Transcript for Enos-Words of Mormon Part 1 • Dr. Gerrit Dirkmaat • April 15 - April 21 • Come Follow Me

There's some great aspects of each of these books, especially ways that we can apply these to ourselves. And there are ways that these parts of the Book of Mormon, especially look forward to the restoration and to the prophet Joseph Smith when we can bring all aspects of the restoration together with our study of the Book of Mormon. It's even more exciting. We're going to see the unfolding of a centuries long, over millennia long miracle of the Lord's foresight in bringing us the Book of One.

Well, thanks for having me. I assume that the reason I hadn't been back in a couple of years is because I did such a bad job teaching your daughter. You know what I said?

It was desperation, you know.

Yep. We started a few years ago. I think we're in our fourth season now. We try to answer questions that people have about church history. We like to save our podcasts for people who take the gospel seriously, but don't take themselves seriously. We like to laugh around a little bit, but also bear testimony. We try to answer questions that listeners have.

I think a lot of times we think about Enus, the thing that first comes to mind is, I'm pretty sure I can't pray all day. I think almost everyone who's been in either a new church calling or they're going on a mission, they thought, you know what, they all pray like Enus. You get about 15 minutes in and it's like, I've got another nine and a half hours before I get to the night time here. And clearly I'm not as righteous as Enus. But I love his conversion story. Enus isn't in a postage. It's not like he's Sonsomozai out trying to destroy the church. But he hasn't been converted. He's an unconverted member if you would say that. You have to think. that Jacob's like holding family on meaning and stuff. You have to think that Jacob's really trying to teach the gospel and yet it hasn't had this overwhelming impact on him yet. One of the first things I take away from this because I've teenage children is this is a way to try to make myself feel better about being a poor father. You're trying to teach him the gospel. You desperately want them to feel the spirit the same way you feel the spirit. And it's sometimes very painfully obvious that they do not. Nor do they care to at this time because I want to go play Fortnite with my friends. What comes to his mind is the words that his father said. I mean, how frustrated Jacob must have been. Here's my son, come on. I'm the prophet. My son won't get on board. He won't fully accept this. But you know, in his quiet moments, those questions about who am I? Why am I here? Is this stuff true? What's the purpose of this life? Those are the types of questions that all humankind at some point is going to ask. And maybe you're 15-year-old isn't ready to ask that question of the universe. but there will come a time at some point that they will. One of the things you take away from this is that parents continue to try to teach the gospel to your children even if it seems like they are not fully embracing it because at some point they're going to have a question and the words that you've spoken, the studies that you've done, that will be something for them to grab a hold of the same way you missed it in here.

I certainly didn't pray all night, but I had an experience when I was in high school. When I was a teenager of 16, it was something similar where I felt this hunger. Now again, my parents had taught me the gospel, and I was never doubting it or rebellious, but there were certainly a lot of things that mattered more to me in my life than going to church. the Nintendo would just come out. There's all kinds of things that I could have spent my time on while I was at the time with a group of friends that it just started doing things that I knew my parents were teaching me weren't right. It led to a conflict where and I was going to be forced to choose between my friends and I didn't want to love my friends. This sounds like a made up story because I'm from Idaho, but I drove my car to a field one night. It was a potato field. Frankly, that's shocking. It's the only field. So it sounds like I'm making that up. But I had that experience where I desperately wanted to know. And the reason why I wanted to know was, if this isn't true, it's not worth losing my friends over. It's not worth having people make fun of me over if it's not true. I certainly didn't pray all night, but I knelt down to that detailed field, and I received a powerful, powerful witness that Joseph Smith was a prophet. And honestly, receiving that powerful testifying witness, it changes your priorities, it changes who you are, and John said, different things bring us to that hunger. But I think the Lord is always willing to give us that answer when we are ready to cry out.

