Brothers and Sisters, I hope you have had a good week this past week and that you and your family are feeling well and staying safe! The Come Follow Me Lesson for this Sunday is Mosiah 18-24. This lesson is about the importance of us honoring and keeping sacred covenants with our Heavenly Father. Our beloved Prophet Russell M. Nelson has focused his ministry on helping the Saints understand the importance of making and keeping sacred covenants and keeping on the covenant path. We have been taught that we make sacred covenants when we are baptized, when we partake of the Sacrament and when are endowed with Priesthood power in the Holy Temple and are sealed to our families as part of the New and Everlasting Covenant.

In Mosiah 18, we learn of the account of Alma the Elder and his people. As discussed in a previous lesson, Alma was one of the priests of Noah who was converted unto the Lord by the preachings of the Prophet Abinadi and was subsequently forced to flee for his life after he begged King Noah to spare Abinadi’s life before he began converting others. One wonders whether Abinadi knew that his labors in the vineyard of the Lord would bear fruit and result in the conversion of a future Prophet of the Lord and the restoration of the full organization of the Lord’s Church to the Nephites or whether he died wondering if his labors had been in vain. I believe as a prophet of the Lord, he was shown before he died that his labors would bear great fruit even though like some missionaries who have served, he did not live to see any of those he taught baptized to the Lord.

It appears that Alma the Elder was chosen by the Lord to restore the full organization of His Church in the promised land of the Americas even though the plain and precious truths of the Gospel continued to be taught by King Benjamin and other Nephite leaders who continued to possess the Melchizedek Priesthood in an unbroken line from the time of Nephi. While we are told that Alma was appointed by the wicked King Noah because he was lifted up in the pride of his heart, we have no reason to believe he partook in the same serious sins as did the other priests of Noah as had he done so the Lord would not likely have entrusted him with so great a task as to fully restore and lead His Church on the Earth. On this matter, the Prophet Joseph Fielding Smith taught, “We should take into consideration in the study of the Book of Mormon the fact that it is an abridgment taken from the records or history that had been kept by the prophets among the Nephites. Therefore, many of the details are lacking. While the detail is lacking, the evidence is very clear that the Melchizedek Priesthood was possessed by the Nephites. In the case of Alma and his priesthood, we are left to surmise that he legally and divinely received it before the days of King Noah. We read that Zeniff, the father of Noah, was a righteous man. Alma evidently received the priesthood in the days of Zeniff, and at no time did he fully accept the teachings nor with full purpose follow the counsels and procedure of Noah and his wicked priests…Just at what time Alma received the priesthood is not clearly stated, but we may presume that it occurred before Noah came to the throne. Moreover, we must also conclude that Alma at no time truly entered into the wickedness of this wicked king.” It appears that there were a couple of decades between Alma having to flee into the wilderness when he was still a fairly young man and the time that his people were led back to the land of Zarahemla. It was likely during this period that Alma was fully converted to the Lord and prepared to serve as the first High Priest over the Church in the land of Helam and later over the Church in Zarahemla.

In Mosiah 18:8-10, it says when the people of Alma were baptized unto the Lord, they made a covenant with God to “serve Him and keep his commandments” just as all of us did when we were baptized into the Church. As members of the Lord’s Church we also covenant to stand as witnesses of God. This means that we covenant to live righteously, share the Gospel with others and defend and uphold the Restored Gospel of Jesus Christ to those who attempt to disparage the Lord’s Church, His anointed leaders including both general officers and local leaders and Church doctrine and policies as revealed to us by Church leaders. The Lord Jesus Christ taught us that one of the best ways we can serve God is by helping and serving others and thereby blessing their lives and serving as instruments of God in helping to answer their prayers. We can also comfort others help bear and lighten one another’s burdens, trials and tribulations. If we do so and endure to the end in righteousness, the Lord promises us in verse 9 that we will be redeemed of God, and be numbered with those of the first resurrection and that we will have eternal life, which is the greatest of all gifts that can be bestowed upon His children. He also promises that He will pour out His Spirit more abundantly upon us in verse 10.

