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Alma 36-38 | Book of Mormon Insights: Revisited · Scripture Central

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I'm Taylor. And I'm Tyler.
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Today, Alma, 36 to 38, and we've brought our friend on, Jack
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Welch, the discoverer of a beautiful literary pattern in
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the Book of Mormon called chiasmus, and we're delighted
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today to have him talk about that discovery and why it
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matters. Many people in the world are
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familiar with the term chiasmus, but there are many of our of our
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audience who maybe have never even seen this word or have any
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idea what it means. What would you?
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What would you How would you describe that?
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Well, join the crowd. It is a term that wasn't very
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widely known and still isn't in many circles.
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But biblical scholars and people who work a lot in ancient
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literature are familiar with this because it's a kind of
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rhetorical way of saying things that is made necessary because
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of some of the aspects of their writing.
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For example, they had no paragraphs.
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They had no periods or commas. They don't use the ways that we
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do to signal to readers when one idea is beginning and ending and
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the next idea beginning and ending.
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And so they used parallelism and this kind of chiasm to create a
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unit structure so that you can tell when you've started
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something. You go through a list of items
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and then go through that list in the opposite order, and when you
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get to the end, you know you've finished.
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And it was widely used not only in written texts, but the
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written texts are based on oral tradition.
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And the use of this kind of organizational way of thinking
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is especially helpful in oral literature.
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And most of the ancient world communicated verbally.
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And so this kind of style is not particularly comfortable to us,
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but when we see it, it becomes really clear.
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Beautiful. So where do we even get the
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name? The word chiasmus in Greek means
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a crisscrossing. It can also mean coming to a
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crux, a crossroads, and chiasmus will often be used to help
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emphasize, in a literary way a turning point where someone in
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their life has come to a crossing.
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And it can also be used in a way to represent what we call an
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antithetical parallelism, where you're having a contrast.
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The first half of the parallelism gives a positive
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idea, and then the next is a negative idea.
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To help emphasize the you know what something isn't is just as
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important to us understanding it as knowing what it is.
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This is a part of wisdom literature to help see like the
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the doctrine of the two ways, there's the right way and the
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wrong way, and chiasmus will often show up in passages that
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are talking about that. So what you're saying is it's
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it's kind of in, in some ways, there are a lot of there are a
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lot of benefits from this chiastic structure, but in some
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ways it's an X marks the spot, bringing people to a point
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almost, almost like this part of the the diagram to say, look,
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here are all of these aspects. Here's a turning point.
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Here are all of these aspects. Beautiful.
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Where in the world did you discover this?
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In the Book of Mormon. Well, in the world, I was in
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Regensburg, Germany, and I was a missionary, and it was in
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Regensburg, which was a center of German Catholicism and lots
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of Catholic bookstores and educated people.
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And it was, as the story has been told many times, I noticed
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on a bulletin board a lecture schedule for some lectures that
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were going to be given that summer.
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And one of them was on the series on the New Testament.
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And my companion and I decided this would be a good way to
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spend our diversion day or our P day.
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And the one lecture that we happened to go to, the professor
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had just read a book about chiasmus in the Gospel of
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Matthew. And it was there that I first
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heard the word, and a couple weeks later, after following up
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on that professor's footnotes and reading and buying some
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literature on that, that the discovery of chiasmus in Mosiah
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chapter 5, verses 11:50 was the the first chiasm that was found
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in the Book of Mormon. Correct me if I'm wrong, but the
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day you discovered chiasmus was the center point of your
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mission. That's correct.
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It was on August 16th, 1967 and it was the exact halfway point
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of my mission. So it was the IT marked the
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spot. X marks the spot.
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What a great day to find that. So, Jack, give give us a couple
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of examples of chiasmus of what it actually looks like on the
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Scripture page. Well, maybe the best place to
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start is the first one I found, which is in Mosiah chapter 5
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verses 11:50. That early morning when I first
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found that I was prompted to simply begin reading where we'd
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left off the night before as we read our Book of Mormon before
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we went to bed. It was in Mosiah chapter 4 that
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I started reading. And Mosiah chapter five was not
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far behind. But the center point of that's a
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good example of that because it's right here that says I, I
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would, that you should remember also that this is the name I
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said I would give unto you that never should be blotted out,
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except it be through transgression.
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Therefore, and that's the turning point.
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Take heed that you do not transgress, that the name be not
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blotted out of your hearts. You would put transgression and
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be careful that you don't transgress.
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Why? So that it would blot.
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Out not be blotted. Out not be blotted out because
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he's. Telling will be blotted out.
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It will be. Yeah.
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So that's how you discovered it? Right.