I agree. Everyone's going to have rough times, and everyone's going to struggle with different things. It's hard because there are days that you just, the things don't work out. At the same time, at least for me, the gospel provides me a sense of peace because the larger questions in life are never the questions that I have. How are you going to pay a bill? How are you going to get this done? How are you going to do that? Those are the temporal questions of life that I may find a way to solve them I may not. But the questions of eternity are the ones that I already know the answers to. That's settled. Yeah, and I think that that brings a level of peace and it brings a level of happiness. I love life and I love to laugh and I love to joke around. I love to be around other people. I credit all of that to the gospel because it teaches me who I am and who other people are and what the purpose of life is and why the gospel is so important.

Well, first of all, we are all desperately flawed individuals. I know it seems like that the family next door has it all figured out, and they're having family on the evening every night of the week, and every one of their kids has gone on three missions, and they're all married twice in a simple minute. I mean, just the reality is we're all sinners. We came to a fallen world, we chose to come to this fallen world, knowing that we would mess up all kinds of things. One thing we should get from the Book of Mormon is, everyone has agency. I remember very well. I was probably the type of person that no one ever wanted to talk to when Angie and I were first married. and didn't yet have kids. Because I would see people kissing my usual probably just put a limit on their screen time.

The easiest parenting you've ever done is someone else's kids before you have any. And then you have your own children and you realize the things that work with one won't even work at all with the other one. There's no giant recipe book that tells you exactly how to turn out. And look at the Book of Mormon. Look at these amazing prophets who are speaking directly to the Lord and their children are falling away. Their children are unconverted. It's not because Mosiah didn't decide to share the gospel with his sons. The reality is in this fallen and broken world. Mosiah was probably asking the same question too. What more could I have done? Maybe I should have been a little bit stricter on this, or maybe I think that the Lord knows the effort that we've put in. And he also knows our regrets. He also knows that we wish we had done better. Anyone who has any self-inverspection at all looks back on their life and says, man, I could have done a lot of things differently. But that's hindsight as historians. It's great to be a historian because you always get to be right. It's like the greatest thing ever. Like, because you already know what's going to happen. And so you get to look back on the past bit. Well, you know, they probably should have done this. It's perfect. It works out great because you already know what's going to happen. And none of us has that roadmap in life. I would say, don't be too hard on yourself. And remember, God is a God of miracles. God is a God who will use your faith and prayers to move things in a way that will bring eventual happiness. And I believe that God will miraculously change the lives of our children and impart because of our faith.

There's at least something to the fact that he's by himself. He doesn't have to figure out how to put down his iPhone, the way that some of us might have to. He just doesn't doom scrolling on Facebook. But no doubt as the son of the leader of the people, there was always something going on and there was always people around and there was always commotion and that by going out when you have time to think, then these kinds of deeper thoughts come in. I mean, let's see, let's talk about the screw tape letters that Satan does some of his best work, keeping thoughts out of people's heads. If you can fill up things with all kinds of commotion and busyness, then you never have time to think more deeply on things. And foriness, whether it's the stars in the sky or whether it's just I am somewhere where I'm by myself. No one can see me. There's no one judging. Oh, there's Jacob's son going to pray in front of him. It's just me. And he thinks about those things and goes to pray.

The next verse kind of gives us part of that answer to that. And I often think, what was it like for Joseph Smith to translate verse five? Because it mirrors Joseph Smith's own first vision experience with what Jesus tells him. So in verse five, there came a voice in the me saying, Enus, that I sins are forgiven. They When you go to Joseph Smith's 1832 account of his first vision, this is his earliest account, the one that's written in his own handwriting about this. He says, I saw the Lord, and he's spaken to me saying, Joseph, my son, thy sins are forgiven. I often wonder when Joseph translates those words, did this hit him that Ennis just had this same experience that I had? And you know what? I was out praying in the woods. I was out praying asking an answer and the first thing that Jesus said to both of us was your sins are forgiven. And I think that is what brings peace. Joseph is actually going to say that. My soul was filled with love and for many days I could rejoice with great joy and the Lord was with me in the aftermath of the Lord telling him his sins were forgiven.

It's very much an open communication and a hungry soul right as desperate for answers is willing to do anything to get those answers.

