Blogging Through the Book of Mormon

Looking at a map of Paul and Barnabas’ first missionary journey, we can see that once they leave the isle of Cyprus they go in a northwestern direction landing in the city of Perga, which we read from the scriptures yesterday. From there they traveled north to Antioch, which can be confusing because this is Antioch Pisidia which is in modern day Turkey, and the other Antioch, the one that they left from is the Antioch that is east and in modern day Syria. Once they settled in “Antioch in Pisidia”, they did what they have presumably been doing the whole time, which is to go into the synagogue. It just so happened that they day that they went into the synagogue was the Sabbath, and apparently what is customary is for the scriptures to be read and then an open invitation to anyone who might “have any word of exhortation for the people, say on.” Paul stands up and calls for “Men of Israel, and ye that fear God, give audience.” I didn’t think...

Bar-jesus, the man who probably was a main leader in the local synagogue, but who also dabbled in the Satanic, apparently took issue with Saul’s teachings of Jesus. If it’s true that Bar-jesus did have Saul whipped, why didn’t the IM say anything about it? I thought about a lot because I didn’t want to just be that person who spouts every crazy idea because it’s exciting, I want to be accurate to the extent that I can. The conclusion I came to was that, in the scriptures specifically no mention was made of this event, and the way that it was portrayed seemed pretty innocuous, so probably in keeping with the scriptures, it wasn’t mentioned. Somehow, “the deputy of the country, Sergius Paulus, a prudent man” found out about Saul and Barnabas teaching and called for them because he “desired to hear the word of God.” As the Roman appointed leader of Cyprus, he probably heard about any and all changes going on in his country. But ...

Monday – John preaches repentance – Matthew 3:1-12; Mark 1:1-8; Luke 3:2-18 At the time of John the Baptist, many Jews believed that they were going to be saved simply because they were “children of Abraham.” They didn’t think that there was any connection between their behavior and salvation. “The mission of John the Baptist was to prepare the hearts of the people to receive the Savior and become more like Him.” He taught that the people needed to change their behavior to become more like God; this is called “Repentance.”    What is repentance? Being sorry and changing our ways. How have we been blessed by repentance? Both our own and of others?   Tuesday – Jewish leaders send put people to question John – Matthew 3:7; Luke 3:7 Pharisees were a group of people who “prided themselves on strict observance    of Mosaic Law. They tended to reduce religion to t...

Saul, Barnabas, and according to verse 5, John Mark “being sent forth by the Holy Ghost” sailed to Cyprus. Now just to stop for a second, John Mark isn’t identified that way in verse 5 but is only called “John.” Because there are so many men named “John” in the New Testament account, the IM clarified, “John, who is mentioned in Acts 13:5, is elsewhere called John Mark, Mark, and Marcus. He probably wrote the Gospel According to St. Mark. He was the cousin of Barnabas, and accompanied Saul and Barnabas at the beginning of their first missionary journey.” Just so we don’t get confused with all the different people with similar names, we can set this guy straight in our minds. Knowing that their destination was Cyrpus we can look at a map from  biblearchaeology.org , and see that Cyrpus is the island and the cities of Salamis and Paphos are on opposite ends of that island. Rome had annexed Cyprus, which means invaded and co...

Ok, this is where it gets pretty new for me because while I’ve heard briefly about the Apostle Paul before, it was very minimal and I’d never heard of Barnabas until a couple of weeks ago. So really, anything from here on out is going to take me a lot of mental work to understand because I’m just not familiar with it at all. I will tell you this though, I went to the temple last night and I had a different appreciation for Peter because he had been the subject of my study the last couple of weeks, it was really interesting and fun to have some new insight based on personal scripture study. Anyway, if we remember from chapter 11, Barnabas went to Tarsus to get Paul and they went to Antioch where they, with a group of “prophets and teachers… ministered to the Lord, and fasted.” The IM points out that it is because the leaders of the Church in that area fasted and prayed to know the Lord’s will that Saul and Barnabas got the missionary call. In r...

