Category: Scripture Notes
-
Peace without righteousness
It isn’t common to have peace among the people without righteousness but in this case it happened because the one thing they all agreed on was their hatred of a common enemy. That kind of peace is inherently fragile and short-lived. It will end in strife or people will repent (strife being the more common…
-
Power corrupts
The only explanation for why it is people in positions of modest authority who enable secret combinations because of their desire for more power is that the audition if some power tends to breed or enhance a greater desire for power. This lust for power leads them to accept an “ends justify the means” mentality…
-
A bright spot
Mormon made a point to record the brief period of righteousness but it was very short-lived considering how dire the situation had been for the Nephites.
-
Parasites
The robbers of Gadianton were parasites economically. They didn’t produce anything themselves. If they had realized that they would have known that they could not succeed in a siege assurant people who were productive and prepared to wait them out. They should have known that they couldn’t sustain an attack on those who produced what…
-
Birds of a feather
Both Trump and Giddianhi subscribe to the idea that no matter how audacious a lie is, if you say it boldly enough (and repeat it enough times) you will convince people to treat it as the truth. Sadly that works on too many people. The less righteous people are the more likely they are to…
-
Burying historical divisions
What would it take for our nation to bury historical divisions as the Nephites and Lamanites did when facing destruction at the hands of the Gadiantons? Would it require an existential threat? What divisions would we bury? Racist divisions (Whites/Blacks/Latinos)? Political divisions (Republican/Democrat; conservative/liberal)? Regional divisions (east/west; north/south; coastal/heartland)? Lifestyle divisions (urban/rural)? I suppose the…
-
Kill the believers
What is it about some unbelievers that they feel the need to threaten believers with destruction? Sometimes there are reasons why they feel the need to punish the believers but the pretexts are flimsy even then.
-
Spreading rumors and contentions
I think that “spreading rumors and contentions” is a great description of how Satan is constantly working among the children of men. Sometimes he will have secret combinations to operate through and grand acts of destruction to encourage but always he will be pushing rumors and contentions to keep the children of men on edge…
-
A familiar message
The message of Samuel the Lamanite wasn’t foreign to the people of Zerahemla. Nephi had been consistently preaching similar things among them. That was why those who chose to believe Samuel and repent knew where to go to seek baptism.
-
Once enlightened
Why is it that those who have lived without the gospel are able to come to it when they receive it and even, those who are simply good but without the gospel seem to gravitate towards living Christian principles more naturally than this who have been taught to live them? My best guess is that…