I love the fact that in the enus story, you see a real life playing out of the tree of life vision that Leiah has. So you have enus desperately desiring. He takes the fruit. He receives forgiveness. And then what's the next prayer that he prays? It's for his brother. It's for his family. The first thing he wants is I want to know for myself. As soon as he's done with that, he then is to use the Lehigh Vision phrase. He's casting his eyes round about to find his family to pray for his brethren and he prays for the Nephites because he wants them to have this. And then it's expanded one more step out beyond that where he's now praying for the Lamanites and receives the assurance that this record is going to come forth to them.

If that was the case, we'd all be wear at ankle braids.

I appreciate the fact that of the things that Hank thinks I'm an expert in it's it's sinning and trying to repent and that's the reality that's why I invited you I thought who's our who can we have on who is a sinner oh I know It isn't a kind of a funny thing that Satan kind of gets us coming and going. And when we commit sin, he spends most of the time telling us that what we did isn't even wrong, justifying it to ourselves, telling us that we're totally fine. Everything's great. It's not really a sin. Everyone else is doing it to me. Come on. What else was I supposed to do? I mean, whatever kind of excuse he can give. And then the other half of the time, once you actually accept your sin, once you accept that I have done wrong, then immediately turns to what you're worthless. Your horrible shame. You couldn't possibly have the love of God anymore. How could someone like you who has a testimony commit that kind of a sin? Jesus doesn't want you anymore. When you hear those whisperings, that is not the Lord. There's only two great powers in the universe. President Woodruff said, the reality is, if you're hearing whisperings in your mind that are not coming from Jesus, they're coming from the adversary. And it's the evil spirit that teaches the man not to pray. It's the evil spirit that teaches people that they can't repent. Some of them are more grievous than others. If you have sins that need to be repented of through the process of confession and repentance and you haven't done that, well, then yeah, you're probably going to feel like you aren't fully clean because you didn't go through the process that are Lord outlined in the restoration of His church. The questions even further than that, you're asking, what about people who haven't done that? What about people who haven't gone through all the steps and they still can't forgive themselves for what they've done? We need to show mercy to ourselves in order to fully show mercy to other people. In order for us to fully be able to extend that healing hand to someone else. have to be able to know what it's like to actually have our sins, though their red is scarlet, become white as well. Every single person who is ever lived on this earth is a sinner and is going to desperately have to have the atonement to be saved. Now, whether our sins are great, whether they are little, whether they are massive, whether they're they're so small that no one even thinks of them, every one of us at some point. has to have the atonement to be saved, and I would hope the people listening. If you have gone through the proper steps for repentance, and you know that you are a changed person, let it go. Let that anxiety let it be put towards serving and helping someone else. Every time you think to get down on yourself because of something in the past, take that moment and say, I'm going to call somebody right now who I know needs some help. I'm going to go visit somebody who I know is struggling. I'm going to do something that's for someone else and I feel like those feelings might, they might just pay.

Another Joseph Smith teaching on this, one way we can determine how close we actually are to God is how we feel towards other people. If all of our teaching and learning and studying doesn't make us love other people, it isn't very helpful. And so Joseph, in 1842, he says, it is one evidence that men are unaquainted with the principle of Godliness. to be old the contraction of feeling and lack of charity. If you don't have love for other people, then however God will you think you are, well you're not. He says, the power and glory of Godliness is spread out on a broad principle to throw out the mantle of charity. God doesn't look upon sin with allowance, but when men have sinned there must be allowance made for them. All the religious world is boasting of righteousness, to the doctrine of the devil, to retard the human mind and retard our progress by filling us with self-righteousness. The nearer we get to our Heavenly Father, the more are we disposed to look with compassion on parishionese souls, to take them upon our shoulders and to cast their sins behind our back. I feel like enus is conversion because it was a real conversion instantly went to I want to give compassion to other people and Joseph is teaching this as well that when you're converted, yeah, you're going to want to roam the whole earth to bless everyone else. you are going to desperately want to extend mercy to others. And another place when he's teaching the really society, he says that suppose Jesus Christ or the angels should object to us over a little thing. We must have mercy and overlook small things. And it really is one of Joseph's most favorite topics that he teaches on. He teaches about repentance and mercy over and over and over again. And frankly, the restoration that the Lord reveals through him is a gigantic expansion of the Christian understanding of the mercy of God. that it is not a few select people who just don't happen to be born at the right time and just so happen to be born with the right kind of Christian parents who just so happen to hear about the gospel that can be saved. But this plan is universal. This plan is for everyone and everyone is going to have a chance at that salvation. Not just the lucky few, the atonement that Joseph Smith is going to be teaching about. The Lord's Atonement is so encompassing and so expansive. And I mean, I think we get a little bit of an insight in it here from Innocent immediately feels just how expansive that power of that atonement is.

