Pathway Lesson 5: 2 Nephi 9-16

I just completed lesson 5 of Pathway.  I’m halfway done with my first semester.  Its pretty exciting.  I think my favorite thing about Pathway has been my studies of the Book of Mormon.  Our weekly study was 2 Nephi 9-16. I had a bit harder time this week because we got into Isaiah, but I pushed through and tried to understand as much as I could!  I kind of was getting a bad attitude about Isaiah, but then I read this by Boyd K Packer from the Book of Mormon Student Manual:

“Most [readers] readily understand the narrative of the Book of Mormon.

“Then, just as you settle in to move comfortably along, you will meet a barrier. … Interspersed in the narrative, are chapters reciting the prophecies of the Old Testament prophet Isaiah. They loom as a barrier, like a roadblock or a checkpoint beyond which the casual reader, one with idle curiosity, generally will not go.

“You, too, may be tempted to stop there, but do not do it! Do not stop reading! Move forward through those difficult-to-understand chapters of Old Testament prophecy, even if you understand very little of it. Move on, if all you do is skim and merely glean an impression here and there. Move on, if all you do is look at the words” (in Conference Report, Apr. 1986, 76; or Ensign, May 1986, 61).

I felt like it was written for me!  Even while I read through Isaiah, I had a tough time understanding what I was reading, but I moved forward, I did read it and tried my best to understand.  Something I did that helped me get through Isaiah, was I listened to those chapters (Did you know you could do that with the Gospel Library app?) and read along with scriptures.  I felt like it helped my mind not to wander. 

I thought I’d share a couple of my favorite verses.  In the first couple chapters Jacob is talking and I really enjoyed his testimony.

2 Nephi 9:14 “Wherefore, we shall have a perfect knowledge of all our guilt, and our uncleanness, and our nakedness; and the righteous shall have a perfect knowledge of their enjoyment, and their righteousness, being clothed with purity, yea, even with the robe of righteousness.”  What struck me about this verse was we will have a perfect knowledge of our uncleanliness AND our righteousness.  I’ve never thought about it that way before, I always thought about judgment being told everything I did wrong or right, but this says we will KNOW.   Definitely made me want to make sure I have a perfect knowledge of the good I did, not the bad!

2 Nephi 9: 20 “O how great the holiness of our God! For he knoweth all things, and there is not anything save he knows it.”  This gave me a lot to think about.  It took me a day or two to wrap my head around it.  Here’s my thought process: We have agency and we can make our own decisions…but God knows all.  How does he know what we will choose?  I’ve come to the realization that Heavenly Father knows us well enough to know how we would choose.  

2 Nephi 9:49 “Behold, my soul abhorreth sin, and my heart delighteth in righteousness; and I will praise the holy name of my God.”  This has turned into a new goal for me.  I love this verse and want to feel this way about all things in my life.

2 Nephi 10:7 “For if there be no Christ there be no God; and if there be no God we are not, for there could have been no creation. But there is a God, and he is Christ, and he cometh in the fulness of his own time.”  I love how simple this makes it.  Sometimes we make things complicated and it doesn’t have to be.  We believe in Christ, so we know there is a God because we are all here. 

2 Nephi 11:5 “And also my soul delighteth in the covenants of the Lord which he hath made to our fathers; yea, my soul delighteth in his grace, and in his justice, and power, and mercy in the great and eternal plan of deliverance from death.”  If I were to use “substitution” on this verse, what does my heart delighteth in?  There are lots of things I delight in, my children, my family, spending time with my family, my testimony, cooking/baking, watching movies etc.  Am I on the same level as Jacob?   No, I’m not there yet, but working on it.

Again, I’m grateful for this class, to be able to really study the words in the Book of Mormon.  I really enjoyed reading Jacobs testimony.  I'm noticing a change in myself while I'm reading the Book of Mormon, its no longer a chore.  I'm enjoying it and maybe even understanding it more.  Made me think of an athlete.  As they work out, they build up endurance and muscles.  Over time they become better at their sport.  I'm hoping the same is happening to me.  I'm working on my scriptural skills and over time I will have more knowledge and understanding.