I grew up with a family of 8 kids, and all of us were very goal oriented. Pretty much all my siblings and I were high achieving individuals in school, and we really wanted to keep goals. Being the 7th of those eight kids, my parents made standards pretty clear without ever really enforcing those standards. I knew I wanted to meet those standards because I loved my parents. And in how I was raised, I was given the space to grow and learn.
For myself, I knew I wanted to learn, grow, and achieve. I learned to improve for my own benefit, because I had the space to do so. One of those early learning experiences was centered on The Book of Mormon. The first time I read The Book of Mormon all the way through was when President Hinckley issued a challenge to read The Book of Mormon in the early 2000’s. I finished it and I went on with my life, without thinking much extra about The Book of Mormon. Then home teachers came by, and they taught the importance of praying about The Book of Mormon in correlation to President Hinckley’s challenge.
I had completely forgotten to pray about The Book of Mormon, and I knew that it was a recommended thing to do. So that night I went to pray about The Book of Mormon, and I felt at peace. I took that to be a testimony of its truthfulness. Now at this time, could you quiz me about the events, principles, and doctrines of the book? Nope, I had no clue other than wars and decapitations. Great young teenager stuff.
A few years passed by, and The Book of Mormon kept coming back to me. I knew I wanted to read it, because I felt good about it. So I may have read it once or twice more. Eventually I realized that I had no idea about the continuity of The Book of Mormon. So I set a goal for myself to read the book intentionally so that I could remember the events of The Book of Mormon. As I intentionally read the book, all the events of the book were coming together, and I was amazed at the continuity and level of detail of the book.
From that point on, I would continue to read the book with purpose to learn as much as I could about the book. On a subsequent reading attempt, while on my mission, I wondered if The Book of Mormon recorded the plates being passed down from person to person. I knew Nephi passed the plates to his brother Jacob, but did Jacob do the same? And so I studied the book and I recorded every time when the plates passed hands, and I found that there was never a gap in history of where the plates were. This was so amazing to me that I made my own graph and I recorded the scriptures that showed or insinuated the plates being passed.
I learned not only from the recorded history of the book, but I also learned principles. For example, according to Nephi I learned how the Lord blesses His people.
But behold, I, Nephi, will show unto you that the tender mercies of the Lord are over all those whom he hath chosen, because of their faith, to make them mighty even unto the power of deliverance."
1 Nephi 1
What in the world does Nephi mean? Nephi’s life sucked. He left his his home voluntarily, had a rivalry with his brothers, almost get killed by the brothers, lived as a nomad for years, almost starved, drowned at sea, and on and on. His life didn’t seem to be at all comfortable, and yet Nephi posited that he would show “the tender mercies of the Lord”. What mercies of the Lord did Nephi demonstrate in the book?
Little did I know that my question would actually be answered very soon.
And so great were the blessings of the Lord upon us, that while we did live upon raw meat in the wilderness, our women did give plenty of suck for their children, and were strong, yea, even like unto the men; and they began to bear their journeyings without murmurings.
And thus we see that the commandments of God must be fulfilled. And if it so be that the children of men keep the commandments of God he doth nourish them, and strengthen them, and provide means whereby they can accomplish the thing which he has commanded them; wherefore, he did provide means for us while we did sojourn in the wilderness.
1 Nephi 17
Here I found my answer! I had assumed that the tender mercies of the Lord would mean a comfortable life, and I was confused because Nephi’s life was the least bit comfortable. But Nephi said that the Lord would “provide means whereby they can accomplish” the commandment. And here is a tiny nugget of truth I found from Nephi’s life. When I obey the Lord’s commandments, He will nourish me, strengthen me, and provide the means whereby I can do what He wants me to do. So, my life won’t necessarily be comfortable, but the Lord will provide a way for me to do what He wants me to do.
I could not have learned so many tiny nuggets of truth if I did not fully intend to read The Book of Mormon for comprehension and understanding of the story. Because I wanted to comprehend the story, I remembered my question about what do “tender mercies” mean and I found the consistent genealogy of the plates.
Journey before the end.
While I attended BYU-Idaho, Elder Bednar visited for a devotional talk. While talking, Elder Bednar described angel Moroni’s multiple visits to Joseph Smith. The multiple visits largely covered the same content, but Moroni added bits and pieces to each subsequent visit. Elder Bednar also described how he often repeats similar messages to people across with world. To summarize his point, Elder Bednar taught the students at BYU-Idaho this important lesson.
Repetitious learning and teaching as a line upon line and precept upon precept pattern of revelation can invite the Holy Ghost to renew, enrich, and enlarge the knowledge we already have obtained; it also can bring new knowledge and understanding into our minds and hearts.
