Captain Moroni!
In this episode of the Weekly Deep Dive podcast, hosts Jason Lloyd and Nate Pyfer delve into Alma 42-55, exploring the intense narrative surrounding Captain Moroni, the Nephite wars, and the profound spiritual and political lessons found within these chapters. They discuss the youthful fervor of Captain Moroni, his proactive military strategies, and the importance of maintaining spiritual and moral high ground in both ancient and modern contexts. The episode also highlights the diplomatic exchange between Moroni and Pahoran, showcasing the balance between righteous indignation and patient leadership. Additionally, Jason and Nate reflect on how these ancient stories resonate with the challenges faced by individuals today, emphasizing the need for personal accountability, resilience, and the value of enduring life’s struggles.
Transcript:
[00:00:15] Speaker A: Welcome to the weekly Deep Dive podcast on the add on Education network, a podcast where we take a look at the weekly come follow me discussion and try to add a little insight and unique perspective. I am your host, Jason Lloyd, here in the studio with our friend and this show’s producer, Nate the tired Pyfer.
[00:00:32] Speaker B: Hello.
[00:00:33] Speaker A: You had quite the drive home last night, dude.
[00:00:36] Speaker B: We were driving safely home. We get up in the Sierra Nevadas, get right past truckee on I 80, and the craziest thing happens. We see cars, maybe only, like, ten cars ahead of us just stop, and both lanes of traffic just stop, and we’re like, oh, that’s weird. I wonder if, like, something fell off somebody’s car or whatever. But then we’re, like, waiting, and then the next thing we see is just, like, dark, black smoke coming up. We’re like, uh oh. A car is on fire.
[00:01:05] Speaker A: Not a good sign.
[00:01:05] Speaker B: Next thing we see is trees and everything, like, on the side of the road right next to us on fire. And then fire is just spreading up the side of a mountain, like, around this house. Police cars are trying to get in. Whatever. A car got in a wreck, started on fire, lit the entire side of a mountain on fire. And I don’t know. I hope they saved the house. But we sat there for about 2 hours, hour and a half, 2 hours, just waiting for them to get it far enough away from the road that cars could at least pass.
So that was my day yesterday. So we got home at 530 this morning. So, anyways, if I sound a little tired today, we had an adventure yesterday, and happy anniversary. Thanks, buddy. 19 years.
[00:01:46] Speaker A: 19 years.
[00:01:48] Speaker B: 19 blissful years. 19 blissful years. Man. Marriage is the easiest thing in the entire world, dude. Not a day of it is ever hard.
[00:01:55] Speaker A: It’s like walking on clouds every day, basically.
[00:01:58] Speaker B: 19 years of only walking on clouds and never having any disagreements on anything ever. In sunshine. That’s it.
[00:02:05] Speaker A: How can there not be sun sign? You’re walking on the clouds.
[00:02:07] Speaker B: I know. All day, every day. Turn your mic up just a little bit.
There you go. There you go. Yeah, now. There we go. What are we talking about today, man?
[00:02:18] Speaker A: So we. We’ve got Alma 42, I think, through 55.
[00:02:24] Speaker B: Okay.
[00:02:24] Speaker A: It’s hard when. When they. When they look at it and you’re. You’re breaking this down. Like, you got three chapters this week and four chapters this week, and. And then you all suddenly have, like, the rest of the book of Alma. It just feels like a lot got thrown at us, and it’s not a lot.
It’s not just that it’s a lot, it’s that it’s Captain Moroni a lot.
[00:02:45] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:02:45] Speaker A: And you can’t help but feel it, you know, when you start reading and man, where is it? Alma 42.
It’s when Moroni first makes the introduction into the book. It’s like you almost feel it. It’s almost palpable to like, here is. It’s like watching a movie and all of a sudden the guy that you’ve been waiting for walks on the screen and everyone just like, oh, this is, this is what we came to the movie for. That’s almost what it feels like when you read. And his name was Moroni. That’s great though.
[00:03:16] Speaker B: Yeah, I know. I’m very like, woo hoo.
[00:03:19] Speaker A: You’re like ready to start applausing and like cheering in your scriptures. You’re like, there he is. The man, the myth, the legend.
[00:03:25] Speaker B: The legend. I love it.
[00:03:27] Speaker A: So this is Moroni making his entrance at, what is it, 25 years old, pretty young guy to be heading up the armies. I’m sure there’s a backstory there that unfortunately we don’t have.
And I don’t even know enough to speculate on how he’s running the place, running the show at 25.
But maybe that, maybe that gives us a little bit of insight into his.
[00:03:52] Speaker B: I’m gonna throw this out there.
[00:03:53] Speaker A: Let’s hear it.
[00:03:55] Speaker B: You know, I’m a patriotic guy.
[00:03:57] Speaker A: Yes.
[00:04:00] Speaker B: We do our best to not talk like, specific politics on this show, because you and I don’t even see eye to eye, I’m pretty sure, on everything politically.
[00:04:09] Speaker A: Thank goodness.
[00:04:10] Speaker B: Thank goodness, by the way. Yes, I’m a radical individualist. That’s my politics is that a human being is. Every human being is so unique and nuanced and has so many different life experiences that don’t put me in umbrellas, don’t put me into camps. I want to feel like I can be radically individual. But what I will say is, I do think we agree on this.
The founding fathers were incredible and inspired by God.
[00:04:35] Speaker A: Amen.
[00:04:36] Speaker B: How old were those dudes when they were leading a revolution, writing a constitution, fighting for their lives, and basically like securing the freedom of a country. Those dudes were like 18 to 25 years old.
Like there was a couple ogs, but the oldest one was like my age, 40.
[00:04:56] Speaker A: Frank, 42 years older. Wasn’t hedgest.
[00:04:58] Speaker B: Benjamin Franklin was older. But I’m saying is like of a do. Yes. And by the way, I’m not to understate, like, his importance.
He’s over in France. He’s negotiating. I mean, look, he doesn’t do his. He doesn’t do his diplomacy work, who knows what happens, right?
[00:05:13] Speaker A: Right.
[00:05:15] Speaker B: But the dudes on the ground signing that Declaration of Independence were, like, 1819.
[00:05:19] Speaker A: They got a lot of Spitfire left energy.
[00:05:22] Speaker B: So, it’s funny because we refer to them as our founding fathers. I think we forget sometimes how wildly competent those dudes were as late teenagers, early 20 year olds, for the most part. I think George Washington was, like, early forties. He’s my age, man.
Like, I’m not leading a revolution. You know what I mean?
I’m just saying.
So to just add a little bit of perspective. We do read this, and we go. We read the stories of the stripling warriors. We read a lot of these things.
[00:05:57] Speaker A: Nephi.
[00:05:58] Speaker B: Nephi.
I hate to say this, but we’ve gone soft, man.
When you look at times when it was required that you had some hardened men and women, you had hardened men and women, that rose to the occasion. We read these stories now, and it is hard for us to comprehend a 25 year old, right, going out there and, like, leading armies.
And that’s, I think, more of a critique on us than it is an understanding on them, to be fair.
[00:06:29] Speaker A: I’ll say that there are some.
You know, there’s some, you. You know.
You know that there are some young men, young women.
[00:06:37] Speaker B: Yes. But I do. I feel bad that we don’t. We don’t get to put them into positions to actually go and rise to the occasion in things like this, just, by the way, for good reason, too, because we live in peace. Like, I know we’re on the brink of world war three right now, but, like, you and I have talked about this all the time, if you look at this point in history relative to the. To the thousands of years of recorded history that we have, it’s like, we have it so good and peaceful, by the way, thank God, because war is hell. I’m glad that my children live in a world that I. That we’re not worried about them and us having to fight for the safety of our farm and our village every single year. So I’m not. You’re totally right. And I don’t mean to cut you off. You’re totally right. We do have amazing, amazing young people. They’re just not being required to do that exact same thing.
