Blogging Through the Book of Mormon

I’ve thought more about the Savior washing the feet of his disciples and I noticed an interesting pattern in my own life. At work I’ll examine a patient and then I asked everyone “can I give you a hand up?” and I hold my hand out for them to take it. What I’ve noticed though is that even if I can tell that the patient doesn’t like me or is uncomfortable or something like that, once I offer them my hand, their whole demeanor changes. I don’t scrub a dirty part of their body, there is no invasion or privacy or personal space or anything but that simple gesture of offering a helping hand completely transforms our encounter and their perception of it. Maybe it’s the physical contact, my willingness to allow them to touch my hand in order to assist them that makes the difference, I don’t know what it is, but I thought that if a two second touch of hands transforms my patient interactions, then what would a several minutes long washing of ...

The day Passover has finally come and Jesus “sent Peter and John saying, “Go and prepare us the Passover, that we may eat.” This is the day when the practice of remembering their delivery from slavery in Egypt is to be replaced with the practice of remembering our delivery from physical and spiritual death. They ask Jesus where they should go to prepare the meal, they don’t have any property there and probably no friends or family so finding a place that would allow a controversial character such as Jesus participate in the most spiritual ritual might be difficult.  Jesus demonstrates his omnipotence again telling them to go into the city and they will see a man carrying a pitcher of water, follow him and ask the master of the house that he goes into “The Master saith unto thee, Where is the guest chamber, where I shall eat the Passover with my disciples?” Then the man of the house will show them “a large upper room furnished: there make ...

This is my 1,000 th  post. It’s taken almost 5 years exactly and my life has been changed in a way that I never could have imagined. In my patriarchal blessing it says, “I bless you to know that there shall be that need in your life to study, in great depth, the scriptures. I bless you that you may so study. Then, from those scriptures shall emerge, in your life great wisdom, understanding and knowledge. This shall be of so much importance in your personal life and in the lives of those for whom you are responsible, yea, those who you love, indeed.” When I was a 16 year old hearing this for the first time, I kind of rolled my eyes because I sarcastically thought “of course the scriptures are important,” and I dreaded the time when I would have to actually do it. But 5 years ago, a friend sent me a motivational question for Memorial Day which was something like “what in your life are you not getting enough out of and what can you do about it?...

Jesus starts reminding his disciples “ye know that after two days is the feast of the Passover, and the Son of man is betrayed to be crucified.” He’s told them this many times over the last few months to get them ready, but now the time is coming up really quickly, so he’s making sure they know. But how is he going to be betrayed and crucified? The chief priests are not pleased with Jesus, especially since they have had such a public encounter with him in the last few days, and they “assembled together the chief priests, and the scribes, and the elders of the people, unto the palace of the high priest, who was called Caiaphas, and consulted that they might take Jesus by subtilty, and kill him. But they said, Not on the feast day, lest there be an uproar among the people” Many of the Jewish people consider Jesus to be at least a master teacher, and at most the Messiah, either way he is very popular with the people. The Jewish leadership sees that they ...

The third parable isn’t introduced as such, but an analogy is made between the righteous and the unrighteous, as Jesus tells the people that when He comes again, “before him shall be gathered all nations: and he shall separate them one from another, as a shepherd divideth us sheep from the goats. And he shall set the sheep on his right hand, but the goats on the left.” The IM says that anciently, sheep and goats would graze together but be separated for the night and that the “right hand” indicated favor while the “left hand” indicated disfavor. The sheep on the right hand will be welcomed hearing, “Come, ye blessed of my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world.” Then Jesus gives several reasons why they will be welcomed into the kingdom and later on gives the reasons why the goats on the left hand will not be welcomed into the kingdom but “these shall go away into everlasting punishment....

The second parable about preparedness is of the Ten Talents. In this parable there is a man who owns a lot of property and is leaving to go away for a while. This seems to be a very common theme, I wonder if this was typical during this time. The man takes three of his servants and to one he gives 5 talents, the second one he gives 2 talents, and the third one he gives 1 talent. The IM says, “In the Savior’s time, a ‘talent’ was a unit of weight and also a large sum of money. In modern usage, the word ‘talent,’ as used in this parable, has come to represent any spiritual gift or any skill or ability given to us by God, and the parable teaches that we are responsible to use these gifts wisely and profitably.” While the man was away, the first servant took his 5 talents and “went and traded with the same, and made them other five talents. And likewise he that had received two, he also gained other two. But he that had received one went and...

To further illustrate the point that no one knows when He will return, Jesus goes into three parables that are only recorded in Matthew. The first is the well known parable of the Ten Virgins. First we must know some ancient Jewish customs for this parable to make sense. Apparently what a marriage consisted of is the bridegroom leaving his house sometime at night, walking with his friends to the bride’s house, and having the marriage ceremony performed in the bride’s house. After the ceremonies, the bride and groom would leave her house together and go to the house that they will share together where there will be a big party, often lasting several days. The Ten Virgins at the center of the story might be the bride’s maids who would go out and light the way for the bridegroom as he entered the bride’s house initially, or they might just be friends with either the bride or the groom and would join in the wedding procession as it journeyed from the bride’s ho...