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There's another thing that was immediately reinforcing to me on
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this, and that is that if you don't remember the name, you
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will be found on the left hand of God.
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And that was up here. And if your name is blotted out,
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you will not be found on the left hand of God.
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Now, this seems like a lot of double talk to us.
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And you'd think that, you know, Benjamin could have been a lot
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simpler in making the point. But the fact is that he wanted
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to focus at this point on the covenant making importance of
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keeping that covenant that they've made and not transgress.
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And what chiasmus allows you to do is really zero in on the
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crucial turning point, the crux, the cross.
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And here it's don't transgress. And sometimes when you see two
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things that are rather unusual, for example, left hand of God
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and left hand of God, the only two places in the whole Book of
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Mormon that the left hand of God are mentioned are right here in
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these verses. And so that uniqueness tends to
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enhance our confidence that the passage was intentional.
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So, Jack, let's jump into Alma 36 specifically because, well,
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let me just ask you, how would you classify Alma 36 in the
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realm of chiasmus in the. Book.
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Well, well, I've written an article called Alma 36, the
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masterpiece it really is. When you compare all of the
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thousands of places in the ancient world where you have
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chiastic structures, this is the best.
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It's most the most purposeful. It is the the most precise, it
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can be analyzed at the word level, at the concept level, but
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most of all at the the spiritual use of this technique, of this
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literary structure to let us know exactly what it was that
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was the turning point of Alma's life.
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Beautiful. OK, let's dive in.
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So should we start here with Alma 36?
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Absolutely. That's would you, Would you?
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Say that this turning point of Alma 36 is actually the turning
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point for you and for me and for you and for the gospel of Jesus
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Christ and for the Church of Jesus Christ.
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That is the turning point. It is the answer.
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In Alma's struggling with the inexpressible horror that he
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finally realized that he was living with and that he would
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become banished and extinct, harrowed up, he says to the
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greatest degree. The one thing that he his mind
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finally caught upon was remembering that his father had
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spoken about the coming of one Jesus Christ, a Son of God.
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And he cried out within his soul, Oh Jesus, have mercy on
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me. Who?
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I'm in the gall of bitterness. And that is the pivot point.
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It's the turning point of his life.
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Interestingly, in Hebrew the word to repent is to turn.
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Lots of times the scriptures will say turn, turn, turn and
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he. He turned a corner, didn't he?
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Yeah. And so it is.
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It's we we think of it as repentance.
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The word repent actually comes from the Latin roots, which have
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more to do with rethinking than actually turning.
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But for the Hebrew world, repentance is turning, turning
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away from what you shouldn't and turning to God and chiasmus.
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There couldn't be a better literary structure than chiasmus
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to make that point. So now if we go into actual
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verses in Alma 36, that turning point occurs at the end of 17
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and the beginning of 18, which if you look very carefully,
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everything leading into that turning point, everything is his
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old life of sin. It's miserable.
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He's describing Jack you views words like harrowed up wish that
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I could be banished. He he just didn't even want to
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exist. Any that's right.
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The realization of what he had done was terrible.
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And yet, once he has been converted, he then will say,
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yeah, my joy was as exceeding as had been my pain.
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It's almost like he's saying, I know there will be people out
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there who won't understand Chiasma, so I'm going to make it
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perfectly clear you can't miss it.
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And so the contrast is, you know, he says, yes, I was in
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deep, deep trouble. But now all of that has been
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fixed. So Jack, would it be safe to say
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that verse one through 17 for for those who are watching, they
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could open up Alma 36 and read verse one through 17 and mark
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every instance of all of the it's all the bad.
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This is all of his life of sin. In essence, you could summarize
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verse one through 17 with one word.
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This is what it feels like to to These are the pains of a damned
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soul. He's describing hell here.
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Yeah, that's kind of what we we tend to emphasize.
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But if you begin, there's a prologue and the prologue is a
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+1. Does my son give ear to my
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words? That's the first thing you do.
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You have to you have to listen to the words and give strict
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heed to the commandments of God. Now he will end by also
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mentioning the commandments of God.
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And he will then say at the very end, and this is according to
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his words, what he's done there is he begins by giving ear to my
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words. But at the end, you are now
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prepared to give heed to God's words.
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You can see the, the shift, the hell and the, the joy or the
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pain and the joy, you know, when he's in the very depths of his
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three days. And then he wants to make sure
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that we understand this. This can't just be one word.
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It has to be a whole set of feelings.
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And that's why he said it was as exceeding as was my pain,
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because it's got all of these features in it as well.
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So as a person analyzes this, think about all of the ways in
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which an unrepented sin will lead your life into pain and
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suffering and spiritual regret and remorse and all of the
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things that sin does to you. And then now think of all of the
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things that conversion will do to you.
