The Book of Mormon and the Ruins
232 With Moroni’s comment in Mormon 9:26 we’ve got to wind that up. “Who will rise up against the almighty power of the Lord? . . . Who will despise the works of the Lord? Who will despise the children of Christ? Behold, all ye who are despisers of the works of the Lord, for ye shall wonder and perish.”
232 Mormon 9:27 Why that word DESPISE! What does DESPISE mean? DESPICIO, which means look down upon, hold as inferior, hold yourself as above that sort of childish nonsense. That’s what despise means, and that’s the only way you can reject the word of the Lord. You can’t be neutral. You can’t laugh it off exactly, and you can’t argue with it and get angry. No, just despise it. We don’t even consider that stuff. That’s for children; that’s guff [you might say]. And as I say, the only way you can reject it is to despise it, so that’s why he’s talking this way. Then “work out your own salvation with fear and trembling before him.” This is the great issue, the fearsome decisions we have to make here, Notice how personal it is.
232 Mormon 9:28 “Be wise [the opposite of despising] in the days of your probation [and then he says an interesting thing]; strip yourselves of all uncleanness; ask not, that ye may consume it on your lusts, but ask with a firmness unshaken, that ye will yield to no temptation, but that ye will serve the true and living God.” That’s an important statement there. What does it mean by “consume it on your lusts”? Yield to the natural man. What limit is there to justifying behavior as natural? Cannibalism is natural behavior, your might say, and orgies certainly are—delighting in the shedding of blood, rape, and all sorts of things that excite people. They get great interest in shows, games, etc. Those things are perfectly natural. Can you justify them because they’re natural? You actually have to resist them—they’re such a strong natural drive. So he says “ask not, that ye may consume it”—that is, consume your desires, fulfill your life and your wishes on whatever you want to do if it feels good. That’s your lust. If it feels good, go right ahead [the world says].
232 Mormon 9:29 Don’t do that, he says, even though it is a natural temptation. But ask [for help]. You have to ask. You must have support in resisting it. Your nature isn’t going to be enough to get through with it. You must have support there. “Ask with a firmness unshaken, that ye will yield to no temptation, but that ye will serve the true and living God.” You don’t mitigate daily vices by visits to the confessional or the chapel or the temple or anything like that. In verse 29 he says, “See that ye do all things in worthiness,” your whole life. There was a lot of talk about that in the conference yesterday and the day before. This very thing—do all things in worthiness.
232,233 Mormon 9:30-34 “Behold, I speak unto you as though I spake from the dead; for I know that ye shall have my words. Condemn me not because of mine imperfection,. . . but rather give thanks to God that he hath made manifest unto you our imperfections, that ye may learn to be more wise than we have been.”
Notice why the Book of Mormon is also taken up with crime and folly and war. It’s an account of follies and calamities. It’s for our benefit, that you may be wiser. There’s a way of avoiding these things he’s been talking about. First you don’t despise; you take these things seriously. Then you’re naturally tempted—everybody is. He says resist that; ask for the Lord to assist you in that, and that will go. Then you can learn from our imperfections. For heaven’s sake don’t do the silly things we did—our follies and calamities. Of course, we are doing them. Then he ends up saying it’s in reformed Egyptian, a language which has changed completely. Verse 34: “None other people knoweth our language.”