Ye Will Teach Them to Serve One Another

In Mosiah 4, King Benjamin taught about a variety of subjects, including faith, repentance, humility, parenting, giving to the poor, and enduring to the end.  He gave this counsel to parents about teaching their children: “But ye will teach them to walk in the ways of truth and soberness; ye will teach them to love one another, and to serve one another.”  I’ve generally considered the next verse to be a complete change of subject.  He gave this well-known instruction about helping the poor: “And also, ye yourselves will succor those that stand in need of your succor; ye will administer of your substance unto him that standeth in need; and ye will not suffer that the beggar putteth up his petition to you in vain, and turn him out to perish” (Mosiah 4:15-16).  I believe now, though, that these two verses were meant to be connected.  Verse 16 starts with “and also,” and hence is a continuation of the idea of the previous verse; it shows how we can teach our children to love and serve others.  In other words, to truly teach them about service, we must serve and succor those who are in need.  Just as King Benjamin taught his people about service first and foremost by his own service—he told them, “And even I, myself, have labored with mine own hands that I might serve you”—parents teach their own children about love and kindness and succoring others most powerfully by doing those things with them.    

               It is interesting to consider how perhaps this focus on service by King Benjamin was passed on to his own posterity.  His son Mosiah appears to have been similarly devoted to serving his people when he became king.  We read that “he also, himself, did till the earth, that thereby he might not become burdensome to his people, that he might do according to that which his father had done in all things” (Mosiah 6:7).  His father Benjamin’s devotion to service clearly had an impact on him and the way he likewise served his people.  He summarized that service to his people in a similar way as his father: “And even I myself have labored with all the power and faculties which I have possessed, to teach you the commandments of God, and to establish peace throughout the land, that there should be no wars nor contentions, no stealing, nor plundering, nor murdering, nor any manner of iniquity” (Mosiah 29:14).  King Mosiah served his people with all his heart, just as his father had done.  Mosiah also appears to have passed on his devotion to service to his sons, who, though rebellious in their early years, because some of the greatest examples of service that we have in the scriptures.  Aaron, Ammon, Omner, and Himni all gave fourteen years of their life serving the Lamanites and seeking to bring them to the knowledge of the gospel.  They “suffered every privation” in order to bring their brethren to salvation and certainly spent much of their lives in service just like their father and grandfather. Certainly King Benjamin would have been proud of his grandchildren’s devotion to serving others, just as he would have taught them to do (Alma 26:28).      

               This topic is on my mind because of Christmas, and I am very grateful for my wife who has done exactly as King Benjamin counseled us.  She started a tradition in our family doing Twelve Days of Christmas to a couple of families each year, although she rewrote the whole thing to be “twelve gifts of Christ” instead.  She spent many hours again this year putting together the 24 gifts, and this was the first year that our children really caught the spirit of it.  She had them help her put together the presents, and then most nights I went out into the cold with them to doorbell ditch the items.  As we surreptitiously walked the dark streets with our gifts to deliver, I was thrilled to see my kids—who are so often focused on themselves—get excited about doing something for someone else.  Those brief experiences were worth more than all the presents I could ever give them, and I vowed that we would continue the tradition that I had only halfheartedly embraced when my wife started it.  We also did something different this year at the request of my wife.  Several weeks ago she told me that we were going to put together gift bags with pumpkin pie and a few things for the homeless and take them to Temple Square to give them away on Christmas Eve.  She got our children excited about the idea and had our three oldest each make their own bags complete with handmade Christmas cards from them.  We drove to Salt Lake and walked around for a while until each found someone to give their gift too.  The last person they found was in a group of about four homeless people and was crying out of sadness (for some reason unbeknownst to us) before my son handed him the gift.  We hoped that sharing a pumpkin pie amidst themselves might help them know of God’s love for them, but of course we’ll never know if the gifts made any difference.  But to have my children see how much need others have and do something to help lift their burdens was priceless for me.  I am so thankful for my wife who truly believes and is teaching our children to believe these words of the Savior: “It is more blessed to give than to receive” (Acts 20:35).