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Tripped over a video of Hartman Rector, Jr.'s October 1985 GC talk while scrolling Instagram today (yes, it's possible to see mostly good stuff on Instagram). Here's the portion he was saying (you can watch it here, starting at 2:45) : (Bolding is mine.) I laughed because it was so familiar. My parents used to say similar things, especially my dad. I think it's sad that so many out there seem never to have learned that the universe really doesn't care whether they want to. Learning to do things you don't want to is an extremely valuable lesson, one every child should learn when they're little - as little as possible and as often as it takes. (For the record, I never had to milk cows, and I'm glad. )

I plan to adjust the remainder of our schedule as follows (for me): Ether 10 on Christmas Monday Ether 11 on Tuesday ('cuz Tuesday is always busy for me) Ether 12 and 13 on Wednesday And according to the schedule for all the rest. Just FYI.

Ether 8 v2: Once again, beware people who use flattering or cunning words. v9: This is interesting. I don't remember a previous mention of a record, just that Ether's record included things from Adam on. I think I always imagined an oral history. But Adam kept records, and I would expect any who try to obey God to keep records, so, yeah, makes sense. Sad that Jared's daughter ignored the tragedies that come from secret combinations and instead decided this would be a good tool to get what she wanted. v10 (et al): Don't sin, not even for the prettiest girl in town. v13: I'm thinking this family was already pretty wicked if Akish trusted them enough to tell the whole lot that he planned to murder the king. If your family is this wicked, maybe go find better folk to hang out with. v17: "fair promises" - if it sounds too good to be true... v23-25: If it sounds too good to be true... (And how else do you overthrow freedom other than to promise wealth and easy and health and whatever other things everyone wants? But no one can deliver such things - people have to work for them or they won't happen.) v26: Strive to do good continually. Come to Christ and be saved! Ether 9 v1-3: When the Lord tells you to get up and leave, don't drag your feet. If you have to leave some things of value behind, do it - your life and obeying the Lord are of more value. v5, 7: There is no loyalty or love among the wicked. (One wonders where Jared's daughter was, and whether it was her son.) v11: The people: "Well, as long as we've got money, we don't really care what our government is doing." v12: Sometimes the wicked destroy each other quickly. v19: Alas, still haven't found me a source for a pet curelom or even a cumom. v20: Just serve the Lord. v28+: When you don't have freedom of religion, but government oppression thereof, bad things follow. v34: This is seriously stubborn - I'm just going to chase after carcasses to feed on and only after they and all other food are gone will I consider repenting. Don't be that stubborn! Don't move that far from the Lord! Repent early and often. Saving chapter 10 for Christmas day.

Ether 6 v3: All light comes from God. We do not have to go through life or trials in darkness, thanks to Christ. v4: Prepare for trials. You may know know the form they'll take, but there are things we always need (temporal, emotional, spiritual) and we can prepare "extra" - food, clothing, etc. for temporal needs; good habits, friends, family, and connection with God for emotional and spiritual needs; etc. "...commending themselves unto the Lord their God." We don't have to be setting off on a scary voyage across the great waters to do this. We can do it every day. v5-8: Just because it's windy and we're getting tossed about and "buried in the depths" doesn't mean the Lord isn't guiding us toward a better place - turn to and trust him. v7: Make your faith "tight like a dish" so that the trials and waves and winds can't hurt you. Pray always. v9: Praise and give thanks to God, even and especially when things are scary. v11: Sometimes the journey is long. v12: Praise and give thanks to God when the hard times end. Recognize his mercies. Be humble. v13: And get to work! v17: Teach of and be taught by God. v19-21: "number" your people (aka, do family history, keep track of your family). v24: Sometimes, that person who came up with really good ideas years ago, comes up with bad ideas too. v25-27: You don't have to go along with it when people decide to do something stupid or wrong. v30: Remember what the Lord has done for you, stay humble and grateful. Ether 7 v2: Reasonably sure Orihah had multiple wives, whether concurrently or sequentially. Otherwise, that was one hardy woman! v3: Interesting to note that among the Jaredites, it's common (if I remember right) for the youngest or at least a younger son to inherit rather than the eldest. The special birthright of the eldest son wasn't a thing with these folks. v5: According to Nibley, this bit of holding the defeated king captive rather than killing him was very consistent with some Asian cultures. v9: They clearly had a different definition of "captivity". v15: Apparently, there can only be one good person named Noah, all the rest have to be sinners. (Be suspicious of people named Noah. Or maybe just kings and princes named Noah?) v25: Apparently, if the gospel is allowed to be preached, people will repent; but people will initially fight against that preaching if allowed to. Another reason to support religious freedom. v27: Again, remember what the Lord has done for you!