Monday – The Word was with God – John 1:1-14 In the beginning “was the gospel preached through the Son.” Jesus preached the plan of salvation to us in the pre-mortal life. Jesus created all things. Jesus created the world, but the world didn’t recognize him. Jesus came to his own people, and they didn’t recognize him.   Why did John begin his account with Christ’s pre-mortal life? How did Jesus create all things? (with Heavenly Father’s guidance)   Tuesday – John the Baptist – John 1:15-19 John the Baptist came to earth to prepare the people for the coming Messiah John testified that Jesus “cometh after me, is preferred before me; for he was before me.” (Because Jesus was the first spirit Son of God, he’s before John.) John testified of the plan of salvation and that “as many as believe on his name (Jesus) shall receive of his fullness… even immorta...

An angel has saved Peter from execution by rescuing him from a Roman prison and leading his out of the city. Peter probably didn’t have a “if I happen to not be executed” back up plan so he ends up going “to the house of Mary the mother of John, whose surname was Mark; where many were gathered together praying.” The IM suggests that this John Mark is the man who wrote the gospel of Mark. His mother’s name was Mary and she was “one of the leading women in the early Church in Jerusalem. Believers assembled at her home, and Peter returned there after being freed from prison.” Peter knocks on the gate outside to be let in and a young woman named Rhoda recognized his voice and told the people that Peter was there. The people didn’t believe her because he was supposed to be executed, but she insisted, so they went to the gate and saw Peter and was very surprised. Peter told them to keep their voices down, went into the house, told them of ...

Herod Agrippa feels that his execution of James was so successful in making him popular among the Jews at Jerusalem, that he sets his eyes on a bigger prize. James was probably more of a nuisance to the people than Peter was, because Peter was probably traveling more, and bore more responsibility as president of the church. James probably had more time at home to preach the gospel and his zeal helped people really get irritated with him about it. So if James’ execution had backfired on Herod, at minimum the people could think, “well at least it’s quiet now.” James is a good test subject, because if the people end up being angry, James was probably considered a minor player in the Christian game. But since Herod saw the positivity from the people that came with James’ execution, he decides to snatch up Peter and plans to execute him in a public display so that he can get all the praise and glory that comes with it. My guess is that Peter’s capture and ...

Monday - Birth of Christ As a spirit, Jesus was a God, the Jehovah of the Old Testament, he was powerful, and comfortable, and “had glory with God the Father ‘before the world was.” He was willing to come to earth and be born as a helpless baby in a fallen world to a nation that was enslaved. When the Savior of the world finally came to earth, he wasn’t received by a grateful world, but arrived in a barn surrounded by barn animals. Near the stable where Jesus was born, there was a group of guys taking care of their sheep. An angel appeared to them and said, “Fear not: for, behold, I bring you good tidings of great joy, which shall be to all people. For unto you is born this day in the city of David a Saviour, which is Christ the Lord.” And a multitude of angels broke forth “praising God, and saying, Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace, good will toward men.” The shepherds left their sheep and went to the stable to find and worship the baby Jesus.   ...

Herod Agrippa I is pretty invested in his relationship with the Jewish people and more especially with the leadership, namely the Sanhedrin and the Pharisees. This is about 14 years since Christ’s death and the feeling of religious revolution has warn off in Jerusalem. At this point, I would imagine that everyone who was going to be interested in the gospel has either converted or declined, so their choices have already been made. Once someone decides against believing in a cause, further pushing by those trying to convince you gets old really quick. Was it just burn out and irritation that led to the problems between Jews and Christians in Jerusalem? It seems like it would have been more that that to instigate the slaughter of leadership. From an article entitled, “Why was Saint James beheaded by order of King Herod Arippa I of Judaea?” from the website Quora.com, John Simpson suggests, “the new waves of persecution unleashed against the church was probably co...

