MTC - Day 14 - April 22, 2008 - Journal Entry

I love P-days. Got up, did laundry, and read Jesus the Christ. It is an amazing and deep book. I learned seven things in one paragraph. After a morning of thinking deep thoughts, we folded laundry, made ourselves pretty and went to email. I printed off my letters, signed off, read my letters, composed a response on paper, signed back on and typed as fast as I could. I made dozens of mistakes - one of which was forgetting to send it to mom. Luckily I still had a few minutes left and was able to find the draft and send it to her. I also got to add a more personal note for her, which was really nice - but sad too. I miss talking to her!

I made my last trip to the temple for a while - it was bitter sweet. What an incredible spirit and just knowing all the things I've learned and wondering about the new things I still need to learn. I have such an amazing testimony of our Heavenly Fathers plan of happiness and the joy that is available to us here on earth.

Looking at gospel principles with child-like simplicity gives such amazingly, deep connotations. In Lesson One we teach God is our loving Heavenly Father. It's beautiful - such sublime simplicity. I love it!

After the session, I went down to Mike Woffinden's office to drop of my temple clothes. Unfortunately he wasn't there, I wrote a brief note thanking him and headed back.

Sister Hartman and I had companion study, we talked about what we've learned and ways to improve our teaching.

We had a fireside last night - Gerald Lund (Work & Glory dude) spoke. It was an amazing talk about the Miracles of the Book of Mormon. I'm going to put some of my notes in here so I don't forget some of the things I learned.

Miracles of the Book of Mormon

Coming Forth -
All we have from Joseph Smith was written by scribes. His spelling was awful and his grammar was worse. He read us a letter Joseph Smith had written Emma and spelled some of the words for us - one of the words was "mutch".

We discussed how studies about the Mayans and Aztecs didn't begin till years after the publication of the Book of Mormon

• It's a record of actual people in a real place - no Hobbits
• Light enough to carry
• Written on gold
• Came from the same culture as those from the Bible

These points were about the Joseph Smith story before the publication - taking the place of devils advocate. Lund said: "Good guess Joseph."

Lund gave some fascinating facts about gold:

• Most ductile (drawn-out) malleable (shaped)
• One ounce of gold can be drawn into a string a mile long
• Gold the size of a sugar cube can be beat into a 50 foot sheet
• Light and easily workable
• Won't rust, stain, or decay even after centuries underground

Then we moved on to the actual translation of The Book of Mormon:

• Completed in 85 days
• With travel and Sundays - more like 60 days
• Average of 9 pages per day

Lund commented, "Good books are not written, but re-written and re-written and re-written."

Consistency
Lund talked about the need to keep things consistent with the history and the culture of the place you are writing about.
He wrote a book based in Saudi Arabia. His character went to a vending machine and got a Coke - months later he received a letter saying, "Elder Lund, I enjoyed your book, but you should know Coke sells to Iraq so Saudi Arabia only buys Pepsi products as a result.
Later, while writing "The Work & The Glory" he had one of his characters say OK, he looked it up and found that word didn't come into use until nearly 60 years later.
There are mistakes in the Book of Mormon

• Mosiah 7:8 permitted, or rather commanded
• Alma 50:32 Bountiful, or rather Moroni
• There are 12 "or rathers" in The Book of Mormon

English - compound subject "My brother and I"
Hebrew culture "I and my brothers" (Nephi)

"Word printing" computer program that identifies different authors by using placement of AND & THE. Put Book of Mormon through this program, it doesn't fit with any writings of Joseph Smith, Brigham Young, or any of the other witness. Further proof that the Book of Mormon was written by many different authors.

Witness of Christ

400 pages are Doctrine
100 pages are History

Book of Mormon teaches the gospel of Jesus Christ, not a history of people.

There are 6,607 verses in the Book of Mormon - 3,625 of these refer to Christ.

Susan Easton Black counted and found 101 different titles and names for Jesus Christ in the Book of Mormon alone.
1 in 9 references to Christ in the Book of Mormon per verse
1 in 7 references to Christ in Bible per verse

Doctrine & Power to Change Lives

Joseph Smith said:

"Book of Mormon brings people nearer to God by abiding by its precepts than any other book."
It has the power to change lives.

He shared a story about two Elders who were tracting in Chicago down by the waterfront. They knocked on a door - a dirty disgusting woman opened the door, the house stunk of tobacco, alcohol and various drugs. The Elders said the stench nearly knocked them down. They handed her a Book of Mormon, asked her to read it and they would come back to pick it up (at this point in time missionaries bought their own Book of Mormons). Several weeks passed, finally they returned to her home, they knocked, the door flew open, the woman was clean and her home smelled nice. She demanded of them "Where have you been? I want to join your church." She told them that she started reading the Book of Mormon and read it all the way through in a day. That day she quit smoking. They hadn't come back so she read it again, about 1/2 way through the 2nd time she quit drinking alcohol, by the time she finished it all the way through the 2nd time she gave up drugs. The missionaries still didn't come back so she went through it a 3rd time, this time looking up all the cross references in the Bible.

The Book of Mormon has the power to change lives!

I LOVE THE BOOK OF MORMON!