trustingly, wherever the Shepherd leads them.  They love and trust the Shepherd.  Sheep that are driven, will go all the same places but must be herded by a herder.  They resent and resist and wander off and get into trouble.  Laman and Lemuel never allowed God to lead them but rather required Him to drive them along.  I'll be spending the day examining whether I am being lead or driven in the things I do.  The difference is too critical to overlook.  I think two words will serve as my personal litmus test, frustration and resentment.  If I feel any frustration or resentment, it is clear that I am seeking my own will and not that of the Father.  I may have righteous desires, but they are centered in me or there would be no frustration or resentment.  If my desires are centered in God and His will, my feeling will be more of cheerful submission and peace.  I know this because of experience.  I wonder if Laman and Lemuel ever enjoyed the wonderful feeling of surrender; that sensation of loving and trusting God enough to follow, willingly, joyfully, wherever He leads?  How sad it is that they were forever doing life the hard way.  Like Nephi pointed out, they were like the Israelites who'd been bitten by the poisonous serpents.  They were too busy, sucking out the poison, so to speak, to look to the real source of their salvation.  Being driven is always more stressful than being lead.  Always.

Here's another observation that may be a bit of a stretch for discussion of this particular chapter.  All through the Old Testament times, when Israel was under the school master of the Law of Moses, God seemed willing to Herd the flock.  Under the new covenant, when Jesus fulfilled the Law, it appears that He will only lead.  His message is "Come, follow me." 

Years ago I witnessed the difference.  In our town we had four Stakes at the time of this story.  The four Stakes combined for Boy Scout Round Table.  At one point two of the Stake Young Men Presidents got into a contest to see who could have the best attendance from their respective Scout Leaders.  The competition became rather fierce.  One President chose to be a herder.  He and a Councilor from the Stake Presidency would go to Round Table and immediately take a head count.  Then they would hit the phones, drive to peoples houses, whatever it took to drag the missing brethren to the meeting.  At first, they were leading the competition.  The other Stake Young Men President, quietly attended the meeting, took copious notes and gathered handouts and other materials.  Then he went home and prepared a packet for each missing leader.  Packets in hand, he visited the home of each leader who'd failed to attend.  Upon his arrival he would say something like, "I understand how busy you are, having been in your shoes.  Since you were unable to make it to Round Table I have taken the liberty to bring Round Table to you.  Would you have a few minutes for me to go over the high points?"  He then would quickly review what had been presented and follow up with a sincere expression of appreciation for the wonderful work the brother was doing with the boys in his charge.  There was never a guilt trip, scolding, or any kind of recrimination, just love and gratitude.

That President, did however, suffer a lot of ridicule from the other.  "You've got to quit spoon feeding your men.  Why would they ever show up if you are willing to hand carry it to them?"  The other President would not believe the sheep would follow and was certain they had to be driven.  In the end however, most of his sheep rebelled.  On the other hand the sheep of the President who lead with love, began to see that there was great value in the materials being brought to them by a serving leader and one by one began to show up to see for themselves what Round Table had to offer.  Eventually, that Stake averaged over 90% attendance while the other dropped below 40% on a consistent basis.

Having made that observation I have viewed these early Book of Mormon chapters a little differently.  Quite often in the Church I have observed, brethren especially, driving their flocks.  Perhaps they feel justified, seeing their sheep to be like Laman and Lemuel.  I hope we remember that the Law has been fulfilled and we must no longer be in the the Sheep Herding Business, but rather in the Shepherding Business.  There is a huge difference.

1 Nephi - Chapter 16

I think it is quite obvious that Nephi and Lehi, didn't need a Liahona, as the curious ball later comes to be known by.  The two of the them seem far more capable than I to be directed by the Spirit as you and I seem to be expected to be.  So, I must conclude that it was given to them, to comfort and school those who were less inclined to seek and heed the promptings of the Spirit.  I suspect that much of the time this was quite comforting and persuasive in coaxing the reluctant travelers along their difficult journey.

If you've ever tried Geocaching, you might have a feeling for what Laman and Lemuel might have thought about the Liahona.  Someone told me that if I took a GPSr instrument and entered some pre-determined coordinates that the unit would lead me to a Cache full of treasure.  When it's arrow literally took me to the very spot, I was astonished.  How could this little gadget retrieve and calculate information from several satellites in space and take me so accurately to a location that to my mind only amounted to meaningless numbers?  Add to that occasional 'text messages' from God and the fact that the daily coordinates were also installed by God and you have the Liahona.  Even in an age where modern gadgetry is all around us, I was amazed at the capabilities of the GPSr.  Imagine how impressive the Liahona must have been to the family of Lehi!

It clearly was no different than heeding the promptings of the Spirit, except that it was plain and visible.  I have often thought it would be nice to give one to each child on the day the receive the Gift of the Holy Ghost, so they could have something tangible to practice with.  In away, parents are their children's Liahona.  How important it is, to help our children understand that the spiritual feelings they get are gifts of the Spirit.  I saw a young girl stand one day and bear her testimony.  She had done so since she was a Sunbeam in primary.  Only this time was different.  This time the Spirit confirmed the truth of what she'd been saying, in such a poignant way, that she wept.  The tears came as such an embarrassing surprise that she fled to the arms of her mother, mortified.  When the Bishop stood to close the meeting, he taught her and the rest of us a very important lesson.  He spoke directly to the girl calling her by name.  He explained to her something Elder Boyd K. Packer has taught, that the connection between our body and our spirit is manifest in our emotions.  He then kindly explained to her that the reason she had cried was because she had felt the Spirit, confirm to her soul (body and spirit) that what she was saying was true and pleasing to God.  He commended her for being so sensitive to the Spirit and praised her for her courage in sharing her testimony.  In essence, he taught her what her experience meant.  He was training her to understand, seek and maintain that connection.  We don't necessarily, automatically, understand what it is we are experiencing when we feel the Spirit.  Blessed are parents and teachers who sense when this is happening to others and help them recognize and appreciate it.

Another example:  I was conducting a baptismal service for some new converts in our Stake.  One of the converts was a young lady.  Her parents, members of another church and not all that happy about her choice, never-the-less had elected to attend her baptism.  During one of the talks, the missionary seated next to her father whispered to him, "Can you feel that?"  The man replied, "Yes, what is it?"

"The is the Holy Ghost, confirming to you that what is being said is true."

Two weeks later, that man and his wife also entered the waters of baptism.  The man later remarked about that experience, "If Brother Reynolds had not pointed out what I was feeling that day, I might never have understood, that God was speaking to my heart.  Thank you, dear dear Brother Reynolds!"

I am so much like the murmuring Lehites.  I am given the Promised Land and I want it now!  It is very interesting that every Promised Land story in the scriptures includes a long arduous, testing, winnowing journey.  Lehi, Moses, Jared, Brigham Young, and their followers all experienced it, why would I suppose I might be exempt.  Clearly, I am not.