The Scene of Commotion

After the conversion of Lamoni he fell into a kind of sleep that he didn’t awake from for three days. When he did finally come out of his sleep, he praised God and proclaimed that he had seen the Redeemer. He was again overcome and “he sunk again with joy; and the queen also sunk down, being overpowered by the Spirit.” When Ammon saw this he too was overcome with emotion because of the miracle that had occurred, and “he was overpowered with joy; and thus they all three had sunk to the earth.” But he wasn’t the last to fall to the ground: “When the servants of the king had seen that they had fallen, they also began to cry unto God, for the fear of the Lord had come upon them also, for it was they who had stood before the king and testified unto him concerning the great power of Ammon. And it came to pass that they did call on the name of the Lord, in their might, even until they had all fallen to the earth, save it were one of the Lamanitish women, whose name was Abish” (Alma 19:12-16). So the king, the queen, Ammon, and nearly all of the servants of the king were lying on the ground as if they were dead—it must have been quite the scene!

               What happened next I believe has something to tell us about the kind of contentious dialogue we see today in our society when controversial issues arise. Abish knew what had happened, and “supposing that this opportunity, by making known unto the people what had happened among them, that by beholding this scene it would cause them to believe in the power of God, therefore she ran forth from house to house, making it known unto the people” (Alma 19:17). Unfortunately the reaction of the people was not what she had anticipated, and as they took in the scene there was much commotion. As it usually is for us today, multiple voices started vehemently putting forth different explanations as to what had happened:

• Some said “that it was a great evil that had come upon them, or upon the king and his house, because he had suffered that the Nephite should remain in the land” (v19).
• Others explained, “The king hath brought this evil upon his house, because he slew his servants who had had their flocks scattered at the waters of Sebus” (v20).
• Those who had scattered the flocks were just plain mad and “were angry with Ammon” and “rebuked” the others putting for their explanations. They tried to slay Ammon but were unable to (v20-21).
• Seeing this, others said that “Ammon was the Great Spirit” (v25).
• Yet another group said that Ammon “was sent by the Great Spirit” (v25).
• Some said that Ammon “was a monster, who had been sent from the Nephites to torment them” (v26).
• And finally a last group “said that Ammon was sent by the Great Spirit to afflict them because of their iniquities; and that it was the Great Spirit that had always attended the Nephites, who had ever delivered them out of their hands; and they said that it was this Great Spirit who had destroyed so many of their brethren, the Lamanites” (v27).

So there were at least seven different variations of arguments and explanations put forth to explain the troubling and unexpected scene that lay before them. Most were totally wrong and a couple were somewhat true, but surely the noise and commotion was too great for anyone to be able to discern what had really happened. Mormon summarized the scene this way: “And thus the contention began to be exceedingly sharp among them” (v28). This seems all too familiar to us today as politics, current events, and difficult situations cause an eruption of arguments and contention and fighting, particularly on social media. I believe Abish has something to teach us about what to do in this kind of situation. What I realized this morning is that even though she knew exactly what had happened and the real reason they were all lying on the ground, she did not engage in the argument. She was not part of the contention but rather watched in sorrow as the people fought amongst themselves. Instead, I believe she followed the Spirit to know what she could do to help the situation, and that wasn’t putting forth one more explanation. For her that was this: “And it came to pass that she went and took the queen by the hand, that perhaps she might raise her from the ground” (v29). That proved to be key to ameliorating the situation as she and then the king spoke to them.

               This is certainly not to say that we shouldn’t engage in conversations, even difficult ones about current events, but I believe that Abish’s example shows us that when the contention become sharp we may need to step away and do something different to help the situation. Even if we have the truth, there may be better ways to help bring that to light than to join in the bickering and arguing and name calling and heated debates that thrive today in social media. Like Abish, we must learn to follow the Spirit to know how best we can respond when the tensions are high.