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And that's kind of this this block of things in this area.
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The the chiasm doesn't doesn't work out as what would we say as
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meticulously as in the early part.
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And but there are different rhetorical devices being used in
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each of these cases that are comparable in the the heaven and
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hell comparison. One of them, for example, is
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where he said that, you know, he did not want to go into the
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presence of God. He wanted to be banished and
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extinct. He just couldn't stand the
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thought. He.
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Just don't want to exist anymore.
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But then how does he explain the joy?
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He now says, yeah, my joy was as exceeding as was my pain.
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And and I thought I saw, even as our Father Lehigh saw God
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sitting on his throne, surrounded by numberless
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concourses of angels in the attitude of singing and praising
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their God. And what he's doing there is
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quoting a whole block of text from first Nephi chapter one to
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say how much he now wants to be like Lehigh, brought into the
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heavenly presence and into the counsel of all those glorious
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beings. The contrast here is is
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elaborate. And there's some other things
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going on than just the the direct inversion.
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But then he talks about here my limbs had been had been
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paralyzed. What he means by that is my my
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hands and my feet. I couldn't move.
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My body couldn't move, but my spirit was still moving.
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And I think that's a really important contrast because down
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here he then will talk about I received now my limbs back
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again. What can I do now with my body
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to now live the life of righteousness here he had been
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destroying this the church down here.
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He will now build the church and he's been born of God here.
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He mentions being born of God down here.
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Again, there are plenty of places where people can see all
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of these things detailed, but every one of them is worthy of,
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of contemplation. You know, the first part of Alma
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36 is a road map of the process of repentance.
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How do you repent? You begin by giving ear to the
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words of the prophet. You go through the, you know,
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the repentance process step by step.
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But ultimately the repentance process is not just deciding
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we're going to be different. It's where our heart is changed.
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And that change comes through the atonement of Jesus Christ.
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And without that, you haven't reached the the real essence of
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this repentance. And who knows this better than
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Alma? He's been through it, and he'd
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love to tell this story. He refers to it in almost every
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one of his speeches. There's an allusion to it in one
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way or another. So here in Alma Chapter 36, he's
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bringing all those pieces together.
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And what he's doing is giving his son Heelman the master
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version of his conversion story. It wasn't appropriate in some
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circumstances for him to go into this kind of depth and talking
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to other audiences. But behind all of Alma's
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speeches stands this one experience.
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And Alma 36 then brings that all together here again, The Book of
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Mormon surprises us again with another fact that, you know, how
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do you explain the presence of something like this in the Book
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of Mormon when so little was known about this in Joseph
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Smith's day? And and even if Joseph Smith had
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known everything we know about it today, you still have them.
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The chore of somehow composing these complicated structures as
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you dictate with no notes. It's staggering.
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And how does it happen? Well, as Joseph said over and
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over again, it was by the gift and power of God.
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And I love to think about that because it is, first of all, a
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gift. This is something that was given
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to us. It was given to me.
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I didn't go looking for this sort of thing.
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This is not me figuring this out.
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This is something that was a gift given to me that I might do
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something with it, as all gifts are given to us.
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When we're given a gift, it's not for our pleasure or
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amusement. It's so that we then can take
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that talent and do something with it.
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It was by the gift of God. And Joseph Smith then knew that
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his mission was to do a lot with the Book of Mormon and he
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fulfilled that mission. We also have this gift placed in
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our hands and, and we know it's a gift because we can see that
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it came by the power of God. And it wasn't just the the power
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in the sense of the mechanistic doing of this, but it's the
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power that it contains, the way in which it can touch souls, the
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way it can actually rivet into your being These principles that
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aren't just being stated casually, but forcefully so that
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the spirit can testify to us, as it has to me.
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The truthfulness of these words that are being not just said and
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not just communicated, but represented in the sense that
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they represent to us eternal truths that otherwise remain
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obscure and inaccessible to us. Would you also say it would be
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accurate to couch it this way, That the Book of Mormon is such
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an amazing gift brought forth by the gift and power of God?
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That it's layered in such a way that if somebody goes their
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entire life without learning about any ancient literary
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techniques, they're still going to benefit powerfully from the
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book. But the more you learn about the
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breadth and the depth of this incredible book and its people
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and the processes that they went through to even get the book
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into our hands today, all the way down through Joseph Smith,
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then it just takes our testimony and our appreciation for not
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just the book, but the central feature of the book.
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It just takes it to whole new levels of appreciation and of
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understanding and of of joy, allowing us to repent in the
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Hebrew sense, allowing us to turn our hearts and our lives to
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God. Precisely.
