Sunday School Lesson Recap: When Does Revelation (Personal and Prophetic) Normally Come

Last Sunday, we wrapped up the monthly theme of "Prophets and Revelation" by focusing on two scriptural stories that describe very different situations but the same action: killing someone else. I used these stories (Abraham & Isaac and Nephi & Laban) to explore what revelation really means and when people generally receive revelation, specifically to address personal revelation in the future of each of the students.

We started by revisiting the story of Abraham being tempted to kill Isaac. (See last week's lesson for a discussion of the word "tempt" in the scriptural account.)  I asked everyone to pinpoint the "revelation" in this story - to tell me what the revelation was. One of the students immediately answered: "Obedience brings blessings." I pointed out that the story can lead to a lesson about obedience, but obedience wasn't the revelation - since obedience had been taught for a long time prior to that moment. At that point, they were stumped, so I altered the question a bit to be: "What was revealed to Abraham that had been hidden / unknown previously?" After some discussion, they understood that the revelation was that human / child sacrifice was to be discarded as a form of worship - and that animal sacrifice was to take its place.

So, in a very real way, the revelation in the story was a clear statement of what would be worded in Moses' time as:

"Thou shalt not murder (your children)" - with an additional understanding of the Atonement that Abraham hadn't possessed previously.

We then turned to the account of Nephi and Laban, and I asked again what the revelation was in this story. Since nobody could answer that immediately, we read the main verses in 1 Nephi 4 that talk about it. We talked about what it means to be "constrained" ("confined; restrained; compelled; etc."). We talked about Nephi's reaction to the idea that he needed to kill Laban ("No way! I've never killed anyone and can't do it.") - and then we talked about the difference between that reaction and Abraham's reaction first thing the next morning. ("Okay, let's get going so I can do this.")

We discussed the concept that Abraham had to be "constrained" NOT to kill Isaac (since he was inclined naturally by his upbringing to kill his son), while Nephi had to be constrained TO kill Laban (since he lived with a long-time practice of animal sacrifice, not human sacrifice) - and how the Isaac story might have been different if Abraham had reacted like Nephi did. (Since the change in sacrificial ordinance was the intended outcome, God might have gone ahead and revealed that to Abraham right away, without all the drama.)

We read the verses that explain Nephi's justifications of his actions, ending with the "revelation" (the new understanding) in verse 13:

It is better that one man should perish than that a nation should dwindle and perish in unbelief.

I pointed out that, up until the time when Nephi was faced with doing something he would not have done naturally, he simply was "honoring his father" and "being a good son". His dad told him they needed to get the plates, so he tried to do that. They asked for the plates, and they tried to buy the plates. Finally, he went into the city on his own and discovered Laban passed out drunk. It only was when he was faced with killing Laban (something that went beyond being a good son) that he was able to see WHY he had to get the plates - beyond the generic, "God commanded it." The revelation wasn't the command to get the plates; rather, it was gaining an understanding of the reason for the command.

In Abraham's situation, likewise, the revelation came ONLY when he was ready to do something that he didn't understand naturally - NOT killing his son. He had "gone through the motions" of blind obedience and, unlike Nephi, had to be stopped from killing because he followed his natural instincts rather than thinking and questioning first.

(Note: I think there is a very reasonable justification for Nephi killing Laban, especially for that time period and the overall story.  I wrote that post this past Wednesday.)

Finally, to follow the concept of really studying scriptures to understand the people, their stories and the actions of prophets (not just what they taught), I briefly summarized (since we were almost out of time) the story of King Mosiah changing the government structure at the end of his life.

1) Mosiah had taken leadership of a people more numerous than the Nephites. That simple fact opens all kinds of issues relative to his government-altering actions before he died.

2) If one of his sons wasn't going to take his place, there was a good chance that one of the people of Mulek who already was influential and popular would do so - especially if the kingship was determined by popular vote. Again, it is stated clearly in the text that the people of Mulek greatly outnumbered the descendants of Nephi in that area. In fact, the moment Mosiah's sons rejected the throne (and Alma the Younger also did), those other influential Mulekite contenders might have started agitating for the position very quickly.

