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Alma 1-2

I am way late in the day for the blog post but things kind of got away from me this morning.  Sometimes I feel like a stretch Armstrong toy that is getting pulled in a million directions by my mind and today I forgot the blog post this morning.  I will say I was able to get a lot of other things done though.

Today we dive into the book of Alma within The Book of Mormon.  The book of Alma is nearly 1/3 of The Book of Mormon and only covers roughly 40 years of Nephite history.  Chapters 1-44 cover Alma the younger's time, chapter 45-62 covers Alma's son Helaman's thoughts, and chapter 63 is Alma's other son, Shiblon.  There is a lot to be learned from the Nephites' and there 40 year history here.  We can learn that the word of God has more power to change hearts that the wielding of sword and that rejecting God's word leads to war and bloodshed.

From these first to Chapters we meet Nehor, who introduces priestcraft (not preaching the pure and full gospel, picking and choosing what they like and doing it for popularity and financial gain) to the land.  Nehor gets into a debate with Gideon (yes, the Gideon who helped plan the escape of the people of Limhi) and ends up killing him.  Yes, seems like a really intense altercation.  For his priestcraft and murder he is sentenced to an "ignominious death" (Alma 1:15) which is a shameful, dishonorable death, most likely hanging. 

Then after all the stirring up Nehor did a guy named Amlici decides he would be more fit to lead the people than the chief judge, Alma (also a prophet) and starts a rebellion to make him king.  As you can imagine there is fighting, bloodshed, Amlici and his people joining forces with the Lamanities and ultimately 12,532 Lamanites die and 6,562 Nephites.  Craziness. 

Now that you have the background I want to just share what stood out to me.  In Alma 1:8-9 we read of the events that transpired between Gideon and Nehor.  Gideon at this point is "stricken in years" meaning he is old.  Yet he has the courage to vocally speak against Nehor and then physically takes a beating from him because he will stand for what is right.  I found myself wondering if when things get hard to I back down because it is hard or scary or do I keep standing my ground like Gideon? I guess in an effort to make it even more relevant, are you backing down right now on your gospel study because there isn't church or seminary and no one is watching you? Are you standing your ground and staying faithful when everything in the world right now is discouraging, disappointing, and things feel hopeless? Don't back down you guys, be like Gideon.

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