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This conversation isn't as much about chiasmus as it is about
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taking our study of the Word of God maybe a little more
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seriously than we have before. And chiasmus is one Ave. that
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that one fruit that will come from that effort.
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To me it reminds me of my favorite quote about the book
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itself from from President Benson when he said there is a
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power in the book that will begin to flow into your life the
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moment you begin a. Serious study.
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Serious study, Not a blind reading or a surface quote book
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approach, but a serious study. If we take this seriously, we
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will feel that power flow into our life immediately, he says.
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And you do, you take it seriously when you say this is
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real, this is reality. The scriptures will even say,
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and is that not real? And that's the question we're
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all asked to come to God with. We often don't start with Meroni
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chapter 10, verse three. We start with verse four.
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But you got to read verse three too because he says when you
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receive these things, oh, you have to 1st receive them.
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And that doesn't just mean get a copy, but you receive it as you
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welcome it into your life, as you receive these things and as
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you remember the mercies that have been shown to you by God
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and allowing you to have these things.
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That's what Alma starts with. Remember the deliverance of your
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your people. He's giving you here also a
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model for how you can be born of God and get that testimony.
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And so after doing those kinds of things, then if you will ask
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with a sincere heart, having faith in God, it will manifest
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the truth of it unto you by the power of the Holy Ghost.
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Well, that's again taking it seriously.
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Yeah, it denotes a process of serious immersion and and
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conversion rather than just a drive through window event.
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And Tyler, let me say one more thing about how you are blessed
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with these kinds of insights. When I find things that I find
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most valuable in my life, it's when I am actually looking for
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something else. When I am working on an
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assignment or fulfilling a calling, and then recognize that
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the Lord has blessed me by giving me something that I would
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not have thought of before so that I could then go and use it.
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And I've mentioned how that happened a little bit with the
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Mosiah 5 discovery, but that's how it happened with Alma 36 as
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well. I hadn't noticed Alma 36 until
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I've been home from my mission for about 6 months and I've been
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called to be the Sunday School Gospel Doctrine teacher in my
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student ward and our elders quorum had decided that we would
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go to the Manti Temple on Saturday, March the 8th.
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I went with them, wanting to be a good member of the Quorum, but
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also knowing that I needed to have the strength of the temple
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if I was going to be a good teacher.
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The lesson that I gave on Sunday morning, right after we got back
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from the Manti Temple and I recorded in a letter that I
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wrote home on Sunday night on March the 9th, that the lesson
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was on Alma the Younger. And what we had decided to do as
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a class was to try to put together a character sketch of
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Alma the Younger. What was he like?
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Did he get mad? You know, what sort of skills,
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how was he like us are different, But what can we
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discern from his words about what kind, what would be like to
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meet him in person? So I was reading through a lot
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of Alma material, not looking for chiasmus, but trying to
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understand Alma. In my letter home that Sunday
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night, I explained going to the temple and how I was very happy
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that I had gone and felt that I had received direction in some
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decisions I was making in my life.
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And then after telling about the Sunday school class going very
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well, I said oh and also I just found a gorgeous pattern in Alma
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36. Period.
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It was late. That's all I said.
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But why did I see this? I mean, I was reading in this
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reprint of the 1st edition of the Book of Mormon.
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I like to do that. But you can see here my pencil
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notations in the margin going down the elements in Alma 36
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that I wrote that very day as I was reading through this,
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looking for something else, only to be overwhelmed with the
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recognition of the turning point with the marking there on the
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top of page 325. And basically, these elements
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would then become the initial presentation of the chiastic
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structure of Alma 36 in the BYU Studies article.
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That presentation has been refined by myself and other
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people over the years, but here it was and it, I won't say it
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just fell in my lap, but it certainly knocked me over and it
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was just, what could I say? But this is just great.
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Now, my point is we, we have to be humble in this process and we
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realize that the Lord will make these things available if He can
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trust us to use these things to bless other people.
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And I hope that's what we've been able to do with our work.
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I know you have done with yours. And isn't that why these little
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gems, big gems, treasures? This is maybe the best example
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of chiasmus anywhere in world literature.
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And it's best not just because of its rigorous structure, but
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because of the message that it's so clearly communicates.
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It's wonderful. As we turn over from Chapter 36
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into the second-half of Alma's teaching to his son Hileman,
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there are some really profound truths that come out of this
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chapter. This is where Hileman is going
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to be the next prophet, the next high priest, and there are a
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whole bunch of things that go with that office.
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And so Alma the Younger is going to take significant time here to
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introduce his son to each of these elements that he is now
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going to be in charge of taking care of and passing down through
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the generations. If you look at chapter 37, verse
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six to me, and this is just my my personal opinion here, that
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verse six is the thesis statement for the entirety of
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what is going on in the rest of chapter 37.
