Latest / Scripture Central / 1 Nephi 11-15 | Jan 22-28 | Book of Mormon Matters with John W. Welch and Lynne Hilton Wilson

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1 Nephi 11-15 | Jan 22-28 | Book of Mormon Matters with John W. Welch and Lynne Hilton Wilson · Scripture Central

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Welcome back to Scripture Central.
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Come follow me for the Book of Mormon.
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This is John W Welch. And I'm Lynn Hilton Wilson,
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excited to talk about Nephi's vision of the Tree of Life.
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Today we're on chapters 11 through 15 in First Nephi, and
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this is some of the most beautiful texts in the entire
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scripture. I'm so glad we get a chance to
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dive in today. This is amazing.
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It really is. He starts out in Chapter 11
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saying he's just finished hearing his dad's vision and he
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is pondering it. He's thinking about it.
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That's Chapter 11, verse one. What does the word ponder mean
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to you, Len? Ponder is the level of thinking
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beyond just casual thought. But I usually include it in my
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prayer. I'm asking the Lord lead my
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thoughts. Help me to understand.
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What about you? You know when you I, I think
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when you ponder. The word has to do with weighing
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and it's weighty, it ponderous. Something is ponderous when it
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weighs a lot and you ponder something when you think heavily
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about it and you weigh and think about it.
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So pondering isn't just being quizzical, but actually starting
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to put the pieces together and think about how it impresses you
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and presses deeply upon. Not a not a fleeting thought.
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Oh yeah, I'd love. This.
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I think it's a great word. And then it says in my heart, I
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was caught away in the spirit of Lord Yay, into an exceeding high
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mountain which I had never seen, and upon which before I had
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never set foot. So the Lord is able to allow him
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to see a vision of himself in a different location.
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But mountains are often temples, you know.
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It's higher places for higher thoughts, for godly things.
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Moses is in a mountain. And then he says the spirit
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comes to him and says, what desirous, thou and I love to
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just step back and think about that.
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What do you really want? You've heard it in other forms
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of scripture. What seekest thou or I think my
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prayers. You know, we're asked by our
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prophet not to have our prayers like a shopping list.
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You know, I if I were to look at my last prayer as what I really
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wanted most, would I have communicated that?
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Or would I have been asking for safety and for health and
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strength? Or would I be looking for deeper
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spiritual knowledge? Do I really want to know God?
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And he really wanted to see the dream of his father, of the tree
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of life. Now his father has had other
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visions, but we're talking right now about the tree of Life
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vision and. Nephi, when he says I want to
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know the things that my father have seen, I mean that's I want
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to be like my dad. And Nephi's the fourth son.
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He's young and I think when he has this respect for his father
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and his mother, I think that's a subtext here that's very
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important. Oh, it is because the whole
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dream has both Soraya and Lehigh at the tree.
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Yeah, it's a very important part.
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Nephi really models for us here the keeping of the 5th
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commandment that you must honor your father and your mother.
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Lehmann and Lemuel don't do quite so good a job as that, but
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you really honor your parents and your ancestors when you want
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to know more about their spiritual life.
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Yes, yes. And when he says what desirest
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thou, he knows that this has been this ponderous weight.
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And Nephi is not just wanting to see what his dad saw, because
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his dad saw it. I think he wants to know and
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feel. I feel like in times when I
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haven't understood where someone's coming from, and I
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have prayed to help me understand that perspective,
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it's a relationship issue as well, and the Lord allows us to
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understand each other better in those relationship requests.
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I think that's right, and I think that Nephi just doesn't
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want this for his idle curiosity.
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No. He knows that he needs to know
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this. I also feel like this spirit can
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also help us know what to pray for and if he is in the place of
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the Spirit and he's been moved by the Spirit.
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He said the whole power of the Holy Ghost was with him as he
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was listening to his Father, that his desire is that.
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So what happens? What does he see?
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Well, that's the big question because he's asked I want to see
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what my father saw. Now you might say Lehigh saw
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several visions. Does he want to see the throne?