[00:07:35] Speaker A: And I will say, thank goodness for the church requiring hard things from young people to go out, leave their family, and serve missions, because I think that’s as close as you’re going to get. And it’s something that the church has been doing for a long time is requiring these people to make sacrifices, significant sacrifices and bravery to approach people they’ve never met before that have views that are at times hostile to what they’re trying to convey.
[00:08:02] Speaker B: Now all we need to do is take their phones away from them and get them off of social media and not let them FaceTime home every week because they’re so soft too. I said it.
That’s right. I said it.
Missionaries used to have to go like out not knowing where they would end up. Like survive on like trying to find people to feed them and house them. And, you know, I’m just saying, like, you and I had it easy and we were just in the early two thousands, but even then, we weren’t calling home every week. We would have gotten in trouble for calling home every week.
[00:08:38] Speaker A: We would have gotten in trouble for calling home every day.
[00:08:40] Speaker B: All right, all I’m saying is, moroni is it doesn’t, in a historical context, you have the sons of Helaman, you have the Mormons, you have the Moronis, the nephis, the ammons, a lot of these young men, the Joseph Smiths. Yes, absolutely.
[00:09:00] Speaker A: And the scripture says, let no man despise you for your youth. And I, I mean, I think the scriptures are full of examples like that.
I mean, even consider Christ. He died ten years before he reached our age.
[00:09:13] Speaker B: That’s right.
[00:09:14] Speaker A: And what did he do?
[00:09:16] Speaker B: I mean, he changed the world, changed the universe. So, yes, I’m with you. It is funny though, in our context of our modern lens, we see 25 and we go, what the, but you think of it historically and you’re like, oh, yeah, nobody lived beyond 50.
[00:09:32] Speaker A: We’ve got some long, we got some long livers every here in the, in the Book of Mormon.
[00:09:37] Speaker B: But I guess.
[00:09:39] Speaker A: But no, you’re right. It’s a different world. It’s a very different world. And, and I, I don’t know. I hesitate even going down this too much, but at the same time, you just wonder, like, like you’re saying, where?
I don’t know.
Here it is. Here it is.
[00:10:01] Speaker B: Okay.
[00:10:04] Speaker A: These young people with all of the energy, all of the vigor and all of the best wishes to go out and change the world. And they’ll go and they’ll get their education, and then what are they confronted with when they try to make a living with their family, by the way? You have to try to buy a home that there’s no way you’re going to be able to afford it, not right now. And you’re going to have to try to support a family that there’s no way you’re gonna be able to do it on a single income. You’re gonna have to now force both.
[00:10:29] Speaker B: Both couples to work, which is not how it used to be even 30 years ago, 40 years ago.
[00:10:35] Speaker A: And by the way, we’re not gonna pay you until you have x years of experience to try to do it with. And how are we setting these up to succeed? I mean, these young people today are facing some extreme challenges that I don’t think Moroni was even familiar with. And how do you succeed in a world? And do we have it backwards? Right? I mean, you get to people that have all of the experience and that are ready to retire in the world, that are making all the income in the world to what, they’re not raising a family anymore. They don’t need it anymore. I mean, what are you going to do to spend your income? Go see the world and go travel when you’re tired? And maybe that’s not even on your list of priorities anymore. And what would you have given to have had that income when you were first starting out and you had the energy to go see the world, to take care of your family, to raise the kids? It’s an interesting world that we live in, and I don’t want to make this a big comment on our social conditions today, but, and I don’t want to even go down political lines on this, but it is just a, it’s just an interesting world that we live in. And our youth do have some interesting challenges that they struggle with.
[00:11:41] Speaker B: I think that if we.
My bow that I would want to put on, that is instead of, instead of finding ways to make it more convenient for them, instead of looking at those challenges and saying like, hey, how can we, how can we soften the blow of some of these challenges?
I’m just such a big believer in, let’s find ways to challenge them, to rise to the occasion, like, let’s inspire them, to overcome them and do hard things again. Years of teaching, years of being coached for, through various things, I just, I saw so much more response and I saw greatness come out of, especially young people, when you inspire them with the idea that it’s like, yes, this is hard and it’s going to be hard, but I believe in you, and I will remove some stumbling blocks if I can, but I’m not going to, I’m not gonna do this for you. And I, you know, well, and maybe.
[00:12:46] Speaker A: That’S the point of it right. Maybe I’m looking at this, and what if we were setting them up with a six figure salary? What if we were to set them all up with. With everything that they need to succeed at an early age? And what do you do? You take away the struggle. You take away the how do I make this work and the desperate prayers and how do I feed my family tonight, and how am I paying my mortgage this month? And the decision, do I pay my tithing or do I buy. Buy groceries? And how do I build faith in the crucible that is those early founding years if everything is set up easily?
[00:13:24] Speaker B: You know, you bring up a good point, is that maybe. Maybe our perspective on this needs to change.
You say, well, yeah, maybe at the age of retirement is when you really do finally have all of your ducks in a row, but that’s the age you want to be doing other things. It’s like, are we saying that that is the pinnacle that we should be trying to achieve? Maybe our perspective needs to be what you just said, which is the crucible in which we’re earning our stripes, is the thing. That is what we should be trying to achieve. Like that actually is the pinnacle of life is learning how to fight through, build character through a struggle, survive, overcome. And if you want to call it a reward at the end of that to get to go, hey, I made it, sweet. But maybe I’m just saying maybe our perspective on it needs to be a little bit more open to the idea that I’ve been self employed since 2012.
Many a night of that has been staring at a wall, nervous, or at times really actually terrified of how I’m going to pay bills. And I look at what that has built in me more than outside of me. I look at what that’s built inside of me, and I wouldn’t sacrifice any of that for more safety or comfort. Like, it’s. It’s shaped me as who I am and hopefully what I can pass along to my kids. So I guess maybe, to answer the question, I don’t think we need to be making it easier. I don’t think that. And, yes, I do. There is something to be said for it sucks that you used to be able to have a single income earner that could afford to support and raise a family and buy a home and really achieve that part of the american dream. Yeah, it is a sad thing to me that. That feels almost out of reach to this point. But I can only speak for myself and say, I found a hardened survivor inside of me, learning how to just battle, whether that was when I was a teenager, you know, whether that be on my mission, whether it be as a young married person trying to figure out marriage and how to improve as a person, to become a better person because I wanted to be, whether that be a father, whatever that is. Like, looking back, I’m like, I don’t want to give up any of those struggles. They shaped me. So I don’t know.
[00:16:07] Speaker A: I mean, even put it in video game jargon for those that out there play. When you’re out there playing a game and you come against some boss or some hard thing, whatever, that you have to hit reset and try again or you just keep losing or it’s just a fight for your life, right?
That’s what, that’s what you come back for. That’s what you’re excited about. That’s where you keep trying to strategize and find a different way to try to approach that and beat it and get past it. But then when you’re 50 levels further past the game and you go back to do that same boss again and it’s just a one shot kill, move over it like game, it’s no fun. The game’s not fun anymore. It’s when you stop playing it. Right. The game loses any kind of sense of enjoyment at that point.
[00:16:47] Speaker B: Yes.
Back to our awesome captain. But I mean, it is to set the stage for this idea.
[00:16:55] Speaker A: And it’s actually a pretty smooth transition because in Alma 42, what I find and what I appreciate about this people at this time period is it talks about their fasting and praying and really diving in to give thanks to God.
