Loving the Book of Mormon Verse by Verse

This week's verses: 13  O all ye that are  spared  because ye were more  righteous  than they, will ye not now return unto me, and repent of your sins, and be converted, that I may  heal  you? 14  Yea, verily I say unto you, if ye will  come  unto me ye shall have  eternal life . Behold, mine  arm  of mercy is extended towards you, and whosoever will come, him will I receive; and blessed are those who come unto me. I like reviewing all the things in these verses that Jesus invites us to receive: healing, eternal life, mercy, Jesus himself. The question that occurs to me is why anyone would not want to receive those gifts. Thinking about one of my own experiences with healing helps me better appreciate the challenge of receiving the Savior. I had a friend that I lived with for a couple of months. We didn't know each other well when we started being roommates, and we quickly saw how different we were. It became difficult to ...

Here's my verse for the week: and the people began to forget those  signs  and wonders which they had heard, and began to be less and less astonished at a sign or a wonder from heaven, insomuch that they began to be hard in their hearts, and blind in their minds, and began to disbelieve all which they had heard and seen For context, the Nephite people spoken about here had received promises of miraculous signs of the birth of Jesus Christ, and those signs happened. And then, within a short amount of time, the people began to forget the signs, and worse still, become impervious to seeing the miraculous - past, present, and future. I want to remember this verse because it shows how capable people are to forget and reject their own past. That something so distinct and vibrant can be forgotten is disturbing! Even more troubling is how that act of forgetting becomes a rebellion that changes how the present and future are considered. In that light, I want to remember how some prophe...

  Ye do not remember the Lord your God in the things with which He has blessed you, but ye do always remember your riches, not to thank the Lord your God for them; yea, your hearts are not drawn out to the Lord, but they do swell with great pride unto boasting, and unto great swelling, envyings, strifes, malice, persecutions, and murders, and all manner of iniquity. I love how this verse seems to capture such a human challenge: God blesses us with everything we have and yet, it is so easy to forget Him when we think of what we have. This (at least for me) common way of thinking is a real trap as it leads to twisted outcomes. Our preoccupations with the riches we have (whatever they may be – family, skills, possessions, etc.) when we do not remember God and thank Him for them become a platform for pride, envy, strife. They are all we think about, primarily in negative terms, and they can never fill the place in our lives that we hope they will be. The key antidote is that phrase...

What is this? I love the Book of Mormon! It comes from God and inspires me to be a better person. I want that for others, too. So, I'm going to start sharing my thoughts each week here. I also really enjoy generative AI and want to learn how to use it for illustrations. So, with each post, I'll try and create an illustration that captures an idea that the scripture inspires. Why am I doing this? I am trying to memorize verses from the Book of Mormon each week. As part of that, I want to think about these verses. The best way for me to think is to write. So, I'm going to start doing that here, in case anyone else wants to love these verses with me! Who am I? I'm a husband, a dad, a researcher, a professor, a guy who hates to exercise but does it to try and live longer (I read that every minute of exercise results in 5 more minutes of life, who knew!). I'm someone who wants to do better and be better, and the Book of Mormon is part of that. Memorizing scriptures is no...