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Theophany, what does the Angel say in the next verse says
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Nephi. Do you behold the tree that your
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father saw? So now we're clearly engaged.
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Nephi is going to get to see the same thing that Lehi saw back in
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Chapter 8. And Nephi also testifies to the
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Angel. I believe all the words of my
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father. And that's when the Angel is so
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excited. Or whoever This guide is the
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word of the spirit. They refer to him here.
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He says Hosanna to the Most High God.
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For he is God over all the earth.
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Yeah, even above all. And blessed art thou, because
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thou believest in the Son of the Most High God, wherefore thou
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shalt behold all the things which thou has desired.
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This is one of the many beautiful titles of our Lord
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that are unique to the Book of Mormon.
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And I really would encourage everyone who's doing their
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reading through the Book of Mormon to, as you're reading
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through the Book of Mormon, to look for names of the Lord and
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to keep a record of Him. Because we learned so much about
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our Savior and our Heavenly Parents by looking at the names
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that are used to describe them and hear this beautiful
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description of the Most High God.
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And as you look, Nephi will use lots of names that express in
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different ways how Jesus was a son and Jesus himself.
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He's a son of God, and he is the only begotten son, and he's the
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most beloved. And Nephi uses a lot of these
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expressions. Well, Jack, this is so important
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because this is one of the major points of apostasy, is taking
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this son out of the picture. Sometimes monotheism is thought
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of as only one God, and there could not be a son, and that is
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perpetuated by many people who believe the Bible.
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And so I can see that this would have been one of those things.
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But the first thing that Nephi records then is to show how this
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is literally going to be a son of God.
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And we'll just turn the page over to verse 13.
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He sees Jerusalem, and he also sees this little city called
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Nazareth. And I'm just laughing that
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they're calling it a city population of 200 to 400.
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And they're going, but you know, they that's what they had.
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That's where they were. And he says, I beheld a virgin
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as she was exceedingly fair and white, meaning pure in that era.
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And it came to pass that I saw the heavens open.
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And an Angel came down and said, what beholdest thou I love this
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dialogue. Nephi is not given an answer.
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He asks a question. And then the Angel says, what do
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you think? Let me tell you something.
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He wants you to extrapolate it. He wants him to think and and
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take ownership. He wants to be invested in this
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answer. That's a great teaching
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technique, isn't. It what?
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What do you see here? What do you think?
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And then Nephi comes up with an answer.
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He sees the birth, and this is verse 17, and where he sees the
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Son of God. And actually this is the center
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of Nephi's message here, which is very powerful.
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I'm going to read verse 17, he said unto him, I know that he
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loveth his children. Nevertheless, I do not know the
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meaning of all things To me. This is saying, if we know that
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God loves us and he loves you, and he loves my enemies and he
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loves my forefathers and he loves the people who are coming
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after, if I know He loves me, I can endure what I don't
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understand. And it's going to be OK, yeah.
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This is. That's why I think it's the
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center of Nephi's message it once we understand the love.
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When you say it's at the center. OK, this is Chapter 11.
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How many chapters are there in First Nephi?
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22. 22 and I asked myself the question Why does Nephi have two
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books, First Nephi and 2nd Nephi.
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Nobody else does. The second Nephi begins kind of
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you know, right after where first Nephi ends.
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The book of first Nephi can be analyzed in a number of ways,
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yes, but most effectively it is seen as a chiastic structure.
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So these reversed parallels. With Chapter 11 is the middle.
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So the most important part is in the center.
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That's right. And you you'll have, for
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example, things that happen twice, like they go to get the
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daughters, which we talked about last time.
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That's in Chapter 7. But they don't marry them until
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chapter 16. Now maybe they married them
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sooner than you might think. Well, they were betrothed, but
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yes, yes, yes. But but the balancing there says
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that there are two things that are important here.
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Yes, and in the first part his brothers taunt him and say you
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can't do this. Well, when you get to building
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the ship, Nephi has to build the ship.
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And being told you can't do that either.