And I don’t think that’s usual that we see here. We talk about what we’ve just been talking about this whole intro for the show, our fasting and our praying and our struggling and our fight is just for survival.
How do I make this work? How do I make one income work for a family of eight? Or how do I figure out self employment and make sure that I can get through the bills next month? It’s a fight. It’s a struggle. And these people are praying and fasting so that they don’t die because the Lamanites all of a sudden get an itch and decide to just go raid their village. Right?
[00:17:49] Speaker B: See, and that’s the thing I’m glad I don’t have to deal with.
[00:17:53] Speaker A: But how do you maintain that intensity in prayer, that intensity in fasting, that intensity when you’re not asking for a favor but actually giving thanks to God and that’s what the Nephites do here that just really impresses the heck out of me is they’re praying and fasting to show appreciation for what God has done.
And I think a lot of times we pray and we fast, and then as soon as the problem’s done, it’s almost like, never mind, God, I guess I don’t need you anymore. And you’re like, wait a second. What? Thanks. Do you, I mean, do we sometimes end up being the eight out of the ten leopards that lepers, that don’t turn and give thanks for being healed?
[00:18:34] Speaker B: One, I want to be a leopard, and two, I do understand what you’re saying, but this is to this back to the overall point.
Look at the pattern throughout this entire book.
When there wasn’t war, what happens?
People get casual. What happens when they get casual? They get soft. What happens when they get soft?
They start forgetting the God that gave them the opportunity to live in peace and safety and comfort. And then what happens? They have to get hardened up pretty quick.
Like, dude, there’s so many parallels with this world that we live in, man.
[00:19:16] Speaker A: There are. But this part of the pride cycle, to me, it doesn’t show the Nephites being prideful and needing to be humbled. In this case, you’re actually seeing the Nephites coming out of that with gratitude, with praising and teaching the gospel and trying to, Helaman’s out there trying really hard, and you have people trying to do the right thing, not getting carried away in the pride. And so this pride cycle, it’s almost broken in here. It’s not the pride that leads to their destruction. It’s dissenters.
And maybe there’s a comment on that. You can be doing everything right. You can be trying to figure this out, turning to God, getting inspiration, getting revelation, and moving on your course, doing just fine, trying to sail your ship, when all of a sudden, out of left field, somebody comes and sinks your boat because they’re pissed off. And it’s not even, it’s not even about you. It’s not even that you messed up or that you, what did I do? And how come I need to repent? And what is it? Sometimes it’s not about us falling in that pride cycle. Sometimes somebody just comes in and has to rain on your parade. And I think I see that here with these nephites when they’re fasting and praying. It’s almost like job. What did job do to deserve what came and hit him his way? He was offering sacrifices to God just on the off chance that maybe one of his kids is going to do something wrong. And so he’s showing the same type of dedication that I see from the nephites, not praying desperately to be saved, but praying desperately to give thanks and to maintain the peace that they have. And yet still it gets taken away. So sometimes maybe we don’t beat ourselves up so hard about what happens, because sometimes it’s not our fault, sometimes it’s not God’s fault. Sometimes it’s just the world that we live in and having the wrong kind of neighbors that just mess us up. No fault of our own. It’s just going to happen.
Amalachiah.
[00:21:14] Speaker B: Yeah, let’s do it.
[00:21:15] Speaker A: Should we go down to Malachia or is it even. I guess we have to go Zerahemla first, right?
He’s the one that, I mean, it’s just full of dissenters, right? And he spurns off and gets the Lamanites all stoked. And Moroni does, to his credit, young, without experience, he just textbook, right? He has prepared his people with shields, with armor, with plates. He’s gone to Alma and he’s asked him, where should I go? And he sought the Lord’s inspiration and he’s gotten ahead of it and he’s secreted armies along the way and he’s laid a trap and he’s not reactive, he’s actually proactive. He knows what’s coming and he’s prepared a way for them to kind of come out of this successful.
And there might be some lessons that we can learn from this.
In his proactive approach to this, at the end of the day, when he starts to have this discussion with Zerahemna, he orders the ceasefire and he’s saying, I will let you all go with the covenant of peace. And Zerahemnah is refusing this covenant and Moroni is making it a point to say God is the one that has delivered us. And Zerahemnah says, we don’t know that it was God. You can’t say that it was God. It was your shields, it was your armor, it was your preparation.
And he’s giving all the credit to the symptoms, not to the root cause.
And that was something maybe I wanted to hit and talk about from Moroni’s perspective. Why did they have the shields? Why did they have the protection? Well, because Moroni was concerned enough about what was going on and thinking about it that he would pray and ask and think and come up with these ideas and come up with these inspiration that he’s able to easily attribute it to God and say, God is the cause for our. And so it’s interesting how some people look at it and they point at the symptoms, but they refuse to go back down the line and follow that and say, okay, but where did those symptoms come from? What are the symptoms of? And that when God’s with us, this is the product that we expect. And why do we refuse to give God credit where credit is due?
[00:23:41] Speaker B: Great, that’s good. Let’s keep going.
[00:23:45] Speaker A: All right. I was just trying to think of maybe something parallel on that.
[00:23:51] Speaker B: I mean, wait, of the idea of us trying to diagnose the symptom instead of figuring out the root cause of the problem. I know. I mean, we can’t.
If we hit pause on the recording, I have no doubt that we could probably talk about plenty of these things.
[00:24:12] Speaker A: But again, my mind goes back to creation.
[00:24:18] Speaker B: I’m glad that you’re in. I’m glad that you’re in a better place than I am mentally. Man, the world’s been getting me down lately. Like, my place immediately just goes to, like, doom scrolling on Twitter. But, okay, I think creation of, like.
[00:24:32] Speaker A: Well, it’s just, it’s because we have life on here is because the atmosphere is the way it is because we have 20% oxygen or because the nitrogen’s the level it is. It’s because we have the right amount of water here on the planet, because it’s the right distance from the sun, because gravity is the right amount of force that it needs to be. It’s because all of these things. And so we look at it and say, it’s not because of God, it’s because of. And we list off all of the symptoms and say, that’s why we have life. And like, okay, I get it, but what’s the root cause? Why are those symptoms? Why do they exist? And maybe we just need to ask ourselves and maybe we should understand what is the point of science? Is it to identify the symptoms? Is it to identify the cause?
[00:25:20] Speaker B: And I don’t know, you went down a way better place than I was gonna go down. So let’s just keep moving on.
[00:25:28] Speaker A: Oh, dear. Do we wanna go down?
[00:25:30] Speaker B: No.
No. Because I like the idea that this discussion that we have each week can be an oasis from the just the constant battery and abuse and gaslighting that humanity is under at this point, basically at all times.
So anyways, no, I don’t want to go down. I want to stay happy, dude, I want to stay positive.
[00:25:55] Speaker A: Let’s make you positive.
[00:25:59] Speaker B: Let’s just get into some, let’s just get into some hardened dudes, some awesome manly men here.
[00:26:09] Speaker A: Getting in through here, scrolling through these, these pages, my analogous scriptures.
Maybe, maybe here’s a good point to like a good time to introduce covenant because you see it with the people of Zerahamna and you see how important that covenant was for them to where even where it meant their death, they still wouldn’t break a covenant. I mean, he says he would. Why enter into a covenant that we know we’re going to break anyways?
But there’s even a sense of honor in that, right? Like I’m not going to keep, like I’m not covenanting. Even saying that he is, he’s saying that he’s not going to.
There’s power with that.
And so they make their covenant and they go their way. But we’re going to see another covenant pop up here when Amalekiah wants to be king and he tries to get all of his people to be king. And again, Moroni goes to head this off and find out what’s going on and stop him from dissenting down into the Lamanites and stirring up all of these problems.