Remember when you first started dating, I don't know. That's, yeah.

But it's hard. I'm a broken, sinful mortal person as much as anyone else. And it's one thing when someone hurts you, maybe they didn't mean to, but they still did. And it was thoughtless and it was careless and it was wrong. Then there are those who deliberately hurt you. There are those who know full well that what they're doing is going to hurt you. And they're fine with it. And how do you reconcile that? And look, there's so many different situations. There's so many different places where people are at. Hopefully, ultimately, I can get to a place where I can extend the same level of mercy and forgiveness that I want my father and heaven to extend to me. When we're talking about someone else who's wrong to us, we always want to judge them on their worst day. We take their worst day and we say that's who that person is. They are this. This is them. And yet when we are on our knees, begging God to forgive us, begging for God to accept us into the selects, shulking them, man, we desperately want God to judge us by our best day. We desperately want to say, I know that I messed up here and I know I messed up there, but eventually I got it right. I mean, that's the great part about the plan of salvation is the person who's making the final judgment call is perfect and not like us and will extend as much mercy as is possible to be extended.

One of the aspects of the plan of salvation that I think is under appreciated by Latter-day Saints. And in part, it's because maybe we don't fully understand what other Christians believe about salvation and hellfire and damnation. It is that as President Oaks said in the last general conference, that with exceptions too few to mention, every child of God is going to because of the atonement of Jesus Christ, eventually inherit a kingdom of heaven. We often think things like, if someone so doesn't repent, well, then they're not going to heaven. Well, actually, doctrine coming to section 76, Joseph Smith's revelation that he receives, is that the atonement is such because we are all God's children, because we all kept our first estate that even those who don't repent in this life. Yes, they will suffer for their sins after this life. But it is radical Christian theology that Joseph Smith receives from the Lord, that the atonement is such, that even those who are horrible sinners who refuse to repent in this life, that at some point, by the time of the end of the resurrection, They will be resurrected and they will go to a kingdom of glory, a kingdom that Joseph describes as a kingdom of bliss. In fact, the Tushal Kingdom as he says is so great and so glorious that you, you can't comprehend it unless God opens the heavens and shows it to you. We are not a religion that believes that everybody around us is going to be arriving in the agony of an eternal hell forever. The Atonement is so all-encompassing that there will be an eventual peace and happiness for everyone. But we're concerned with that eternal life that Venus was praying about and exaltation. How do we become like our Heavenly Father? That's the purpose of the church. It's the purpose of God to bring to pass the immortality and eternal life of man. The purpose is eternal life. But that doesn't mean that there's not mercy outside of that.