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OK. And so as you work your way out
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through the. Text.
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You see a lot of parallels, and they're probably intentional.
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They probably are. Especially with an important
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message like this one. And and they don't need to be
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particularly rigorous if their purpose is to focus on the most
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important thing, which is at the middle of the book.
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And he says that the whole purpose if his intent is to
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bring people to Christ. And how does he know about
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Christ? He has learned about it in this
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heavenly mountain experience. Chapter 11.
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That's right. OK, I'm also fascinated with the
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way that the Angel directs him to look and to see and to
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behold. And so I just thought Nephi
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repeats that as long as we're talking about parallelisms.
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And there are over 180 references in this little teeny
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book of First Nephi to look and see.
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I think he's really trying to encourage his readers to be
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sincere seekers here. So skipping down in Chapter 11
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to verse 20, he sees a child in the Virgin's arms, and then in
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21 the Angel says, Do you know what the meaning of the tree is?
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Now to me those are like disconnected thoughts.
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But he's trying to make him think and that's when Nephi gets
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it. And he says, I answered him,
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saying, Yay, it is the love of God which setteth itself abroad
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in the hearts of the children of men, Wherefore it is the most
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desirable of all other things. And it just dawned on me, thanks
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for bringing this out, that how is it that Jesus Christ is the
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tree? Well, in the tree that Lehigh
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saw there's white fruit, and partaking of that white fruit
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gives you joy and eternal joy. And you were there under the
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umbrella of God's power. Well, the tree is Jesus Christ
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it. Has to be.
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Who also by partaking of His flesh and blood, we then become
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children of God and we come under His power and we are at
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the tree. And that Sacramento element will
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then grow up in us to become a tree of life ourselves.
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That's what Alma will finally tell us in Alma chapter 32.
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So the tree and Jesus have a lot to do with each other.
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Well, the tree has to be Jesus because of the Garden of Eden
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because. Explain that.
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Well, you can't partake of that tree in your sins, or else you
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will live forever in your sins from Adam and Eve's story.
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And so the tree of life was guarded.
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But here, now the tree is delicious because we can be
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forgiven, and we can only be forgiven through the atonement
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of Jesus Christ. And in my life, the times that I
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have felt the most love from the Lord has followed sincere
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repentance. You know that turning yourself
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back to God, turning around, apologizing, changing your
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heart. That's when you feel the
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greatest love of God and you feel the greatest love of God.
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When you have when you can express love to a child or when
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you express love to someone else, you can feel love towards
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God. There's many ways to feel the
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love of God, but repentance is one of these beautiful ways.
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But the tree, I think, is the our Redeemer, the Messiah, our
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beloved Jesus Christ. I think that's wonderful.
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And the repentance, what happens in Lehigh's vision of this is
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people all have to come to the tree.
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We talk about coming unto Christ.
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So the coming under the tree and coming unto Christ are.
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Are synonymous with repentance as well.
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They illustrate that illustrates it.
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And the path of course, you have to come unto Christ by following
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the path that leads to the tree in Lehigh's vision.
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Well, and and Lehigh has the rod too.
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And the rod is that word of God. So we can come unto Christ
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through his words and holding pressing forward.
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So we begin to see how how the tree what Lehi saw was actually
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what Nephi is going to be shown. But there's more.
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Nephi goes to a lot more details in his account.
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Than his chapter 12, chapter 13, chapter 14 and I got wondering.
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All right, we can now find the Tree of life and Jesus being
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related. What about these other things?
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There were actually four groups that come to the tree in First
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Nephi chapter 8. OK, in Lehigh's vision.
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First there's Lehigh himself. The Prophet gets there and then
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he wants his family to come, yes, and some come and some
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don't. Yes.
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And then he sees great multitudes coming.
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Yes. And some of them will come to
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the tree, but many will end up in the mists of darkness being
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lost. And finally there's a fourth
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group, and that's the group that comes.
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And as we said last time, they humbly fall down and are
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thankful as they fall, and offer their gratitude for being there.
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So how does Nephi's vision relate to Lehigh's?
