Spiritual Insights...and other stuff

Our story begins when a stalwart Nephite missionary named Ammon travels to a far away land to preach the word of God to the enemy, the Lamanites. Through much service and sacrifice, he finds himself taking part in the breathtaking conversion of many previously bloodthirsty individuals, in the which they bury their weapons of war, swearing never to shed blood again. Things start to go South at that point. All the Lamanites who rejected Ammon are livid - they despise anything with even so much as a whiff of Nephite, so Ammon's missionary work didn't exactly tickle them pink. In their ensuing rage, they mercilessly slaughter more than a thousand of their converted brethren, who refuse to retaliate in any way. Our wicked Lamanites remain unsatisfied, and subsequent attacks are scrawled on the calendar. As you can see, things were not going well for these newly converted Lamanites. Ammon keenly observes their impending danger and presents his marvelous solution to the king: "...

I often find myself judging people for not doing anything about issues they profess to care about. In my mind, ranting on Facebook about how terrible the government is doesn’t really achieve anything – it doesn’t make a difference. This whole idea I’m talking about is called slacktivism – people on the internet trying to support or not support some political or social or religious cause, but it requires so little commitment and involvement that you never really know if they’re serious about it. Slacktivism sucks us all in, myself included, so I probably shouldn’t judge. It lulls us into thinking that “liking” a post about stopping religious discrimination is doing our part, or putting a “sad face” on a friends’ post will make their cancer all better. Sometimes, people get so hyped up they comment, or even make a post of their own, but will that really have an effect? I thought actions spoke louder than words, so do words even make a difference? These thoughts of mine were...

While studying this week, I found a peculiar passage in Helaman chapter six referring to "the Lamb," which set me on quite the mental adventure. It all started when the Lamanites were preaching vigorously to convert the wicked Nephites, which they achieved. Many Nephites became "humble followers of God and the Lamb." ¹ Who's the Lamb? I looked to the New Testament to answer that question: when Jesus went to John the Baptist to get baptized, John sees Him and says, "Behold the Lamb of God, which taketh away the sin of the world." ² So, Jesus is the Good Shepherd and the Lamb. In this post, I wanna focus more on His role as the Lamb and how we can more deeply understand this metaphor. Before I get into it, I found John's testimony of Jesus to be highly fascinating. He said, "Behold the Lamb of God." If we interpret that "of" to mean possession or some other association, Jesus is God's Lamb. I think we can agree on that. ...