Sunday, May 6, 2012

The immediate future - the saints of God

First Nephi 14 part 1

In hindsight, it is easy to see historical events as Nephi described them in his vision.  Events in the life of Christ, events in the establishment of America, Columbus, the revolutionary war, the restoration, the coming forth of the Book of Mormon - these events are plain to understand now that we are beyond them in time.  Nephi's vision points us yet forward, for a little way, before it is abruptly cut off and assigned to the Apostle John to write.  There are 4 specific occurrences that are either in the process of happening now, or will happen in the future.  The angel sets the stage by reminding Nephi twice about the covenants of the Lord unto the house of Israel.   By the end of these 4 events however, the angel says that it will be the day for the commencement in preparing the way for the fulfilling of the covenants.  The angel also sets the stage by describing that the great and marvelous work will divide men one way or another (v7), and the main actors on the stage are the church of the Lamb of God and the church of the devil, a.k.a. the great whore of all the earth, who has dominion over all the earth, among all nations, kindreds, tongues, and people.  

First

There are several things here that we could say describe the Church as of this day - its numbers are few, its dominions upon the face of the earth are small.  And while it is in many nations, I don't know if it yet meets the condition of being upon "all the face of the earth".

No comments:

Post a Comment