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You'll notice he says, Now you may suppose that this is
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foolishness in me, but behold, I say unto you that by small and
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simple things are great things brought to pass, and small means
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in many instances doth confound the wise.
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So if you look carefully at Chapter 37, you're going to see
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a whole list of things that could be considered, especially
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by the world, as small and simple and not very important.
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Take a moment of reflection and think back on your life to some
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of the turning points in your life where you made some
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decisions or you you turned and went a different direction with
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your life. What was it that caused that
27:16
turn? Now, this may not be the case
27:18
for all of you, but often it's small and simple things that
27:24
come along. Somebody will say something or
27:27
do something, or a door will open up and it seems small and
27:30
insignificant. You walk through that door and
27:32
next thing you know, your whole future has been changed and it's
27:37
pretty profound. Years ago, just as a little
27:40
illustration of this, when I was teaching Institute up in Logan,
27:45
I had 100% job satisfaction. I loved teaching at the
27:50
institute. I loved my colleagues, I loved
27:53
the students. I loved what I was doing working
27:56
with developing an online seminary program and working
27:58
with some pre service students preparing them to be seminary
28:02
teachers. I loved everything about my job
28:05
and I had 0 intention of ever leaving the Seminary Institute
28:09
program one day. Two teachers from Brigham
28:13
University, Frank Judd and David Whitchurch, were in the building
28:18
observing some teachers. And Wayne Dimock, the institute
28:23
director, came and told me that they were going to be in my
28:25
class. And I said, Wayne, I have zero
28:28
interest in teaching at BYU. I am not leaving us.
28:31
And I and he said, well, just be kind to them.
28:34
I said, well, I can do that. After the lesson, I'll never
28:38
forget this moment. I can still see in my mind's eye
28:41
in my office. They're in the institute in
28:43
Logan. David Whitchurch and Frank Judd
28:46
sitting across from me. And I was being very kind and
28:49
very friendly with zero interest in leaving the institute.
28:55
And David asked, so Tyler, would you ever have any interest in
29:00
teaching at BYU potentially? They weren't offering a job.
29:03
They couldn't do that. They were just out searching for
29:06
potential candidates. And I smiled and I opened my
29:11
mouth to say very kindly, thank you, but I I really have no
29:16
interest, I mean zero interest in teaching at BYU, which would
29:21
mean I would have to leave the institute program.
29:24
And it was in that moment my mouth was open.
29:27
I was ready to say I have no interest when 4 words came very
29:34
forcefully into my mind with an exclamation mark attached.
29:39
And the four words were don't close any doors.
29:45
And it came in command form in an instant.
29:47
Remember, my mouth was open. I paused and said, I've never
29:54
really seriously considered it before.
29:56
At which point I'm thinking, what are you doing to me?
30:00
I couldn't figure out what was happening.
30:03
Brothers and sisters, it was a very small, very simple thing
30:08
that occurred in that instant that I didn't close the door and
30:13
one thing led to another led to another led to another, and next
30:15
thing you know, we're teaching at BYU and other opportunities
30:20
to learn and grow and develop and do things had now opened up.
30:25
I didn't even know what to ask for before that point.
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Small and simple means is at many times how God carries forth
30:34
His work. Now watch as we go through
30:37
chapter 37. Just look at this list for a
30:39
minute. You get in verse two, he
30:42
describes the plates of Nephi that you're now going to be in
30:45
charge of Heelman. Small and simple to the world.
30:49
Wow, great things brought to pass.
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He then goes to verse three, The plates of brass.
30:54
You're going to be in charge of taking care of those small and
30:57
simple great things brought to pass.
30:58
You'll notice then in verse eight, he says now it has
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hitherto been wisdom in God that these things should be
31:05
preserved. For behold, they have enlarged
31:08
the memory of this people. These plates, these scriptures
31:11
have been preserved because they enlarge the memory of this
31:14
people, small things, great things brought to pass.
31:19
Because if you enlarge memory of the people, you're going to
31:21
increase their ability to, to have these moments where they
31:25
repent, where they turn away from sin, away from, from the
31:29
flesh and the natural man and turn towards God and the things
31:33
of of the covenant path. Look at verse 11.
31:37
This is a small and simple way to handle really big doctrinal
31:42
questions that we don't yet have revealed.
31:44
Notice he says, now these mysteries are not yet fully made
31:47
known unto me, therefore I shall for bear.
