Flooding My Life with the Book of Mormon 2.0

2 Nephi 8:7 Hearken unto me, ye that know righteousness, the people in whose heart I have written my law, fear ye not the reproach of men, neither be ye afraid of their revilings. In other words, I must lay personal pride aside. I must not let the opinions of others manipulate me. In the end, popularity and fame are illusory goals and fickle rewards.

2 Nephi 5:25 And the Lord God said unto me: They shall be a scourge unto thy seed, to stir them up in remembrance of me; and inasmuch as they will not remember me, and hearken unto my words, they shall scourge them even unto destruction. God allows hard things to come into my life to help me and humble me. He will not remove all evil from the world until the Millennium. In the meantime, I will always have scourges (i.e., things that cause suffering)  to contend with. A scourge is as much a gift from God as is any blessing.

2 Nephi 3:1 And now I speak unto you, Joseph, my last-born. Thou wast born in the wilderness of mine afflictions; yea, in the days of my greatest sorrow did thy mother bear thee. In speaking to his son, Joseph, Lehi reveals an intimate truth. The journey in the wilderness was no piece of cake for Lehi. He received revelation that Laman and Lemuel would reject salvation. He saw Nephi suffer greatly at the hands of his older brothers. He saw his older sons attempt murder and lie and deny that they had seen an angel and heard the voice of God. Their constant murmuring made his life miserable.  The contention his older sons and the sons of Ishmael brought into the family caused Lehi to despair of life as they crossed the ocean under what, even in the best circumstances, must have been very trying conditions. Lehi had been hungry and fatigued right along with the rest of his family. Despite marvelous revelations, glorious visions, and the miracle of the Liahona, Lehi had not escaped the...

1 Nephi 21:18 Lift up thine eyes round about and behold; all these gather themselves together, and they shall come to thee. And as I live, saith the Lord, thou shalt surely clothe thee with them all, as with an ornament, and bind them on even as a bride. My trials and afflictions, faithfully endured, will be my garments and adornments in the world to come. They will be beautiful jewels, like ribbons and medals of honor, to testify to my faithfulness to the Lord in this life. Rather than shun them and hate them, I rejoice in the knowledge that God trusts me with them. He believes in me as I believe in Him. 

1 Nephi 20:10 For, behold, I have refined thee, I have chosen thee in the furnace of affliction. We all get to experience the furnace of affliction and the refiner's fire, but God does not choose us all. Just because we suffer does not qualify us to be God's chosen people.  It is only when I allow the fire to work properly in my life that God chooses me. Only when I am truly refined will I come into God's presence.  On the other hand, I can simply burn to a cinder, leaving nothing redeemable in the ashes of my afflictions except bitterness and anger. God doesn't choose bitter, angry people. He chooses the brilliant, priceless nuggets that He can pull from the ashes to make up His jewels.  I don't get to choose the furnace in which I am fired, but I get to choose the resulting product.  God will choose me when I choose Him over the empty coals of a blasted life. When I want what God wants, He can do marvelous things with me. The hotter the fire, the faster and more t...

1 Nephi 18:11 And it came to pass that Laman and Lemuel did take me and bind me with cords, and they did treat me with much harshness; nevertheless, the Lord did suffer it that he might show forth his power, unto the fulfilling of his word which he had spoken concerning the wicked. Nephi was no stranger to persecution. Sadly, the persecutors were his own brothers. God knew Laman and Lemuel would be troublesome to both Lehi and Nephi. Why did He send such rebellious boys to Lehi and Sariah? Didn't the Lord know how much harder the family's escape from Jerusalem and voyage across the ocean would be because of these two recalcitrants? Of course, He did. That's exactly why He placed them in the family. The righteous needed opposition to strengthen their righteousness. We see over and over that God permits bad things to happen to good people for a variety of reasons. I doubt that Nephi knew in the moment he was being lashed to the mast what good thing the Lord had in store for h...

1 Nephi 17:14 Yea, and the Lord said also that: After ye have arrived in the promised land, ye shall know that I, the Lord, am God; and that I, the Lord, did deliver you from destruction; yea, that I did bring you out of the land of Jerusalem. Seen in their proper perspective, the big trials in my life teach me and testify that God is at work in my life. From an eternal perspective, when I reach the promised land of exaltation, I will truly realize that it is only through the power of Christ because of His Atonement and the grace of God that I am saved and exalted.

1 Nephi 17:13 And I will also be your light in the wilderness; and I will prepare the way before you, if it so be that ye shall keep my commandments; wherefore, inasmuch as ye shall keep my commandments ye shall be led towards the promised land; and ye shall know that it is by me that ye are led. I need light in the wilderness because it is a dark and desolate place, cut off from my normal sources of artificial light. No electrical outlets, no way to recharge the batteries in my flashlight, no stores from which to buy oil for my lanterns or candles when the last burn down, no wood to gather to make a fire. As a human, I crave light. God has designed the dark wilderness, so I will search for light until I find His light. The whole purpose of the wilderness experiences in my life is to help me 1) come to myself so that I can 2) come to God and ultimately 3) come home to my heavenly home.  Keeping the commandments does not necessarily rescue me from the wilderness, but it makes the w...