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OK, so we have 4. Groups And do we see those same
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four groups in Nephi? So what does Nephi see?
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Well, it begins in Chapter 11, what we now call Chapter 11.
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But that's stage 1, where he learns about the condescension
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of Jesus. Jesus is coming down.
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He's being born as a mortal. This is the one person who is
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coming. Now that's Lehigh coming.
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So we have that first stage and then secondly we have in chapter
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12 Nephi is seeing that there will be many people who will
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hear of Jesus's preaching in in the Holy Land.
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Yeah. He talks about the 12 apostles
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and that they're going to judge the 12 tribes.
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We see Christ's ministry. Yeah.
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Yeah. And some of them are even in his
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family, James and others. But there's a family, a small
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group of followers, that will follow Jesus in Galilee, but
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many of them will not, and so some will not come to Jesus even
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though he's in their midst. And then the third chapter.
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Chapter 13. What we now call Chapter 13 is
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the gospel then being taken to the world, to the great and
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spacious people, people all over.
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Verse 13 talks about the nations and the kingdoms of the
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Gentiles. Verse 6, Great and Abominable
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Church. Yep.
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Does that sound like the great and spacious building for you?
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Can. You get the picture there.
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Follow what I'm saying. Yeah.
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So in Lehigh's vision, this is the third group.
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This is those who did not partake.
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And so you're saying this whole point about the apostasy fits
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into the same parallel from his dad's vision?
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Oh, Jack, I'm. I'm following.
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You. OK, so he's just elaborating on
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how this will affect not just a few people in the vision, but
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the whole world. Because it's not just the time
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of Christ, it affects us now. And it does.
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And that that'll get to stage 4. That's when the people do come
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to the tree, right in Lehigh's vision.
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Yeah, there are some who will come and they will learn and
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they will partake and they will be glad and they will stay
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faithful. Now Nephi is seeing that there
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will be a restoration. There will be some who will come
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and will partake of the fullness of the gospel, but this will
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then lead to, in chapter 14, a final standoff and Nephi sees
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that there will just be two groups.
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The English translation that Joseph Smith gives that says
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there will be two churches, but the word church, at least in
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Greek, is Ecclesia. It means an assembly, 2
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gatherings. One of them will be a great and
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spacious building with all kinds of various things and people
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doing all kinds of things. One will be a much more
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cohesive, unified church. Or those who are a cohesive
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group of people who are striving to have the Lord.
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Yes, but the one Nephi says is the Church of the Lamb, or the
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Gathering of the Lamb and then all others.
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And that is what Nephi's vision ultimately sees.
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There are people who are at the tree of life, and then there are
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all the others. And I don't want to negate the
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fact that there are saving ordinances and there are truths
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that need to be restored. But I also believe all that
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sincerely come unto Christ and seek him will be part of that
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church, whether in this life or the next life.
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It's not us and them. Well, I've never been able to
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see Lehi's vision as tightly connected to Nephi's.
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So thank you for pointing out that you sort of zoomed out in
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history to seize a a a world view as from the symbols that
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were introduced by Lehi that was.
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That's correct. All I did to find this was I
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said Nephi tells us that he wants to see the things that his
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father has seen, and now I want to find out what that means.
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And as I worked on it, it all did come together.
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So open up. There are two charts.
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Oh, great. Let's look, look at these
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charts. Put them up there on our slides.
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The first chart I want to mention that comes out of this
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project is chart #92 in Charting the Book of Mormon.
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And as you can see, the tabulates on one side what
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Lehigh saw and on the other column what Nephi sees.
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And you can see the parallels tracking closely all the way
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down. So that's kind of the overview
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of the two. But then to make things a little
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more useful because it's kind of hard to remember 25 things, I
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then also put together another chart, which is chart number 99,
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and I call this the four stages of the Nephite prophetic view.
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The four stages happen to follow very closely Nephi's 4 chapters.
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What you see is that this pattern will be repeated by
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Nephi and others have been and I will use this same pattern.