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Kind of a fun approach to say it's not been rebuilt, so I'm
31:54
going to for bear. Because sometimes, brothers and
31:57
sisters, we get so caught up in the deep and eternal mysteries
32:00
when we really don't know. It's kind of like
32:03
kindergarteners sitting on the playground talking about
32:07
principles of quantum physics just because we learned how to
32:10
count to 10. There are some things that are
32:13
revealed and there are others that aren't.
32:15
And it quite frankly, it doesn't do as much good to spend a ton
32:18
of time in our classes hypothesizing or or guessing
32:24
about things that we really don't know.
32:26
So Alma shows us a beautiful pattern here.
32:28
I'm going to for Bear. I don't know.
32:30
And it's OK to not know. In fact, sometimes it's more
32:33
dangerous to act like we do know when we don't know.
32:36
We can actually do more damage that way.
32:38
Look verse 13, or remember, remember my son Helaman, how
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strict are the commandments of God.
32:46
If you circle commandments, that is a small and simple thing
32:49
whereby great things are brought to pass.
32:52
Look at verse 16. If you keep the commandments of
32:55
God and do with these things which are sacred according to
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that which the Lord does command you.
33:00
For you must appeal unto the Lord for all things, whatsoever
33:02
you must do with them. Now check this out.
33:05
Behold no power, no power on earth or hell can take them from
33:14
you, for God is powerful to the fulfilling of all His words.
33:20
Small and simple diligence and obedience will bring about the
33:24
great power of God to help us fulfill things.
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Now in humans realm that was you do your best to take care of
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these plates and no power of earth or hell can take them away
33:35
from you. But for us it's we do the things
33:38
that we're asked to do on the covenant path and no power of
33:42
earth and hell can remove that faith, that testimony from us,
33:46
that conversion process from us. Now go to verse 21.
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Now I will speak unto you concerning these 24 plates.
33:56
So we get the plates, the record of the Jaredites, small and
34:00
simple things take care of them. The very ending of verse 21.
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Preserve these interpreters, the interpreters that God gave small
34:08
and simple things that bring great things to light.
34:11
Look at verse 32 through 353637. He's talking about these small
34:20
and simple elements of the gospel, repentance, being
34:24
humble, meek, lowly of heart, remembering to gain wisdom, to
34:29
cry unto the Lord. Prayer is a small and simple
34:33
thing which brings to pass great blessings from heaven.
34:38
Then in 38 he talks about the ball or director or our Father's
34:43
called it Leahona, which is being interpreted a compass.
34:47
By the way, little trivia here. That's the only place in the
34:50
entire Book of Mormon, 531 pages in English, where you get the
34:54
name Leahona. Everywhere else is just referred
34:58
to as the ball or the director or the compass.
35:00
Here is where Alma the Younger actually gives it its name, the
35:04
Leahona. Small, simple, intricate.
35:09
It can't be replicated by man. And yet because of that little
35:14
small gift from God, it LED them through the wilderness.
35:19
Now look at verse 41. As you analyze as an individual,
35:23
as a couple, as a family, whatever setting you're in, as
35:27
you analyze the small and simple things in your life that are
35:31
like a Leahona, that give incredible direction to guide
35:36
you in the more fertile parts of the wilderness, look at verse
35:39
41. Nevertheless, because those
35:42
miracles were worked by small means, it did show unto them
35:46
marvelous works. They were slothful and forgot to
35:50
exercise their faith and diligence.
35:51
And then those marvelous works ceased and they did not progress
35:55
in their journey. Sometimes we look for the big,
35:58
the fantastic that the miraculous in order to then
36:03
follow and be diligent and obedient.
36:06
It's the idea of if God commanded you and your family to
36:09
build a boat or an ark, most of us would probably say wonderful,
36:13
let's go do it. And we would we would work at
36:16
it. But if he says love your family,
36:19
love your neighbor, minister to the needs of those around you,
36:24
sometimes it's so small and it seems so insignificant that
36:28
maybe we don't give as much diligent heed to those commands
36:33
as we do to the big, huge commands or the big callings in
36:36
the church versus the little callings that seems so small and
36:41
simple. And yet it's often in those
36:44
callings where lives are totally changed because of a moment here
36:50
and experience here or a pattern throughout that process of
36:54
working with people and ministering with people.
36:57
And I know of nothing more applicable to this principle
37:01
than what happens in the home, what happens with families.
37:05
It's not big, huge family vacations that create that
37:10
covenant culture as much as it is daily discipleship, daily
37:15
striving to be good and to teach the correct principles, not just
37:21
with our words, but with our actions.
37:24
And when we see each other struggling and then repenting
37:28
and granting forgiveness to each other and moving forward
37:32
collectively as a group, great things are brought to pass.
37:37
Let's finish this concept in chapter 37 with verse 44.
