Escaping Bondage
This week I did something I never do; I watched snippets of ‘Come Follow Me’ commentaries on YouTube. It was exactly what I expected, and I will not be doing that again anytime soon. The content was about as milk-toast as you can get. They ranged from narrated cartoons to guys in suits stating the obvious. If it sounds like I am being critical, you are right. Anyone who knows me or has heard me teach knows I am not a fan of church lesson manuals. The reason is that they do not promote creative thinking about gospel topics and doctrine.
The reason I watched some of the online commentaries is to see if anyone noticed what I did about the concepts taught in Alma 36, and they did not. There is no doubt that Alma’s spiritual rebirth through the grace of Jesus Christ is the highlight of the chapter, but there is something I completely missed the many other times I have read or quoted from this chapter.
I am not here to tell you that I am some scriptural genius or that you should believe what I say. My sole aim is to share my thoughts and impressions when I read the scripture. My secondary objective is to get you thinking in ways that I believe will enhance and promote a deeper understanding of the gospel. I don’t think we understand just how true and accurate the Book of Mormon is. Those who criticize or mock it do so at their peril.
The chapter is bookended by Alma’s promise and testimony to his son Helaman that prosperity is guaranteed by obedience to God’s commandments. However, the part that struck me was how God’s people had been delivered from bondage by the hand of the Lord. The middle of the chapter discusses Alma’s delivery from the bondage of grave sin. In other words, Alma equates a personal experience to a momentous historical event.
I want to draw some of the parallels between both stories. First, the children of Israel were in bondage to the Egyptians, while Alma was bound by the chains of hell for his sins of attempting to destroy the church of God. Second, the Israelites and Alma were miraculously delivered by the hand of God. I am stating the obvious things we always see as we recall either event, but there are other crucial aspects we don’t see.
When Alma recognized the extent of his sins, he said, “…I was racked with eternal torment, for my soul was harrowed up to the greatest degree and racked with all my sins.” And, “…the very thought of coming into the presence of my God did rack my soul with inexpressible horror.” Now, imagine the feelings of the Israelites trapped between the Red Sea and the armies of Pharaoh. I think “inexpressible horror” would describe the situation adequately. Alma wished he could become extinct, and the children of Israel faced extinction. In either case, only the power of God could save them.
Now, I want to focus on this verse. Alma states, “I have been supported under trials and troubles of every kind, yea, and in all manner of afflictions; yea, God has delivered me from prison, and from bonds, and from death; yea, and I do put my trust in him, and he will still deliver me. And I know that he will raise me up at the last day, to dwell with him in glory; yea, and I will praise him forever, for he has brought our fathers out of Egypt, and he has swallowed up the Egyptians in the Red Sea; and he led them by his power into the promised land; yea, and he has delivered them out of bondage and captivity from time to time.” In this instance, Alma directly equates his personal salvation with that of ancient Israel.
So, what can we glean from this story? First, when we think our situation is impossible, God can and will deliver us as we call out to him. Second, He will destroy the enemy of our soul as we follow the path He opens for us. The crucial thing we must do is move away from danger, whether it is spiritual or physical. If we attempt to stay where we are, living with sin, we will be destroyed as surely as Pharaoh’s armies would have killed the Israelites. We cannot keep one foot in Babylon and the other in the promised land.
Those are the points no one else made as I watched the YouTube channels that discussed this chapter. My challenge to you is to find other hidden gems or spiritual insights that I missed, and I promise you that I did. The scriptures are not trivial. They contain treasures waiting to be discovered and revealed that can change how we see things, always for the better.