When God remembers His covenant

Recently I was reading an article by Steven L. Olsen called “The Death of Laban” from the Maxwell Institute, and I ran across a paragraph about the term "remember" that I thought was particularly enlightening, so I wanted to share it with you.

Throughout the Book of Mormon text, the term remember has a different connotation when applied to God. On several occasions God declares that he will remember his covenants or his people (e.g., 1 Nephi 19:15–18; 2 Nephi 29:1–14; 3 Nephi 20:29; Mormon 5:20–21; 8:21–23). Given God’s omniscience, the meaning of remember as “call to mind” may seem absurd. More appropriate in this context might be the synonyms renew or restore, as in the Lord “remembers” (i.e., restores) his covenants with Israel when Israel “remembers” (i.e., recalls and commits to live) her divine covenants. In short, not only does the term remember frequently refer to keeping or preserving covenants, but it has covenantal implications in general usage throughout Nephi’s record.²⁹

How does this help us find meaning when we hear the sacrament prayer phrase where we promise to “always remember him”?

Peter talks about God’s view of time

But, beloved, be not ignorant of this one thing,

that one day is with the Lord as a thousand years,

and a thousand years as one day. (2 Peter 3:8)

I across some interesting differences in the JST for the above verse:

But concerning the coming of the Lord, beloved,

I would not have you ignorant of this one thing,

that one day is with the Lord as a thousand years,

and a thousand years as one day. (JST 2 Peter 3:8)

First, I notice that the JST turns Peter’s saying from “don’t be ignorant” to “I would not have you ignorant,” which is a substantial alteration of tone from commanding to charitably solicitous for the saints to learn something that he believes will help them a lot. (This for me hints that the concept will have more importance to us than we think.)

The second change seems inconsequential, but when plumbed, it yields intriguing suggestions. We are used to this idea that one day to the Lord is a thousand years and a thousand years as one day, but the JST seems to take away the sense that this conception of time for the Lord is general, and instead applies it only to the COMING of the Lord. How can that be, if the coming of the Lord is only one point in time?

But concerning the coming of the Lord…

one day is with the Lord as a thousand years,

and a thousand years as one day.

To me this seems to say that when the Lord comes, the changes of a thousand years will be packed into one day and wickedness of the past thousand years will seem like a bad dream of a day, and going forward into the Millennium, it will seem each day as if we’d always been doing things that way for a thousand years.

How might this help us? The context of this verse shows that Peter was addressing those who doubted the second coming and who thought that history would just continue on unchanged as it had for centuries, since they had not seen anything change the whole world so abruptly. This verse helps by explaining that whether the state of things has been a thousand years long or one day long, the Lord can work such marvelous changes that one thousand years of habits and traditions seems like one day, a tale that is told.

I know there are also people who prefer to think that God is not governed by the linearity of time passage. We tend to want to think of God as a time traveler when we doubt His ability to plan so far in advance and doubt His power to work His will among men, especially among the stubborn and unbelieving. However, any of us who have seen the Lord’s tender mercies in our lives and who have considered all the little conditions that had to be put into place so far in advance to bring them about know that if the Lord can be so merciful in such subtle ways to us, then He does indeed know all and have all power to work His will, preparing far in advance for the changes to come.

This verse could also be a statement about how the Lord explains the second coming in the scriptures, which, if we have been alert, we will have noticed. The Lord dwells upon the good, the anticipated events with such great detail that it is as if one day lasts a thousand years. He also brushes over the evil days, such as the time that Israel has been scattered, as if it were only a short time, packing a thousand years of history together and speaking of it as if it were only one day. If we were to put a name to this, we could call it “the accordion time model,” stretching out the good and collapsing the bad. I've seen this in the Book of Mormon too, such as when Nephi explains to his brothers that Israel will be scattered, but then will be gathered again. We see it in the Book of Isaiah as well, where the scattering of Israel is predicted and then the gathering of Israel is predicted in the very same chapter.

