Word, Heart, and Mysteries
Today, I want to focus on Alma 12, verses 10 and 11. They read, “And therefore, he that will harden his heart, the same receiveth the lesser portion of the word; and he that will not harden his heart, to him is given the greater portion of the word, until it is given unto him to know the mysteries of God until he know them in full.
And they that will harden their hearts, to them is given the lesser portion of the word until they know nothing concerning his mysteries; and then they are taken captive by the devil, and led by his will down to destruction. Now this is what is meant by the chains of hell.”
I am struck by the correlation between the word of God, our hearts, and the mysteries (that is, the mysteries surrounding the nature of God and us). I will present some of my thoughts on each of these topics.
The Word
The Epistle Dedicatory of the King James Version of the Bible says this about the word of God, “… which is that inestimable treasure, which excelleth all the riches of the earth; because the fruit thereof extendeth itself, not only to the time spent in this transitory world, but directeth and disposeth men unto that eternal happiness which is above in heaven.
The power of God’s word is endless. When he speaks, nature and all matter in the cosmos obey. I want to clarify my belief that God does not act contrary to the laws of nature but in harmony with them and that all matter and the elements obey His Word because of this. The principle of harmony and obedience to God’s word extends to us but with the additional element of agency applied.
The Holy Ghost is the means and the agent for the word of God that speaks to us and all things that can be acted upon. This is illustrated beautifully in the creation story when it says, “And the Spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters. And God said, let there be light; and there was light.”
Another way to think about the Spirit is as a transmitter of the Word. Through the Holy Ghost, God’s word is broadcast throughout the universe. However, a transmitter is no good without a receiver; that is where the heart comes in.
The Heart
We should think of our hearts as receptacles or receivers, the difference being that they are containers or spaces that hold the word of God and devices that collect and decipher spiritual transmissions. The vessel of the heart must be clean so as not to corrupt the living water that comes through the Spirit. Likewise, the message will never be received if our heart is not tuned to the spiritual frequency.
The scriptures that focus today’s thoughts describe people who choose to harden their hearts or not and describe the effects of both conditions. To continue the analogy, when we choose a path contrary to the word of God, our receptacles are full of corruption, and our receivers are tuned to the wrong frequency. The point is that we get less and less spiritual communication, which leaves us vulnerable to Satanic captivity and being in hell.
Conversely, miraculous things happen when we keep our hearts pure and tune them to God. The promise is that we are given a greater portion of the word. And it doesn’t end there. As we fill our receptacles with pure and virtuous principles, we fine-tune our spiritual receivers even more.
Mysteries
So far, we have covered the basics of spiritual communication and know how things function. Once we master foundational principles and maintain ongoing communication with God, He will manifest greater knowledge in our hearts. We call these advanced principles mysteries. This is when God begins to manifest himself to us in a way that changes us fundamentally.
The mysteries are to know God The Father and Jesus Christ, which is to have eternal life. When we know God, we come to know ourselves as we are known to Him. This is the ultimate transformation we can experience. The promise in verse 10 is, “… he that will not harden his heart, to him is given the greater portion of the word, until it is given unto him to know the mysteries of God until he know them in full.”
I urge you to consider your heart’s condition and find ways to purify it and tune it to receive the word of God.