Ether 3 v1: It has been suggested that the brother of Jared knew the account of the "window" in Noah's ark and that it was similar to these stones and that was where it got the idea (learned from an institute teacher, also heard elsewhere, but I forget the details). v2+: IMO, this is nothing like the sort of prayers we hear in the Church, but it ought to be. There are a lot of lessons in this prayer, but I'm not sure I have the energy this (late) morning to explore them (my head is killing me). At a high level: humility, confession, testimony, the attributes of God, our need of Him, why pray, the virtue of working and thinking... v5: "thou canst do this" It's as if the brother of Jared is giving the Lord a pep talk. Or just expressing confidence in the Lord. Either way, it's an intimate and endearing exchange, for some reason. v6+: The mixture of complete faith, knowledge, and revelation here is interesting. As is the degree of confidence the brother of Jared has with the Lord. I have to believe this comes from a combination of humility, constant repentance, striving hard to keep the commandments, and rock-solid faith. v9: Surely the Lord knew full well what the brother of Jared saw, yet he asks. The Lord's way of teaching is to ask questions - to get us thinking! v11: I believe this is an eternal principle. The Lord asks the brother of Jared if he (bofJ) believes (already, present tense) the words which the Lord shall (future tense) speak - before the Lord has spoken them, before the brother of Jared has heard them - does he believe something he doesn't even know yet! I believe this is how the Lord works, it is a principle of receiving revelation. If you would receive guidance from the Lord, you must believe it (or really, believe Him) first and receive it second. This is what the scriptures mean by "sincere intent". The Lord will only reveal things to you if you already believe and fully intend to act in harmony with those things. This is also what "faith in Jesus Christ" means - like Enos, we must know that God cannot lie (and the brother of Jared, v12). This is yet another way in which the Lord's ways are reverse of the world's: the world says "prove it and then I'll believe", the Lord says, "believe and then I will reveal it". v12: It can be faith promoting to ponder these truths for a time - that God speaks truth and cannot lie. v13: "Because thou knowest these things ..." What things? The Lord has yet to speak whatever words he was referring to in v11, so far as we have here. It appears that verse 12 contains "these things". All the more reason to ponder on them! (Perhaps, too, "these things" include v9 - that Christ will take upon himself flesh and blood.) v14: Possibly the clearest explanation of the gospel or doctrine of Jesus Christ. v15: Lots of speculation about this "never have I showed myself...", since other prophets before this had seen the Lord. Most seem to think it's the manner in which the Lord showed himself - as he would look when mortal. v24: Ah, disregard yesterday - Jared perceived it as the people being confounded, but here the Lord says it's the language he confounded (probably the same thing from different perspective, but still). v25: This seems to be what happens with all prophets who are allowed into the Lord's presence, though it's not always been recorded. v26: This is faith - have sufficient faith in the Lord and all the Lord's word to you will be fulfilled. Some things are not (yet) for public consumption. Learn to keep sacred things sacred. Trust the Lord's timing. Ether 4 v6+: The need for faithfulness in what you already have - if you hope for more, master what you already have. Believe the Lord! Believe in the Lord! v12: How to know if it's from God. v15+: Reason to believe. v18-19: The message is always the same: Repent, come unto Christ and follow him. Ether 5 (getting ahead) Personal instruction to Joseph Smith!

I suspect that's why the practice stopped - those who chose the music were never choosing to sing any of the longer hymns. How Firm a Foundation is another that would get skipped. I'm leaving strict instructions that should I die (as opposed to the Second Coming happening first), there is to be no funeral. But if they rebel and insist on holding a funeral, they are to do nothing but sing every single verse of all my favorite hymns - I'll leave a list. How Firm a Foundation and A Poor Wayfaring Man of Grief will be on that list. (And if they do anything other than sing all my favorite hymns, I'll come back and haunt whoever made that decision.)

But if you're like most folks, you'll have to work hard to make it through book 10 and then you'll just go on fandom.com and read the very detailed chapter-by-chapter synopses to save yourself the slog through the remaining books - sorry, but once you've read something faster paced, you just won't have the energy or will-power to keep going through WoT.

I don't think this was a Church-wide instruction. We had a stake president who instructed all the wards to sing all the verses of every hymn sung during Sacrament meeting. But it was announced that this was instruction from the SP. I don't remember ever hearing anything like it from Church HQ (doesn't mean it didn't happen, just that I don't remember it).

