Tag: alma 17
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A note on idolatry and culture
Idol worship in the Old Testament When Moses received the 10 commandments on Mount Sinai, the first two dealt with idol worship. 3 Thou shalt have no other gods before me. 4 Thou shalt not make unto thee any graven image, or any likeness of any thing that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth: 5 Thou shalt not bow down thyself to…
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"An instrument in the hands of God"
This is a short follow-up note on my series of posts on the phrase “stretch forth thine hand” (which begins here). One main lesson from that study was that prophets are messengers from God calling a covenant people to repent. As we learned from the account of Enoch (discussed in part 4), Enoch feels the…
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Collectivism in the Book of Mormon
I am currently reading a book called “Misreading scripture with western eyes”. It shows how we often misunderstand scripture because we read it through the lens of our culture which is very different from the culture of those who wrote it. The authors are Christian but not LDS so I am interested to see how…
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Internal consistency — Lamanite cities
We should seek and rely on a personal, spiritual witness of the Book of Mormon, independently of scholarly research and secular approaches. But when critics manage to lure away faithful members with their arguments, countering those also has its place. My assertion is that the Book of Mormon is more complex than most people realize.…
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Moroni's "covenant of peace" — part 2 (sending forth angels)
In my last post, I outlined an example of what I call the covenant worldview on display in Alma 44. There’s a little more to the story which I’d like to share in this post, which relates to the principle of mercy. The Doctrine & Covenants summarizes this principle very nicely: 42 But, behold, I…
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The harvest of the Sons of Mosiah
I was surprised to find that, except for quoting Isaiah, the word \’harvest\’ is only found twice in the Book of Mormon. The first time is in Alma 17:13, when the Sons of Mosiah are going on a mission to preach the gospel to the Lamanites. 13 And it came to pass when they had arrived…
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Come, Follow me: June 22–28. Alma 17–22: “I Will Make an Instrument of Thee”
This week\’s Come, Follow Me lesson covers Alma 17-22. Here are additional resources from this blog for each chapter to supplement your study: Alma 17 — The missionary companions of the Sons of Mosiah, More about swelling hearts, Covenant symbols in Alma 17, Tracking the timeline, and more… Alma 18 — Fear and Darkness (a…
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The missionary companions of the Sons of Mosiah
The mission of the Sons of Mosiah among the Lamanites might be my favorite story in the Book of Mormon. We talk about the Sons of Mosiah a lot and tend to forget that they were not alone. In Alma 17:8 we read about the beginning of their mission And thus they departed into the…
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More about swelling hearts
Notice the language Mormon uses to describe how Ammon reacts when he sees the fear of death in the Lamanite servants who were assigned to help him water the king\’s flocks: 29 Now they wept because of the fear of being slain. Now when Ammon saw this his heart was swollen within him with joy;…
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Covenant symbols in Alma 17
Every primary-age boy knows the story of Ammon defending the king\’s flocks at the waters of Sebus by \”disarming\” the men who come to steal the flocks. Recently, I went back and read this account and was surprised to see so much covenant symbolism. Mormon truly was an expert at telling a story in a…
Book of Mormon Notes 