I am sure that during your lives and perhaps even during the past two months of the pandemic we can all think of experiences where the Lord has answered our prayers through others or helped them bear our burdens as we have strived to keep the Lord’s commandments and kept our sacred covenants. I have been humbled and amazed at how frequently and how quickly the Lord has answered my prayers to bless members of my family over the past several weeks as we have been in need of His blessings and I am so grateful for those blessings as I know the Savior is the author of all good and that no blessing comes to us save by Him. Every time the Lord answers our prayers and we grow stronger in righteousness, the Lord increases our faith in Him, which is a gift to the faithful, and thereby increases our ability to have our prayers answered in the future. In Doctrine and Covenants 20:37, it says that we make ourselves worthy to be baptized by humbling ourselves before god and demonstrating that we have broken hearts and contrite spirits, repented of all our sins, with a willingness to take upon ourselves the name of Jesus Christ having a determination to serve him until the end of our lives. Once baptized and becoming members of the Lord’s Church, we renew our sacred covenants of baptism by partaking worthily of the Sacrament and thereby receiving a new a remission of our sins.

In Mosiah 18:17-31, it describes the commandments the Lord gave His people through the Prophet Alma to help them become united as members of His Church. We are taught that Heavenly Father, His Son Jesus Christ and the Holy Spirit are united and one in purpose and the Lord has commanded us to be united as one in purpose as well. One of the best ways we can be united is to avoid contention especially in our families and in our homes. My daughter Kathryn who returned from serving her mission in Santiago Chile recently told me that she has been amazed by the spirit of peace and complete lack of contention which she has observed in her homes since she returned from her mission. This has been one of the great blessings which our family has enjoyed since the pandemic began as have turned to the Lord for comfort and relief and sought to more fully yield ourselves unto Him and His holy will. In addition to ministering spiritually to those in need, we can also bless others by striving to be more generous in our fast offerings which ward leaders used to provide assistance to ward members in need.

In Mosiah 21 it talks about the people of King Limhi and, later in Mosiah 23 the people of Alma, being in bondage to the Lamanites and how they knew there was no way they could be delivered except by divine intervention. As they humbled themselves before the Lord in prayer, the Lord made their burdens light until He eventually, in Mosiah Chapters 22 and 24, delivered both peoples from bondage and led them to reunite with their brethren in the land of Zarahemla. In like fashion, many of us have been in spiritual bondage to sin and have been unable to break our chains of sin without sincere repentance which is only possible through the Atonement of Jesus Christ forgiving us and though the Savior strengthening us to overcome our sins. Here we learn that often, the Lord often blesses us on His own timetable and not on our own as a test of our faith and to enable us to expend more effort to grow spiritually.

In these chapters, we learn about how God can help and bless us in the midst of our trials and deliver us from tribulation. Please think of ways the Lord has eased your burdens in your lives and helped you overcome afflictions and share them and your testimonies with your family members along with the gratitude you have felt to God during Home Church this Sunday. We have been taught that that Lord Jesus Christ not only bore all of our sins but had all of our tribulations that we have experienced in our lives heaped upon his shoulders that He would better know how to succor us in our tribulations. I testify that I know through personal experience that the Lord will lighten our burdens and answer our prayers in this time of trouble if we but ask our Heavenly Father and exercise our faith that He will answer our prayers.

In preparation for next week’s lesson as you read Mosiah 25-28, I urge you to think about family members or those close to you who may have strayed from the Gospel and then pray for insights how you might help those friends and family members to return to full fellowship in the Church. Many claim they are “spiritual, but not religious” and reject the need for participation in the Church claiming that they have a personal relationship with God and do not need to attend Church. Yet as Elder Christofferson has taught the Lord Jesus Christ founded His Church on Earth and has taught us the need for the Church and Priesthood Authority to provide us with the saving ordinances without which we would be unable to return to live with our Heavenly Parents.

As we continue to struggle with being unable to gather and attend Church or attend the Temple regularly, I am so very grateful for the privilege and opportunity to share my testimony and spiritual insights with you as a Gospel Doctrine teacher and pray that the Lord will continue to bless you and your families in all that you do and answer your prayers for relief.

Brother Pyne