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And it really does boil down to four articles of faith.
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Jesus will come, he will be rejected by his own people, and
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there will be a scattering. A second scattering.
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Lehigh and Nephi knew that there would be a first scattering
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because they were a part of that, with the Babylonian
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conquest and then the Jews and Jerusalem being scattered and
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destroyed. But the vision is showing the
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Roman scattering of all Judea. That's right.
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But there will then after Jesus after his death.
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In 70 AD. Yes, some will reject Jesus, and
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to the extent that there will then be a great scattering
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beyond that. Yes.
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And then the third stage is that there will be then a day of what
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we might call the Gentiles or the nations.
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That's what the word Gentile means, is the nations.
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And that's all these different nations that now are created.
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And that's what you see in the great and spacious building with
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all these different groups and different people.
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But the Lord will not forget the Gentiles, and He will bring to
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them. We get the restoration.
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The Gospel and that is then stage 4.
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I love it. Which is then the coming of
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Christ and the ultimate victory of Christ over any forces that
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oppose him, particularly of the forces of Satan in this case.
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So I've come to call this particular worldview the Nephite
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prophetic worldview. As I mentioned, it's based in
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Lehigh and Nephi, but you can use this as a tool to help you
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understand what Nephi and others are saying when.
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Honestly, it's really quite confusing if you don't know the
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key. So you get the picture of what's
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going on in Nephi's vision and the prophetic view that he has
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as. It parallels to his dad's
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vision. We will see one more place in
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first Nephi where these four stages are represented, and
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we'll talk about that next time because it comes at the end of
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first Nephi. So stay tuned for that.
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And it's interesting to track how that apostasy will happen.
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Nephi is pretty explicit. He first says that they will
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take away certain parts of the gospel.
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Yeah, I've got this here. It's verse 29, I think, because
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of these things which are taken away of the Gospel of the Lamb
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and exceeding great, many do stumble.
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Yeah, insomuch that Satan hath great power over them.
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So after Jesus dies and the apostles are gone, Nephi sees
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that things will be taken away from the gospel, and we know
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that certain things like baptism, an understanding of the
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rest, the physical resurrection of Jesus is lost fairly early.
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Oh. Very early.
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Baptism for the dead is certainly lost, but the
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Scriptures are still there. The texts are still there, but
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they take things first away from the gospel.
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Agency is taken. Satanic influences are taken.
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Can I? Say the whole plan of salvation
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somehow gets confused because there are problems in early
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Christianity and arguing and philosophical changes.
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They're trying to make it commutative with the Greco Roman
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world, yeah, yeah. After things are taken away from
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the gospel, Nephi sees that they take away many covenants.
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That's the second thing that gets lost.
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So once you lose the plan of salvation, then the covenant of
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baptism is no longer understood the way it originally was, and
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other things like temple ordinances are dropped.
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This is the time when people are moving over to the great and
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spacious building, following the ways of the world instead of the
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ways of the gospel. And the third step that Nephi
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sees in the apostasy is that after things were taken from the
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gospel and covenants were removed, then things are taken
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away from the Bible, from the book.
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So can you name a book or two that maybe was there that was
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eventually discarded? Well, how about the Epistle of
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Barnabas? Well, that's the New Testament,
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yes. The New Testament, yes.
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I have read that the pistol of Barnabas was not canonized
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because they talked too much about the resurrection.
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I. Think.
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Resurrection, Yeah. They were saying Jesus had a
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body and they didn't like that because they were trying to show
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that Christ was still spirit because the Greeks didn't think
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physical body was pure enough. And so I think Barnabas wasn't
25:24
accepted because the physical resurrection.
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But in the early Christian writings, and even in Codex
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Sciaticus, Barnabas is a part of the.
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Scriptures I didn't know that. But it gets lost.
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It just gets quietly dropped. OK, OK.
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How about the narrative of Zossimus?
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We talked about that last time. I don't know.
25:42
Was that ever in the Canon? I don't think so.
