Blogging Through the Book of Mormon

22:15-19 - Abraham’s obedience in being willing to sacrifice Isaac as God had commanded was so significant that God institutes a covenant with Abraham. While they were still at the spot for the sacrifice, the angel “called unto Abraham out of heaven the second time,” and here are the things that Abraham was blessed with: 1. An abundance of “seed as the stars of the heaven, and as the sands” of the sea. 2. This abundant seed “shall possess the gate of his enemies.” 3. That through “thy seed shall all the nations of the earth be blessed.” The article on this chapter from gospeldoctrine.com notes a reference from Neal A. Maxwell which says, “Anciently, the vastness of Abraham’s eventual posterity was compared to the sands of the sea, a staggering promise. The Restoration’s revelations and translations accommodate a vast universe; this it is no surprise to us that scientists’ latest estimate of the number of stars in the universe is approximately 70 sextillion- ‘more stars in the sky,’ sc...

22:3-14 - We don’t know how long it took Abraham to figure everything out in his mind, and there is probably more to a sacrifice offering than just deciding to do it and then going there. The confusing thing is that verse 3 days that “Abraham rose up early in the morning” and left with Isaac to go make the sacrifice. I always assumed that this meant that Abraham rose “early the NEXT morning,” but there’s nothing in here that says that they left the next day, just that on the day that they did leave, it was early, implying a sense of purpose and commitment. So overall, we don’t know how long it took Abraham to come to terms within himself and his faith to reconcile the command to sacrifice his son Isaac and everything that he believed that went against that. They traveled three days to get to the spot on mount Moriah where Abraham had been commanded to perform the sacrifice. Abraham has the two servants that he brought with him wait “afar off” from the mount with the donkey that had ca...

22:1-2 - Now we get into the well-known account of Abraham being commanded to sacrifice Isaac, which is something that I’ve always struggled to understand. There are some interesting insights into this that helps clarify some of it, so we’ll see how it goes. Verse 1 says that God “did tempt Abraham,” but the IM notes that the word used to translate into “tempt” could also be translated to “tested” or “proved.” The temptation, or test, was the command to “take now thy son, thine only son Isaac, whom thou lovest, and get thee into the land of Moriah; and offer him there for a burnt offering upon one of the mountains which I will tell thee of.” There is a lot to unpack in this statement. Let’s start with the word “tempted” or “tested.” When this was written, the end result of Isaac being spared was already known, so it could be accurately referred to as a test, whereas when it was originally told to Abraham, he could only assume that the end result would be Isaac’s death. Secondly, human...

21:14-21 - This whole situation is just tragic because Abraham is letting Sarah dictate the destinies of Hagar and Ishmael. Even though God promises to take care of Ishmael and make him a great nation, I still think this is a horrible move on Sarah’s part. Honestly I was a fan of Sarah but now not so much. After receiving the promise from God, Abraham gets up early in the morning “and took bread, and a bottle of water… and sent her away,” with Ishmael. I read in an article that he would have been about 16 years old at this point, which really hits home for me because my son is almost 16 and I feel like we were abandoned by his dad. I know that my hardships as a single mom are nothing compared to that of Hagar, but I really feel like I identify with her just trying to take care of her boy and shouldering that crushing responsibility alone due to no fault of her own. Obviously, wandering in the desert with a loaf of bread and a bottle of water doesn’t usually end up having good results ...

21:1-8 - Maybe it’s because I had taken such a long break because of work, but I forgot that earlier the Lord had given Sarah a specific timeline, within a year, that she would have her son. I also want to point out that while she seemed skeptical at first, obviously they had enough faith that they kept having sex so that when the Lord’s time was right, she could conceive. At this point, it’s been a year since the Lord made this promise and Sarah became pregnant. I have a few questions about this whole “giving a timeline” thing. God told Sarah specifically 1 year, God told the Nephites that 600 years from the time Lehi left Jerusalem, the Savior would be born, and Samuel prophesied that within 5 years Jesus would be born. My question is this, why did the Lord give such specific timelines to people anciently, but here we are sitting with “the day of the Lord is at hand,” and 200 years later, we are all just kind of sitting around looking at each other. I recognize that God didn’t always...

20:1-7 - Lot has gone from Sodom to Zoar to a cave in the mountains, and likewise, Abraham leaves the desert he was staying in as a nomad and “journeyed from thence toward the south country,” and dwelled in some cities that I’ve never heard of. We again have the problem where Abraham believes that the royalty of the city will kill him because his wife Sarah is so beautiful, they will want her for themselves. And we know that the Lord has told Abraham to tell everyone that she is his sister before when they went to Egypt. Technically, he’s not lying because as he says in verse 12, “yet indeed she is my sister; she is the daughter of my father, but not the daughter of my mother; and she became my wife.” The IM has a little chart that shows Sarah as being the daughter of Haran, Abraham’s niece and Lot’s sister, which might explain why Abraham is so anxious to look out for him because he’s not only his nephew, but Sarah’s brother as well. This account of king Abimelech in these cities is ...