Around the time that Saul and Barnabas brought the aid from the saints in Antioch to the saints in Jerusalem, “Herod the king stretched forth his hands to vex certain of the church.” This begs the question, who was Herod and why did he care about the church enough to cause problems for the believers? This Herod was Herod Agippa I, a very interesting man. He was the grandson of Herod the Great who had all the baby boys murdered to try to kill the new “King of the Jews.” He was also educated in Rome and was BFF with the son of the Emperor, Drusus Caesar. After a tumultuous adulthood that included stints in prison, fleeing for his life several times, disgrace, and honor, Agrippa was finally made king over all the lands his grandfather had in Judea. Agrippa was loyal to Rome but he was also incredibly respectful of his Jewish subjects. He was so ingratiated to them, in fact, that while performing the reading of the scriptures as part of a Jewish tradition, he teare...

With Peter telling the believers in Jerusalem that the Lord had required the gospel to be preached to the gentiles, to their credit, the people believed what Peter had said and set out to preach the gospel. Some of the preachers “were men of Cyprus and Cyrene” and they went to Antioch and “spake unto the Grecians, preaching the Lord Jesus.” These missionaries preached a powerful witness of Christ and “a great number believed, and turned unto the Lord.” When the success of the missionaries reached “the church which was in Jerusalem” they sent Barnabas to go as far as Antioch and probably either observe or help out where he could. We have heard of Barnabas before, first when he sold everything he had and gave the money to Peter for the Church, which was contrasted with Ananias and Sapphira who said they did the same thing, but actually didn’t. It seems that he was chosen to go support the missionary effort because “he was a goo...

“Come, Follow Me” weekly outline: Jan 7 th  to Jan 13 th Monday: Genealogy of Christ through Joseph The gospel was taught to Adam and passed down throughout all generations of human history, though most people did not accept it. God made covenants with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob thus establishing the Kingdom of Israel. When they were righteous, the people of Israel prospered, but when they were wicked, they were not protected and were scattered and enslaved. Because of the wickedness of the people, when Christ was born, Israel was a slave-state of Rome, therefore there was no place for the true king of Israel. If the people had been righteous and had an autonomous theocracy, Jesus Christ would have been the rightful king of Israel through the lineage of both Joseph and Mary. Even though Joseph was not Christ’s biological father, Joseph had legally claimed paternity of Jesus which entitled him to full inheritance as his son.   * Why was...

Come, Follow Me – Week of Jan 7, 2017 to Jan 13, 2019 Tuesday, Jan 8 th  – John the Baptist Because Luke begins his account with the birth of John the Baptist, I wanted to flesh out why John the Baptist was important. At the time of Christ, the Jewish people had misunderstood so much of the gospel that they didn’t expect a man like Jesus to be the Messiah. They expected a military king, not a prophet. John the Baptist was taught most of the gospel in the wilderness where he grew up by the Holy Ghost. John the Baptist prepared the people to accept Jesus as the Messiah when he came. The people who were ready to receive the gospel from Jesus were already looking forward to the coming of the Messiah and were attracted to John the Baptist’s message. Most of the disciples of Christ were first disciples of John the Baptist. They had already mentally broken with traditional Pharisaic Judaism and were open to new teachings. It was necessary fo...

Come, Follow Me – Jan 7, 2019 to Jan 13, 2019 Matthew 1; Luke 1 Monday: 31 Dec 2018 - On Monday we read Moroni chapter 10, which concluded our most recent reading of the Book of Mormon. I explained a little bit about going into the new curriculum, how we would be studying a certain part of the New Testament at home during the week, and then talking about the same material during Church that coming Sunday. Tuesday, 1 Jan 2019 – This lesson was a lot longer than most will probably be because we were driving when we were discussing it. I had briefly looked over the outline in the manual and read the first part of Matthew that discusses Jesus’ lineage. So the discussion went something like this: When Adam ate the fruit, before he was put out of the Garden of Eden, Heavenly Father explained that because he had broken the rules, he couldn’t live with God anymore, but because Heavenly Father wanted Adam and all his family to come back and live with him again after ...