Wow, if I had the absolute formula for that, you know, I'd bought it and not sell it because I'd want everyone to have it. I'd give it away for free. Let me speak for myself. I'm not a prophet. I'm not enous, so I don't know exactly what his experience is. I'm reminded in the New Testament of the experience that after Jesus feeds the 5,000s and this is John chapter six that, look, this is the ancient world And in the ancient world, there is no social safety net, so the question on the minds of nearly everyone in the ancient world every day that they woke up is, where can I get food? Am I going to have enough to eat today? You would be living in a perpetual state of hunger almost. When Jesus performs these great miracles where he miraculously creates the bread, There are so many people who ate that bread or heard about that bread, who stopped seeing the forest for the trees, who instead of saying, this is clearly the Messiah. They started saying, hey, there's a way we can get bread here. I'm not going to be hungry anymore. And when they come to Jesus and Jesus starts to teach them the more difficult doctrine, that he's in the bread of life. Anyone who eats this bread, the bread that I created, just like Moses and the wilderness, you know, the people ate man of, they've died. But this is the bread of life. The response from his disciples. It's not from the crowd. The response from the disciples is after that time, many of them go away and don't fall in because they couldn't see how Jesus helps them temporarily now, and Jesus is speaking about something that's after this life. It was a hard saying for them. And look, it was especially hard in the ancient world because the entire purpose of religion in the ancient world was for the gods to help you now, God's supposed to give you what you want now. You don't sacrifice a goat to Jupiter because you're hopeful that you'll go to the Elysian field someday. You do it so that Jupiter makes your crops grow now, that you do it so that your sun comes over more now. The whole point of religion is this world. And when Jesus comes along and says, The point of this life is the next life. Man, it is radical, radical theology that most people cannot even comprehend. Jesus is teaching something that no one else has taught, that's impossible to understand. And many of the people who were his followers said, I can't believe. But when he turns to the apostles and says, well, thou go away also. heaters response is I think what our response needs to be. To whom shall we go? Thou hast the words of eternal life, and we believe in our sure thou art the Christ. The way to make faith unshaken is to focus like a laser. on the Holy Spirit testifying to you that Jesus is the Christ and that Joseph Smith saw God. The way to have your faith shaken is to allow details of how God unfolds his plan to become more important than God's plan. people get shaken because I don't know as doing my family history and I saw that my great-great-grandmother she was married to three different men in our life when we went to the temple I mean we sealed it all three of those men but I mean of course she can't be married all three of them in the next life so which one do you think she's actually married to it just seems weird that we don't really know but I found her journal and it says that you know she really loved her second husband more I think so I think that's the one we whip ourselves into a frenzy desperately trying to figure out exactly how God is going to make everything right. To the point where, say on the question of ceilings or marriages, people might even lose their testimonies because they can't figure out how ceilings work. And the great tragedy of that is the only reason why you even have a question about who's married to who in the next life is because Joseph Smith is a prophet. The moment Joseph Smith stops being a prophet, you don't have to ask that question anymore. Because the answer is nobody. Because marriage doesn't exist in the next life for any other Christian. Why do we believe it exists? We believe it exists because Joseph Smith is a prophet. I don't want to say you don't want to be inquisitive. That you don't want to ask questions. My entire life and career is based upon asking questions and trying to get back to sources, trying to figure out how things happen. Joseph Smith was asking questions. There's nothing wrong with saying, how did this work? I want to know more about this. But we have to keep a focus on the fact that the only way you can know anything about God. is through the Holy Spirit. That's it. It's the only way. And when the Holy Spirit testifies to you that Jesus died for your sins and that this is God's restored church, okay, I may not know exactly why the Curtains Safety Society fell. Does that change the fact that Joseph Smith saw Jesus? I don't know exactly how marriage is going to work in the next life. Does it change the fact that Jesus died for us? Those questions are still good questions, but we can't allow our questions to dominate the things that the Holy Spirit's already testified to us. That was way too long of an answer to that question, guys.

Joseph Smith has something. He has plates. The reality of this book is something that comes from somewhere and that's why it's so important to gain a testimony of the Book of Mormon, right? Because the Book of Mormon not only teaches us about Jesus, which is essential. But there are all kinds of people all over the world, wonderful Christians who are doing great things to help others in this world who have strong testimonies of Jesus. Latter-day Saints have a different understanding of that Jesus. because of the Book of Mormon, and because of the revelations that Joseph Smith received. We talk so much about it because those two important questions get answered, is Jesus really my Savior? If this book is true, then Joseph Smith is a prophet, and this is really God's church. That means that exaltation is a thing. It means that these revelations that Joseph gives to help us understand what this life is about, that the Lord gives to Joseph Smith, that they teach us what we need to do in order to become like our Heavenly Father.