3) Nehor is described as being another King Noah, in philosophy and intent. Amalici was one of his disciples. They are said to have gained a following FAR too quickly to have started a grass-roots campaign from scratch at the end of Mosiah's life.

4) If Mosiah knew either of them was likely to become the king, it would have provided the best possible motivation to change the system.

5) If you think about it, the best possible reason for Nehor, and then Amlici, to be extremely upset and demand what they had assumed they would attain would have been what they would have seen as an attempt to perpetuate the minority rule of the Nephites over them. Consider the situation in some Islamic countries even today; there are striking parallels.

6) It's easy to condemn Nehor and Amlici, given the descriptions we have of them, and I'm not trying to endorse them in any way - but it's harder to realize that they might have had a very compelling legal argument and an incredibly strong emotional appeal to a majority people ruled by those of the minority.

Many things are more complex than we tend to assume - and many things in the Book of Mormon are pretty amazing when looked upon a bit more comprehensively than we tend to do.

I emphasized that prophets often do things not from revelation (though Mosiah wasn't a prophet, he might have seen his decision as revelatory) but rather from a perceived need at the time. [Another example I didn't share in the class would be Moses' interaction with the daughters of Zelophehad - where he first allowed them to keep the lands of their inheritance when they married (since their father had died without having sons) and then restricted them to marrying only someone in their own tribe (so their tribe would not lose the lands of their father's inheritance when they married).] There is nothing wrong with leaders making non-revelatory decisions, since leaders often have to make decisions for organizations on their own, based on their best understanding - but we need to be careful not to confuse those decisions and personal views as "revelation" and accept everything they do and say, by default, as the pure word of God.

I ended the lesson by mentioning that I believe all of the students will be faced in the future with something(s) that requires them to gain new understanding (to have something "revealed" to them) and that I believe most of those revelations will come to them only when they have thought, pondered, questioned, considered, discussed, studied, prayed, etc. diligently - when they are at the point where they simply can't understand something better through their own efforts. At those times, through patiently "enduring to the end", a new insight will hit them and they will understand FAR better than if they simply had followed conventional wisdom and relied on the testimonies / understanding of others. Those times hopefully won't involve an impression to kill someone, but the deepest insights generally will come in the times of deepest struggle and trial. I told them I hope they don't give up before the revelation they need comes to them, no matter how it comes to them - even if it seems to be only an idea that makes sense as a solution to what they face at the time.

Sunday School Lesson Re-Cap: The Purpose and Meaning of Commandments

This month, the focus is on commandments. I decided to model my approach on what I did when we covered ordinances and covenants - focusing on the meaning and purpose of commandments, generally, as the foundation of understanding what commandments can teach us about God, and then dissecting specific commandments to see how they fit into the overall framework of what commandments can teach us about God.

We began by looking in the Bible Dictionary and seeing that "command" and "commandment" are not defined there. I told the students that I think there are some things that are assumed to be so simple and obvious that we tend to think they don't need to be defined in a place like the Bible Dictionary but that I disagree - strongly. I believe commandments are a complex subject, worthy of an entire month of study. We did read the entry for the Ten Commandments, since they are the foundational commandments of our Judeo-Christian heritage.

We then defined "commandment". We got "rule" - which then was amended to "God's rule" - which then was changed to "a rule that is so important that it has to be followed or dire consequences occur". I asked where else the word "command" is used, and we talked about the military application. I pointed out that we now allow soldiers to not obey a direct order if that order is particularly egregious but that soldiers used to be discharged, jailed or even killed automatically for not following a direct command. We talked about how commandments and punishments have changed over time - how we no longer accept some things that used to be seen as commandments and no longer punish people the same way for not obeying commandments. We used honoring parents, adultery and polygamy as specific examples, and we talked about what we can learn about God from the fact that commandments have changed throughout history.

The students suggested the following things:

1) God gives us commandments that are best for our own circumstances - that the world changes and, therefore, some things about how we need to live change, as well. We talked about what it means to believe in continuing revelation and how we can't get stuck following outdated rules simply because people used to accept them as commandments.