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For Behold, it is as easy to give heed to the word of Christ,
37:46
which will point to you a straight course to eternal
37:48
bliss, as it was for our fathers to give heed to this compass
37:53
which would point unto them a straight course to the Promised
37:58
Land. You'll notice if you look back a
38:00
few verses that there were many times when they didn't give
38:03
diligent heed to that compass, and so they wandered.
38:07
And Alma tells Healman here that they spent eight years wandering
38:12
because they didn't take a direct course, because they
38:14
didn't give heed to the words and to the direction given on
38:18
the Leahona. When Alma finished with his son
38:22
Healman, he then turns his attention to Shiblan, a
38:26
remarkable son. But we only get one chapter for
38:29
him. As Jack pointed out earlier, the
38:33
first part of chapter 38 from verse one down through eight is
38:40
kind of Alma summing up his story, the full chiastic version
38:47
of his story that he gave to Heelman.
38:49
He's giving kind of the highlights to Shiblon.
38:52
He's not giving him the full story in its in its entire
38:57
detail. And then once he gets to verse
39:00
9, notice he shifts and he says, now my son, I have told you
39:05
this, that you may learn wisdom. Let's now talk a bit about
39:09
something called wisdom literature.
39:11
Alma 38 could be described as wisdom literature.
39:14
Now this phrase is very specific around certain types of
39:19
literature that show up in Scripture, for example, the book
39:22
of Proverbs. That is wisdom literature.
39:26
And I want to remind everybody this word wisdom is pretty
39:29
amazing because other words that we are all familiar with
39:32
actually come from the same word, like wit and idea.
39:38
Even the word history, which actually means inquiry.
39:41
Even our word vision and evidence all have to do with
39:45
seeing. The basic concept of the word
39:48
wisdom has to do with seeing. And all these words here are
39:52
about seeing things. So the book of Proverbs is
39:57
literature where a righteous father is teaching righteous
40:01
instruction to his son, and a righteous son will listen to the
40:06
beautiful righteous words of his father, preserve them, and then
40:10
teach them to his children. Now, of course, the real Father
40:13
we should be listening to is God the Father.
40:16
But at wisdom literature, a human father in some ways
40:19
represents God the Father, who delivers loving covenantal
40:23
instructions and commandments for how to live well.
40:26
If we look at Alma 38, who is the wise Father?
40:30
It's Alma the younger, and he's teaching wise commandments to
40:35
his son Shiblon. And what's really interesting is
40:38
if you look throughout the Book of Mormon record, in fact, in
40:41
some ways the Book of Mormon record itself is wisdom
40:45
literature. It begins with Lehigh, this
40:48
righteous father, teaching the wise words to his son Nephi.
40:53
And how do you know who the righteous are?
40:56
It is those who are willing to listen and preserve the wise
41:01
words of the father as well as a righteous father on earth.
41:06
And what does Nephi do? He listens to the wise words of
41:10
his father, Lehi, who happens to be learning from God the Father,
41:15
and he shares that with his children, Lehman and Lemuel.
41:18
They don't listen. They are not wise.
41:21
They're actually fools. And if you look at the Book of
41:24
Mormon record, it actually is a series of fathers teaching
41:29
covenantal instructions or words of wisdom to their sons who
41:34
preserve that and teach it to others.
41:36
In fact, we have this interesting pattern.
41:39
After Abinadi teaches, Alma the elder is converted.
41:44
He had listened to the wise words of Abinadi, and then he
41:49
passed those down to his son Alma the younger, who then
41:52
taught those wise words to heal him in.
41:55
And Helaman listened to those wise words and became a wise
41:59
person by also teaching and preserving and transmitting
42:03
those records to his son Helaman and so forth to then his son
42:08
Nephi. And Nephi had a son named Nephi,
42:10
who had a son named Nephi. And then actually this last
42:15
Nephi had two sons, and one of them actually passed the records
42:20
down to Mormon. Here from Abinadi to Mormon is
42:26
almost an unbroken chain of wisdom literature of God the
42:31
Father delivering the wisdom of how to live a life of joy to
42:36
fathers, to sons who listened to their wise fathers and preserved
42:41
those words for themselves and for others and passed that
42:45
tradition down all the way until now.
42:48
We have these wise words available for us today.
42:52
And so the question is, will we become wise parents?
42:57
Will we preserve these wise words and deliver them to our
43:02
children? Will we teach these wise words
43:05
to our children? Will we model these wise words
43:08
to our children? And most importantly, well, we
43:11
help our children turn to the real, wise Father who can always
43:15
deliver wisdom and ultimately, joy and salvation.
43:20
When the scriptures jump into this wisdom literature, it's
43:24
beautiful. It it becomes kind of, it reads
43:28
more like the Proverbs where it's a word to the wise.