I love that, John, because I mean, I feel like that all the time. If you think you're frustrated that you can't find answers to all of your church history questions, it's literally my job. I imagine how frustrating it is when I have a question about some church history thing and all I do is study all day long and I still can't find an answer to it. It is a natural, natural thing to wonder how things happen and with our limit at understanding our limited intelligence of what happened in the past to say, well, that doesn't really sit quite right with me. There's got to be more to that story. I'm sure there is. At the same time, It doesn't change the core focus. Did Jesus die for our sins? Did He restore His church on the earth?

It's an odd thing, honestly. And it's part of our humanistic, rationalistic worldview that we have today. It's a weird thing that there's actually an expectation.

Yeah, that you don't have to believe if you can't fully understand why you're doing it. And there's no evidence in scripture of that case. There's literally none. And yet, you have people constantly saying, well, that doesn't make sense to me. Yeah, get in line. It didn't make sense to Abraham. It didn't make sense to Adam. It didn't make sense to Jacob. It didn't make sense to Joseph Smith. Things don't make sense. It's funny, because I will sometimes Pajoratively, be called by antagonist of the church. They will put George of Lee call me a sheep. And like, yeah, yeah. So almost like that's what Jesus is looking for.

You're just a blind sheep falling in that you know, I'm like, First of all, obviously I don't want to do this in certain situations I've done it, where again, just because it's my job, not because I'm special or I'm smart. I've read like 10 times more on this stuff than whoever this antagonist person is. So I'm not blind at all. Yeah, I'm a sheep, but I'm a sheep because I'm going to follow the Lord because it's the Lord. And I don't have to know. It'd be great to know, but I don't have to know.

It really is the test of discipleship. I always say the test of your discipleship isn't whether or not you are sharing the general conference talk that just so happens to perfectly align with your political and social beliefs. The test of discipleship is, are you sharing the one that's totally opposed to what you personally think? We can't turn the church into an extension of our political social arguments that we make. We have to do the opposite. Ultimately, for people to be unshaken in their faith, they need to get to a point where I follow the prophet no matter what. And if I don't agree, I follow. And if it makes sense, I follow. And if I don't want to follow, I follow. And yeah, that's scary to people because it means, well, I'm giving up my agency. No, you are choosing with your agency to say, I am going to follow God's representative. Well, what if he's wrong? Well, then God will know that I chose to follow his prophet and it will be accounted unto me for righteousness. My job is to exercise faith in the Lord's prophet regardless of the evidence that I have. I hear a lot of people say the opposite. I hear a lot of people say things like, well, you know, you've got to figure all this out for yourself. Sure, you do need to receive an answer. But you're not going to receive an answer that, oh, yeah, here's where President Nelson got it wrong last week. But luckily, I have the answer.

You just, you just put it on double speed, triple speed, just like people listening. Yeah, that's what it is.

It is a fascinating aspect of the internal aspect of the record, which we're going to talk more about with words of Mormon. Because there's actually two sets of records that you get into these books of Jeremiah, you get a reticence for people to write in them In part because there's another record. This is probably like me not wanting to write in a journal because I mean, well, my wife's keeping a journal. I mean, she's going to be more honest anyway. There's another record. So I don't have to do it. It is fascinating. You wonder what are the things that were not recorded here or that were recorded, that we would have if we had the book of Lehigh, because we take things like Jaram verse 4. There are many among us who've had many revelations for they are not all stiff-necked and as many as are not stiff-necked and have faith have communion with always spirit which make it manifest under the children men according to their faith. There's a lot going on, but you take verse two, we kind of describe. It's a place where teeny, there's not a whole lot of room, and we already know it's being recorded somewhere else. So, as these plates are small, and these things are written for the intent of the benefit of our brother and the layman, I'd say, wherefore it must be that I write a little. But I shall not write the things of my prophesying. So, Jerome was prophesying something. We don't know what it was, but he was prophesying. nor of my revelations. Jeremy's Eve revelations. No idea what they are. For what could I write more than my fathers have written? For have not they revealed the plan of salvation? I stand you, yay, and this suffice with them. It's obviously a great deal of humility there with Jeremy, but also a clarity that The plan of salvation has already been outlined here. Even though I've received revelations and I've prophesied, it's still all the plan of salvation. It's all right there.

