#39 Book of Mormon for Latter-day Saint Families 2 Nephi 5:7

I love the scriptures!!! I sure do! 2 Nephi 5:7-22 In these scriptures Nephi is telling us of how he and those who followed him and the concept of keeping the commandments had to leave the company and presence of his brothers who were known as the Lamanites. Now some of these people were in fact descendants of Laman but, more correctly, they were those who did not wish to be obedient or bound to the law of Moses and keeping the commandments. Nephi speaks of how HE did different things including building up a civilization by literally building and HE even built a temple. The point I feel impressed to make is that HE did not do this alone. Rather, he taught, led, and worked along-side the other people in the community and they built a city. It is easy to get caught up in language and apply todays meanings to another era. We need to be careful and realize that while God is the same yesterday, today, and tomorrow man is not. You might even say that man prides himself in being able to shift each and every generation out of its complacency and comfort of where the previous generation was, thus creating the Generation Gap as they called it when I was growing up in the 79's. Nephi led by example and what he taught was obedience to the laws of God and health and safety for all of God's children, including the ability to defend themselves if need be as shown by his having swords prepared. Verse 21 speaks of the changes that occur physically for those who chose to step away from the light of the gospel. This principle continues today. It is actually possible to see the light fade from the countenance of those who once knew and turned away. God does not label people. He labels attitudes. We as humans tend to label people including ourselves and this is wrong. May his Spirit guide us to value the human as he does and to respect and honor the self and the other is my prayer, in Jesus name, amen.