1 Nephi 12:2 And it came to pass that I beheld multitudes gathered together to battle, one against the other; and I beheld wars, and rumors of wars, and great slaughters with the sword among my people. The phrase "rumours of wars" appears many times in the scriptures. War is certainly a curse, but why are rumors of war a parallel problem? Because even when we may be experiencing local peace, reports of wars elsewhere remind us that our immediate peace is fragile.  The reports of war became prominent in the 1960's when the nightly news brought images of the Vietnam War into our living rooms. War was no longer a distant event about which we heard only delayed summaries. War in all its gory details was now in our homes on a regular basis.  And that trend continues as reporters with cameras and satellite links bring the horrors of war in real time to our television screens every day. The scenes of suffering and destruction shatter our illusions of proximate peace. We are at ...

1 Nephi 10:18 For he is the same yesterday, today, and forever; and the way is prepared for all men from the foundation of the world, if it so be that they repent and come unto him. God planned all things from the very beginning. He knew exactly how earthlife would play out for His family. He knew Adam and Eve would transgress His law and bring about the fall of mankind. In fact, He needed it to be so, so that mortality would have meaning.  We had to have choices, and so we needed opposition. At the same time, God planned for the way for us to return to Him. The atonement and resurrection of Jesus Christ were planned as well. Jesus would be the way that we could follow to return to our Father in heaven. To paraphrase Elder Holland, Jesus was not Plan B or even Plan A, He was and is the ONLY Plan .

1 Nephi 8:28 And after they had tasted of the fruit they were ashamed, because of those that were scoffing at them; and they fell away into forbidden paths and were lost. Peer pressure can be totally destructive to our spiritual health. Satan knows how our pride works, and he uses others to wound our pride. It is not easy to remain steadfast in the face of criticism and mocking. Humility and meekness are the antidotes to the poison of pride and humiliation. We must fear God more than we fear man. 

1 Nephi 8:27 And [the great and spacious building] was filled with people, both old and young, both male and female; and their manner of dress was exceedingly fine; and they were in the attitude of mocking and pointing their fingers towards those who had come at and were partaking of the fruit. A ploy of Satan is to make me feel foolish and to doubt myself and my judgment when I choose righteously. If he can get me to doubt and wonder if I am doing the right thing, I will pause, and in that moment, he will pounce. He will play on my FOMO and tempt me to wonder if I am missing something pleasant or important. He wants me to compare the value of God's blessings with the luxuries of the world. He is banking on the natural man overcoming the child of Christ just long enough to distract me, turn my head, and eventually turn my heart from God. He is very seductive and clever. He doesn't need me to jump into his lap; he just needs to catch my attention. 

1 Nephi 8:10 And it came to pass that I beheld a tree, whose fruit was desirable to make one happy. Lehi recognized intuitively the value of the fruit of the tree in his vision even before he tasted it. People know the goodness that the gospel can bring into their lives. They are drawn to it. The fruit of the gospel and its soul purpose is happiness. God's greatest desire is for us to be happy. But He knows true happiness can be appreciated only if we contrast the sweet with the bitter. So, He lets us experience both in morality, so that eternal happiness is all the sweeter.

1 Nephi 8:8 And after I had traveled for the space of many hours in darkness, I began to pray unto the Lord that he would have mercy on me, according to the multitude of his tender mercies. God has a boatload of loving blessings in store for us. He wants to reach out and bless us constantly. But He must balance blessings with our need to experience trials. If He took away every trial and affliction immediately as we encounter them, we would not learn to possess our souls in faith and patience. Nevertheless, He has an abundance of loving blessings for us, and He will bestow them upon us according to His wisdom and in His own due time.

1 Nephi 8:7 And it came to pass that as I followed him I beheld myself that I was in a dark and dreary waste. In Lehi's dream, his being in the dark and dreary waste was not a mistake. He did nothing wrong, nor was he being punished. In fact, the man in the white robe, who symbolized the Holy Spirit, led Lehi into the wilderness deliberately. My wilderness experiences are not punishments but opportunities to learn and grow. In fact, when I am at my very best and most in tune with the Spirit, it may be the very moment that the wilderness looms before me. If I continue to follow the Spirit into the dark and dreary waste, as Lehi did, I will eventually end up where the Lord wants to take me.

1 Nephi 5:8 And she spake, saying: Now I know of a surety that the Lord hath commanded my husband to flee into the wilderness; yea, and I also know of a surety that the Lord hath protected my sons, and delivered them out of the hands of Laban, and given them power whereby they could accomplish the thing which the Lord hath commanded them. And after this manner of language did she speak. Sariah's testimony was based on outcomes. This is shaky ground for a testimony. At first, she lost faith in God because she thought He had not protected her sons, and now her faith in God was stronger because He had indeed protected them. What would happen to her faith when the next thing goes wrong? I may want God to protect me from every problem and every danger, but the fact is, He will not protect me constantly. I have to experience adversity and trials. If He kept me from every difficulty, this life would be wasted. I would return to Him weaker than when I left Him. This life is a probation, me...