I've just made next week's thread so I can't forget. It's our last thread! Given the holidays, you might want to rearrange chapters or read ahead some this week, or something...

Please see the Book of Mormon Reading Group thread for details (and discussion of 1 Nephi 1 - 5). Our goal is to read the Book of Mormon by the end of the year. I'll make a new post before each Monday so that it's ready to go - weeks go from Monday to Sunday for our purposes. Hooray!! Last week! We made it! Don't give up now! Christmas day's reading is a doozie, though, so you may want to plan some rearranging of chapters to read more sooner and / or later. This week's schedule: Dec 25 Ether 10 Monday Dec 26 Ether 12 Tuesday Dec 27 Ether 13 Wednesday Dec 28 Moroni 2 Thursday Dec 29 Moroni 7 Friday Dec 30 Moroni 9 Saturday Dec 31 Moroni 10 Sunday Last Week: Book of Mormon Reading Group: 18 Dec - 24 Dec 2023 (Mormon 1 - Ether 7) Thread Index

...We should also put him before all else. (First great commandment...)

Well, this should not surprise me. The Lord always warns people and pleads for them to repent before the negative consequences come. There must have been prophets calling folks to repentance, we just don't have records of that.

Long ago, I used a "mind mapping" application (X-Mind) to chart the leaders mentioned in the book of Ether. I'm attaching a PDF - it's huge - to print it would require 11x17 paper (A3 for @Jamie123). Looking at it, it's not going to make a lot of sense until I start reading. The stars are people said to be righteous. The angry red faces are those said to be wicked. I forget what the lock icon was, but I expect it's people involved in secret combinations. The notes (represented by note icons) didn't transfer and I'm not inclined to manually add them (they mention things like "poisonous serpents disappeared during his reign"). Anywho, I thought it might be interesting to others - or not - you can decide. Let me know if you don't see the PDF (and want to). I'm just attaching it to the post, not inserting it anywhere in the text, so I think it will show up at the bottom of this post - not sure until I actually submit it... Ether 1 v2-3: Either those were big plates, or the language was very efficient, or it was the "Cliff Notes" version of events. v6-32: See PDF. "(d)" after a name means they were a "descendant of" the person before rather than "son of". v33: @Jamie123, according to Joseph Smith, the name of the brother of Jared (which is never given in the book of Ether) is Mahonri Moriancumer. (See this old post from my former self for more interesting stuff about the name.) The whole sequence of events here suggests that at least some people knew ahead of time that the Lord would confound their language, otherwise, the requests from Jared to his brother would have been different ("unconfound us" rather than "don't confound us"; and "where will we go" rather than "now that we've been scattered, where to next"). v34: This is interesting. I think the general idea is that the tower of Babel is the origin point of the many languages on earth, but the exact wording, even in the Bible is interesting: And in Ether, "not understand our words" - as if the confounding made it so a person couldn't even understand their own words. I think Jordan Peterson paralleled this with the present day where people are so divided and use the same words so differently that they don't understand each other - the hearer understands the words used to mean something different than the speaker. Also, in Genesis, it's the language that's confounded, but in Ether, it's the people who are confounded (which makes more sense to me). Anywho, it's interesting. As I recall, the Book of Jasher has more (and interesting) details about the tower of Babel events. Finally, I had an institute teacher who said that according to some non-scriptural source (that I can't remember anymore), the people could still see the city of Enoch at this point, and were building the tower to reach that. Which seems even more plausible than that they were trying to get to a heaven they couldn't even see. v35: This suggests that whatever language the Jaredites spoke was likely more "pure" than other languages. v38: Alma 37:37 "Counsel with the Lord in all thy doings, and he will direct thee for good; ..." Be faithful, go where the Lord wants you to go, and you will be blessed in your efforts. This relationship where Jared comes up with the ideas and sends his brother to go ask the Lord is interesting and strange to me. Regardless, we can abstract at least one lesson - when your "brother" is nudging you to counsel with the Lord (or otherwise be faithful), accept his suggestions. v41-43: Just because the Lord has great blessings in store for you, don't expect him to wave a magic wand, fire up the transporter and the replicator and do all the work for you while you sit back and play a video game (or whatever). v42: "there I will meet thee, and I will go before thee". Christ always goes before us, in every way. He is there for us to follow. He was the first-born. He was the first resurrected. He was the first to keep all God's commands. He shows the way for all willing to follow. He goes before. So follow him and he will lead you to that which is "choice above all". v43: "And thus I will do unto thee because this long time ye have cried unto me." Don't give up. Continue praying, continue following. Ether 2 v1-3: This is quite the expedition! v4-7: When the Lord is leading you, don't worry about how long or difficult the journey is. Trust him to be leading you aright. v8: Whether or not you're on the land of promise, serve God. v9-12: Moroni, talking to us. Repent! v13-14: A little rest after a long journey might be acceptable to the Lord, but apparently a 4-year vacation and failing to pray the whole time will get you a long lecture (if you're lucky). v15: Repent early and often. v18-19: Before you ask for more, make sure you've done / are doing the things the Lord has already instructed. v19: They clearly understood that you could run out of air, even if they didn't understand more. v20: The Lord gives them the solution to problem #1 (air). v23-25: But for problem #2, the Lord asks the brother of Jared to puzzle out some possibilities, and helps him along by ruling out some of them. Lesson for us: Sometimes the Lord solves our problems. Sometimes he explains what won't work. Sometimes he expects us to propose solutions. Book of Ether.pdf