43:32
The truly wise people will pay attention to this, learn wisdom
43:36
here. So look at some of the things he
43:39
says. There is no other way or means
43:42
whereby man can be saved only in and through Christ.
43:47
Behold, He is the life and the light of the world.
43:50
Behold, He is the word of truth and righteousness.
43:53
If you want to be wise, learn that lesson first among all the
43:57
other lessons. No other way to be saved only
43:59
in, through, in and through Christ.
44:01
Now look at verse 10. And now as you've begun to teach
44:04
the Word, Even so, I would that you should continue to teach,
44:07
and I would that you would be diligent and temperate in all
44:11
things. You're starting to sense
44:13
something. This father talking to his son
44:16
Shiblon, he's noticed some things in his son's character,
44:21
and he's addressing those and teaching him wisdom.
44:24
Look at verse 11. See that you're not lifted up
44:28
unto pride. See that you do not boast in
44:31
your own wisdom nor of your much strength.
44:34
In other words, Shiblon's a pretty smart guy.
44:37
He's pretty strong. He's pretty effective as a
44:39
missionary. They're they're on this mission
44:41
right among the Zoramites. When this is this story is being
44:45
inserted. Look at verse 12.
44:47
Use boldness but not overbearance.
44:52
Maybe Alma has observed this son get a little too overbearing at
44:57
times in his teaching, in his interactions with people, and
45:02
then this wise counsel also see the ye bridle all your passions
45:07
that you may be filled with love.
45:09
Brothers and sisters, we live in a world that looks at the word
45:13
passion and instantaneously attaches to that all of the the
45:17
physical aspects of passion. But you'll notice Alma's words
45:22
bridle all your passions. Not all passions are are
45:28
physical or sexual in nature. Some of our passions might have
45:33
to do with things like art or sports or culture or politics or
45:40
travel or entertainment or video games or reading or whatever.
45:46
There are a lot of things that human beings can become
45:50
passionate about. And I love the fact that Alma
45:53
told his son. See the E bridal all your
45:57
passions, not just the physical kind, bridal, all of them.
46:02
Notice that he didn't say kill all of your passions.
46:06
He didn't say squelch crush beat down all of your passions.
46:11
He said bridal all of your passions.
46:15
Which means you're holding the reins, You're calling the shots
46:20
on every one of those passions. You're deciding where those
46:24
passions take you because if you don't bridle the passion, the
46:28
passion grows wild. And all of a sudden that wild
46:31
Mustang, that horse is going to take you places you never
46:35
intended to go at speeds you never thought possible nor
46:40
desirable. But if we can bridle those
46:42
passions, those God-given desires, appetites and passions,
46:46
whatever they may be, and however they've developed in
46:48
your life, if you keep them in check, you control the pace, you
46:53
control the direction, then they will take you places you want to
46:58
go. Otherwise they're going to take
47:01
you places you never intended for them to go, and you're going
47:04
to lose control. And you can spend a lot of time
47:07
looking at the significance of a bridle and a bit in an animal's
47:11
mouth. Something so small, so seemingly
47:15
insignificant and simple can control something so big and so
47:21
powerful. So if you or somebody that's a
47:24
loved one is struggling with with addiction or with certain
47:30
passions that have have gone wild, the question might be how
47:35
can we learn to begin to put that bridle in and begin to take
47:41
a little more control today than I had yesterday?
47:44
And how can I start steering it in directions that are a little
47:47
more helpful today than they were taking me yesterday?
47:50
Bit by bit unintended work our way forward in in bridling all
47:56
those passions. And notice his last counsel in
47:59
verse 12. See that you refrain from
48:02
idleness again, this activation of agency.
48:06
Don't be idle. Do things.
48:08
And then he counsels him on some other things and then bids his
48:11
son farewell as he sends him off to teach the word unto this
48:16
people. In closing, brothers and
48:19
sisters, there is a God in heaven and He sees everything
48:24
past, present, and future. He knows you better than you
48:27
know you. He understands the the
48:30
constraints that you're facing better than you understand them
48:32
and better than I understand mine.
48:34
And there will be times in your life when He will bring people
48:39
or situations or settings that may seem small and simple at
48:43
first in order to steer you in a certain direction or to turn
48:48
your life in another direction. Whether it be attached to sin
48:53
versus righteousness or career or family decisions or schooling
48:59
or whatever it may be. My invitation to you the day to
49:04
finish would be, don't close any doors on the Lord and on the
49:09
direction that He may bring into your life.
49:11
Know that He lives and know that He loves you.
49:14
And we leave this with you. In the name of Jesus Christ,
49:16
Amen.