Moroni, we get to the title of liberty and he rends his coat. And I don’t know if we fully appreciate the significance of rending your coat. Like I get if you’re gonna tie your coat to a pole and make a flag.
[00:27:31] Speaker B: He’s got a Hulk Hogan, this thing.
[00:27:33] Speaker A: Yeah, yeah.
[00:27:37] Speaker B: He’S gotta make a point.
You had that mental image as soon as I said that, didn’t you?
[00:27:45] Speaker A: Absolutely.
Unfortunately.
[00:27:48] Speaker B: Let’s do this, brother.
Wait, unfortunately?
[00:27:58] Speaker A: I mean, can you do the whole compression one more time?
[00:28:02] Speaker B: No, I mean literally, I just a brother, that’s all I got.
[00:28:07] Speaker A: So Moroni is hulking out.
[00:28:09] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:28:10] Speaker A: But aside, aside from just the, the aesthetics of rending your coat, because I don’t, I don’t know that anyone was actually there watching him rend his coat. I think this was more of a opportunity.
[00:28:25] Speaker B: Okay.
[00:28:26] Speaker A: There’s, there is significance in him rending it. And you hear about people rending their coats and as a sign of severe anguish or sorrow or whatever in the Old Testament. But this does get us into covenant language when he’s tearing this. It’s similar to what you had with the tearing of animals that I know we’ve talked about ad nauseam with Abraham and the covenant and the sacrifice that he made. And the other interesting thing, it doesn’t have to be just the animals that you’re tearing in this case he’s rending his coat.
And when he shows up with this rent coat and the title of liberty written on it, what’s the reaction of the people? They rend their garments as well.
And so you’ve got this. The idea of tearing the animals in this agreement was we will be torn and destroyed and killed just as these animals are. And you’re gonna see that same language here in Moroni when they cry out, will God rend us and destroy us even as we’re rending our coats? So the rending of the garment isn’t just to look awesome as the hulk. It’s not just because I want this to be a smooth square when I hang it on the flagpole. There’s deeper significance in the cutting of a covenant. And that’s the other thing. In Hebrew, you don’t make a covenant. You don’t write a covenant. The verb that they use in Hebrew to describe a covenant relationship is you cut a covenant. And this is Moroni cutting a covenant, literally, but cutting his coat and writing out the agreement. Here you also see it outside of just killing animals. When Israel comes into the land, they put half of the blessings on one side of the mountain. So they’re going through a valley. So one mountain has the blessings, the other mountain has the curses, and they’re going through between the two mountains. And you look at that as God has rent the land by pushing the mountain up on either side. And just as the mountains are pushed on either side, they will be pulled out of land and scattered to the northe north or scattered to the south if they don’t obey this idea. So covenant doesn’t have to be just an animal. Here Moroni gives us an opportunity to view this with the rending of his coat. And in Israel, we see that with the rending of the land. And an important part of these covenants is not just the blessings but the cursings. When you rend something, inevitably you have two parts. And so on the title of liberty, he’s written, what you have is the blessings for our liberty, our peace, our freedom to establish our religion so that we can worship. Those are the blessings that we will be established in the land. Then what’s on the other side that gets rent. Those are the cursings. That we’re going to be trampled under the feet, that we’re going to be destroyed, that we’re not going to be established. And this becomes the prosperity promise again that Moroni is going to refer to. And as we go back to what Alma refers to, if you keep my commandments. You prosper in the land. If you keep not, then what’s the flip side? The coin of that is you will be cast out of the presence of God. And so this is, we will be preserved and maintained the presence of God, or we will be cast out of the presence of God and stamped on our feet and annihilated as a people.
[00:31:45] Speaker B: A lot of.
[00:31:47] Speaker A: Oh, go ahead.
[00:31:48] Speaker B: No, I was going to say, I do think, though, that we also just need to discuss the actual cloth or clothing part of this.
In the garden of Eden, an animal is killed and coats are made for Adam and Eve to wear as part of their garment, as part of their promise, as part of their commitment. I don’t think that we should overlook the idea of covenants being made on a piece of cloth that we wear as well. And that, and that have symbols on them as well that represent the very specific language of the covenants that we make, too. And I don’t, and correct me if I’m mistaken, don’t the people wear. Don’t the people wear the title of liberty? I know they rent their coats. And again, I may have misread that, and if so, I’ll delete this and edit it out. But don’t, but don’t they wear, don’t they wear the words of the title of Liberty as well? Am I totally misremembering this?
[00:32:53] Speaker A: You know, let’s, let’s read and check real quick.
[00:32:57] Speaker B: And I listened. I listened to this again in the car on the way home yesterday. And so I’m, I am, I’m totally. I’m admitting that I may have, I may be misremembering this.
[00:33:08] Speaker A: So, so they do. Okay. I think this is where you’re hearing it. And I think this is where it’s coming from. And this is verse I, 13 is particular. Verse twelve is where it starts. Verse twelve. And it came to pass that he rent his coat, and he took a piece thereof and wrote upon it in memory of our God, our religion, our freedom, our peace, our wives, our children. He put it on a pole. Verse 13, I think, is where you’re getting this from. And he fastened on his head plate. That’s what it is. And his breastplate and his shield and girded on his armor. That’s about his loins. So there was, there was a component of dressing themselves, right?
[00:33:43] Speaker B: That’s what it is.
[00:33:44] Speaker A: Even if his coat is fastened on a pole, it still had this idea of arming themselves and clothing themselves. So I love the connection that you’re making.
[00:33:52] Speaker B: And I also just love where he’s wearing it though, too. His mind, his arm. That represents strength, you know, I mean, it’s like you, you even look at the different of the different pieces of armor that he is fastening it onto as well, I think is beautiful, profound, something worth thinking about.
[00:34:08] Speaker A: I like it. I like it. And where I was going to head is verse 20. Just because we’re talking about all of this as very covenant symbols that we look at, we recognize, we read that, we’re trying to point out and help you understand, unless you think that we’re taking this a stretch too far, verse 20, I think, just nails it. Behold, whosoever will maintain this title upon the land, let them come forth in the strength of the Lord and enter into a covenant. This was a covenant. That’s exactly what this was. And it fits the pattern of ancient covenant making. It’s not just something that we look at and say, oh, we’re trying to assume that because it looks like this, it’s what it is. It is what it is. And I like your connections, particularly to the Garden of Eden and the clothing and the idea that, I mean, in Hebrew Kaphar is cover. Kippur atone literally means to cover. And in order to cover Adam and Eve’s nakedness, an animal had to be cut to bleed out to die and the clothing cut off of them to clothe Adam and Eve. And you have, you have this very first covenant with your cutting it. You’re separating it, you’re dividing it. You’ve got the cursing, the death of the animal and even take this to doctrine. Covenants 19 I the Lord suffered these things so that you wouldn’t have to, but if you don’t, you must suffer even as I. And so what do you have with that covenant?
It’s not just the blessings, but the covenant is also associated with the cursings. There’s two parts of that. One piece was put on the pole, but let’s not forget that another piece was cast down to their feet and they all trampled it and rent it and destroyed it and said, this will be us if we don’t. We lift up the blessings, but we also abide knowing that there are cursings associated with this.
[00:36:08] Speaker B: Love it.