How does this help us? It helps us not feel cheated if bad times seem to last longer than the scriptures seem to give us an idea of. It also gives us an idea of the Lord’s way of thinking—He dwells upon the good times and anticipates them centuries and even millennia in advance, rather than dwelling upon the bad.

Mosiah the messenger

10 Therefore, he [King Benjamin] had Mosiah brought before him;

and these are the words which he spake unto him, saying:

My son, I would that ye should make a proclamation

throughout all this land among all this people,

or the people of Zarahemla, and the people of Mosiah who dwell in the land,

that thereby they may be gathered together;

for on the morrow I shall proclaim unto this my people out of mine own mouth

that thou art a king and a ruler over this people,

whom the Lord our God hath given us….

18 And now, it came to pass that Mosiah went

and did as his father had commanded him,

and proclaimed unto all the people who were in the land of Zarahemla

that thereby they might gather themselves together,

to go up to the temple to hear the words which his father should speak unto them. (Mosiah 1:10,18)

Here, King Benjamin gave Mosiah a command to proclaim a gathering of the people to the temple the next day. In verse 18 we are told that Mosiah went and proclaimed to all the people as he had been asked to do.

It seems that Mosiah acted as his father’s messenger and visited everyone in the land to let them know. Somehow it touches me to think of Mosiah as the town crier for his father. It shows something of his life of service and his williness to do what must have been a mundane task.

3 Tiny Habits

Recently I ran into a method that explained to me why and how I was able to get in the habit of reading the scriptures every day. BJ Fogg, a PhD from Stanford has a motivational method called “3 Tiny Habits” he developed to help people make positive changes in their lives in about a week. He recommends that if you are trying to develop a good habit, then you make it something extremely small that you can do in about 30 seconds every single day and then tie that action to something that you already do everyday, so that the first action becomes a trigger for the new action that you are trying to make a habit.

So, if you want to get in the habit of reading your scriptures every single day, make it your goal to read just a single verse. That’s it. (And don’t underestimate the power of reading a single verse! I have felt my entire outlook on life change from reading a single verse on those days when that was all I could do!) The beauty of starting a tiny habit is that it is also painless. If you think reading only a single verse is too short a time, just remember that scripture that out of small things come that which is great.

When I first started reading my scriptures on my own, I tied my reading activity to the activity of getting into bed at the end of the day. I was able to read just about every day for two years because of that. After that two years, I changed my routine to reading in the morning, so I tied it to the activity of getting dressed. A few years ago, I changed my routine again and I tied my reading to the activity of eating breakfast. I can see that I have been able to maintain my reading habit because I tie it to something else I always do. It also shows me that my family was able to consistently do family scripture study because it always came right after dinner; we couldn’t leave until we read the scriptures together. Scripture study was tied to dinner.

So, why is my title 3 Tiny Habits? Well, if it happens that your new years resolutions are implementing family prayer and family scripture study, all you have to do is figure out an activity that you already do as a family that you can tie those small habits to. Make it short so it is painless. And as the third habit, how about giving each person a hug and a kiss? (My family growing up actually tied this habit to family prayer.) That will make it so that each person will get at least one physical sign of affection each day.

Vengeance as a whirlwind

Behold, vengeance cometh speedily upon the inhabitants of the earth, a day of wrath, a day of burning, a day of desolation, of weeping, of mourning, and of lamentation; and as a whirlwind it shall come upon all the face of the earth, saith the Lord. (D&C 112:24)

Having grown up in the Midwest and seen how tornados form and their conditions, this verse is telling. The clouds form, the sky gets a very unnatural color, the wind rises, and in the middle of the roiling clouds, the funnel drops and turns. It roots up everything, tears it apart, and scatters it far and wide. Tornados tend to have narrow paths...


so when this verse says vengeance will come “as a whirlwind…upon all the face of the earth,” we are to understand that it will hit everything.


The impulse to take revenge when you've been wronged is so strong that it can suck you in almost without realizing it, especially if everyone else around is wrung by the same drive.

STAND IN HOLY PLACES AND BE NOT MOVED.