My opinion, Moroni wasn't expecting to do anything except finish writing a few things his father told him to write. But he survived longer than he thought, and the Lord instructed him to do more (and / or he just decided to add some more). So I think Mormon 8 and 9 are Moroni's "well, I'll just wrap this up and we're done." But then Ether and Moroni are Moroni's "huh, well, I'm still alive, so I guess I should do something useful." But that's totally my opinion. (You'll discover that Moroni includes in the book of Moroni some letters from his father. So just as we have two Moroni chapters in Mormon, we'll have some Mormon chapters in Moroni. ) Alternate answer: Life is messy and unexpected.

See here:

The Nephite journey doesn't seem to have taken as long as the Jaredite journey: Nibley speculated that the route Lehi and his family traveled would have been dangerous (for outsiders) and fire would have given away the fact that there were people there. No fire in the barges seems obvious.

A right-wing devil:

A right-wing devil:

Hmm. Probably not. Remember, I'm not writing a 700 page novel, I'm writing 95-100 word scenes that people will get once per week. Complexity won't survive that format. People forget what happened last time too easily, unless it's action. But it's now planted in the back of my brain, so heaven knows what will eventually come out.

Mormon 8 (written by Moroni) v1: I think at this point, Moroni doesn't think much of his survival chances and also doesn't expect to be doing much writing in this book. v5: Poor Moroni. v11: Be worthy, even if literally no one else is. v14: Is "the record thereof" of great worth to you? (It is to me.) Clearly Moroni was shown and prepared for what would happen in the future. v22: Trust this and roll with those purposes. v25: How humbling it must have been to Joseph Smith to read these things about himself. v27+: I always wonder whether "day" is Joseph Smith's day or from then through the Second Coming. Whatever the case, the following descriptions of wickedness are lessons in reverse - don't do that stuff! Be a humble follower of Christ. Mormon 9 (still Moroni) v3: Work hard to not abuse God's laws. Repent after you do. (v6) v7+: Believe in the gifts and power of God. Believe in Jesus Christ. v20+: Don't dwindle. Believe! v21, 25: "doubting nothing" is a high standard. Learn the will of the Lord so that you can then ask for it, nothing doubting. v27-29: Just do / be this!

Same tune as Stars Were Gleaming (starts at 2:49 in this video - this album, Noel, is my favorite Christmas album):

Ugh! Hate waiting for newbie first posts to be approved (even if I totally understand the reason)! Welcome, @MichaelMoulton! I look forward to reading your reply once @pam has approved it!

Maybe 616 through 665 screwed up and so now it's 666.

Didn't we go over this one before? Eve's fall caused Eve to fall. It wasn't until Adam chose to fall that mortal mankind became a possibility, and, of course, they would come into a fallen state. Had Adam chosen to stay in his initial state, there would have been no "mankind". Or, the snarky version: By Eve came the fall of woman and by Adam came the fall of man.

Thank you, that's helpful! Something like this? Yeah, Klaw's are all ceramic. (And some Corelle dessert bowls that have nothing better to do.) Wow! That's unusual. Good for him. (Everything I've read on it says dry just doesn't have any advantages for the cat - only convenience for the humans.) Oh. I guess that could be, or he's just indifferent. The only smell Klaw has run from is Windex - the ammonia in it. But he's all the time sniffing stuff. Confirmed, he's a cat! Klaw doesn't sleep enough - he's all the time insisting I come play with him - or feed him more...