Things As They Really Are

When Nephi was commanded to build a ship, Laman and Lemuel did not believe he could do it. After telling him that he was not capable of such a task—not wanting themselves to have to labor—they gave their perspective on the events that had transpired for their family: “And thou art like unto our father, led away by the foolish imaginations of his heart; yea, he hath led us out of the land of Jerusalem, and we have wandered in the wilderness for these many years; and our women have toiled, being big with child; and they have borne children in the wilderness and suffered all things, save it were death; and it would have been better that they had died before they came out of Jerusalem than to have suffered these afflictions. Behold, these many years we have suffered in the wilderness, which time we might have enjoyed our possessions and the land of our inheritance; yea, and we might have been happy. And we know that the people who were in the land of Jerusalem were a righteous people; for they kept the statutes and judgments of the Lord, and all his commandments, according to the law of Moses; wherefore, we know that they are a righteous people; and our father hath judged them, and hath led us away because we would hearken unto his words; yea, and our brother is like unto him” (1 Nephi 17:20-22). Clearly, they had a skewed perception of what had transpired and what was true. They believed their father had led them based on his “foolish imaginations” when it had been the Lord who very clearly guided them; they did not see that the Lord had strengthened and protected their women (who as Nephi recounted, eventually bore their trials without even murmuring), but they only saw the suffering of their wives; they believed that the people of Jerusalem were righteous when in fact they were wicked and ripe for destruction; and they believed the if they had stayed in Jerusalem they would have been happy, when in reality they would have been brutally attacked and killed by the Babylonians (or taken into captivity). They had experienced the same trials as Nephi but they interpreted those events drastically differently than their younger brother.

                Jacob would later teach that “the Spirit speaketh the truth and lieth not. Wherefore, it speaketh of things as they really are, and of things as they really will be” (Jacob 4:13). Laman and Lemuel did not see things how they really were and really would be, and I think Nephi’s response to them is instructive. How can we help those we love whose perception of their own experiences is jaded and distorted? How do we respond if they see the events of their life only from a selfish perspective and cannot behold the hand of the Lord blessing them? Nephi sought to help them understand the stories of the scriptures. Since they couldn’t understand the workings of the Lord in their own lives, he tried to get them to see what the Lord had done for His people in ancient times. He recounted, “Yea, and ye also know that Moses, by his word according to the power of God which was in him, smote the rock, and there came forth water, that the children of Israel might quench their thirst. And notwithstanding they being led, the Lord their God, their Redeemer, going before them, leading them by day and giving light unto them by night, and doing all things for them which were expedient for man to receive, they hardened their hearts and blinded their minds, and reviled against Moses and against the true and living God” (1 Nephi 17:29-30). Moses and his people had been led by the Lord from Egypt to the promised land, and the Lord had miraculously provided for them and guided them, just as He had done for Lehi’s group as they crossed the desert. And like Laman and Lemuel, the Israelites had hardened their hearts at times despite the miraculous way the Lord had intervened in their lives and couldn’t see past their own selfishness and discomfort. Since his brothers could not see things as they really were in their own lives, Nephi hoped to help them understand what had happened in the scriptures in the lives of the Israelites that they might make the connection with their own story. Nephi would explain later that he was explicitly trying to do this: “And I did read many things unto them which were written in the books of Moses;… for I did liken all scriptures unto us, that it might be for our profit and learning” (1 Nephi 19:23). And so perhaps that is our best approach to help those we love to similarly see things as they really are: help them understand the dealings of the Lord with others in the scriptures and hope that they can make the link to their own lives.