Gospel principles are often taught through repetition. The next points to learn of the Gospel are often done subsequent to previous points, so paint stroke by paint stroke a composition starts to form. Eventually, many paint strokes can be formed into an intricate and interweaving pattern of a beautiful piece of art.
In the devotional talk, Elder Bednar reminisced how his life has changed over the years of service. He mentioned that his wife Susan would often record variations of the messages that Elder Bednar taught. These variations came about Elder Bednar’s growth as an Apostle.
I am not the same man who [taught things when I started as an Apostle]. I am the same man, but I am different. I have traveled the earth for more than a decade and visited countless homes of faithful Church members—the rich and the poor, the meek and the humble, the educated and the uneducated. Those converted and consecrated Latter-day Saints have changed me.
This was profound to me. This demonstrated to me the growth of an individual when they embark on the journey of learning and growing for their entire life. Like Elder Bednar, I feel like I can say the same thing, because I have embraced the struggle of learning.
I am not the same boy that picked up The Book of Mormon all those years ago. Paint stroke by paint stroke, a composition of understanding formed for me as I studied the scriptures, learned science, matured, struggled as a missionary, repeated reading the scriptures, experience the death of my mother, start a career in software engineering, get married to a wonderful kind outgoing woman, embrace the principles that other religions teach, travel the world to experience other cultures, and learn more and more how I work psychologically as a person. I am the same, but I am different.
I have learned in my 32 years of life, that the Holy Spirit lives with me and continues to live with me. He is present, teaching, and guiding how “not to shrink” in a world full of opposition and unfairness. I am reminded of when Oliver Cowdery tried to translate The Book of Mormon. He received an important revelation about learning and growing.
Verily, verily, I say unto thee, blessed art thou for what thou hast done; for thou hast inquired of me, and behold, as often as thou hast inquired thou hast received instruction of my Spirit. If it had not been so, thou wouldst not have come to the place where thou art at this time.
Behold, thou knowest that thou hast inquired of me and I did enlighten thy mind; and now I tell thee these things that thou mayest know that thou hast been enlightened by the Spirit of truth;
D&C 6
I believe that the Lord loves it when we come to Him and ask questions about our own lives, similar to Oliver Cowdery, as well as He loves it when we learn for ourselves what to do for ourselves. He will support oneself through the spirit line upon line and precept upon precept. Anything we are able to learn for the better will be a good thing. Eventually, we will come to a place where we have been guided because we were listening to the promptings of the Holy Ghost.
Additionally, the Lord gives Oliver Cowdery another important instruction.
Yea, behold, I will tell you in your mind and in your heart, by the Holy Ghost, which shall come upon you and which shall dwell in your heart.
D&C 8
I recently had a profound conversation with a person that managing OCD symptoms with medication. I asked asked this person a deep question, “If I may how do you feel the spirit?” I learned that this person feels emotionally inert from the OCD medication, and this person could only trust his mind to perceive the Spirit. Here I feel I learned that too often are feelings of the Spirit focused on what is felt emotionally, so the intellectual aspect is often forgotten. And in a sense, there is a failsafe for if one can’t feel emotionally or vice versa with intellectually. If both are functional, then the Holy Ghost can confirm something emotionally and intellectually.
In the end, work needs to be done to keep up with the Holy Ghost. I think that one of the things that Alma teaches puts the need to experiment succinctly.
But behold, if ye will awake and arouse your faculties, even to an experiment upon my words, and exercise a particle of faith, yea, even if ye can no more than desire to believe, let this desire work in you, even until ye believe in a manner that ye can give place for a portion of my words.
Now, we will compare the word unto a seed. Now, if ye give place, that a seed may be planted in your heart, behold, if it be a true seed, or a good seed, if ye do not cast it out by your unbelief, that ye will resist the Spirit of the Lord, behold, it will begin to swell within your breasts; and when you feel these swelling motions, ye will begin to say within yourselves—It must needs be that this is a good seed, or that the word is good, for it beginneth to enlarge my soul; yea, it beginneth to enlighten my understanding, yea, it beginneth to be delicious to me.
Alma 32
If I work emotionally and intellectually, I can build, prototype, and experiment on the things that I learn through my life. The more times I repeat that same process, the more I can add things to what I am building. As long as I do something with what I’m learning, there is no way for me to stagnate in this hard life. And then when I see what I’m building get bigger and better, then I will know for certain that what I’ve been learning is valuable.
I believe life is a journey, and it was never meant to be comfortable. Little by little over time, I can learn things by revisiting topics that I have already read, so that I may become a better and wiser person. Wisdom will magnify my soul in which I will become content with my given life effort.