Image #1: 620CKRM Willy Cole Blog, http://www.620ckrm.com/blogs/willycole/?p=983
Image #2: Watercooler Weather, http://watercoolerweather.blogspot.com/2008/05/here-we-go-again.html
Image #3 Ultimate Chase : Deadly Florida Tornado Damage Photos, http://www.ultimatechase.com/Chase_Accounts/florida_tornado_damage_photos_2007.htm

Where two or three are gathered together in Christ's name

19 Again I say unto you, That if two of you shall agree on earth as touching any thing that they shall ask, it shall be done for them of my Father which is in heaven.

20 For where two or three are gathered together in my name, there am I in the midst of them. (Matt. 18:19-20)

We can see from the stories after Jesus’s resurrection that this promise was literally fulfilled. The disciples on the road to Emmaus were joined by the Savior. The apostles meeting in closed doors were joined by the Savior. How many other gatherings may not Jesus have visited without making himself visible?

I also think the great principle and promise of these verses is that the size of the gathering doesn’t matter as long as it is in His name. Thus, branches in the far reaches of the earth have the same spiritual privileges as stakes in an area well-populated with members.

I remember before a year of BYU started I and some other students were there early before most everyone else arrived. There were about twelve of us, and we were together in a dorm lobby. Someone got a notion that we could bear testimony to each other, so we did. We went around the group and shared our testimonies of the gospel and some of the miracles that brought us to that place in our lives. I remember that I felt a very special spirit there as we did that. I like to think that it was the Lord that was with us that day when we were so unified in gratitude and knowledge.

If you feel it is appropriate, will you share any experiences you had when you felt the Lord was with you when you gathered in His name?

Considering the purpose of King Noah's high tower

And it came to pass that [King Noah] built a tower near the temple; yea, a very high tower, even so high that he could stand upon the top thereof and overlook the land of Shilom, and also the land of Shemlon, which was possessed by the Lamanites; and he could even look over all the land round about. (Mosiah 11:12)

This comes in the recital of the evils that King Noah did, so while it sounded somewhat harmless at first, I started to think about why it might have been added and whether it was disapproved of.

Perhaps one problem with this tower is that it upstaged the temple as the focus of the area. If you wanted to look toward the temple, the temple wasn’t the most beautiful thing to look at, as our temples often are. King Noah had made his tower bigger and better. (Abinadi probably considered it a major eyesore.)

And too, the purpose of the tower may have been foolish if it was built just so King Noah could stand on the top and look down on everybody! (How different from the temple, where people come to worship and look up to God.) If that was King Noah's only purpose for the tower, then the tower is certainly a contrast from King Benjamin’s tower, which was used to teach people from and remind people of their duty to God. King Noah’s tower may have been part of his efforts to forget the Lord and go his own way. (How often do we get spiritually get on our high towers just so we can look down on people?)

However, perhaps King Noah built this tower as a way to observe whether the Lamanites were preparing for war. We know that earlier in the Zeniffite record the Nephites were consistently taken by surprise by invading Lamanites, and perhaps the tower was designed as a means of observing Lamanite war preparations to give Nephites advance notice and time to prepare for defense. If so, it was a very good plan, and it worked...except King Noah was a very bad watchman for that tower. He only saw the Lamanites were invading because he was chased up onto his tower, and then it was still too late to do much about the invasion except run away. King Limhi did a much better job as a watchman on that tower; he was able to discover all the Lamanite preparations for war and prepare his people ahead of time (see Mosiah 20:7-8).

How does this help us today? It shows us that a tower doesn't do much good without a watchman that consistently watches. Our prophet is a watchman on the tower for us. We are also watchmen for those who are within our stewardships. We want to be watchmen like King Limhi, not King Noah. We want to be watchmen who watch consistently so that when the enemy is in range, we can take notice while they are yet afar off and prepare our defense rather than seeing the invaders in the borders with nothing we can do but run.

Is there an experience you can share of a time when being a good watchman saved you and yours?