25:44
OK, OK. But the bottom line is they're
25:46
not there. They're praying and placious
25:47
things taken out. But it's by removing these books
25:51
or things, actual words that are taken out but that does, that's
25:54
not the first thing that happens.
25:56
So the apostasy happens at a much earlier stage.
25:58
And then they are removed almost deliberately to prove their
26:02
point, as if they were trying to go before a court of law saying
26:05
these things obviously don't there.
26:07
In fact, I have to tell you, one of my graduate teachers was
26:10
teaching the resurrection of the Lord and you remember in Luke at
26:13
the very end where he's on the road to Emmaus and then he eats
26:17
with them, my professor said. And I don't want to denounce
26:21
anyone other's faith tradition, but from his faith tradition, he
26:24
said, Luke, Luke, you've got it wrong.
26:27
Jesus never could have eaten. He never had a body.
26:30
He he he was saying Luke got it wrong.
26:32
I I just thought don't don't say the scriptures are wrong.
26:36
Anyway, that was the same ideology.
26:39
And this, the platonizing or spiritualizing of the gospel
26:44
happens in the second and third centuries with Neoplatonism.
26:48
So we can see we can track how this happens and.
26:51
You said some of the plain and precious things taken out.
26:54
I was fascinated when we studied the Old Testament a couple years
26:57
to find that Satan was removed. The word devil is not even in
27:00
the Old Testament, and Satan is basically in the book of Job.
27:04
There's only four other references outside of the book
27:06
of Job for the word Satan in the Garden of Eden story.
27:09
We don't even have the word temptation or tempter.
27:12
I mean, it's completely denuded. We if you're going to look for
27:15
Satan, you're going to have a hard time until you get to the
27:18
Book of Mormon. And in this vision, he's all
27:22
over the place. We see devil and Satan.
27:25
And so I've made a little chart to show the numbers of how often
27:31
we can recognize who Satan is, what he's doing, what his
27:34
purposes are, and how we put ourselves in his path.
27:38
Because he even says once we let go of the iron rod, we then are
27:42
swooped into his control. I think we learn more about the
27:47
adversary in this these chapters than we do in the whole Old
27:53
Testament. This is just a powerful place to
27:56
learn about our enemy. And Nephi, of course, will then
28:00
talk in second Nephi chapters. You know, he goes down through
28:04
the ways of the devil and wow, does he spell it out.
28:07
Yeah, yeah. I think that was one of those
28:08
things that were the plain and precious things that were
28:10
removed. You're right.
28:12
And what we had said before was that what Lehigh seas is then
28:17
This the basic plan, the plan of salvation.
28:21
And what is lost are pieces of that.
28:24
And if you lose the plan of salvation, then you don't
28:28
understand the role, like you say of Lucifer or of Satan and
28:32
the premortal counsel and the. An agency and all that?
28:36
Yeah. Well, let's finish up Chapter
28:42
14. We don't finish his vision.
28:45
He says stop writing. The rest of it is going to be
28:48
recorded by the Apostle of the Lamb.
28:51
I think he's talking about the Book of Revelation.
28:53
Certainly is. In fact, even his name is given,
28:56
isn't it, Jeff? Yes, and his name shall be
28:58
called John. Yep.
28:59
Now, what the Book of Revelation actually gives is the account of
29:04
the final episode of the, you might say, the showdown between
29:10
the forces of good and evil. Yes it does.
29:12
When the seven seals are unloosed and the judgement
29:15
finally happens and the New Jerusalem is built, now Nephi
29:22
doesn't see that part. Well, he doesn't record it.
29:26
Well, he may see a glimpse of it.
29:28
It's kind of vague. He knows it's going to happen.
29:31
He knows from chapter 14 that ultimately, and he's told this
29:35
and he tells us this much, that the goodwill prevail.
29:38
Yes, yes, definitely he gets. How that will happen and what
29:42
will happen in the way of the Final judgement, I think he
29:45
doesn't have much more detail about.
29:48
I think he's probably seen some of it, but I'm not sure he would
29:52
have known what to make of all the, you know, the beasts and
29:56
the things that are in the Book of Revelation.
