Inside the Great and Spacious Building

In 2007 President Packer gave a now classic BYU devotional speech about the vision of the tree of life entitled Lehi’s Dream and You.  In it he made this interesting observation: “You may think that Lehi’s dream or vision has no special meaning for you, but it does. You are in it; all of us are in it.”  He told the young adults, referring to 1 Nephi 8, “Read it carefully; then read it again.”  He emphasized later on in the talk speaking of the Book of Mormon more generally: “Read it again, beginning with the eighth chapter of 1 Nephi.”  He told us about himself, “The Book of Mormon has been my iron rod” and I think that the thrust of his message was that it must be ours if we are to make it through this life spiritually unscathed.  One of the words from the vision that he emphasized is found in verse 28: “And after they had tasted of the fruit they were ashamed, because of those that were scoffing at them; and they fell away into forbidden paths and were lost.”  President Packer used this scripture to warn us, saying: “At your baptism and confirmation, you took hold of the iron rod. But you are never safe.  It is after you have partaken of that fruit that your test will come.” 

                As he discussed the dangers that we face, he made this comment that completely changes how we think of the physical location of the parts of the dream: “Largely because of television, instead of looking over into that spacious building, we are, in effect, living inside of it. That is your fate in this generation. You are living in that great and spacious building.”  So instead of the tree of life on one hand and the great and spacious building on the other side with a divide between them, it’s as if the great and spacious building now hovers over all of us.  In the dream we know that the building “stood as it were in the air, high above the earth” (1 Nephi 8:26).  It has no foundation or connection to the ground, and one way we might view President Packer’s statement is that the building has now expanded to cover and hover above everything in the vision, including the tree of life.  If he were to make the statement again, I think he might amend it this way: “Largely because of television and computers and the internet and mobile devices….”  The great and spacious building has permeated all of society and now is no longer just one destination—it is everywhere. 

                  So what do we do?  How can we avoid the great and spacious building if it is all around us?  The now almost cliché answer that we sing about in primary is still—and ever will be—the answer.  We must be found “holding fast to the rod of iron” or we will be lost (1 Nephi  8:30).  The challenge is not simply to arrive and grasp it—it is to hold on forever, for even those who at one point were “clinging to the rod of iron” fell away when they let the world shame them (1 Nephi 8:24).  As Nephi told his brothers later, if we will “hold fast unto it” then we will “never perish,” and the “temptations and fiery darts of the adversary” cannot overpower us (1 Nephi 15:24).  As we reside under the dark backdrop of the great and spacious building that permeates the whole world now, we must, as Elder Packer invited us, “study the Book of Mormon, and pray” so that “an unseen power will hold your hand as you hold the iron rod.”