Brothers and Sisters, the Come Follow Me Lesson for this Sunday is Mosiah 7-10. I hope you have enjoyed reading these Book of Mormon chapters as much as I have. These chapters tell the story of how King Mosiah asked Ammon to lead a search party to find the Nephites led by King Zeniff who had left to try to return to inhabit the land of their first inheritance, the land of Nephi. This city had served as the Capitol of the Nephite nation until the greater number of the Nephites who were wicked in the land of Nephi were destroyed by the Lamanites around 279 BC as noted in the Book of Omni 5-7 after Mosiah was warned by the Lord to flee in Omni 12-13 with as many righteous Nephites as would come with him. They were led to find the Mulekites in Zarahemla whether they united with the Mulekites. Ammon was successful in finding the people of Limhi after being lost in the wilderness for forty days. Subsequently, after the people of Limhi were led by the Lord to flee from captivity, Nephi became the capitol city of the Lamanites.
I loved this lesson because as it states in Mosiah 7:14-33, if we turn to the Lord, trust him and serve Him, He will deliver us. This lesson applies to our day and time when many of us are praying for deliverance from the harmful effects of the pandemic with our Churches and Temples closed, the missionaries restricted from proselyting with some of our family members sickened and suffering from the virus and many jobs lost, making it more difficult for us to provide for our families. When I heard that the chapels and Temples were being closed my heart sank, but I knew it was the Lord’s will at this time. During General Conference, the Prophet and other Apostles provided us with a message of hope promising that this pandemic will prove temporary and that someday in the not so distant future the Temples will be re-opened and the work of the Lord in saving the dead will recommence. How I have missed going to the Lord’s House and look forward to that day!
When I was a thirteen year old boy I attended a Regional Conference in southern California presided over by President Hinckley whose talk was entitled “Look to God and Live.”(Alma 37:47). This counsel seems even more important to me today. Throughout scriptural history, the Lord has sent pestilences to chasten His children and encourage them to return to Him. In this way, we can see the Lord’s love and tender mercies for the people of our nation and the world in this pandemic as he is giving His children another opportunity to repent and turn back to Him before He pours out His righteous judgments upon them. When this pandemic began, I sought diligently to receive the peace of the Spirit and have since received it by being more diligent in my scripture studies and other commandments of the Lord. Just as in Mosiah 9-10, when King Zeniff prayed for strength to defend themselves against Lamanite aggression, so can we be strengthened to face the trials and tribulations we face today and once strengthened we can strengthen, minister and uplift one another. Just as the people of Zeniff were physically and spiritually prepared to defend themselves against Lamanite attacks so we as members of the Lord’s Restored Church on Earth have been taught to physically and spiritually prepare ourselves for the coming trials including by having a one-year supply of food to safeguard us against future famine and economic distress.
President Nelson saw that the time would soon come when our Churches would be closed and so he instructed us to hold home Church as individuals and families to prepare us for this difficult time. Over the last several weeks as we have convened home Church meetings with our family members, I have felt the influence of the Holy Ghost even stronger than I have when I attended ward and stake meetings in the Chapel. I am guessing that many of you have had spiritual reawakenings since this pandemic began two months ago as I have and that your testimonies have been strengthened thereby.
In Mosiah 8:5-12, it states that while a small group of Limhi’s people were searching for the land of Zarahemla they found the plates containing a record of the Jaredites which we now know as the Book of Ether. The Jaredites had been led away from the Tower of Babel before the Lord confounded their languages. The Book of Ether gave a history of the Prophets of their time and the destructions that came upon their people because they apostatized and were disobedient to God’s promise which he gave them in Ether 2:12 which says “Behold, this is a choice land, and whatsoever nation shall possess it shall be free from bondage, and from captivity, and from all other nations under heaven, if they will but serve the God of the land, who is Jesus Christ, who hath been manifested by the things which we have written.” Similarly, there has been a curse proclaimed upon the Lord that if the inhabitants of the America’s reject the God of this land and do wickedly they will be destroyed, as were the Jaredites and Nephites, in the Lord’s due time after the righteous have been gathered from among them.