2) God gives broad commandments, and we are the ones who make the smaller rules that we accept as commandments.

We used the second reason as a springboard to discuss the old Mosaic Law - to understand how ten original commandments ended up being over 600 specific rules. I told them that we would talk about that in more detail as we discussed specific commandments this month.

I asked them if we can rank commandments in order of importance. They all agreed that we can, so I asked how we might do that properly. They came up with the following, which we discussed - after my disclaimer that we can't let ranking sins allow us to think that it's okay to commit "lesser" sins simply because we aren't committing "greater" sins.

1) By severity of consequence to others: Thus, as a rule, killing is worse than stealing.

2) By severity of consequence to ourselves: Thus, adultery is worse than not keeping the Sabbath holy.

3) By personal temptation: Thus, lying can be "worse" than killing, if someone is not inclined at all to kill but is inclined to lie.

With that foundation, we read Matthew 22:35-40:

35 Then one of them, which was a lawyer, asked him a question, tempting him, and saying,

36 Master, which is the great commandment in the law?

37 Jesus said unto him, Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind.

38 This is the first and great commandment.

39 And the second is like unto it, Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself.

40 On these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets.

I asked them what "tempting him" meant in that context, and they understood it meant it was a test - a way for the man to start an argument and discredit Jesus.

We talked about what it means to love others as ourselves: not doing anything to someone else that we wouldn't want done to us; doing things for others that we would want others to do for us; sacrificing what we want to make sure others have what they need; etc.

I then asked them what it means to have all the law and the prophets "hang" on the first two, great commandments.

They understood the concept quite well, and we settled on the analogy of multiple articles of clothing hanging on a rack. Remove the rack, and the clothing falls to the floor - lying there gathering dirt and dust. The thing that is the "hanger" provides support so what hangs can be used properly - so it can be effective and proper. Also, from one of the students, without the support of the hanger, we could have all the clothing in the world but it wouldn't help us - since we wouldn't want to wear clothing that had been lying on the floor getting dusty and dirty. We talked about how we can "keep every commandment" without it changing us in any way if we don't keep the two great commandments upon which all the others hang - that, if we obey without love, we are following the Mosaic Law and not the Law of Christ. Conversely, if we really love God, others and ourselves, we will keep the commandments naturally - especially if we understand how each commandment can be grounded in love.

With that in mind, we turned to the list of commandments we had written on the board and talked about each one of them in the context of how they can be related to loving God, others and ourselves. One of the students had mentioned earlier that a Seminary teacher had said that each negative command ("Thou shalt not") could be rephrased in a positive manner ("Thou shalt"), so we used that concept in analyzing each command we discussed.

Honor they parents: How do we do that within the context of love?

We honor righteous, caring parents by showing our love for them - accepting their right to lead us and set rules, becoming who they want us to become, etc. I explained the Protestant idea that honoring God generally is framed in terms of praise - but I pointed out that, given the choice of either extreme, I would MUCH rather have my children become whom I want them to become than to hear them praise me every day. Praising God is important, but it's more important to "honor" God by becoming what he has asked us to become.

I told them that they all have wonderful parents, but I asked them how someone with lousy parents can honor them. What about a girl who grows up with a father who beats and sexually molests her? How can she honor him? We talked about how breaking the cycle and becoming someone different brings honor to the family name - how that person can live in such a way that others who used to curse or belittle the family name can praise it, instead.

Thou shalt not kill: How do we reframe that in the context of love?

We can love others so much that we treat them the way we would want to be treated - and, out of that love, not kill them. I mentioned the acceptable exceptions, like self-defense, protection of others being threatened, justifiable wartime actions, etc - but, even then, we can do everything possible to avoid such an extreme action.

Thou shalt not commit adultery: How do we view that in the context of love?

We can love our spouse so much that we would not hurt him or her by breaking our marriage covenant. We can love the other person and their spouse so much that we would not hurt them by contributing to their marriage covenant being broken.

We ran out of time, so we will pick up the discussion next week and continue to talk about other commandments (and rules), their meaning and purpose, and how they can help us understand God.