[00:36:09] Speaker A: And I think where you’ve grounded this in the atonement and talking about Adam and Eve and so much of this is the ancient world. I feel like the Book of Mormon offers us a bridge to take this ancient covenant symbols and meaning and stories and transpose it into our modern world. We may see this all throughout the Book of Mormon, but you might look at it today and say, well, what? We don’t cut animals. We don’t cut atonement and covenants the same way that they did, then if you don’t see it that way. And I think this is something that we’ve been talking a lot, talking about a lot, Nate, is the sacrament as a covenant or even the waters of baptism as a covenant or passing through the temple veil as a covenant? And what’s happening when you’re parting the waters and dividing the waters and going through it might not seem like it, but compare that to when the Dead Sea.
I said the Dead Sea. When the Red Sea is split and divided in half and the people go through. And that’s called a baptism in the New Testament. But what is it? It’s a dividing. It’s a separating and passing through the two pieces, and it’s tying that ordinance to baptism. When we perform baptisms today, it’s that same covenant pattern. We’re dividing the waters and going through there, and there is blessings associated with that. There’s cursings associated with that.
When we do the sacrament and we take the bread and we tear it in half, and then we rip it and tear it and divide it into small pieces, and then we send it out. And even you’ve pointed out, Nate, the way that it’s administered to the congregation, with deacons going on either side of the aisles, what’s happening is we’re being placed in between those pieces that are cut and divided.
And as much as these blessings that are associated with it, that you can have his spirit to be with you and the promises that come with being part of his people. At the same time, we read the scriptures, let no man participate of the sacrament unworthily, and talks about some of.
[00:38:22] Speaker B: The damnation to their soul, the cursings.
[00:38:25] Speaker A: That are associated with that curse.
[00:38:26] Speaker B: Well, and even with the sacrament, it’s a very visual representation of the cursings of that too, which is the idea of a body on an altar being torn to pieces. I mean, it’s dark and it’s morbid, but it’s represented during the ordinance of the sacrament, even visually. So, yeah, I’m with you.
[00:38:50] Speaker A: And even in the temple, when we part the veil and are allowed to pass through the parted veil, you see that symbolism. And so this covenant pattern in the Book of Mormon isn’t just for ancient scripture, isn’t just for yesterday. It is very much a part of our patterns, our lives, our covenant making today.
And I think it helps inform us and understand what we’re doing. The one thing that I like about this, and we start breaking down the symbolism of it. What’s the commonality? We go to the covenant we’re making in the temple, and what’s rent is the veil that we’re passing through, or baptism, and what’s rent is the waters that we’re passing through, or the sacrament. And again, it’s the bread that’s being divided. And you might look at it and say, well, it’s different. And in this case, it’s the clothing.
Or in the case of Adam and Eve, it was an animal. In the case of Abraham, it was an animal. And you say, well, all of these have different things. But wait a second. What do they all symbolize?
Wasn’t that animal that was first sacrificed a symbol of Christ who was the lamb of God, who was going to be a sacrifice?
Isn’t the bread a symbol of Christ in his body that’s being divided for us? Isn’t the temple veil called Christ? And is it not him that was on the cross that was killed when the veil was first parted?
As much as it might seem different, all of these symbols of covenants are all possible because they tie back down to one single source. And even, as you pointed out now with Moroni in the title, is that clothing? What does that clothing symbolize? Do we not wear the veil? Do we not take upon ourselves Christ, and does that clothing that covers us, that atonement not symbolize Christ and his ability to cover us as we take his image upon us and as we become like him?
[00:40:44] Speaker B: Amen, brother.
Let’s keep going.
[00:40:47] Speaker A: Should we hit up Amalachiah’s?
This is one of the craziest coups.
And these chapters, I mean, I guess I get why they grouped them all together, because they read so fast. It’s just some parts of the Book of Mormon.
You run kind of slow through because it feels heavy and you’re trying to understand. Isaiah chapters can sometimes be difficult, right? And you get to hear, and it’s almost like. It’s almost like the Isaiah chapters are the uphill climb and a roller coaster, and you’re just trying to get there, right? You get to the Moroni, and it’s just all downhill. You just fly through them so good. But you get to this coup, and you’re like, how in the world is this guy able to pull this off? And I think it’s worth noting, if Amalekiah goes to the Lamanite king and says, hey, we need to go wage war with the Nephites. By the way, my plan is to have you killed and take your wife and take your kingdom and go raise hell and destroy the Nephites so that I can be, like, king of the universe.
[00:41:50] Speaker B: I don’t know if that would go over so well.
[00:41:52] Speaker A: Not gonna get a lot of support on that. Right.
And so the game. The game with Satan, I think oftentimes it’s not checkers, it’s chess.
And you even look at the people that are afraid to go back to war, and maybe this has back to the covenant they made, and they don’t want to go back because they knew that the Nephites let them go in the first place. Right. I don’t know what’s going on and all the details behind this, but they do not want to go back to war with the Nephites. They take off king, gives Amalekiah the command of his troops that are still loyal to him. He goes out and meets with him.
And what a bunch of trickery to meet him at the base of the hill and be like, hey, come down. I will surrender, and you can have the entire army.
And all that guy is seeing in front of him is the next move.
And that’s why I say it’s like chess, right? When all of a sudden, you sit your bishop right out in front of their pawn, and all they can see is, I get to take your pawn, and you’re really just giving this to me. And what they don’t see is two or three moves behind it when, oh, guess what? Second in command gets to take over the whole army when the first one dies. So what’s the next move gonna look like in this playbook?
It’s a game of chess.
[00:43:08] Speaker B: Also just functional strategy, too.
The idea of giving up physical high ground is, you know, is a pretty prominent theme in this section, as well as spiritual high ground.
[00:43:21] Speaker A: I like that.
Cause he asked him, like, what, four times to come down?
[00:43:26] Speaker B: Yeah. I mean, it’s. It’s. But again, it’s like it’s.
You just said it.
It’s the things that you see.
It’s the things that you see still around us always. Which is the promise of the easy way, the promise of the shortcut, the.
It’s too good to be true. It is. And what it usually requires is you giving up the high ground.
And so, anyways, just. Just a tiny little nugget.
[00:43:54] Speaker A: Well, if we look at any of the temptations, right. What is he tempting Eve? The knowledge to be like God to know between good and evil. I’m going to give you something that’s right.
And what does he.
[00:44:05] Speaker B: What is the easy way of doing it? Not, not the hard way where you actually have to learn and be patient and wait and all of this stuff like that. But what was required for Eve, she had to be disobedient, which is the way that we give up moral high ground is when we’re not exact with keeping the commandments. And then eventually what had to happen, too, is that they literally got kicked off of the high ground and had to go down to the bottom of the mountain to try to start that climb back up again.
So, yeah, I agree with you.
[00:44:33] Speaker A: And when he takes Christ up to the top of the pinnacle or up in the mountain, worship me and I will give you all the kingdoms of the world. I’ll give you everything that that’s right.
[00:44:45] Speaker B: Again. I think that it’s become so clear reading through the Book of Mormon this time around, just in a world that we live in, how relatable so many of these stories are to what it is that we are doing. And you look at, you look at this argument of the high ground from the very moral standpoint of the wars that we are waging. And we kind of said it earlier, and I want to be more complimentary of the youth because, yeah, they might not be going out to war every year to fight marauding bandits and villages.
[00:45:34] Speaker A: And things, knights to get their honor and slay the dragon.
[00:45:38] Speaker B: They might not be doing that, but they’re so much more of a dangerous and subtle and sneaky war that they are having to fight that you and I didn’t. And the requirement for the easy way, or the supposed easy way is always to give up your moral high ground. And you look at a lot of the corrosive debates, even within the church, of ideas and behaviors that as a church, we have very strong worded literature that says what we believe.
But we live in a society, in a social climate that’s trying to pressure even really good standing, believing members to, to bow to the social norms and social requirements of society and to at times reject or put off the very clear language given to us by God through our prophets on certain societal issues.