Yeah, Jeremy's basically like Shakespeare compared to the book of Omnye. He's waxing poetic there when you get to the rapid succession of people who have the plates in the book of all night now it's still called the book of all night because they're still following that whoever speaks first basically in the book they get the book named after them so it's why I always want to you know try to write a forward to someone else's book hopefully they'll name the book after me but yeah all night's definitely not the one who writes the most in this no he put something in there and then he passes it down and passes it down one thing that becomes clear in both gerrym and all night is that the act of passing these smaller plates down is an act of passing a prophetic mantle. This is something that needs to be passed and needs to be passed. It is funny to see them spend more time saying why they're not going to write that you could write something. Instead, you spend two verses saying that you're not going to write anything. You could have said something else. Again, I think it's because they're keeping a larger record, verse 11. The record of this people is engraving upon the plates, which is had by the kings, according to the generations. And I know of no revelation saved that, which has been written neither prophecy, wherefore that which is sufficient is written, and I'm making it. Now that's a bit of a dump that's making that statement. But again, the fact that there's another record that there's these larger plates is clearly causing them to hold back and to say, what we have here is already here and I was told only to write things that are new here, basically what they seem to be saying.

Ah, the Abinadome? But I'm sure. Sounds like the one that King Noah would have had, unfortunately. One of the fascinating things about Omni is this is the first place in the Book of Mormon, if you're reading from the beginning, where you learn that there are other peoples that are involved, the title page of the Book of Mormon is a spoiler alert. But if you're already moving through reading the book itself, it's really just the waymonites and Nephites, laymonites and Nephites, laymonites and Nephites. and tell you get to Omni, you learn something that actually affects all kinds of the remaining stories in the Book of Mormon, both geographically with names, but also with people. You're going to learn something that you weren't quite aware of at first, because if you're Nephi, you simply assume that everyone in Jerusalem is destroyed. So when you get to Omni, verse 12, There's a couple of cool parts about this. He says, behold, I will speak unto you, somewhat concerning Mosaic, who has made King over the land of Xerahemma. Okay, Zara-Hemla. You're actually having introduced here something brand new. Well, it's a good thing that he was made the King over Zara-Hemla.

Yeah. What an amazing King he must be. He knows there's context on the larger plate. So he maybe doesn't feel like he has to go in all that context, but he is providing the story here who has made King over the land of Zara-Hemla for behold, keeping warned of the Lord. that he should flee out of the land of Nephi, and as many as would harken under the voice of the Lord should also depart out of the land with him into the wilderness. First part about this that I think is applicable. The Nephites have been living in the aptly named land of Nephi since Nephi separated from his brothers. This is hundreds of years. Three hundred years roughly that they have lived in the land of Nephi. And Mosiah is told by God they need to leave. Guess what? the people who are faithful, leave with them. How applicable is that to latter-day saint restoration theology? And I'm not just talking about coming to Salt Lake in January, 1838 in Cartland. Joseph Smith receives a revelation. It's not in the doctrine and covenant, so I can't point it to you. You can go to josemouthpapers.org and you can find it there. Where Joseph receives a revelation, that commands all of the faithful saints who are still in Kirtland because Kirtland has now become a nest of apostasy and lawsuits and threatened mob violence and all kinds of things that are going on. Joseph receives a revelation that all of the faithful that are in Kirtland need to leave and go to Missouri. There's some who say, yeah, I'm not. Thanks. I'm not leaving my house. I'm not walking a thousand miles to Missouri. The worst part about walking a thousand miles to Missouri is that when you get there, you're in Missouri. They didn't have air conditioning. Okay.