29:59
Well, I it's it's interesting that we do have though the fact
30:03
that we know the author because this is a debated topic any any
30:08
New Testament scholar knows that we aren't going to claim the
30:11
author of this as John the Beloved the Apostle.
30:14
They're going to debate it. And yet here we have a second
30:16
witness that the author of the winding up of the days and the
30:21
Savior second coming and the majority of the text is our day
30:25
and age where the seven vials are being poured out on the
30:27
earth is going to be written by this man.
30:30
So the Book of Mormon comes back again and again to testify of
30:34
the things of the Bible. The fact that it was in
30:37
Bethebara is only mentioned in the Gospel of John.
30:40
And yet we have a second witness here in first Nephi, the fact
30:43
that the Revelation is written by John.
30:46
We now have a second witness here in chapter 14.
30:48
It I I really think it's an appropriate title to say this is
30:52
another witness of Jesus Christ. We we don't have enough.
30:57
We need focusing on our Savior. And in chapter 13, Nephi is also
31:06
shown that there will be that book and so he doesn't know what
31:11
the content is. And in fact, even though the
31:15
Book of Revelation wasn't given great prominence in early
31:19
Christianity, it was there. And I think the Angel is saying,
31:23
even though there will be people who will not follow, they will
31:27
be given enough that that there will be some faithful.
31:31
And there will be records enough that when the final restoration
31:37
occurs, there will be other books that will come forth.
31:41
There will be things that will come out of that early
31:44
generation of Christians that will testify of the truthfulness
31:48
of the Bible and of the Book of Mormon.
31:56
Let's move on to chapter 15, when his brothers want to find
31:59
out what his dad saw. That's right.
32:01
And so Nephi says, Why didn't you ask?
32:04
The Lord, you know, to me, it's just so fascinating that.
32:08
He knew. Yeah, that's verse eight, I said
32:11
unto them. Have you inquired to the Lord?
32:14
That is the answer for all of us, And most people would say I
32:17
didn't get an answer. Well then I have to go back to
32:20
verse 3, where he says you're going to have to do more than
32:23
just inquire. You're going to have to look
32:25
unto the Lord. You're going to have to seek.
32:27
You're going to have to repent. You're going to have to change.
32:30
If you don't get an answer the first or second or third time,
32:33
or the 4th year or the 5th year, keep asking.
32:38
Nephi must have come down and started telling them a little
32:41
bit about what he had seen. I'm sure that they had already
32:45
read Lehigh's vision or had been told that.
32:49
Yeah, I didn't need. To tell the whole family and
32:51
you, you must wonder how Lehmann and Lemuel felt when they don't
32:55
come to the tree you. Know.
32:57
Well, I think that's one reason why they want to talk about it.
32:59
That's right. And I think that's why they say,
33:01
OK, tell us more, Why doesn't the Lord tell us these things?
33:06
You know, this is really interesting because the way he
33:08
answers it includes the idea that we have to be nourished
33:13
from the vine. And I see that as something that
33:16
Christ also spoke about in the Last Supper.
33:19
But it's also in Isaiah and it's in Ezekiel.
33:21
You know, it's all over the Old Testament where we have this
33:24
idea that we are part of the vine and broken off and
33:27
nourished from the vine that they had so few plants in that
33:30
day and age. You know, the idea that you have
33:32
a either a Grapevine or an olive tree or something, It would be
33:36
very consistent that you could replant it.
33:38
But verse 16 reads in chapter 15, Behold, I say unto you,
33:43
yeah, they shall be a remembered among the House of Israel and
33:46
they should be grafted in being in the natural branch of the
33:49
olive tree, in the true olive tree.
33:52
And then he goes on, he talks about the Jews being rejected.
33:54
And his dad is seeing these people coming and going, and
33:57
he's trying to show them a broader history of the world.
34:00
And I think it's so important to them because they are one of
34:02
these branches that have been broken off.
34:04
You know, they're they've come from Jerusalem.