And I would just say, even though it’s not very much fun to have to argue with people on social medias and your neighbors and even sometimes people within your family, and sometimes it’s not the most comfortable thing to defend the church’s policies and stances on certain hot topics, social hot Topics Satan is doing his best for us to take the convenient way out of that and say, well, it’s not worth arguing or it’s not worth whatever. And what he’s trying to do is get us to come off the top of the mountain, where we do have God on our side and we do have the moral high ground. And there is very much a push to have us come down to fight that battle. And I would just say that I believe the scriptures are giving us the answers if we are open enough to see the answers that they’re trying to teach us.
[00:47:50] Speaker A: Yeah, I love what you’re saying. And I see modern day Moroni Amalekiah playing out in the youth today, and even greater than the youth, myself included, all of us, when we look at what we trade up, when we lose to high ground. And I look at, for example, the youth program that the church put out there.
And initially when that came out, I was involved in young men’s. And it felt like it was a gutting, like you hit a trifecta of COVID So we can’t do as much, right, and then we’re going to get rid of the young men’s presidency and put it under the bishop brick. So now you lose a little bit of that support. And by the way, we’re separating from scouts, so you lose the leadership, you lose Covid the ability to meet, and then you lose the scouting organization, and there go. And it feels like a lot of young men’s programs have deflated and that you don’t have that structure. You don’t have as many activities or organized events than what you used to have. But then I take a look at that, at what they replaced it with. And this idea of goal setting that you need to be talking to your kids and not even waiting for the young men’s organization or the bishop to do it. But maybe as parents, we can sit down with our kids and say, what is it that you’re wanting to accomplish in life and the value behind that of what are your spiritual goals? What are your mental goals? What are your physical goals? How are you developing yourself physically and socially? What are your social goals? And how do you interact with your friends? And how do you develop that? And to sit down. The reason why Moroni was successful is because that was on his mind.
He was worried about how do I protect my people?
And as that was on his mind, and he started to establish goals of creating a way to protect my people. Then you get the armor, then you get the protection, and then it’s funny, because amalekiah, they copycat that, right? They learned the lesson. Oh, well, they had shields. We can do shields too. And when they pop up the next time to go fight them, it’s not shields, they’re not stagnant. Because now Moroni’s developed these. These earthworks and these fortresses and these single entrances that. Why? Because that’s where he is focusing all of his time. And I look at our youth today, and me and what we fight with.
We give up the high ground when we don’t think about our mental goals or our spiritual goals, and we don’t exercise because we don’t have a goal physically to develop ourselves. And what do we lose? And we’re trading years of our life by not maintaining some level of activity or some healthy standard of living because we’re losing that high ground and we’re not thinking about it. And we’re subtly trading that off for the self gratification and pleasures of today.
And we look at how many people get stuck with the mindless scroll that is social media.
[00:50:50] Speaker B: Oh, guilty.
[00:50:53] Speaker A: And you look back and you say, what could I have done with those hours of time? How could I have developed this, that or the other?
[00:51:00] Speaker B: Like, no good either, by the way. It’s not like, it’s not like it’s fixing any problems, but continue.
[00:51:05] Speaker A: Yeah, that’s. I think that is the fight today where we lose the high ground. If we come down off that high ground, when we trade our time and our energy and everything we possess, instead of giving it to God, instead of giving it. Who’s giving it back to ourselves to develop ourselves and telling us, here, you, I. You matter. Let’s get you to be like me. Instead. We give it to Satan, who replaces it with something that makes us happy in the moment.
[00:51:32] Speaker B: Or that’s easier.
[00:51:33] Speaker A: That’s easier. At the end of the day, we feel like we haven’t gotten anything.
[00:51:36] Speaker B: I want to say. I want to say, though, that sometimes it is even a matter of being willing to stand alone on the high ground, knowing that you’re still in the long run, in the advantageous position in a battle.
[00:51:51] Speaker A: You’re still not being willing to compromise.
[00:51:53] Speaker B: You’re still not being willing to compromise or even just come down a little bit or even meet me halfway up. That it’s just like if you. If you are right and square with God, it’s sometimes lonely, but. But it’s still where we need to have the courage to stand.
Something. I wanted to just really quick because pae horns this week too, right?
[00:52:17] Speaker A: I don’t think he’s yet. Is he?
[00:52:18] Speaker B: I thought he was.
[00:52:19] Speaker A: I don’t.
[00:52:20] Speaker B: Isn’t he in 50?
[00:52:21] Speaker A: Dude, if he’s 50.
[00:52:22] Speaker B: Remember. Remember when I was listening to this? I’m just. I’m saying right now, for some reason, I thought this week was Alma, 43 through 52. And so I was pretty sure that Pae horn was this week.
[00:52:31] Speaker A: You’re 100% right.
[00:52:32] Speaker B: I’m just saying, we’re not. We’re not closing this without talking about my favorite dude in the scriptures.
[00:52:36] Speaker A: You’re right.
[00:52:38] Speaker B: As a child. As a child, my dad would tell me that Pae Horn was his favorite character. And I was just like, oh, whatever.
[00:52:44] Speaker A: Let me. Let me. Let me slide something in, okay, because. Because I want you to end with Pajoran and.
[00:52:50] Speaker B: Okay, all right, all right, all right, all right, all right. Because I got a lot to say about this.
[00:52:53] Speaker A: Perfect. Then let me. Let me just wrap something real quick with Moroni.
One little thing that I want to add.
You’ll notice that it wasn’t Alma or Helaman telling Moroni to make the plates or to build the fortifications.
And what I mean by that is, we don’t sit here and wait for the prophet to tell us everything that we need to do. We should all be engaged.
And yes, the prophet has the keys of revelation to guiding the church on earth, but he does not have the keys of revelation of guiding your individual choices or what you do as a family. And we can’t put that on somebody else because that’s what Satan wants us to do. And look at how the church apostasizes in the. Let’s shift the accountability to.
Satan says, I will save you. You don’t have to worry about it. Let me take care of it. And takes all of that off of him. We can’t put our salvation on the prophet and wait for him to tell us everything that we need to do. There needs to be personal accountability and an understanding that, yes, the prophet does have the keys to revelation for the church, but the Lord is pouring his spirit out upon all men everywhere. And we get answers and inspiration from sources outside of just the profit. That’s all I wanted to add.
[00:54:13] Speaker B: Fantastic.
[00:54:14] Speaker A: Now I’m excited for Pahorn.
[00:54:16] Speaker B: So let’s just briefly talk about. Cause it’s important that the sequence of events, in my opinion, Moroni doesn’t feel like he’s getting the support that he needs from the government. Right? He’s going, hey, like, we need troops. We need whatever perspective is so important in the discussion of this story and why I think both Moroni and Pejoran come out looking so awesome in this story is that Moroni sends a letter that basically says, it’s been said from the beginning of time, you clean the. Cleanse the inner vessel before you. Before you cleanse the outer vessel. If you’re not going to send me the support that I need, I’m coming for you first.
As you read, it was a fairly strongly worded letter, which is basically like, if you’re corrupt, I’m coming to kill you.
[00:55:09] Speaker A: How much of that do you think is because Moroni’s young?
[00:55:13] Speaker B: That’s a great question, but I don’t want to. But. But also, I’m kind of like. Hell yeah. On that letter, too, though. I’m sorry. I’m kind of like, good job, young Mandy.
I don’t. I don’t. I know that sometimes this story can be read in a little bit of a knock on Moroni. Right? Like, he’s young. He’s not impetuous. He’s. He. There’s a little bit. That’s what I’m saying. He’s jumping to conclusions a little bit and is a little hot headed.