As it says in Mosiah 8:12-19, one of the greatest ways the Lord has shown His perfect love for us in our time is by giving us modern-day prophets, Seers and revelators. He has told us that the Prophet will never lead us astray and if we but heed the counsel of the Prophet in all things and live righteously and virtuously, we will find greater protection for ourselves and our families in this troubling time. The job of a Prophet is to testify of the divinity of the Lord Jesus Christ, to exhort us to keep the Lord’s commandments and to warn us of the Lord’s righteous judgments if we do not repent of our sins. The Prophet holds all the keys not only for the governance of the Church and its members but for the Kingdom of God on Earth which we have been promised will gradually be restored and which will grow to encompass all the world after the Lord’s Second Coming, which will bring an end to all nations and usher in the Glorious Day of the Millennium. I testify that President Russell M. Nelson is the Lord’s living Prophet on the Earth today and that he leads and guides the Lord’s Church in furtherance of the Savior’s Heavenly direction.
In a talk entitled “Revelation for the Church, Revelation for our Lives,” our beloved Prophet, President Russell M, Nelson proclaimed, “The time is coming when those who do not obey the Lord will be separated from those who do (see Doctrine and Covenants 86:1–7). Our safest insurance is to continue to be worthy of admission to His holy house. The greatest gift you could give to the Lord is to keep yourself unspotted from the world, worthy to attend His holy house. His gift to you will be the peace and security of knowing that you are worthy to meet Him, whenever that time comes. Even at a time when the Temples are closed, there is great protection, safety and peace in righteous living and obedience to the Lord’s commandments.
In D&C 86:1-7, the Lord explains the parable of the wheat and the tares. We are told that the field is the world ripe for harvest. The tares symbolize the wicked and the wheat symbolizes the righteous. The Lord commands that the field not be burned until the wheat (righteous) has been gathered among them. This is the doctrine of the gathering. Many times in the Scriptures, the righteous have been physically gathered and physically separated from the wicked prior to His righteous judgments being poured out upon them. Some examples of this were Lot and his family being led out of Sodom and Gomorrah, Lehi and his family and the Mulekites being led away from Jerusalem before it was destroyed around 600 BC, and Mosiah and the righteous Nephites being led away from the wicked Nephites around 279 BC. In His talk, the Prophet also underscored the importance of having a strong testimony and staying close to the Spirit in order to ensure we are spiritually prepared to survive what’s coming. He stated: “If we are to have any hope of sifting through the myriad of voices and the philosophies of men that attack truth, we must learn to receive revelation…In coming days, it will not be possible to survive spiritually without the guiding, directing, comforting, and constant influence of the Holy Ghost.”
Brothers and sisters, if the Prophet were to ask us tomorrow to quit our jobs and leave our homes and flee to the mountains or rural areas to flee for safety from the coming storm as he has in times past, would we react as the Prophets Lehi and Nephi did and be obedient without hesitation or would we be like Laman and Lemuel and mock the Prophet for being a visionary man and say the Lord cannot destroy this great nation because we are too strong and therefore refuse the Prophetic call to gather. I pray that we would all be willing to sacrifice our earthly possessions to prove ourselves obedient to the Prophet no matter how hard it might be. Now is the time for us to learn to be obedient to the Prophet when it is easy so that when it is hard we will be able to protect and safeguard our families against the destructions which have been prophesied in the Holy Scriptures before the Lord’s Second Coming which Church leaders have suggested will occur in our lifetimes in the not so distant future.
As it says in Mosiah 10:11-17, our choices truly influence generations. If we remain strong in our testimony of the Gospel, then our children and Grandchildren will likely follow our righteous examples. Similarly, if we fall away from the Church or try to pick and choose which commandments and which Prophetic counsels to obey and which to ignore, our children and their children will likely do likewise as it was with the descendants of Laman and Lemuel. The choice is ours. As President Monson taught, “decisions determine destiny.” May God bless you all during this trying time! I look forward to teaching Gospel Doctrine again when our chapels re-open again.
Brother Pyne