34:06
They've been broken off. And so this part of the vision
34:09
is something they could Lemuel could accept this part, yes, we
34:13
are part of that. And that's in stage 3, where
34:17
there will be this scattering and that's all a part of what's
34:20
happening. Where do you think they learned
34:22
about the grafting of the olive tree?
34:24
Well, we're told that it was part of the brass plates, and
34:27
we'll talk about that in Jacob 5.
34:28
Zenith. So they've read that, but it's
34:31
not only there, it's another place.
34:33
The olive tree is mentioned many times in the Old Testament, and
34:37
they would have known that from their own experience in Galilee
34:41
and Samaria, wherever they had lived Jerusalem.
34:46
We don't know where Lehigh's property was, but it probably
34:50
had olive trees on it. I also feel like it's
34:53
fascinating that once Nephi finishes talking about the the
34:56
dream, he then goes to talk about Isaiah.
35:00
This is chapter 15, verse 20. And he said, I did rehearse unto
35:04
them the words of Isaiah who spoke concerning the
35:06
Restoration. So it's goes back to your idea
35:10
that there's there's always the hope of the gathering.
35:12
There's always the hope that and I feel like whether it's in this
35:16
life or the next life, there is always hope that you can receive
35:19
the message of the Savior again and you'll be able to find that
35:23
truth. The Book of Mormon is so
35:25
consistent at saying there's always another plan that God
35:29
will always welcome you home. We prodigal's who are broken off
35:33
because of our wickedness. Yeah.
35:35
The idea of being grafted off would appeal then to Lehman and
35:39
Lemuel, who were told that they didn't come to the tree at
35:43
first, but if they would come, they will be grafted in and they
35:50
will become a productive and important part of the tree of
35:53
life. And that's when Lehman and
35:55
Lemuel now start asking the specific questions about what's,
35:59
what's the rod, It's the word of God.
36:01
Is this verses 22/23/24? You know, he, he, what's the
36:05
tree? What's this?
36:06
What's this, you know. And this is where we get so many
36:09
of our symbols is in this later, I think they were beginning to
36:14
trust him enough to keep asking. And the dialogue was opening up
36:18
a wonderful conversation. That's when he finds out what's
36:20
the water? Oh well, Dad didn't talk about
36:23
it. But this is sin.
36:24
This is temptation, This is filthy.
36:26
You know, I I love this part of the discussion.
36:30
And and I think you're absolutely right that Lehmann
36:33
and Lemuel have have, you might say a Rubicon here to cross or
36:38
not. Are they going to stay with this
36:40
group? Are they going to go with
36:42
Lehigh? I mean, they're still there in
36:45
the valley of the first camp. They're they're just a couple of
36:49
weeks outside of Jerusalem, down on the Red Sea borders the Red
36:52
Sea. And so they could bail out, but
36:56
they choose to follow, and they want to know.
37:00
OK, tell me what the rod is. Tell me what we need to know.
37:04
And for whatever it's worth, they do all pull together.
37:09
They couldn't have gotten through the desert if they
37:11
weren't united. It's kind of like the early
37:15
church pioneers, yeah. Yeah, It's like all of us.
37:17
It's like us today. We cannot.
37:19
Get across the plains alone. Cannot be so politically divided
37:22
that we can't find some mutuality to work together.
37:24
But I think another reason why they hang together, we'll talk
37:28
about next week with the marriages.
37:30
So the marriages are going to be consummated next week.
37:32
Their betrothals, The period of engagement will be over.
37:36
But before we leave this beautiful chapter on the tree of
37:38
life, I just want to testify that I believe that God wants
37:42
all of us to come to that tree of life.
37:44
And that Tree of life is a representation of our Savior,
37:47
and the fruit is His love, and we do it.
37:50
We can feel God's love by studying our scriptures.
37:53
Hang on to the rod, hang on to the word of God, and you will be
37:57
able to feel God's love as you prayerfully approach it.
38:00
I believe this with my heart and my soul.
38:03
In the name of Jesus Christ, Amen.
38:06
Amen.