[00:55:48] Speaker A: Mm hmm.
[00:55:49] Speaker B: Good.
Fine. Because sometimes this. This is war, bro.
And sometimes you need people that are willing to write some tough letters and.
[00:55:59] Speaker A: Say, hey, sometimes you have to light a fire.
[00:56:01] Speaker B: That’s exactly right. I don’t read this at all as a negative thing from Moroni. I’m going like, good job, young man. Way to take the bull by the horns and do what you need. Now, you were wrong, but Horan sees.
[00:56:15] Speaker A: It the same way, though.
[00:56:16] Speaker B: And this is why I love him. And this is why I love him, is because Pejoran had every right to write that dude back and say, who do you think you are, you little beep?
He had every right. He had the moral authority. He was in a moral position to go, don’t ever write me your little snotty threats again, or I’m not going to. I mean, he had every right to do this. And what was his calm, understanding, demeaning responses? I am so glad to hear things are that you’re okay. I’m so glad to hear that you’re still alive, my friend. We’ve got a lot going on here, too, by the way. Please come and help us. Yeah, please come and help us clean house here, too. We want to give you the support that we need to. It was a masterclass in the Lord using two very different tools. It’s like, again, to a hammer. Everything looks like a nail, right? And consider Moroni is fighting tooth and nail for survival.
Yeah, I can understand how he would be frustrated. Yeah. I can understand how things probably didn’t look so great. The optics of that didn’t look so great. I can understand that. In desperation, he’s going, we need the support of our leadership if it was going to happen. And again, speaking of, say, like a revolution, right?
Is like, you couldn’t have all Benjamin Franklin’s.
[00:57:52] Speaker A: No. And think of this, too.
Just as the prophets were worried about the blood of the people they were teaching coming on them, if they didn’t teach them. Think about Moroni and the blood of the people that died in battle, if he is a commander, did not make the right command decision. This is why I’m how that weighed on him.
[00:58:10] Speaker B: Neither person in this. I think that both people, both Moroni and Pejoran, come out to me looking better than they did even going into this exchange, because it shows you that Moroni was a dude that’s out there getting it done good. And, and again, sometimes, yes, sometimes we may jump to conclusions, that’s fine. But he wasn’t doing it out of anything other than love and a defense. And for his people, he was coming. His indignation was as righteous as it got. And Pahoran, being just the incredible show of actual, like, patience and diplomacy and very much godlike understanding, was able to flawlessly and graciously and generously and in a very godlike way, respond and go, hey, man, I’m not chewing you out. I’m just so happy that you’re still alive. I’m happy to hear that, you know what I mean? That you haven’t been destroyed.
Here’s what’s going on here, my friend.
Let us figure out a way to actually get together and work this out.
I think it’s one of the subtle but pinnacle like, just beautifully illustrated story of God using two very different approaches to accomplish his purposes. And again, you don’t win the war if they’re all Benjamin Franklin’s, but you don’t win the war without the Benjamin Franklins.
You needed George Washington and you needed John Adams, and you need some of these, you know what I mean? Some of these rough kind of blunt, whatever. And then you need your Benjamin Franklin’s who are out there negotiating for treaties, negotiating for peace, finding finances, to even pay for this endeavor, securing ships, you know what I mean? It’s like all these things, it’s like you needed all of these different, unique people to win the war. I love those chapters. I love the letters back and forth between Moroni and Pajorn. It’s been one of the things I’ve been most excited about rereading.
[01:00:34] Speaker A: Again, it’s interesting, you say you need the John Adams and the Washington and the Franklins. You look at how many awesome heroes they were, because it’s not even just Pahoran and Moroni, but lehidhead and Tiankum heading up these armies. You know, he can’t, Moroni can’t just go in to take care of Pahorn if he doesn’t have people that he can delegate the affairs. And you’ve got Helaman on one side, and you’ve got just these awesome guys that you can lean on. And as much as this is about team effort and all of these different people, still within these chapters, you get the influence that one person has.
Look at what amalachiah, as a single person was able to accomplish, and the death and the destruction that one person becomes responsible for. And then on the flip side, look at how much life Moroni was able to save by thinking ahead, by being prepared by, you know, just the impact that one person has. But still, at the same time, which.
[01:01:37] Speaker B: Is why it highlights the idea that it’s better that one person die than an entire nation, you know, suffer. This just goes to show you why.
[01:01:46] Speaker A: And Moroni was so determined to try to cut amalekiah off before that even. I mean, if he could just. That was his goal, right?
[01:01:54] Speaker B: I know, but.
[01:01:55] Speaker A: But you want to look at it. I mean, what about the efforts of tiancum, who later does correct that blip?
[01:02:02] Speaker B: Yep, the blip.
I saw an awesome poll that’s like, who are your favorites out of all of these? And it was like, moroni, Pahoran, helaman, tiancum. And whoever you chose, it was kind of this fun breakdown on like, oh, you want the leader? Oh, you want the muscle man? Oh, you want the diplomat? Oh, you know what I mean? It’s like, like, who would you rather have of these four? Like the president or whatever, or not even that. It was just like, what? It’s like some people, a lot of people like, oh, we want a leader. Some people, like, I want to be the leader. Some people, you know, but, but I do. Like, I love all of the very unique characters that are part of this, you know, narrative.
[01:02:44] Speaker A: It’s a fascinating section in the book of Mormon. It’s sad that we only get one lesson to cover. I know the complexity.
[01:02:51] Speaker B: I feel like it could have been. I feel like it could have been its own week of come follow me again. Because it’s so applicable to the world that we’re living in now. And you, it’s.
And we talk about the founding fathers. It’s like they didn’t even really like each other in a lot of these cases.
I mean, especially kind of, even during the actual, like, setup of this country, there were a lot of times that the peaceful, even organization of this country was hanging by a thread.
And there are times that we have to, I think, I mean, part of diplomacy is getting letters from people telling us how terrible we are and that they’re gonna, you know, how much they hate us and that they’re gonna come and kill us. And having enough calm and patience to go, what’s the bigger picture? Do I wanna win this argument? Do I want in this war? Because Pei Horn could have, he could have immediately written back and just been like, slam, you know, you suck. Here’s why. Blank, blank, blank, blank, blank, whatever. And then be able to, in theory, pat himself on the back. But instead he built a bridge.
[01:04:07] Speaker A: Yeah, he built a bridge.
[01:04:08] Speaker B: He wanted to win that war. And again, I’m trying to not be too obvious politically here, but what would this world look like if the people, our political enemies, quote unquote, instead of going, hey, let’s fight about every point of detail that I know that I’m right on and that I can prove that you’re wrong on. What if instead we took those opportunities to build bridges with people?
That’s my only really big takeaway lesson from that, that I feel like now more than ever, it’s, what do you care more about scoring some points on Facebook or actually building coalitions of, of people that may have at one time been your enemy to go, hey, let’s work for the actual greater good and.
[01:04:59] Speaker A: Understand exactly what you’re saying. Nate, man, you’ve got all sorts of wisdom today.
[01:05:04] Speaker B: It’s that late drive, it’s a late night.
It’s not me. It’s the lack of sleep and caffeine.
[01:05:12] Speaker A: But understanding. Understanding where somebody’s coming from. And sometimes you know exactly what they’re trying to say, but you choose to ignore it anyways just to make them more mad or to try to make your point.
And if you know what they’re trying to say and you can agree to at least part of that, why not take that? And like you say, build on that. Just build something and say, you know, I get it. And I see where you’re coming from, and that’s very valuable to me. But this is how. It’s just that much different in how I see it a little. And then they’re going to give you that. You would hope that they would give you that same flexibility, but even if.