My blogging year in review: top posts from 2011

As the year draws to a close, it occurred to me that it might be helpful for me (and interesting to you as readers) to review some of the highlights of the year on my blog. With the help of Google’s handy analytics tool, it was a simple matter to find out which of my posts from 2011 got the highest number of pageviews. (The widget on my sidebar only compiles them on a rolling monthly basis, not a yearly basis.)

Reader’s top 10 favorite posts from 2011 (in order from highest number of pageviews to lowest)

1. Why did God choose the rainbow as a token of His covenant with Noah?
2. In the beginning there was taxonomy...
3. Book of Mormon war chapters help us defend against pornography
4. 84 blog posts collected as a Book of Mormon commentary
5. Things that make my brain explode inside my skull
6. 14 things I loved about general women's conference 2011
7. 16 ways to mark your scriptures
8. A dire prophecy fulfilled
9. Important Counsel from President Monson’s Apr. 2011 talk “The Holy Temple—A Beacon to the World”
10. Temple symbolism to ponder

Next, I give you a list of posts from 2011 that I consider my favorites. If I was to write “the small plates of Michaela” using only material from this year, these posts are ones that I would choose (presented in no particular order).

The Small Plates of Michaela in 2011

There has to be backstory to Captain Moroni’s meteoric rise

Importance of frequent provisioning

Lessons from Alma 55: changed loyalties, impulse control, causes of carelessness, and winey Lamanites

Helaman’s insight into helping others keep covenants

Why both “salt of the earth” and “light of this people”?

The great Nephite prayer party of 3 Nephi 19

Why D&C 122 holds more encouragement for us than we think

Secrets of God’s grace

Hyrum Smith’s insight for enduring martyrdom

Lessons about resisting Satan from Moses 1

Enoch tells of Adam’s baptism and how God taught Adam the gospel

How the account of Jesus's suffering helps me have faith

They took them wives even as they chose

To increase my love of the Lord

Don’t give up your objectives

Lessons from Peter’s deliverance from prison in Acts 12

Why did God choose the rainbow as a token of His covenant with Noah?

Let the Lord encourage you

The angel’s prophecy to Nephi of the coming events of the church in the latter days

2 Nephi 8: Jacob quotes Isaiah 51 to teach about death and the resurrection (not just the gathering)

The woman at the well: A character study

And not faint

The Pride of Our Eyes

Insights on the twelve chapters of Isaiah (2 Nephi 12-24) quoted in 2 Nephi

Strong as to the strength of men

Thus it whispereth me to do according to his will

Christ shared how He resisted temptation

While shepherds watched their flocks by night

We are come to worship him

Zeniff’s war propaganda

See if you can pick out the war propaganda:

11 Now, the Lamanites knew nothing concerning the Lord, nor the strength of the Lord, therefore they depended upon their own strength. Yet they were a strong people, as to the strength of men.

12 They were a wild, and ferocious, and a blood-thirsty people, believing in the tradition of their fathers, which is this—Believing that they were driven out of the land of Jerusalem because of the iniquities of their fathers, and that they were wronged in the wilderness by their brethren, and they were also wronged while crossing the sea;

13 And again, that they were wronged while in the land of their first inheritance, after they had crossed the sea, and all this because that Nephi was more faithful in keeping the commandments of the Lord—therefore he was favored of the Lord, for the Lord heard his prayers and answered them, and he took the lead of their journey in the wilderness.

14 And his brethren were wroth with him because they understood not the dealings of the Lord; they were also wroth with him upon the waters because they hardened their hearts against the Lord.

15 And again, they were wroth with him when they had arrived in the promised land, because they said that he had taken the ruling of the people out of their hands; and they sought to kill him.

16 And again, they were wroth with him because he departed into the wilderness as the Lord had commanded him, and took the records which were engraven on the plates of brass, for they said that he robbed them.

17 And thus they have taught their children that they should hate them, and that they should murder them, and that they should rob and plunder them, and do all they could to destroy them; therefore they have an eternal hatred towards the children of Nephi.