But the reality is, you know, seriousness, they're being asked to give up everything and walk a thousand miles, thousands of them do it. Thousands of them say, Okay, I'm from Ohio. I grew up in Ohio. I've been here since the church was first in Ohio. I'm going to go where shows of tells me to go. Verse 12 really is this incredible leap of faith for technical purposes. It's also the reason why the Book of Mormon becomes very confusing for the next several books. because the laminites take over the land of Nephi. It was always as a kid. I was like, this is the weirdest thing ever. Why are the laminites living in the land of Nephi? Because I was like, oh, we went up to the land of Nephi to preach. Seems like you could just turn around and you'd be doing that if you're the Nephites, wouldn't you just already be there? No, because they were there and they leave. because they're worn and it came to pass that he did as a according to the word commander and then they departed out of the land into the wilderness and as many was harking on to his voice of the word they were led by many preachings and prophesies. So again, the people have to make this step of faith to follow the prophet and when they do they then get further details, and they were admonished continually by the Word of God, and they were led by the power of his arm through the wilderness until they came into the land, which is called the land of Xerahem. And they discovered a people who were called the people of Xerahem. Now, there was a great rejoicing among the people of Xerahemla, and also Xerahemla did rejoice exceedingly because the Lord had sent the people of Mozaya with the plates of brass, which contained the record of the Jews. Behold, it came to pass the Mozaya discover that the people of Xerahemla came out from Jerusalem at the time that Zedakaya, King of Judah, was carried away captive in De Babelon. At the end of this prophetic journey, they don't just find other people. they find other Israelites who had also been brought out of the land of Jerusalem. This is going to be the focal point now of the entirety of the rest of the Nephites civilization surrounding this land of Xerahema where Mosiah and his followers because they were faithful because they heated the word of God end up in this place where they are far more supported, where they're far safer from the laymenites, and also where they are able to make massive conversions to the Church of God because the people of Xerahema didn't take plates with them. Not only had their religion become corrupted over the 300 years, their language had become corrupted. They had to teach them their language in order for them to be able to communicate with one another. And I don't know how difficult a process that was, but you can find a linguist who will explain to you that over the course of 300 years in isolation, a language will change pretty quickly. It introduces this, we often call them muacites, right? These people that come out from Zetakaya. The first inklings we have also of the Jaredites. So the book of Omnike, it is the spoiler alert central of the book of Mormon. It just starts dropping bombs about things that you're going to be spending most of the rest of the time in the book of Mormon, because it talks about Cory Antimer, who had been with the people of Xerahema. and that he was the last of that Jared I civilization that we don't really know anything about yet, but we're going to learn a whole lot about going forward. The foreshadowing there is great and then of course you get this introduction to King Benjamin. This is an important introduction in part because we don't get an introduction of King Benjamin from the book of Mosiah. The Book of Moses starts off in the middle of a story and I'm sure you're next guest when they talk about the Book of Moses. I will say that. Moses is the only book that kind of starts in the middle. It doesn't say, let me tell you about Benjamin. It starts with Benjamin being the king. Omni and words of Mormon kind of give you this lead in of who King Benjamin is that we frankly wouldn't have otherwise. I love this parting words that Amalachi is going to give. He says, and now my beloved brethren, I would that you should come unto Christ who is the Holy One of Israel and partake of his salvation and the power of his redemption. ye come unto him and offer your whole souls as an offering on him and continue in fasting and praying and endure to the end and as the Lord liveeth ye will be saved. That is a beautiful summary. of how it is we can follow that plan of salvation. This idea of enduring to the end, this idea of offering our whole souls of being willing to give up everything to Christ. Maybe he's not one of them more well-known prophets in the Book of Mormon. Doesn't even have a book named after him, but what he has to say is very powerful.

Liberty JL being the lowest point at Joseph's life. And I have to believe the summer of 1828 is given it a run for its money.