[01:05:46] Speaker B: They don’t, you didn’t give up the moral high ground. Because the thing is, I’m not saying that we need to sacrifice who we are and what we believe, but what I am saying is, even if you can find a way to at least bridge lines of communication to where we can go, hey, instead of me judging you as a human by this narrow set of parameters of who you are voting for or what issues you do and don’t stand for, instead of tearing you down as an actual human being, let’s let our ideas push against each other’s ideas as much as they need to. To. By the way, in a lot of cases, just strengthen your ideas. Like, in a lot of cases, having your ideas pushed against helps you kind of anchor in what it is that you really kind of believed in the first place. Because it’s withstood a little bit of pushback. Right. And in the cases that it folds under the pushback, maybe it’s a good chance for a little bit of self reflection one way or the other. You didn’t create an enemy in the process.
With that said, at times there are people that we just simply have to reject their ideas. It doesn’t mean that, you know me, I’m a free speech absolutist, but I. There are times that it’s like, hey, no, I’m sorry. These are things that I can’t stand for and I won’t, and I’m. And I’m unwilling to budge on. But I have a feeling that for the most part, there is so much more room for bridge building than there is, you know, outright flat rejection.
[01:07:21] Speaker A: What if. What if. What if Pahorn wasn’t Pahorn? What if he was?
What if it was a wicked chief judge that was trying to selfishly gain control of the inside of the kingdom?
[01:07:34] Speaker B: Well, he. It’s funny because he could have. He could have very much taken advantage of. Of the gung ho ness of Moroni, been like, oh, yeah, like, sure, come in and whatever. And he, in theory, could have sabotaged the whole thing. It could have been a, you know, it could have been a trap. You’re right. It could have gone. It could have gone down a lot of dark paths.
[01:07:55] Speaker A: What if he was hot headed and just relieved Moroni of duty? Like, I am the chief judge and you are no longer the head of the army.
[01:08:01] Speaker B: You’re going to talk to me like that?
[01:08:02] Speaker A: Done.
[01:08:03] Speaker B: Yeah.
[01:08:03] Speaker A: Sideline.
[01:08:04] Speaker B: That’s right.
[01:08:05] Speaker A: And the funny thing is, I don’t think Moroni’s response changes in either case. What does he do?
[01:08:10] Speaker B: See you. See you tomorrow, buddy.
[01:08:14] Speaker A: His ability to raise his own army.
[01:08:16] Speaker B: Outside of the, which is rad.
There’s, there’s so many, man, there’s so many just awesome examples in this. Hopefully everybody’s been able to enjoy getting their own, you know, lessons learned from it. I, again, as always, just want to put in my pitch for be involved in your communities, be involved in your local politics as much as you can because we really can make a difference in all of those things. Please be socially as aware of the world around you as possible.
It sucks that sometimes it feels like we are kind of given choices to make that we might not like. But the more that we’re at least informed and aware, I feel like it gives us the chance to make our communities a better place.
[01:09:10] Speaker A: You know, I read the church’s letter that they sent out earlier this year to encourage people to be involved in the election process.
And they invite people to look for candidates that have integrity and that are going to uphold the constitution. And what happens when you look at your candidates on both sides of the aisle and you’re like, you feel a.
[01:09:35] Speaker B: Little nervous about those things?
[01:09:36] Speaker A: Yeah. And you’re like, I don’t know, that either side has a lot of integrity or either side’s willing to really go to bat for the constitution. Like, what happens?
And, you know, maybe, maybe there are Moronis out there sitting on the sidelines.
[01:09:52] Speaker B: Just, that’s probably the lesson to be taken from. That is what you’re saying right now is that there are probably people that are not throwing their, their name in the hat because they see what happens to people that for the best of intentions, enter the political spectrum and then have people just try to destroy them as actual human beings. Yeah, it is hard to get a lot of really good, honest, you know, non controversial people to go out. And this is why I think I’m constantly beating the drum for be involved in your local politics because I do think you see that a lot in your local, in your neighborhoods, and in your city councils. And even on a state level, you do see a little bit more hands on people that are willing to go and be involved in that type of stuff. Or if it’s the you and me sitting on the sidelines, not doing enough to go and show up to a city council meeting, we need to be better about that as well or we need to stop complaining about it. You know, on a national level, it’s just a different game. So I try to, that’s why I sometimes just get caught. I just get caught doom scrolling. But I need to be better about that as well and actually just go and put that energy and effort into basically trying to create good citizens out of myself and my family and my neighbors.
[01:11:17] Speaker A: The crazy thing is Joseph Smith went to the candidates and he went to the president of the United States and he tried to, to get support and to put his support behind somebody that was going to support him. And he felt like he had no good options. And so what did that guy do? He ran. He Moroni. He, that’s right. He put his name, he raised an army.
He raced an army. But his name was, that didn’t quite go so well for him. But you know what?
[01:11:44] Speaker B: Because again, like, it’s, I think he.
[01:11:46] Speaker A: Actually had a legitimate chance of winning that thing.
[01:11:49] Speaker B: I mean, that’s, I try not to get too beaten down just by the constant bad news.
And again, I do know who I’m supporting and it’s not because I think that they’re a great person, but it’s for bigger reasons than that. To me, elections have become a lot more than just the two people that are actually representing parties. And I try to do my best to go, this is a platform that I feel like best represents me and it’s against a platform that I feel like doesn’t represent me and my family as I would want it to. And so I take those letters. The funny thing with those letters is sometimes you have a lot of people that read the letters and say, oh, this is clearly about, this is clearly against the person that I don’t like. It’s like, oh, it’s weird how that works.
[01:12:41] Speaker A: I’ve heard of, I’ve heard convincing arguments about how that applies to both everybody.
[01:12:46] Speaker B: That’s what I’m saying. And so, and so I think that the church is wise in doing its best to say, try to find people that are good, you know, whatever. But at the end of the day, I think so much of it is try to find, try to find a platform that best represents a world that you want to live in, raise a family in, whatever, and, and, and not feel like you have to. But this is where my radical individualism comes in, where I’m just like, just because I vote for a person, I don’t feel like I have to be, represent or apologize for every stupid thing that that person ever does. Because it’s not me. That’s not me. I have really two, sometimes three choices. Like, yeah, those are pretty. Those are pretty, like, wide swaths. You know what I mean? Like, those paintbrushes are pretty wide. It’s like, yeah, I’m one of those little hairs of a brush in there kind of going like, yeah, I kind of. Here’s where I’m at on that, and here’s where I’m at on that. And I don’t feel like I should have to apologize for that, ever. So, as we’re reading about wars and leaders, it just does kind of stir up a little bit of the, you know, that side of my. Of my.
My attempt at patriotism as much as it can be.
[01:14:05] Speaker A: So it’s government of the people, for the people, and the more people retract.
[01:14:09] Speaker B: Yeah.
[01:14:10] Speaker A: Just kind of leaves it open, right?
[01:14:12] Speaker B: Yep. All right. Anything else you want to talk about this week?
[01:14:15] Speaker A: No, man. I mean, yes, no.
[01:14:19] Speaker B: Yes and no. Always, right?
[01:14:20] Speaker A: Always. It’d be fun to dive into Tian can be fun to get into these scriptures. There’s too much to talk about in a week long episode. I think we’re good.
[01:14:28] Speaker B: Okay, cool. Well, let’s. Let’s wrap it up then. You can get ahold of us at the email address high deepdive.com. we always appreciate your questions, comments, feedback, thoughts, hopes and dreams, music, recommendations, etcetera, etcetera. That’s all we got for this week. Until next week.
[01:14:48] Speaker A: See ya.
0 responses on "Alma 43 - 52"