18 For this very cause has king Laman, by his cunning, and lying craftiness, and his fair promises, deceived me, that I have brought this my people up into this land, that they may destroy them; yea, and we have suffered these many years in the land. (Mosiah 10:11-18)

Here Zeniff tells his people the history of the conflict between the Nephites and the Lamanites. He tells the Lamanite view of why the Nephites should be destroyed. He also tries to point out how the Lamanites do not share Nephite values of the Lord and trusting the Lord and how it has made them wild and ferocious. He tells about how the Lamanites have taught their children to hate and try to destroy the Nephites.

He ends up with blaming King Laman for cunning, fair promises to deceive and destroy. And he says, “and we have suffered these many years in the land” (v18). However, that complaint of suffering does not seem sincere, because earlier in the chapter, Zeniff writes, “thus we did have continual peace in the land for the space of twenty and two years” (v5). You can’t have continual peace for twenty two years and then turn around and blame Lamanite enemies for causing you to suffer these many years in the land. Either Zeniff’s memory is bad or he is stretching the truth to pump up his propaganda, not realizing that he is falling into the same fault as the Lamanites’ traditions he decries. He claims the Lamanites have preserved and magnified their sense of being wronged, yet he is doing the same thing. Just as the Lamanites twisted the story of Nephi and Laman, Zeniff is twisting the story of the relationship between the Zeniffites and Lamanites over the past generation.

Why is he doing this? He feels he has to stimulate them to fight their hardest against the Lamanites. Yet compare Zeniff’s propaganda to Captain Moroni’s title of liberty and reminders to fight for their God, their religion, their freedom, their peace, their wives, and their children! Captain Moroni’s encouragement seems much cleaner than Zeniff’s.

What does this teach us today? I think it is showing us that it is better to say what you are fighting for, rather than to recite your wrongs.

We are come to worship him

1 Now when Jesus was born in Bethlehem of Judæa in the days of Herod the king, behold, there came wise men from the east to Jerusalem,

2 Saying, Where is he that is born King of the Jews? for we have seen his star in the east, and are come to worship him. (Matt. 2:1-2)

This seems to indicate that the sign of the new star that had been given to the Nephites had also been given to other people as well. The Nephites were too far away to go to Israel to see, but these wise men realized they were close enough, and must have said to each other “let us go now and see this thing which is come to pass, which the Lord has made known unto us,” much like the shepherds said to each other after the angels appeared to them in the field. Once they knew it was happening, they wanted to see for themselves, and not just see, but pay homage.

I really like how the wise men are examples of exercising their agency to act. They knew, and they acted on what they knew, even though it was a sacrifice. They were willing to leave all their other concerns behind at home and go on this journey. I think that all of us who leave the world behind and go on the incredible journey to come to Christ are no different, no less wise than these wise men.

I’m also touched that the wise men were willing to go on this journey to see the new Messiah as a baby. What could Jesus do for them at that time of life? He couldn’t preach to them, He was too small to consciously exert His power to heal any infirmities they might have had. How would they benefit from seeing Him? They already believed in the Messiah, so they weren’t seeking the evidence of their eyes. I think they wanted to see how the great Jehovah condescended to come to earth as a little child. In the eyes of the world, this baby was no great thing—babies are born every day. Babies are weak and helpless. Babies know nothing and have done nothing great to warrant admiration. Somehow the wise men knew that this baby was great because of the great spirit that was housed in it. It was Jehovah in that baby boy body, the same that saved Noah with the ark, the same that made such great promises to Abraham, the same that brought the children of Israel out of Egypt and parted the Red Sea for them, the same that did so many wonders throughout the scriptures. It was Jehovah they were worshipping.

Another thing that is touching is that the wise men already referred to Jesus as “the king of the Jews.” Even though it was evident that Jesus hadn’t obtained the power and authority of kingship and wasn’t yet universally acknowledged as king, they didn’t care. To them, Jesus was king, and they paid homage as though He was. I think that we are no less wise if we acknowledge Jesus as king of kings today and worship and obey Him as such, even though He isn’t yet universally acknowledged as king by the whole world. Eventually He will be.