1 Nephi 12 - Prelude giving the Book of Mormon message

The Book of Mormon is known for several key messages. Two of those are mentioned prominently in 1 Nephi 12. 1 Nephi 11-14 is when Nephi is given the explanation of what his father's vision of the tree of life means. At the same time, he's shown the future of his people, which connects so well with the tree of life as some of his people come to Jesus and some do not.

The two main messages I noticed in 1 Nephi 12 are:

1) all who come unto Jesus will be washed clean forever through his blood

2) those who are prideful and fall prey to the temptations of Satan will be miserable

Here's the verses showing #1:

10 And these ^atwelve ministers whom thou beholdest shall judge thy seed. And, behold, they are righteous forever; for because of their faith in the Lamb of God their ^bgarments are made white in his blood.

11 And the angel said unto me: Look! And I looked, and beheld^athree generations pass away in righteousness; and their garments were white even like unto the Lamb of God. And the angel said unto me: These are made white in the blood of the Lamb, because of their faith in him.

Not only are the 12 disciples made holy, but so are all people throughout 3 generations. So many were/are saved through their faith in Christ and his blood spilt for them.

#2 is in these verses, just after witnessing the destruction of his people:

17 And the ^amists of darkness are the temptations of the devil, which ^bblindeth the eyes, and hardeneth the hearts of the children of men, and leadeth them away into ^cbroad roads, that they perish and are lost.

18 And the large and spacious ^abuilding, which thy father saw, is vain ^bimaginations and the ^cpride of the children of men. And a great and a terrible ^dgulf divideth them; yea, even the word of the^ejustice of the Eternal God, and the Messiah who is the Lamb of God, of whom the Holy Ghost beareth record, from the beginning of the world until this time, and from this time henceforth and forever.

19 And while the angel spake these words, I beheld and saw that the seed of my brethren did contend against my seed, according to the word of the angel; and because of the pride of my seed, and the^atemptations of the devil, I beheld that the seed of my brethren did ^boverpower the people of my seed.

Because of pride and temptations of the devil, his seed were overpowered by Satan. They did not have the help of the Lord, and they faltered and were destroyed.

This is the story of the book of Mormon. All can be saved, if you come unto Christ; if you do not come to Christ, you lose your peace, happiness, and eventually will be destroyed. Those who don't follow Christ do so because of their pride or because Satan gets them unfocused/confused.

This helps to reinforce the next 500 pages of text that we read. In addition, it was probably a fascinating thing for Joseph to translate considering he translated the entire Book of Mormon from Mosiah through Moroni before starting over with 1 Nephi. I'm sure he was convinced Nephi was a prophet after Joseph had already seen and learned the 2 lessons above in the rest of the Book of Mormon.

Offer yourselves as a sacrifice: be a good, faithful person

A concept that helps show that a believer is one who acts the right way as well as says he/she believes is in Romans 12 as well as in Omni 1 in the Book of Mormon.

There Paul talks about the need to offer oneself as a sacrifice. What is sacrificed? The bad things someone may be inclined to do:

1 I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that ye present your ^abodies a living ^bsacrifice, holy, ^cacceptable unto God, which is your reasonable ^dservice.

Offer yourselves as an offering to God. Become the person he wants you to become. This is a reasonable ask from God who gives so much and sacrificed his Son to allow us to become like Him eternally. Omni 1 gives a similar message:

26 And now, my beloved brethren, I would that ye should ^acomeunto Christ, who is the Holy One of Israel, and partake of his salvation, and the power of his redemption. Yea, come unto him, and ^boffer your whole souls as an ^coffering unto him, and continue in ^dfasting and praying, and endure to the end; and as the Lord liveth ye will be saved.

Once again, offer your souls to Christ, continuing in fasting and praying to keep the faith, and if you keep faithful to the end, you're guaranteed salvation. Once again, a great tradeoff for being faithful.

Returning to Paul's message - he then spends the rest of Romans 12 giving examples of what it is to offer yourself as a sacrifice to God. It's doing what he asks: weeping with those that weep (see also Mosiah 18:8-9), showing mercy happily, not being evil to those who are evil to you, having faith, cleave to that which is good, love truly, etc.

Being good to people, and believing in the Lord's efforts on our behalf, and following his messages through prophets is the way to happiness and offering as a sacrifice.

Context when Paul's discussing works and grace

A few verses are often used to emphasize grace is all that is needed for someone to be saved. Here's a couple of these in Romans 3:

23 For all have ^asinned, and come short of the glory of God;

24 ^aBeing ^bjustified freely by his ^cgrace through the ^dredemption that is in Christ Jesus:

However, it's very important to read more and consider he's talking principally about "the law" in this chapter. "The law" is what the Jews follow very strictly. Paul spends this chapter saying that "the law" isn't necessary to save someone, but that it's Jesus and faith in him.

At the end of the chapter, Paul says that the law is established by faith.

30 Seeing it is ^aone God, which shall justify the ^bcircumcision by faith, and uncircumcision through faith.

31 Do we then make void the law through faith? ^aGod forbid: ^byea, we establish the law.

It appears that faith is what makes the circumcised man acceptable to God as well as the uncircumcised man (in other words, the Jew and the Gentile). The law also is made worthwhile by a man with faith; that's the purpose of the law, to increase the faith. Notice it doesn't say that law is worthless now; the law is valuable when faith is the driving motivation behind the person performing the law.

Thus it is in life. Faith makes action worth doing. Action makes faith grow.

Have a great day.

Doing Greater things than the Master - a difficult challenge

At the end of his life, the Savior told the Apostles that they would do greater things than Him if they believed. That's such a tough statement to live up to. Here's the verse from John 14:

12 Verily, verily, I say unto you, He that ^abelieveth on me, the works that I do shall he do also; and greater works than these shall he do; because I ^bgo unto my ^cFather.

I can only imagine how Peter felt then when he healed the lame man outside the temple. That event was the first recorded time that the Apostles had a great following and did a work that was truly comparable to the miracles of the Savior. Certainly, it was a day where their confidence in their calling grew. Here's the incredible account of the healing:

1 Now Peter and John went up together into the temple at the hour of prayer, being the ninth hour.

2 And a certain man ^alame from his mother’s womb was carried, whom they laid daily at the gate of the temple which is called Beautiful, to ask alms of them that entered into the temple;

3 Who seeing Peter and John about to go into the temple asked an^aalms.

4 And Peter, fastening his eyes upon him with John, said, Look on us.

5 And he gave heed unto them, expecting to receive something of them.

6 Then Peter said, Silver and gold have I none; but such as I have^agive I thee: In the ^bname of Jesus Christ of Nazareth rise up and walk.

7 And he took him by the right hand, and ^alifted him up: and immediately his feet and ankle bones received strength.

8 And he leaping up stood, and walked, and entered with them into the temple, walking, and leaping, and praising God.

9 And all the people ^asaw him walking and praising God:

10 And they knew that it was he which sat for alms at the Beautiful gate of the temple: and they were filled with wonder and amazement at that which had happened unto him.

I once heard Elder Gene Cook talk about this experience of Peter's. He said that this was true faith; Peter had never done such a thing, but he trusted in Jesus to a remarkable degree, he had the Priesthood, and the result was a great miracle.

Later we read that the man was over 40 years old, and that the people marveled greatly at the miracle. In the end, Peter's reputation grew so that people brought their sick out into the paths Peter was walking so that perhaps his shadow would touch the sick, and the sick would be healed. This is similar to the woman touching Jesus garment or the friends of the man with palsy dropping him in through the roof. Peter began to become all that Jesus wanted.

Here's Acts 5 about Peter:

14 And believers were the more ^aadded to the Lord, multitudes both of men and women.)

15 Insomuch that they brought forth the sick into the streets, and laid them on beds and couches, that at the least the ^ashadow of Peter passing by might overshadow some of them.